Post #1927145

2026-04-23 15:56 UTC

@gael Like it or not, the reason personal computers even exist and are affordable to every day people is because of Microsoft. Are they a shitty megacorp? Yes. But you literally would not have a PC if it weren't for them.

Replies (4)

@gael@mastodon.social 2026-04-23 16:03

@starlily I'm learning hard today 😅

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@argv_minus_one@mastodon.sdf.org 2026-04-23 20:30

@starlily I seriously doubt that. The Apple II and Commodore 8-bit machines ran Microsoft BASIC, but Microsoft wasn't the only organization who could write a BASIC interpreter for them. The IBM PC ran Microsoft MS-DOS and Windows, but if Microsoft didn't exist, it would have run CP/M and GEM instead. There is no one person or company who made personal computing possible. Especially not in the 1980s when there were a ton of competing products (Apple, Commodore, Tandy, IBM/MS, etc). @gael

Open ##1927147
@tyzbit@toot.now 2026-04-23 20:44

@starlily @gael i don't deny your points but your argument does not persuade me. for instance, we can thank Wernher Von Braun and Joseph Goebbels for space flight and modern medicine's knowledge of the human body (respectively) but the people themselves need not be present in the fields going forward. Hyperbolic examples, I know, but countering "we should not respect microsoft" with "but remember how much they contributed" does not mean they deserve respect now. now, microsoft might deserve our deference or attention still. maybe they were critical to what we have today. i'm open to the argument. what they did in the past doesn't earn them a free pass to me, though. edit: minor correction - "earn them a free pass" is not the characterization i wanted. i know you're not asking for that. what i mean was we do not need to respect them now because of what they did in the past.

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@503bartley@pdx.social 2026-04-25 02:21

@starlily @gael Mulefeathers! (Typed on a Kaypro.)

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