Slashdotted - XP dual boot issue

[Rory Gleeson]

> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 14
> Date: Sun, 23 May 2004 14:34:18 -0400
> And, I guess we'll get to read about how it's an
> MS problem and how newbies and Window-users shouldn't be using
> Fedora if they want to migrate to Linux and only have themselves
> to blame if they encounter this problem.
> >
> >>>Not true. They bought Windows, right? Call tech-support. Demand
> >>>correction of bug.
> >>>
> >>>Or... much better, ignore them entirely... or give them a call:
> >>>
> >>>Hi, just to say: one less Windows user...
> >>>
> >Rui
> 
> Humm, bad attitude IMO.  OTOH, its a well known fact that a windows 
> install will trash any linux installed mbr things and has been doing 
> it for years.  On purpose we think...


It's more than just a bad attitude.  It's a defeatist attitude.  

What an easy world for a monopolist it would be if every time they put
up an obstacle, their opponents said, "We're not going to try to
overcome that obstacle.  They put it up, so they should take it down."  

And telling a monopolist that they just lost a customer doesn't shake
them like a normal corporation because they don't abide by market forces
or fair competition.  

Our *responsibility* in the face of monopolistic tactics like this is to
build workarounds and fixes.  Fortunately, I'm guessing that Redhat
people working of this might feel similarly.  If nothing else, I'm sure
they're not sitting around waiting for MS to fix the bug, as this user
suggested.  

MS created the problem, but it's up to us to find the solution. 
Mandrake did have a similar problem with 10.0 CE that didn't take my
system down, so I was lucky, but they fixed it. This isn't a
Fedora-specific issue.  And possibly this is a kernel issue.  But it
doesn't matter if, at its root, this is MS's creation - it's the Linux
community's problem now to fix.  

Or, we could just call MS tech support and demand a correction to the
bug... ;)

By the way, since this bug has been noted by multiple users since
February, is it in the errata?  I couldn't find it.