Re: Way OT: Adam Smith and Software Markets

["Frank J. Lhota" <NOSPAM.lhota.adarose@verizon.net>]

"Preben Randhol" <randhol+news@pvv.org> wrote in message
news:slrnb69b7q.4de.randhol+news@kiuk0152.chembio.ntnu.no...
> Oh? So when the university chooses Word as the standard I'm not forced
> to use it? And who is choosing it? The administration, who writes
> letters etc...

Presumably, the university only mandates that the file format for documents
be MS Word. There are other word processors that work with files in the MS
Word format, including WordPerfect and StarOffice. One could use these
products in place of MS Word and still meet the university mandate. If you
are displeased with MS Word, please look into the alternatives.

> The point was that the productivity hadn't increased.

It depends on the time period. My experience is that my colleagues and I
wrote much more efficiently with MS Word 6 than with previous word
processors. Certainly, we had a big productivity gain over the WordStar
days. Admittedly, the more recent versions of Word have not had that many
big improvements. The reasons for upgrading from Word 2000 to Word XP have
not been all that compelling, and for that reason, MS Office sales have been
down.

> No the point is that I cannot make the decision. When you work with
> others it is not always your decision. Some conferences even requires
> the manuscript to be in Word (sic!).

Again, look at your alternatives. I know some diehard WordPerfect buffs
(going back to the MS-DOS days) who have never entered a keystroke into MS
Word. They have submitted papers to conferences by editing the papers in
WordPerfect, then saving the document in MS Word format.

> LaTeX is free as in free beer and has been around for year. Yes of
> course, but the big problem is the inertia. You cannot easily produce a
> Word compatible word processor, bcs the word format is neither open or
> fixed. And until you can you cannot compete because *everybody* is using
> Word. I cannot simply send a document written in say abiword to some
> other person and expect him to have abiword on his computer. The problem
> is that people are expecting word.

I'm sorry, I have just gotten too old to take this argument seriously. I
recall the lament that as bad as WordStar is, it will never be replaced
because of all those WordStar documents, and all those people trained in
WordStar. Then WordPerfect came along, and suddenly that became the de-facto
standard. And yes, there was a time where conferences, businesses, agencies
and universities standardized on the WordPerfect format. Suddenly, the
conventional wisdom was that WordPerfect was irreplacable. A few years
later, WordPerfect was frequently replaced with MS Word. Now MS Word is the
"invincible"leader of the word processor world. "It will never be replaced!"
Yeah, right.

To be blunt about it, the MS Word of today looks a lot like WordStar before
its fall. There have not been any exciting enhancements in the latest
versions of MS Word, just as there was nothing earth shattering in the
version of WordStar released before WordPerfect. With WordStar, they were
losing customers in trickles before they lost them in droves to WordPerfect.
We're already seeing that happen with MS Word -- sales are down for the
latest version. MS may very well be resting on their laurels, but they do so
at the risk of suffering the same fate as Micropro and WordPerfect. There
are only two directions for MS Word to go: it must really improve, and fast,
or it will join other outdated software that gathers dust in attics.

> But a challange: Make a better Outlook which protects against viruses
> and try to make money on it.

Have you tried Opera? Eudora?