Merit argument: the real issue. 1528

Longfellow

Very wordy, if not far too longwinded and meandering. I read about 50%. Hope you're not too disappointed.

I have to ask: What's wrong with three or four paragraphs, rather than 28? It took you eight paragraphs just to get to the point of the post, which boils down to "We shouldn't trust MS because we can't have the code. We should trust Linux because we can have the code."

It's an old argument. And it's a shallow argument, one which crumbles the VERY FIRST TIME you utilize any software - from BIOS to boot manager to compiler to OS to package installer to end-user package - that you haven't personally written yourself. You don't know if the binaries that come with your Linux distro were compiled from the source code that might come with it. And if you did compile your entire system, ala Gentoo, you didn't read and test every line of every app and the kernel. And if you did read and test every line of every app and the kernel, you don't know anything about the compiler used to create the executables.

At every step you could be creating a monster.

Most cola bozos distrust MS - for no good reason. They're just paranoid. They don't mind blindly downloading and installing compiled OSS packages from any open source site on the Internet, but running Windows means the NSA is logging all your keystrokes.

Enjoy!

DFS