To the original poster,
Lots of people see the past through "Rose" colored glasses (or some other color of glasses which distorts their vision and memory).
Although I don't agree with Smerf's long fantasy tale, I do agree that Microsoft did, and continues to do great damage to the world of computing and that unknown numbers of innovative computer projects were killed, or never even got started, because of Microsoft's stifling business practices (criminal practices that should have been punished in a court of law). Who knows what our world would be like today if there had never been a Microsoft, or even if just fair competition had been enforced and no one company had ever been allowed to dominate the computer industry the way Microsoft has done.
I think everything would be better without Microsoft, but we will never know.
The past might not have been great, but having many choices was definitely better, and having unobstructed development, without intimidation and buy-outs just to eliminate competition, is always better.
