Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

Re: Rick Segal on Blue Mountain v Microsoft

Author:Dave Aiello
Posted:2/24/1999; 7:44:25 AM
Topic:Rick Segal on Blue Mountain v Microsoft
Msg #:3202 (In response to 3189)
Prev/Next:3201 / 3203

I agree with most of what Rick Segal says in his message.

The questions I have for Dave Winer are these:

How would you react if Mail to the Future messages were blocked by the Outlook Express spam filter?

What recourse would you have to resolve this with Microsoft?

What action would you take if you knew that Microsoft were planning to ship a "dot-zero" release of the browser that means that some people's PCs would never be able to receive Mail to the Future messages?

Blue Mountain Arts may be a multi-million dollar business, but they are dwarfed by Microsoft. I have no doubt that Blue Mountain Arts quickly concluded that they would not reach an understanding with Microsoft before Microsoft shipped IE5.

Once IE5 is preloaded on PCs, some users will activate the spam filter and never look back. Those people represent potential customers permanently inaccessible to Blue Mountain Arts unless they find a way to circumvent the filter.

It's too bad the Microsoft went so far into the beta process and didn't realize that the spam filter blocked mail from legitimate businesses. But, it's certainly not Blue Mountain Arts' fault. They are just the business that had the foresight and the means to take the only action that had any real chance of halting the shipment process.

Two final questions:

In a posting after the technical problems associated with Netscape Communicator, Dave asked for a way to get the Netscape browser without the mail client, and all of the other accessories.

Wouldn't we be right to use this forum to ask Microsoft to give us a browser with XML support, without the mail client, at least until they can resolve their legal issues?

Would we accept the "it's too late to separate IE and Outlook Express" argument if it came from Netscape?

Dave Aiello

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