D E S K T O P W A R R I O R S
Microsoft's pushing ActiveX. Apple's got OpenDoc. Everyone has Java. You're not supposed to worry about who wins. Here's why you should.
we have quietly entered the Cold War phase of the battle for your computer desktop. Just as global armed conflict gave way to subtler confrontations based on threats and propaganda, the heated battles over operating systems and competing browsers have recently gone underground, down to the level of code. The stakes, however, are just as high. Ultimately, you will have to live and work with whatever system prevails in this war. But you aren't likely to be asked for your opinion. The battle is being posited as too technical for you. The engineers will let you know when they've decided its outcome. The battle is about making monstrously large things smaller and more manageable, about shattering monoliths into usable components. It's about flexibility. Ultimately, it's about freedom of choice. The victor will surely dominate desktop computing for the next two to five years. I think you ought to have a say in this war, don't you? Next: Who cares — and what can you do? |