Whether Bill Gates goes to heaven or hell has absolutely nothing to do with
Windows.

On the other hand, I believe Windows 95 was one of, if not the major
impetus behind the rapid growth of the Internet and the tech side of the
economy at the end of the last century.

Before Windows 95, the Internet was mainly used by techies accessing it via
UNIX boxes of whatever flavor, MS-DOS or Windows WFW or 3.11 with an added
TCP/IP stack and the Macs.  When Windows 95 hit the streets with built-in
TCP/IP and easy connections to modems, the use of the Internet grew
rapidly.  Within a year or so, Windows 95, OSR 2 was shipping on new
computers with built-in modems.  Users no longer had to buy a modem and
fiddle with the connections, it was right there.  Plug and Pray finally
became Plug and Play and people were surfing the Internet and sending
e-mail effortlessly.

Yes, there were lots of problems when folks were upgrading their 486/50 to
Windows 95.  These slow systems, with non-Plug&Play ISA cards, presented
sometimes insurmountable problems.  But the vast majority of users were
able to upgrade and everyone later bought newer systems with Windows 95
built-in and they never looked back.

Gates blundered.  He never thought the Internet was going to grow like it
did because of Windows 95.  He simply wanted people to go and connect to
his MSN.  AOL grew rapidly by sending out a seemingly infinite supply of
diskettes, later CD-ROMs, with their easy-to-install client.  This would
never have been possible prior to Windows 95.

Windows 95 opened to floodgates to masses of technically challenged people
who up to now, would never have considered buying a computer.  The volume
of units sold grew at a great rate and entire legions of people where hired
to feed this insatiable demand.

Sheer economics and the volume of demand drove the industry toward the
cheap PC.  I remember in 1993 when it was announced that the new OS from
MS, Windows NT, would required 24MB to run properly.  The laughter from the
pundits was deafening.  Talk about bloatware!  24MB just for the OS,
incredible!

Windows 95 moved the entire industry forward to the Internet age and
mandated the availability of cheap memory and cheap computers.

Please understand that MS could not have done this alone and that it might
have occurred without Windows 95.  But the reality is Windows 95 provided
the impetus for all this.

Whether this is good or bad, remains to be seen.  To my mind however, this
has been a good thing.

Kind regards,

Denys. . .

Denys Beauchemin
HICOMP
(800) 323-8863  (281) 288-7438         Fax: (281) 288-7438
denys at hicomp.com                             www.hicomp.com


-----Original Message-----
From:   Mike Yawn [SMTP:[log in to unmask]]
Sent:   Thursday, September 06, 2001 11:30 AM
To:     [log in to unmask]
Subject:        Re: OT : some facts and stats

Rao, Ragu ([log in to unmask]) wrote:
: 8. Bill Gates is 40 this year. If we assume that he still can live for 35
: years, he has to spend US$6.78 Million per day to finish his money before
: going to heaven.

If St. Peter has ever used Windows, I bet Gates burns.

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