Macworld: News: Ballmer: Linux users owe Microsoft Unbelievable. Microsoft is rotten to the core, and that rotten core is Steve Ballmer. Microsoft will always be rotten as long as Ballmer is in charge.

Slashdot | Microsoft's Masterpiece of FUD? Microsoft's boys are at it again, turning their sites on Linux this time with a "study" about how horrible it will be for Europe if they interfere with the rightful launch of Windows Vista. Be afraid, Europeans, be very afraid. Just remember who you need to be afraid of.

Tom Yager, Infoworld: Linux will get buried After a sensational headline like that, I expected more from the actual article, but in this segment, at least, Yager is more worried about backpedalling to avoid incensing the Linux crowd than explaining how Apple's UNIX platform will "bury" Linux. He doesn't mean Linux is going away... instead, he predicts it will go "underground." Basically, he predicts that Linux is dead as a client platform but will live on in embedded solutions and on servers. He doesn't really talk much about how or why Mac OS X will make headway against Windows, though. Perhaps in a future article in the series...

MacDailyNews: What makes Mac OS X a great operating system is Apple’s attention to detail With all the hoopla over two or three high-profile switchers from Mac OS X to Ubuntu, it's nice to hear from an Ubuntu Linux user who tries to objectively compare the two. Bottom line for him: Mac OS X is way ahead in "attention to detail" and user-friendliness for the average user.

Daring Fireball: And Oranges and Dive Into Mark: Juggling oranges I'm anxious to read this back-and-forth between two long-time, experienced Mac users. Recently, Pilgrim decided to abandon Mac OS X and switched to Ubuntu, a popular Linux variant. Gruber takes him to task, and Pilgrim explains why he's right and Gruber's wrong.

Unraveling the Mac OS X Microkernel Myth This is another intelligent essay by Daniel Eran on his Roughly Drafted website, addressing the question that keeps getting raised about whether Mac OS X has a good enough kernel or not. And whether there's some value in combining Linux's kernel with Mach.

Consortiuminfo.org - A Tale of Two Press Releases: Big Lies and Objective Journalism This is a sequel to the author's first article on this subject. This second article is even more detailed in chronicling the lies Microsoft has been spreading around the web in order to win mindshare against open source software.

Consortiuminfo.org - On the Art (?) of Disinformation: telling the Big Lie Here's a guy who sounds as fed up by Microsoft's continual disinformation tactics as I am. He's making the same argument I have made to family and friends for awhile now... namely, that Microsoft really is using the propaganda tactics made famous in a little book from the 1920's called Mein Kampf. The "big lie" became a famous propaganda technique through its use by the Nazis in World War II. As Hitler explained in Mein Kampf,

in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously.

I have felt for a long time now that Microsoft has, either consciously or unconsciously, adopted the Big Lie tactic as standard operating procedure in its business competition, and distressingly it seems to have paid off for them. Many Microsoft fans are fans merely by virtue of Microsoft's success rather than because of the value of Microsoft's contribution to computing, and they, like Hitler's masses, simply will not believe anyone who tells them that the company has lied about anything important.

This article pertains to Microsoft's latest series of Big Lies about the open source "movement," which the company rightly recognizes to be a major threat to its dominance. Microsoft is a company that will not hesitate to lie about anything in order to win a battle, and it seems that the bigger the lie, the better. This is nothing new, of course. Microsoft told so many lies just during its antitrust trial that it would be an interesting project to document them.

Perhaps if enough people like this blogger from Consortiuminfo.org take the time to call Microsoft on its lies, some Microsoft fans will start to think twice about their blind allegiance to the company and begin recognizing lies when they occur.

Why Windows is less secure than Linux: Two System-Call Diagrams Explain All This is a pretty neat idea... Graph out all of the system calls that get made in an OS when it displays an HTML page and associated files and graphics. Compare it with another OS. In this case, the author is comparing Windows with Linux, and it's a prime example of a picture being worth a thousand words.

LXer: Working Linux Emergency Response System Undermined at Homeland Security by Microsoft Lobbying Replacing LAMP systems with Windows systems is Microsoft's call-to-arms, and they are on the march with that song at Homeland Security. We all know that Department made the stupid decision to standardize on Windows platforms after it was formed, and despite challenges to that decision, they proceeded. Do you feel safe yet? Now, LXer reports that even a perfectly good LAMP system such as this one is being dismantled because it's not a Windows system. This is how are tax dollars are spent, folks: Propping up Microsoft! It's gotta stop!

Linux Zine Compares Ubuntu, Macintosh and Windows XP Operating Systems As the posting at Slashdot indicated, this is a surprisingly honest review of the "big three" operating systems, with interesting conclusions that you might not expect.

Apple Matters | When Will Apple Notice Linux? This Apple blogger raises some good questions, which hint at a potential dark side to Apple's personality.