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April 29, 2005
Let's Go On a Witch-Hunt For Opera Employees - A Response to OperaWatch's Editorial
I'm writing this in response to OperaWatch's editorial.
First of all, the article in the "Daily Illini" is a joke (and not even a cruel one). The guy writing sounds rather definitively like he doesn't know what the fuck he's writing about, or doesn't know good/clear writing from a hole in the ground (what were his editors thinking?). I'd parse the article, but you'd have to pay me.
Who decided you should legislate what people say? Just because you don't like what's being said doesn't mean you get to invoke some vague notion of impropriety onto the person saying it. Especially when you got it wrong, and he didn't say what you say he said.
In what for you would be the worst case scenario, what Berit Hanson meant was what you said he meant, "that IE should be used as an alternative for webpages that aren't properly displayed in Opera". That, however, wasn't what he said. Perhaps you should RTFA. This is where that idea is (rather sloppily) put into your head:
"But Spektor also said that while Opera is better, it cannot replace IE because many pages are specifically designed with IE and do not follow the same standards as Opera."
Aforementioned "Spektor" is "Alex Spektor, [a] senior in engineering" at the university. It is following that sentence that the writer links that comment to Hansen's comment,
"Opera, like most web browsers, follows the w3c standards for web page design but IE does not, Hanson said."
Now, I could say that that was the intention of the writer, but I don't credit him with a great wellspring of ability/intention in what he writes. Confusion breeds confusion.
First, if Hanson had been saying what you think he meant to say earlier, I'd still be defending him, if only because he'd be displaying a decided candour as to the conditions on the ground for InterWeb users - I still use IE (and Firefox) when things don't turn out the way they should in Opera - and if you're advocating end-users not use IE at all, how would they get to Windows Update? Sure it's wrong for MS to lock things in like that (similarly with MSNBC), but that's the way things are - you're not happy with it? poor baby. You'd be pillorying people for speaking their mind and telling the truth. Yay you.
That, however is not how things went down, nor how they've progressed. What Hanson said, in isolation, is this:
"You can use them side-by-side. We recommend that," Hanson said. "Opera is a tool for the internet."
Perhaps "Penn State took IE off of their computers and instructed their students to use Opera instead" as Hanson claims - I suspect he means that IE is hidden or locked down requiring admin privileges on the school network. But normal end-users like you and me still need more than one browser - no administrator updates my computer for me.
What Hanson was referring to (unless I'm grossly mistaken) is the advent of choice - which is what Opera has always presented itself as - as a choice rather than as Grand High Poobah of All Browsers. Opera is a tool for the internet, just as IE is. Of course Hansen hopes that using them "side by side", since IE hasn't been summarily locked down, will mean that the students will realise what they're missing and switch over as much as is possible. I can't imagine IE Fanboys at Penn State being particularly friendly to Opera if it was forced on them.
OperaWatch, if you want to retract what *you* said (ie: post a response), you can e-mail me.
This is why you have many eyes. Stained-glass window anyone?
Posted by subtitles at April 29, 2005 3:25 AM | Opera Boggling
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