[gyrgrls]

I tried to install the latest Shockwave (not Flash),
and got a rude awakening. Unmodified, it WILL NOT INSTALL
on Windows 2000. There seems to be an invalid or missing
entry point in a module called "kernel32.dll".

Rather than hacking THAT file, another dedicated hacker
repacked the .msi installer for Shockwave version 11,
and, VOILA! It now works. He made it switchless, and bypassed
the version check. Bless his heart. While Adobe and Microsoft
don't directly endorse this hack, they don't really care,
because it's related neither to security compromise nor piracy.

Shockwave 11 plugin for Mozilla does
work fine on Windows 2000, but thanks to Adobe, the installer
balked.

This isn't the first time Adobe has suffered from major
bugs, usually involving installer or activation routines.
Photoshop CS (version 8) was famous for losing activation
every time a user farted crosswise. Thank goodness,
this bug was corrected in CS2 (version 9).

Now that Adobe has bought out Macromedia (the original
authors of Shockwave and Shockwave Flash), the fun begins
all over again.

And it doesn't get any better with OSS, whether on an i386
or Mac platform. Quicktime flaws are a REAL treat to deal with
... NOT ... no matter what the operating system.

As for distros, Mandrake and Debian flavors seem to be the
worst offenders. On non-unix platforms, Windows 2000
seems to be the toughest to get to comply, notwithstanding
the poorly implemented Vista. Whoever conceived Vista
should be shot! They should have followed Apple's example,
and gone Unix. Yeah, and the tooth fairy is coming soon.
Maybe even before Santa Claus.

Like it or not, MS is crumbling, and they, and Apple,
are becoming a duopoly. I would like to think it can't
get any worse. I dream of penguins, most ever night.
Then I wake up. Then I fire up Windows 2000.