[vorbis] offtopic mailer discussion

[Todd Goodman]

* noprivacy at earthlink.net <noprivacy at earthlink.net> [030805 19:25]:
> > > So basically, it is a *known* problem with OE (not the first time a bug
> has
> > > been found in MS code!) **BUT** some mailer clients ignore the known
> problem
> > > and allow their users to create emails which many (most!) people will be
> > > unable to read.
> > >
> > > Certainly nice of the authors, don't you think...
> >
> > This is the most self-centered, ignorant, and brain-dead reasoning I've
> > ever encountered in my 17+ years of email, Usenet, and BBS'.
> 
> So, you are saying that it is *okay* for an author to deliberately write a
> program that he *KNOWS* will generate mail that 95%+ of the world can *NOT*
> read?

I'm saying that just because some company chooses to ignore the
standards (or has a bug dealing with something) that it's no reason for
every other program out there that follows the standard to stop doing
so.

And how do you know when the sending mailer was written?  Perhaps it was
written before the breakage of OE 6.0.

> 
> Standards are great.  But only as long as *everybody* follows them and does
> so without any bugs.  Adding features etc. is great, but if you want it to
> be compatable with everybody, then you have to write for the lowest common
> denominator.

Most people will contact the company that wrote the buggy software
they're using and request/demand a fix.

Myself, I stopped using that kind of buggy software and started using a
more feature rich mailer that I can actually fix myself if something's
wrong with it.

> 
> When 95%+ of the world uses a mail client that can't properly handle some
> aspect of some standard (regardless of why), then only an arrogant fool will
> write a program that will generate data (email etc.) that will deliberately
> *not* work with it.

95% is definately an exageration as this only seems to impact Outlook
Express version > 4.0.

Even ignoring all other OS's and mailers for MS, I bet more people use
Outlook than Outlook Express.

> 
> I'm not fan of Microsoft.  And I've never ever suggested they write bug free
> code.
> 
> But even the most niave user will have to admit that Windows is 95%+ of the
> desktop world and that anybody who writes a general purpose application that
> generates data that is *deliberately* incompatable with it, is not acting in
> the best interests of their own users.  And that even if you do actually do
> that, you should at least warn your users so they will know there is a good
> chance that your data (email etc.) will be incompatable.

Again, OE is not used on 100% of the Windows systems out there.

Where have you gotten the idea that it's *deliberately* incompatible?

How can you possible fault an author for following the standards?

Does M$ warn their users that many people sh*tcan any HTML only email
when they make HTML-only the default?

Anyway, this is approaching a religious debate (and one that is off
topic for this list.)  If you want to continue the discussion I'd be
happy to do so in private email.

Todd
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