Netpliance going belly-up would be cool???
Man, if that isn't PARASITIC thinking... Look, it's nice that we all got a bunch of cheap PCs with a good amount of hacking potential. Why is Netpliance the enemy? Because they've been desperately trying to cover their ass so they don't lose $300 per I-Opener unit? Get serious here. We, the hacking community, are fully responsible for Netpliance's demise. I don't see anything cool about a company losing millions of dollars.
And lost to whom? The hackers? Noo... the hackers are the small minority who do all the work and occasionally publish the results. The majority are the lame script-kiddies buying these things as Cheap PCs, and running to Codeman and Badflash for pre-fabricated accessories. (Heaven forbid a script-kiddie must do the hacking themselves!!)
What's so "cool" about this?? Supplies of IOpeners are now way way down, and both Netpliance and the hacking community are feeling the loss.
With Netpliance gone, all the Moms and Grandmas who legitimately use their service (which is by far the EASIEST interface I've ever seen of any Internet Service) will have to buy a brand spanking new PC and learn things "The Hard Way". And guess where they'll likely end up? Borg-Online -- err -- America Online.
If anything, I give Netpliance some serious props for trying to tap into a new market. Sure, their legal and accounting department's got their heads up their asses right now (whose fault is that??) but overall, they started out with a good idea, and a solid product.
And you'd be so proud and think it's so "cool" that we killed an innovative company? Which Borg-Cube is paying your checks?Microsoft or AOL?
