Reasons for not using Microsoft

What's Bad About Microsoft: this isn't a new article - it was last revised nearly a year ago - but it's the fullest collection of charges against Microsoft in one place, that I know of.

A computer technology 'monoculture' is no more safe or healthy than any kind of monoculture in nature, argues Peter Griffin in the New Zealand Herald: Microsoft's Might Means Danger

What John Naughton calls the Microsoft 'stealth tax': for every computer system bought by businesses or individuals, 55% of the cost is for Microsoft software, which you're not even buying.

It's absurd to give Bill Gates a gong ... by John Naughton. Here the calculated amount of the 'Microsoft Tax' is even greater: 60%.

The way they treat their customers.   Ernie Ball's story  of why he gave up on Microsoft and changed to Linux.

And some positive reasons for using Linux

"If you spend a dollar with a local company working on Linux, that dollar stays in your economy," said Simon Phipps of Sun Microsystems.

"When you spend a dollar with a multi-national corporation as a license fee for a piece of software, that dollar leaves your country."

"It's about keeping the money in your local economy, developing skills and developing the local economy to be strong in its own right in a global context."

This taken from an article on the BBC