observations on open source

When I first made my never-far-from-the-conversation switch to Apple, I decided I was going to put my actions up against my words, and use OpenOffice for all of my text editing needs. And, for a little while, it was tolerable. When a fellow user and friend switched back to microsoft Word, he did so because OpenOffice felt like 'a windows app that just happens to run on a mac.' I later corrected him that it was much more like a linux app that just happens to run on a mac, but you get his point.

I persevered. But, today, I reached my breaking point. The hassle of settings, of formatting, of doing pretty much anything other than entering text, was getting to me. Hell, the hassle of saving a set of changes, and then opening .doc files to find that they had reverted, got to me. Moreover, my friend was right. The interface was hideous, counter-intuitive, and didn't work well with anything in a .doc biased world.

Today I learned something very odd. Microsoft products can look appealing. Apparently only when they are coded for a Mac, though. Confusing. Still, I had to abandon my open source ideals, and for one simple reason; it doesn't work well enough.

It works, inarguably. I COULD, if forced, live with using only that one program. But, for me, open source isn't just about escaping the tyrrany of massive corporations, or harnessing the power of crowdsourcing. For me, open source is mostly about creating alternatives to fight the limitations intentionally imposed on users for corporate gain.

Today I learned that unintentional limitations and failings are worse, on an individual experience level. Worse because being unable to do what you are supposed to do will always be more glaring than being unable to do something the designer doesn't want you to do.

Still, using Word makes me feel dirty. Maybe I should switch to Pages...