I will light a candle rather than curse your darkness! (I am not trolling and welcome this discussion !)
>>Almost all companies do? Or do you propose they use the public social web instead of groupware like Exchange or Google Apps?
Odd you equate google apps w/ exchange.
Most companies have an intranet that includes a wiki, evernote, or forum. Also, many source code control systems include a knowedge base, wiki, and comment system. Google docs + hosted domain gmail is easy to use, more secure, more robust, and lower cost than Exchange + Outlook. The reason large companies don't do this is they have sunk costs in Exchange and an admin who likes it -- why change? But for start-ups and new companies it is a no brainer. Licensing alone of Exchange (plus windows server with active directory) is prohibitive. Most users have IM accounts on AIM, Skype, or Gmail to use for chatting.
>>What's horrible about them?
UI, stability, security, documentation, user license agreement, required system resources, remote exploits that grant admin rights. I'll run out of space to list them all!
>>I don't see much of a monopoly effect unlike with Word
Good point, for example MS is appealing the verdict that it in fact abused its monopoly position with Word vs. Wordperfect. It is more subtle when it comes to Outlook. For example, the only workstations Dell sells come with a MS operating system, that includes IE and Outlook (but you must pay for Outlook/office after 2 months or something). Or staples. Or Office Depot.
>>why won't people switch
The power of mono-culture aka monopoly. It is well documented in the public record that microsoft repeated abused their monopoly position.
This is beyond the scope of email clients, but look into:
Novel Networking (IPX),
3COM lanman licensing,
Sysbase & MS SQL server,
Apple's UI lawsuit vs win95 that MS settled,
IE & Netscape,
Real media vs windows media player,
The Samba group trying to get docs ,
Word & Wordperfect,
>> The lack of such server software is what killed Thunderbird
I recently set up an email system for a small company using cPanel, hMailServer (a Windows mailserver) and Thunderbird. I actually looked at Zimbra but decided to go with a Windows-based solution. I also considered Google Apps, but was afraid it wouldn't allow for fine-grained control over access permissions (i.e. managers seeing subordinates' accounts and restricted shared folders) and also unrestricted creation email aliases/accounts.
Should I have taken a closer look at Google Apps? Thunderbird isn't the easiest to use, but I like how it's easy to work with shared IMAP folders. Do you know of any solution (groupware suite, etc.) to the need for shared email folders with user access control?
>It is more subtle when it comes to Outlook. For example, the only workstations Dell sells come with a MS operating system, that includes IE and Outlook (but you must pay for Outlook/office after 2 months or something). Or staples. Or Office Depot.
That sounds extremely roundabout. A 2 month trial of Outlook is not going to convince anyone to keep using it.
>Wow, ummm, no.
You have not provided one shred of reason to counter my point that, if there was a Exchange alternative that integrated well with Thunderbird, it might have been a success.
>>Almost all companies do? Or do you propose they use the public social web instead of groupware like Exchange or Google Apps?
Odd you equate google apps w/ exchange.
Most companies have an intranet that includes a wiki, evernote, or forum. Also, many source code control systems include a knowedge base, wiki, and comment system. Google docs + hosted domain gmail is easy to use, more secure, more robust, and lower cost than Exchange + Outlook. The reason large companies don't do this is they have sunk costs in Exchange and an admin who likes it -- why change? But for start-ups and new companies it is a no brainer. Licensing alone of Exchange (plus windows server with active directory) is prohibitive. Most users have IM accounts on AIM, Skype, or Gmail to use for chatting.
>>What's horrible about them?
UI, stability, security, documentation, user license agreement, required system resources, remote exploits that grant admin rights. I'll run out of space to list them all!
>>I don't see much of a monopoly effect unlike with Word
Good point, for example MS is appealing the verdict that it in fact abused its monopoly position with Word vs. Wordperfect. It is more subtle when it comes to Outlook. For example, the only workstations Dell sells come with a MS operating system, that includes IE and Outlook (but you must pay for Outlook/office after 2 months or something). Or staples. Or Office Depot.
>>why won't people switch
The power of mono-culture aka monopoly. It is well documented in the public record that microsoft repeated abused their monopoly position.
This is beyond the scope of email clients, but look into:
Novel Networking (IPX), 3COM lanman licensing, Sysbase & MS SQL server, Apple's UI lawsuit vs win95 that MS settled, IE & Netscape, Real media vs windows media player, The Samba group trying to get docs , Word & Wordperfect,
>> The lack of such server software is what killed Thunderbird
Wow, ummm, no.