>> To reference your own example and use your own terminology, almost 
>> every feature of OpenOffice Writer was "stolen" from MS Word.  Even 
>> the menus were laid out as similarly as possible.
> 
> Yes, this was such a dirty trick by Open Office, take some program that 
> another company had spent years and huge amounts of money to develop, 
> and BLATANTLY just copy it so it looks almost identical.  Then, give it 
> away for FREE!  How can they get away with that?  They're parasites 
> trying to crush everyone else.

I would be far more sympathetic if it weren't for the fact that Open 
Office was put together in (comparatively speaking) five minutes yet 
works far better than the thing it's copying. You would expect quite the 
opposite; Microsoft has been developing and testing their Office for 
*decades*. You'd think it would be perfectly honed and polished by now. 
The fact that somebody else can knock something up in five minutes that 
works better doesn't reflect well on M$.

Still, I would prefer it if OO didn't try so hard to exactly copy M$. 
Who says the MS Office menu layout is the most logical choice? Why don't 
they come up with something better themselves? (Similar remarks apply to 
KDE and the way it attempts to copy Windows rather than come up with 
something better.) The answer, presumably, is that copying an existing 
product means people don't have to "learn" anything to use the new one - 
but then, that does start to make you wonder what the advantage of the 
new one actually is...

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