Petition to Microsoft

[aetherfox]

I respectfully disagree.

I think its a big change. For me, I will be using something legal. That makes a difference. Microsoft is showing care. That makes a difference. Bring the community as one. Thats a difference.

You guys know anyone on slashdot?

This petition to Microsoft is hereby established for the specific purpose of requesting Microsoft to release its older BASIC line of compilers and interpreters (such asQuickBASIC 4.5/ 7.1 and Visual BASIC for DOS) as freeware products.

Signers of this petition are active BASIC language developers, and have expressed full support is this request to Microsoft. By making the software freeware and allowing distribution, Microsoft will be encouraging more developers, and feeding the online BASIC programming community with a new, but dying hope. As Borland has done with their older collection of compilers and interpreters, Microsoft could launch a "museum" of their older line of products.

The support for the community by Microsoft will be appreciated by the signers of this petition, and we ask Microsoft to acknowledge the desire of many hobbyist programmers, and even beginner programmers, who use older compilers like QuickBASIC for fun and a challenge or as a stepping stone to further language. QuickBASIC is known in the community to be a great stepping stone to other Microsoft products such as the Visual BASIC line of products. The fact that it is 17 years old and runs on a platform that has lost support a long time ago doesn't stop these programmers from using it.

Signers of this petition would also like to thank Microsoft for other great products like Visual BASIC, Visual C++, and computer games, such as Age Of Mythology. We hope that you will fulfil our request.

Admins: Put this on the news please. I am disappointed that only 20 replies are on this, 4 from me.