ON SOUTH KOREA'S PROBLEM WITH VISTA

DECISIONS, DECISIONS

(Update Below)

And you thought your personal dilemma on whether or not to upgrade your PC to Microsoft Vista starting this Tuesday was tough.

One of South Korea's oldest newspapers, the Chosun Ilbo, has a fascinating article on why government institutions in that country are recommending that it's 50 million people DO NOT upgrade to Microsoft Vista just yet. 

The reason has to do with Microsoft's older software.  As the piece explains:

"When Microsoft releases its next-generation Windows operating system in Korea next week, local Internet users will find that it doesn't work with many of their favorite Web sites.

A Hangul version of the new OS, called Vista, hits shelves Jan. 31, but the new OS is incompatible with many Korean online banks, portals, games sites and malls.

Three government bodies -- the Ministry of Information and Communication, the Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs, and the Financial Supervisory Service -- warned Tuesday about the expected confusion.

The problem is that Vista doesn't play well with a software program called Active-X that is widely used in Korean Internet sites. Without support for Active-X, online services that Koreans use everyday like banking, stock trading, and shopping won't be available.

Vista users will also experience problems with government sites in applying for and printing documents and certificates."

The irony of course is that Active-X is Microsoft's technology made incompatible with new technology from Microsoft.

The whole thing should blow over in a couple of months or so, when the various sites deploying Active-X in South Korea re-program things for Vista. 

But it's apparently a mini-millennium bug problem in the whole country for now.

They'll be stuck with using only their world-leading wireless broadband 3G networks and related services only until then, poor babies.

Update:  Reader Paul Kim points to a more-in depth article on the issue in South Korea, in his comment below.  Provides some good historical context in particular.  Thanks, Paul.

Comments

[Paul Kim]

As background, here's an in-depth post on the history that's led up to this situation.

[Alex Tolley]

So reminiscent of MS's Office upgrade strategy. Get enough users to upgrade, whose default generates new file formats incompatible with older versions, forcing everyone else to upgrade, willing or not.

Is it any wonder MS will not stick to common standards.

Charles Stross mentioned this obliquely in his novel "Glasshouse". The history of the late C20th was lost to posterity because of proprietary format wars.

Now S. Korea has a countrywide compatibility issue - maybe they will seriously think about the consequences of monoculture/monopolies.