Doesn't item ii prohibit the use of DirectX, .Net and ActiveX since all of those things were designed and licensed for the sole purpose of making "derivative works"?

Well, if it is it's kind of amusing. The /. community is all about tinkering with toys both old and new. But if we're going to revive an old machine for the purposes of tinkering, we're not going to pay money to do it. Seriously, most of us live in our mom's basements (or should probably be stored there for the benefit of society). Do you really think we have money laying around?

"I don't hate Microsoft because of Windows. I hate Microsoft because they made mediocre software the standard."

I think that about sums it up. Microsoft has been great at getting out a lot of products that its customers have asked for, the only problem is that they aren't always finished when they are released. Apple on the other hand usually releases fairly stable software or they at least keep working on it until it becomes stable, but on the down side they don't release as many products as Microsoft does.