I hate New York. It isn't just the Yankees. It is the snide attitude that nothing else matters. Dave Winer, today, has an entry today that smacks of the same self-righteousness:
"Basically the rule is that success breeds envy, and envy isn't that far from hate."
While I think that this sentiment is true, I think that the bigger reason that people hate him is that he is a Bipolar whiner. I've never had an email exchange with him where he doesn't take his toys and go home.
By Dave's own criteria, the only reason people hate Microsoft is because we are so successful. In the ancient essay that he points to he makes this argument (with BillG) directly. However, he has changed his tune over the last couple of years. I'm pretty sure that he wouldn't write the same thing now.
The "they only hate me because I'm successful" arguement may be some of why MS is such a focus for animosity, but I (and a lot of other people at Microsoft) think that the problem is deeper than that -- it is one of the ways the company has changed over the last couple of years.
If Dave really beleives what he wrote, he is guilty of the same hubris of which he accuses us.