Yes, I see your point.

Well argued sir, I stand corrected.

Or maybe not.

Re: "Why is Flash an acceptable alternative?"

I don't recall suggesting that it is. Having said that though, considering that we already have 1 plugin that provides "a rich multimedia experience" and in my opinion that is one too many.

However, considering we DO have Flash, and also considering that, closed source or not, Flash does run natively and relatively well under Linux* then having another closed but in this case effectively reverse engineered variant is of little value to those outside Fortress Redmond.

Considering that MS has a history of allowing their proprietary tech to become entrenched in a market before attempting to pull it away again either thru use of legal threats or subtle undocumented API changes I see no reason whatsoever to endorse, support or even use any of their products or protocols unless absolutely necessary and as I pointed out earlier there is hardly a surfeit of Silverlight sites, nowhere near enough to make the installation of Moonlight attractive or necessary to me.

* I am aware of the 64 bit tardiness, the patented Adobe bloatiness as well as the occasional crashing issues when using multiple flash sites simultaneously but due to the nature of surfing the net these days I tend to end up using it lot and I don't have a lot of trouble with it, apart from the fact that some websites seem to think it is necessary to download multiple megabytes just to show me a welcome page. Not to mention out of control flash menus. But that is the web devs fault and not Adobes really.