In fairness, I should let you know that I only just found out the results were published this week. I've been far too busy with NC World [shameless plug] to participate in anything but my column and my own forum. In fact, as I write this, I still haven't read the results (I'll go do that as soon as I'm done).
For the record: I see nothing wrong with OS/2 Warp 4 winning POY again. I think it was good enough to deserve such a win. However, though I'm a big fan of Stewart's I think Stewart contaminated the poll when he foolishly (IMO) challenged our readers to vote OS/2 #1 in his infamous "OS/2 will never win again" column (I forget the actual headline, but you know what I'm talking about). Therefore, if there was any anomaly in the results (and I still don't have enough info to say either way), I'm guessing it would have been due to that challenge.
Now, you can look at that two ways. At the time, Stewart was InfoWorld, so it was as good as InfoWorld putting out the challenge. Since "InfoWorld" challenged its readers, you could say it should have stood by the results of that foolish challenge.
Or, you could say that since Sandy has replaced Stewart in that role, she has the right to retract what Stewart had done and redo the poll. I personally would have chosen the former, but I fully respect and support the latter especially since I don't think the challenge should have been issued in the first place.
There are a lot deeper issues here, like whether or not a reader choice should be self-selecting, etc. I'm not even sure how I stand on that, frankly, since I haven't given it enough thought.
None of these opinions are stated under duress or fear for the security of my column. If anything, my editor encourages me to challenge conventional wisdom for the sake of the reader, even if it opposes the conventional InfoWorld "point of view".
If there is any doubt about that, consider the fact that every editor in chief knows it is productive to a publication to allow and even encourage dissenting opinions, and damaging to cut or stifle them. Anyone who is familiar with the whole Zachmann "scandal" knows that, whether they believed there should have been a scandal or not.
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