Monoculture lameness

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Software compatibility problems marred the launch of the iPhone 3G at Apple's flagship store in London, where customers had difficulty activating their new phones.

Apple has an exclusive deal with network operator O2 in the UK - but O2's web-based activation system requires the use of Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser to register a new phone: It won't work with the Safari browser bundled in Apple's Mac OS X.

In its Regent Street store, Apple had installed VMware Fusion desktop virtualisation software on some of its Macintosh computers, allowing them to run Internet Explorer on Windows, but the activation process was still not working.

Behind the iPhone 3G launch day fiasco, O2's software doesn't work with Apple Safari.

I just don't understand why on earth, today, companies continue to waste money on incompetent web developers who know nothing better than IE on Windows. In this particular case of O2 launching the Apple iPhone it's not just lame, it's utterly ridiculous.