Hacker News Reader

Take "similar software" to mean all things being roughly equivalent, including price. Jeez.

That's also untrue. If one was cheaper, but required me to install some desktop software, I'd happily pay the extra to have the better solution.

I'm pretty sure I had to download silverlight to watch netflix movies on my Mac.

Netflix are using Silverlight for their streaming service, see http://netflix.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=43&item=288 for details.

Not a good example. Netflix would have chosen Flash probably if it wasn't for a special deal with Microsoft. They traded something in exchange for choosing an inferior solution (inferior in that it requires a download).