Cringely editorializes: “When I wrote last week about my conclusion that the legal system — any legal system — is unequipped to change Microsoft’s monopolistic behavior, I had no idea that within 24 hours, Sun would be throwing in the towel, trading its so-called principles for $1.95 billion in cash. So I guess I was right. Only now, a few thousand readers out there expect me to blithely produce an answer to the problem of what to do to bring Microsoft into the civilized world. Well, I say it can’t be done“.
The Only Way Microsoft Can Die is by Suicide
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
McNealy should have watched “Godfather 3” —
“Never hate your enemies, it clouds your judgement.”
I hope some people will learn this before commenting here.
The final stage I call “missing the boat,” which involves a significant advance in non-Microsoft technology that Redmond chooses to address by not addressing
Not really “significant advances”, but I think iTunes, Playstation, maybe Palm, are good examples at keeping Microsoft at bay. Microsoft may be a little late here.
As for Linux: It’s a non-factor unless it becomes a desktop *platform*.
So what would you rather? Would you prefer if Microsoft stopped making good software? You’d be left with no alternative to the crap which is produced by companies like Sun and Real, then. In fact, the only option where quality means anything would be to use a Mac, because without corporations like Microsoft pushing the software industry forward, you’re left up shit creek with nothing but Slackware; and let me tell you, that’s not a place you want to be.
#4 microsoft will open source all of windows
Whatever you’re on, it might be strong stuff.
The best way to beat someone is to become he’s best friend.
I don’t think that anyone who will constantly say “Microsft sucks” and sue Microsoft have any chance. The problem is that everyone (or company) that wants to beat Microsoft behave like this…
Personally, I don’t hate Microsoft’s software. I don’t like it much, and only use it to run software I do like (AutoCAD, SolidEdge, Call of Duty). However, that is all irrelevent. Microsoft broke our laws. They broke very *important* laws. They have done immense damage to the software industry. It does not matter what else they have done, they must be punished. Justice cannot work on a case-by-case basis.
The author is right, MS won’t go away. But we can kill their monopo, slowly and surely. A critical mass has not developed for Linux for various reasons, but at this point, moving one after the Justice Dept’s ineptitude, Gates must be prevented from establishing any more proprietary file types in essential computing. Gates and all things Windows must be kept OUT of automobile computers, appliances, TVS, etc, and, moreover, out of security-laden internet transactions which make MS the middleman between all parties doing business on the net. This should be true for all companies who are essentially Gates’ whores [click here __ to “report abuse”] and are afraid to port to Linux for fear of that walking Failure of Capitalism. Cakewalk is an example. I have stopped using it. Do not allow any proprietary MS file types on your computer if possible. It’s a start.
Above all, Linux needs high level applications to make it competitive–the kind of applications that artists, musicians, and moviemakers use. The OS will not develop further if the applications are not evolved quicker than they are evolving now.
1) Everyone who uses computers is affected by Microsoft, not just those who buy their products. Look up “dead weight loss” in an economics text. Microsoft’s monopoly status is taking money out of the economy. Its not just them getting a bigger piece of the pie than you — its them shrinking the pie in their efforts to get a bigger piece.
2) Who cares where you buy your products from? Its the capitalist way — and therefore the American way — to buy products from whoever can sell them to you the cheapest. Buying from more expensive companies just because they are American subverts the free market, and makes the economic pie smaller for all of us.
It dose not mater what people like Cringely, or companies like Microsoft think about Linux and foss (free and open source software). It has become big enough, even on the desktop to be talked about. You can’t get it out of IT anymore because unlike any other competition you can’t kill it.
Even if you kill Linux (if its possible) there are other foss operating systems to take its place, the programmers will move on. They won’t say “Oh well, back to proprietary software for me!.” The other thing is that even when foss is “only” used by technical users, there will be more and more of them as time goes by. Then there is the third world, not just places that can’t afford to buy proprietary software, places that don’t have software in their language.
What’s essayer for you to learn, software that isn’t perfect but you can use because its in your language or software that is perfect (not that I think proprietary software is better then foss, I’m just using a stereotype) but you don’t understand because its in a foreign language?
So back to the issue, Microsoft doesn’t have to die, and it won’t. Other ex-monopolistic companies are still hanging around and are still important. The same thing will happen to Microsoft. If some other company or even foss project comes along and brings this about, fine but I personally am betting on a slow and long ongoing erosion of market share.
So what would you rather? Would you prefer if Microsoft stopped making good software? You’d be left with no alternative to the crap which is produced by companies like Sun and Real, then.
You sound young. Do you remember that there used to be alternatives to Microsoft software? Fifteen years ago most people would have considered WordPerfect, Lotus 123, DBase, Borland Compilers, etc; to be best-in-class. Many of the better programs had their upgrades long delayed to market because Microsoft wouldn’t share API’s in time to release competing software at the launch of a new version of Windows. Microsoft still writes Office to secret, unpublished Windows APIs.
I’m sure you don’t find that fair either, it must just be that you don’t care.
People, economy and society need IT standards, something that they can trust their money, IT infrastructure and business on.
Windows has become the standard OS for most people – because of MS’s clever business decisions in the pst, and because there has simply been a need for such a standard platform as Windows. Yeah, MS Office etc. are important for MS too, but there would be no MS Office domination without MS Windows dominion first.
However, because of Microsoft’s monopoly position, and sometimes nonethical and greedy business behaviour and unclean tactics (including FUD tactics), people are becoming more and more tired of Microsoft and MS Windows in particular. A single IT company, in such a position as MS has had, is simply totally unacceptable from ethical, business or whatever point of view.
I think that future of the operating systems will be more and more open source. There’s a clear need for that change. People won’t accept any company, MS or other, to have such a dominant, monopolistic position in IT field anymore. But there’s still need for OS starndards (probably only a couple of operating systems can compete for the postion on majority of people’s desktops at the same time, for example). A more or less open source OS it will be that suits those needs best.
Microsoft will survive, and so does Windows in some form or other, probably being one of the main desktop OS’s long time in the future too. But MS won’t – and shouldn’t – have dominance over everyone else in the IT like they have had lately. And that should be good for everyone, even including Microsoft itself. Better competition -> better innovation, security etc. -> better products.
As a mainframe CE in the 1960s, I remember the same comment about the stranglehold IBM had on the data processing industry and how none of the “seven dwarfs” had a chance in hell of catching them.
Seems no one could see the new technology of the PC coming down the pike to change the industry. I suspect that no one today can see the new technology that will do for MS what the PC did for IBM either.
Kind of like the scientists in the 18th century that said man could never travel faster than 60 MPH because he would suffocate from the air pressure (regarding the steam railroad travel).
Two things I have learned in my 63 years boys, never say never and ever is a long, long time.
Well I am not happy about Microsoft’s position either. But I don’t lose any sleep over the $35 Dell paid MS for my copy of Windows. If we didn’t have Microsoft to be Microsoft than someone else would be (apple?).
Agreed. Microsoft is like a Windows virus. You can secure your box by updating your virus defs are a patch, but soon after another virus comes along to take its place, and this happens because of the ecosystem in which viruses are allowed to live goes unchecked, that ecosystem being Windows.
As for Microsoft, even if you were to somehow get rid of them, someone else would simply come along to take their place, because of the ecosystem in which these kinds of companies are allowed to live goes unchecked, that ecosystem being Corporate America. Do you doubt me on this? Think about how many options you have for local telco or cable service and meditate on that for awhile. You expect the government to do anything about it? Hell, these people own the government.
Anyway, I actually had more to rant about, bot I gotta go.
The other thing is that even when foss is “only” used by technical users, there will be more and more of them as time goes by.
Yeah, in 20 years maybe. That’s about the worst (and laziest) reason I’ve seen yet to bet on Linux adoption.
Microsoft will die, surely.
Microsoft’s only advantage is binary compatibility with 10-year old products. One day, Microsoft will be forced to break this binary compatibility (Perhaps with Blackcomb or even Longhorn!) But the result will be a crushing blow to Microsoft. Corporate users who want to use the products they’ve been using for 6-8 years, will probably continue using an old version of Windows, while companies who create new products will suddenly be faced with a choice: WinFX, QT, The syllable developer stuff, GTK or Cocoa (There will probably come some new developer platforms by that time.)
On that very day, all operating systems will once again be equal. I can see GNU/Linux, Syllable, SkyOS and MacOS becoming the operating systems that will be in the sharpest competition with each other.
As Linus has said, Linux is not intended to destroy Microsoft.
It will simply be an unintended consequence.
Anybody who thinks Microsoft can hold Linux at bay forever is an idiot.
And even if that were possible, there will be – contrary to Jaron Lanier’s nonsense – new software technology developed in the next twenty years or so which will bury current technology and Windows with it.
And it won’t come from Microsoft because they don’t do R&D regardless of how many billions they CLAIM to spend on it.
Have a nice day, Microsoft trolls.
And as for you, Cringe, get a grip. You’re overreacting to Scott McNealy’s own incompetence.
You placed the words good software and Microsoft in the same sentence, what are you on? I think I need some of it cause in all my years of computing I have yet to see this good software from Microsoft. They were over 8 years late in delivering wha they were promising for Windows 95 and even that XP is the equivalent of software garbage.
I have had to sacrifice one of my favourite software titles but my move away from Microsoft has given me a nice and stable Operating Platorm with heaps of development potential. Oh year, all my hardware works on it too with very little effort.
>>The other thing is that even when foss is “only” used by >>technical users, there will be more and more of them as time >>goes by.
>Yeah, in 20 years maybe. That’s about the worst (and laziest) >reason I’ve seen yet to bet on Linux adoption.
There are lots of teenagers that have computers, a 12 year old could learn alot about computers by the time he is 18. Yes it takes some time but 20 years is to much.
I agree that people like us may find MS’s dominance hard to swallow, but I doubt Joe user has any concept of this.
There are so many variables that need to be addressed in parallel to unhinge MS, even if they lose the OS market the likelyhood is they’ll still find a way to get .net, directX or something like onto every PC, maybe I lack imagination but I don’t see how they can lose, their products may have to change but their dominance will remain.
Do you remember that there used to be alternatives to Microsoft software? Fifteen years ago most people would have considered WordPerfect, Lotus 123, DBase, Borland Compilers, etc; to be best-in-class
I remember – and I tell you those “leaders” fell behind because of their own faults: 123 and Dbase stopped evolving and Excel/Fox/Access ate them for lunch, Borland – it is a textbook case of corporate suicide through idiotic behavior – just see what it is doing to its own C++ these days, only WordPerfect was more or less competetive to Word.
Many of the better programs had their upgrades long delayed to market because Microsoft wouldn’t share API’s in time to release competing software at the launch of a new version of Windows
123 had 4K lines limit per spreadsheet while concurrent Excel version already had 64K limit. Do not tell me it was due to some “secret” API !
You placed the words good software and Microsoft in the same sentence, what are you on?
Their payroll.
in all my years of computing I have yet to see this good software from Microsoft. They were over 8 years late in delivering wha they were promising for Windows 95 and even that XP is the equivalent of software garbage.
I’m sitting here on a Dual Xeon system, running XP Pro and Server 2003, and I’m sorry, but I can’t help it if you’re one of these people that sees imaginary ‘promises’ from software companies. Just what exactly were you expecting from Windows 95?
It gave you the world’s first 3D-Style GUI, with a whole host of programming APIs and system libraries which were available to developers. Hell, people were writing Windows 95 software even before it was released, back during the Chicago beta program.
I’ve got 8 books here filled with API references, all published in 94-95, well before the release of Windows 95. The software base for Windows is so much larger than the software base for UNIX derivatives, and it’s only been around for half the time. Developers use Windows for a reason; it’s easy to code nice, GUI applications which their users WANT, and the best people at coding these applications are Microsoft themselves.
The best coders in the world work for MS, partly because of the wages which MS can afford to pay them. You think developers working for Sun or IBM get a fraction of the salary and stock options that developers at Microsoft do? Hell no. Not to mention that every single head-in-the-clouds Linux/UNIX obsessed user that I’ve taken to Microsoft events like PDC, Developer Briefings, etc, have left new people; ready to develop for Windows using VS .NET, purely because it outclasses any of the alternatives out there.
“…you’re left up shit creek with nothing but Slackware; and let me tell you, that’s not a place you want to be.”
Actually that wouldn’t be to bad for a lot of people. And yes, there are many alternatives to not only the Windows operating system, but to the software in general. Open source projects and participants around the world have built an excellent community. However, if Microsoft were to go down, I feel alot of the economy would crumble becuase of the dependency on Microsoft’s software. It just wouldn’t be smart to bring them down in the long run. So if you dissagree with the MS business practices, I guess we’re just stuck with it for now.
“American capitalist system”, hmm far from it, MS resembles a Dictatorship!
Microsoft is riding the wave of Capitalism, they mastered the market. I just wish people would stop whining, whining will get you no where.
“..people choose to use Microsoft.”
No, actually they don’t choose. It’s chosen for them, and that’s the problem. When you walk into a store to buy a computer (quite a few of which don’t even Apple) which OS is inevitably on the computer you’re going to buy? Now remember, you used the word choice. Okay now imagine you walk into the store and all the computers have, let’s say for example, Solaris preinstalled (so the closed source fans are happy). Will people go out of their way, spend $199 on XP and hope it will install on hardware that is already preconfigured to suit Solaris even though most of them have no idea how to install an operating system? Or would it just be simpler to run Solaris, learn Solaris as much as necessary and use apps that run on Solaris?
There are lots of teenagers that have computers, a 12 year old could learn alot about computers by the time he is 18.
“Could” being the key word here. It’s whether they want or care to learn (very, very, very, very few don’t care about or are aware of Linux — they barely know or care about Windows or Macs — and this is just teenagers).
If Open Source is ever going to cause mass migration from Windows, you gotta bring it to the people, not wait for them to come to you (and I’m not talking about evangelism). Depending on widespread computer literacy is just silly to me.
There’s nothing wrong with GNU/Linux as a Unix-like OS. It just lacks the cohesiveness it needs to make a good desktop platform. A platform doesn’t equal throwing a bunch of jumbled pieces at people and telling them to “Pick it up!”
I’m sure Linux will get there, but for now, I’d say the Playstation 3, Handheld’s, and Macs still have a better chance, *if anyone*, to take away some of Microsoft’s marketshare.
No, actually they don’t choose. It’s chosen for them, and that’s the problem.
God forbid that people have to drive a couple blocks to their local PC shop to buy a PC without an operating system installed. I bought my lastest system without an OS. Best Buy isn’t the only game in town you know. The frothing at the mouth anti-Microsoft freaks just can’t get it through their heads that people want to use windows.
By the way, i’m typing this on a gentoo, Gnome 2.6 system.
“Microsoft is not a success story.”
“slap in the face to each and every person that believes in the American capitalist system”
You can’t be serious. Isn’t MS exactly the textbook pride of the American capitalist system?
From a technology standpoint things look different. Innovation has not been one of MS’s strong sides. Worse, MS has been in the way for others to fill in the gap. But they have had no need to not rest on their laurels. The irony is that innovation is a favorite MS buzzword. Used both to defend itself in antitrust cases and to promote its products. Smart deceptive marketing move to hide the facts.
I’m not sure that ending up with a giant is not where evolution would have taken mankind anyway. Software is not like soap. It’s more like lego – with hidden interfaces. If it weren’t for the fact that Word, Excel and PowerPoint files are blackboxes then things would look different.
A patent last 17 years. The concept of a patent exists because the subject cannot be hidden and therefore easily cloned. Not so with MS file formats. But maybe they should be governed by the same rules e.g. the specifications revealed after 17 years whether patented or not.
I don’t get why the author of this article uses the term suicide. He is merely describing how someone in a monopoly position dies. If you look at all other monopolies in history, they die 1 of 2 ways. Either the gov’t breaks them up, or the world moves on and doesn’t consider their technology critical anymore. With the second, the situation the author describes occurs, but I would hardly call it suicide.
Don’t predict the future
Create the future!
MS won’t go away just because you predict it, and even if they do it’s not sure that you’ll be happy with the situation afterwards unless you make sure it’s what you want.
I know that most of you aren’t software developers, but there’s still a lot you can do. Like promoting your OS of choice.
I promoted BeOS for quite a few years, both on the net and IRL. I showed it at local schools and a few companies and got very positive responses, some of them even decided to use it. Yeah, I know BeOS went away but at least I tried to make the future what I wanted it to be. Imagine if there were a 100 people doing the same thing in every town, we’d see things change pretty quickly.
There are a lot of channels open for promoting alternative software in the community (the “real life” community). Use them.
That article is FANTASTIC. The author is absolutely correct about the position of Java, given Sun’s recent concessions. Until I got to the end of the piece, I angrily condsidered the author a defeatist. Very well written.
1. There was computing before Microsoft. There will be computing after Microsoft.
2. I do agree that appropriate measures should be taken in response to their breaking the law. However, the test for a judge is not how much the measures penalise Microsoft or benefit the PC software industry, but how much it benefits everyone. Measures that strangle Microsoft will screw up an astronomical number of people, so if you’re waiting for such measures to be implemented… well, don’t bother.
Okay now imagine you walk into the store and all the computers have, let’s say for example, Solaris preinstalled (so the closed source fans are happy).
It’s not about closed source, open source, or fans. It’s not even about Operating Systems.
It’s about all of the other software. Hmm..Wouldn’t ya know? People like to actually do stuff. So the question is: “What can this here nifty Linux _desktop_ do that that Windows PC doesn’t do?” Answer: Nothing! What’s worse: It can do more.
While we’re talking about limited choices in software or what a distro guarantees will run, let’s not forget to mention limited choices in Hardware.
Why is Microsoft the one to blame when it’s Linux that hasn’t even managed to compete?
Actually I think Micro$soft could go open source on some things (Particularly Windows when OSs go commodity) and still make money. It will probably come when Bill Gates and Steve ballmer retire and a more open minded second generation of Microsoft management take over. (Actually I think opening Windows or at least the parts of it they didn’t license from others would make Microsoft MORE money. On Office, development tools and games if they would dump that stupid money loser Xbox and return to the idea of the PC as a gaming platform.)
It’s just a software company.
And US Steel was just a metalworks, and Standard Oil just produced petroleum, AT&T was just a telephone company…
You sound like a fanboy that is bitter that people choose to use Microsoft.
I’m not bitter that Microsoft became a monopoly. Monopolies arise naturally in a capitalist system. In *our* capitalist system, however, they are supposed to be punished when they use that monopoly status in uncompetitive ways, and justice has not been served in the case of Microsoft.
Seriously, get some professional help if you’re getting so worked up over Microsoft.
I see reason to get worked up over a company that has cut the fledging computer industry off at the knees.
Bill Gates never put a gun to someones head and handed him/her an XP box to install.
Not all criminals need to use such crude methods as violent force!
It will probably come when Bill Gates and Steve ballmer retire and a more open minded second generation of Microsoft management take over.
Do you seriously think that “more open minded” people will apply for a position in MS management? MS will always be a place for people with closed minds and nothing but dollar signs in their eyes. That applies to both the heads and the developers.
It gave you the world’s first 3D-Style GUI, with a whole host of programming APIs and system libraries which were available to developers.
The software base for Windows is so much larger than the software base for UNIX derivatives, and it’s only been around for half the time.
The best coders in the world work for MS,
…people choose to use Microsoft.
God forbid that people have to drive a couple blocks to their local PC shop to buy a PC without an operating system installed.
WHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA!!!!!!!!!! There seem to be a lot of comedians around here. Let’s see…
Microsoft NEVER gave us “the world’s first” ANYTHING. It was always available somewhere else first before Microsoft stol… er, BORROWED it.
Anyone who thinks the software base for Windows is larger than Linux/BSD/Unix is obviously just looking at the shelves in their local WalMart.
Microsoft is one of the leading companies to outsource programming and services to foreign countries to save a dollar. Are they spending top dollar to get the best? Heck no!! They’re spending the least they can get by on for whoever will do the job cheapest, quality be damned.
As someone else mentioned, very few people choose Windows. It comes on the machine they bought, and that is that. Do you choose what embedded processor is in your toaster? Your washing machine? Your VCR? Of course not! You take what they give you. So shut up about people “choosing” Windows.
Local PC shops are usually MORE pro-Microsoft than big stores. Big stores sell Windows on their machines because that’s what it comes with. Little stores do what they think will make them the most money, and that’s push the OS that locks in the market. Someone locked into a Windows machine is locked into their local PC store for service and updates.
And US Steel was just a metalworks, and Standard Oil just produced petroleum, AT&T was just a telephone company…
Nope, not buying the comparison to US Steel or Standard Oil. The barriers of entry are low for software. AT&T was a natural monopoly because it owned the physical lines like gas and electric.
I’m not bitter that Microsoft became a monopoly. Monopolies arise naturally in a capitalist system. In *our* capitalist system, however, they are supposed to be punished when they use that monopoly status in uncompetitive ways, and justice has not been served in the case of Microsoft.
OEM’s made the deals with Microsoft. Why don’t you blame them. Nobody forced OEMs to bundle windows with their machines. Why do you think they put windows on the machines? It’s because windows is what the vast majority of people want to run.
I see reason to get worked up over a company that has cut the fledging computer industry off at the knees.
Now you’re being ridiculous. The computer industry is “fledgling” and microsoft has cut its off at the knees? Get real man. Sounds like you need to go work as a Lawyer for Real and Sun. A bunch of whiners that have a hard time competing on the merits of their products.
Not all criminals need to use such crude methods as violent force!
Hehe, you can do better than that. Way to duck the argument. The crux of your and others arguments always boils down to people are too stupid to be aware of other options for software in the marketplace. People are able to buy PCs without operating systems. If they are too dumb to figure that out then that is their fault. Even if Microsoft would have been broken up into OS and application parts do you think anything would be any different. Nope.
Raynier, nothing is stopping you from writing and selling Raynier’s Killer Lisp OS.
I still think Microsoft resembles a Dictatorship more that capitalism. If they were operating capitalistically, why then are they getting all these fines? Why then have they dictated how Windows should be run on the pc? Maybe Finnish-Socialism(Linux)will eventually beat Microsoft at its on windowing system game,,I hope.
Yeah, your nick fits you perfectly
I still think Microsoft resembles a Dictatorship more that capitalism.If they were operating capitalistically, why then are they getting all these fines?
Been drinking a little bit too much tonight? That is so funny that I’ll let you ponder the nonsense.
Maybe Finnish-Socialism(Linux)will eventually beat Microsoft at its on windowing system game,,I hope.
Haha, that one is just as ridiculous as the last one. When did Finnish socialists start running Linux development. Linus lives in Silicon Valley and despises hard leftists. Read his book.
while i don’t deny m$ may have the best programmers in the industry, how is it that JLG and Be inc was able to produce a better OS?
>>You placed the words good software and Microsoft in the same sentence, what are you on?
> Their payroll.
That makes you unable to talk impartially. This is like crying: “I’m honest.” Sure. Yeah, right.
>> in all my years of computing I have yet to see this good software from Microsoft. They were over 8 years late in delivering wha they were promising for Windows 95 and even that XP is the equivalent of software garbage.
> I’m sitting here on a Dual Xeon system, running XP Pro and Server 2003, and I’m sorry, but I can’t help it if you’re one of these people that sees imaginary ‘promises’ from software companies. Just what exactly were you expecting from Windows 95?
Don’t know about the guy who replied to you, but I expected it to work flawlessly. No, I’d say better, I expected Windows 3.1 to work so; I’d accept Windows 95 to be a bug-fix release, not another product to suck more money from me. And they didn’t get my money.
> It gave you the world’s first 3D-Style GUI,
You’re kidding us, huh? Just one word to you: videogames. I’ll avoid the Xerox & Apple story.
> with a whole host of programming APIs and system libraries which were available to developers. Hell, people were writing Windows 95 software even before it was released, back during the Chicago beta program.
Great business practices. Probably invented some 1,000 or 2,000 years ago. I’ll tell you what: I was a developer and did programming for DOS, because Windows wasn’t sophisticated enough to handle the programs I did. Commercial programs, btw, not rocket science.
> I’ve got 8 books here filled with API references, all published in 94-95, well before the release of Windows 95.
Try to sell them. 😉
> The software base for Windows is so much larger than the software base for UNIX derivatives, and it’s only been around for half the time.
Unix programs are modular. You need less of them for that reason. Regarding Windows software base, who will maintain them, since Microsoft will monopolize everything?
> Developers use Windows for a reason; it’s easy to code nice, GUI applications which their users WANT,
From what I’ve heard and seen, developing for Macs is easier. And people choose to pay money for Qt instead of using Microsoft solutions, citing Qt’s superior quality. Oh, they must be dellusional companies, right?
> and the best people at coding these applications are Microsoft themselves.
Sorry, I don’t buy it. I’ve seen too many bugs in Microsoft products.
> The best coders in the world work for MS, partly because of the wages which MS can afford to pay them.
I don’t know what kind of developers get excited about money. The ones I know code for art, and they are real artists. And about the best coders being there, maybe, but management is doing a great job of nullifying their skills. 🙂
> You think developers working for Sun or IBM get a fraction of the salary and stock options that developers at Microsoft do? Hell no.
I don’t know about Sun, but IBM is well known (if not for anything, for its age). IBM is not Microsoft. Money is not the only measure. There are other dimensions you are not considering.
> Not to mention that every single head-in-the-clouds Linux/UNIX obsessed user that I’ve taken to Microsoft events like PDC, Developer Briefings, etc, have left new people; ready to develop for Windows using VS .NET, purely because it outclasses any of the alternatives out there.
Even if were better, which I hardly can believe, we are seeing exactly the opposite every day. Everyone is abandoning proprietary platforms (Unix, Windows, you name it) and going for free as in Freedom standards.
Man, you’re fighting products which are free! They’re even cheaper than pirated Windows copies. I don’t see a way out for Microsoft, unless they discover how to go into a parallel universe, where there’s no FOSS.
There’s a great risk that you were trolling, and I usually avoid posting here, and then I always write M$ (*grin*), but I chose to answer anyway… some kid could believe you, and we can’t allow lies to children, can we? 😉
:I’m not bitter that Microsoft became a monopoly. Monopolies arise naturally in a capitalist system. In *our* capitalist system, however, they are supposed to be punished when they use that monopoly status in uncompetitive ways, and justice has not been served in the case of Microsoft.
Actully corperations like MS have to prove that they exist for the public good and MS being a monolopy means MS does not exist for the public good so the US goverment could legally say MS is no longer a company since it abused its rights as a corperation, liqudate it giving its assets to stock holders and dump its intellectual proporty into public domain. Of course even though such a option is legally there, there is no political will to take such a hard line approch to monopolies.
Nope, not buying the comparison to US Steel or Standard Oil. The barriers of entry are low for software. AT&T was a natural monopoly because it owned the physical lines like gas and electric.
The barriers for HOBBY programming are low. If you want to go commercial, the barriers are HIGH. You’ve obviously never tried to sell programs yourself. Many commercial SDKs and APIs cost tens of thousands of dollars. That’s not LOW in anyone’s book… except Microsoft.
OEM’s made the deals with Microsoft. Why don’t you blame them. Nobody forced OEMs to bundle windows with their machines. Why do you think they put windows on the machines? It’s because windows is what the vast majority of people want to run.
Uh – actually, MS DID force many to include Windows, as well as threatening them if they carried any other OS. MS also threatened harware manufacturers who wrote device drivers for other OSes. You’ve obviously never read the Findings of Fact in the last couple Microsoft anti-trust cases. MS just recently lost a case in Japan where they were found guilty of attempting to force Sony into unfavorable terms for OEM contracts. You’re horribly naive on the whole matter.
Hehe, you can do better than that. Way to duck the argument. The crux of your and others arguments always boils down to people are too stupid to be aware of other options for software in the marketplace. People are able to buy PCs without operating systems. If they are too dumb to figure that out then that is their fault.
Yeah! If those old geezers are stupid enough to give me their life savings for some worthless scheme, what business is it of the government to put me on trial! It’s THEIR fault for being too dumb to figure out they’re being scammed!
Nice argument…
Do you know why thousands of wars were fought for in the entire human history? I was for only one single reason that is FREEDOM. Blood was shed, scarifices where made just for one reason FREEDOM. With microsoft you dont have any freedom, As the microsoft model become more and more close source(taking control of hardware as well). then people will have no choice left. Do you should know what the end results will be?
Fine, if “The Only Way Microsoft Can Die is by Suicide” then the good news is that the process is already beginning. Balmer has repeatedly stated that their installed base is their biggest enemy. When your customers are your biggest enemy, you know your company is on the slow train down suicide hill.
The barriers for HOBBY programming are low. If you want to go commercial, the barriers are HIGH. You’ve obviously never tried to sell programs yourself. Many commercial SDKs and APIs cost tens of thousands of dollars. That’s not LOW in anyone’s book… except Microsoft.
Uhh, hello mcfly….Microsoft’s sdks are free and if you’re in the business of developing software then you can probably the cost of Visual Studio. At least with Visual Studio you don’t have some crap per-app license that QT forces you into.
Uh – actually, MS DID force many to include Windows, as well as threatening them if they carried any other OS. MS also threatened harware manufacturers who wrote device drivers for other OSes. You’ve obviously never read the Findings of Fact in the last couple Microsoft anti-trust cases. MS just recently lost a case in Japan where they were found guilty of attempting to force Sony into unfavorable terms for OEM contracts. You’re horribly naive on the whole matter.
Microsoft can’t force anybody to do anything. OEMs are free to enter or not to enter into a contract.
Yeah! If those old geezers are stupid enough to give me their life savings for some worthless scheme, what business is it of the government to put me on trial! It’s THEIR fault for being too dumb to figure out they’re being scammed!
incomprehensible babble that I won’t comment on.
[u]The barriers for HOBBY programming are low. If you want to go commercial, the barriers are HIGH. You’ve obviously never tried to sell programs yourself. Many commercial SDKs and APIs cost tens of thousands of dollars. That’s not LOW in anyone’s book… except Microsoft.
Uhh, hello mcfly….Microsoft’s sdks are free and if you’re in the business of developing software then you can probably the cost of Visual Studio. At least with Visual Studio you don’t have some crap per-app license that QT forces you into.
Uh – actually, MS DID force many to include Windows, as well as threatening them if they carried any other OS. MS also threatened harware manufacturers who wrote device drivers for other OSes. You’ve obviously never read the Findings of Fact in the last couple Microsoft anti-trust cases. MS just recently lost a case in Japan where they were found guilty of attempting to force Sony into unfavorable terms for OEM contracts. You’re horribly naive on the whole matter.
Microsoft can’t force anybody to do anything. OEMs are free to enter or not to enter into a contract.
Yeah! If those old geezers are stupid enough to give me their life savings for some worthless scheme, what business is it of the government to put me on trial! It’s THEIR fault for being too dumb to figure out they’re being scammed!
incomprehensible babble that I won’t comment on.[/u]
continued m$ child trolling. No facts of information but that of a complete fantasy. This is proof that you do not need a good product at all if your good at marketing. Think on how many dumb assess like the above where you could charge for each roll of toilet paper in his own home no less.
“Balmer has repeatedly stated that their installed base is their biggest enemy.”
Taking that sentence at face value then there you have it. He trapped himself. He might as well instead have said that too little innovation is their biggest enemy. The delta is not significant enough for the installed base to consider an upgrade.
I’m not against that they make money and tons of it if they so desire. Allthough it seems kind of purposeless just piling up money. The world would be much better off with some innovation instead. IBM and now deceased DEC did not that have that kind of money. But they still innovated.
The barriers for HOBBY programming are low. If you want to go commercial, the barriers are HIGH. You’ve obviously never tried to sell programs yourself. Many commercial SDKs and APIs cost tens of thousands of dollars. That’s not LOW in anyone’s book… except Microsoft.
Which leads me to believe that you’ve never actually downloaded or used any of these SDKs — because .NET, Win32 SDK are free. They even include a free compiler.
Uh – actually, MS DID force many to include Windows, as well as threatening them if they carried any other OS.
That consent decree was in the early 90s. Some people can’t seem to move on.
Yeah! If those old geezers are stupid enough to give me their life savings for some worthless scheme, what business is it of the government to put me on trial! It’s THEIR fault for being too dumb to figure out they’re being scammed!
Caveat emptor. It doesn’t just apply to software. If you’re ignorant about what you’re buying, you deserve what you get.
Would you prefer if Microsoft stopped making good software?
Of course not! I would prefer they start.
Why don’t you at least learn to use the tags properly so someone has a chance to see what you’re babbling about.
No need for microsoft to go out, it can be very usefull to advance other operating systems. Ride it like an bronco.:)
Why don’t you at least learn to use the tags properly so someone has a chance to see what you’re babbling about.
I have a better idea. why don’t YOU stop trolling so we have more constructive comments on here instead.
Caveat emptor. It doesn’t just apply to software. If you’re ignorant about what you’re buying, you deserve what you get.
to a degree yes. but not to such poor software as m$
“Now the thread has deteriorated into some crackhead, slashdweeb comparison of Microsoft to the Nazi Germany or something. Some of you people need to get de-programmed from your stay at Stallman’s cambodian-style re-education camp. Geez.”
Well you all know the conversation has gone down hill, when ad homeniums are done to someone who’s not here to defend themselves. BTW He didn’t say a word about any particular “evil empire”, just that freedom is important. Important enough to defend, regardless of whom is doing the taking. No need to engage in character assasination.
All this simply recognizes that it is too late for Java to succeed in the Windows world. .NET is now too good.
True.
Sun no longer poses any threat to Microsoft. Part of this feeling is based on agreements between the two companies that have to exist but weren’t announced. For all we know, Sun may have given up the future of Java altogether and will allow it to wither away and be replaced by .NET.
True too. Sun will never recoup all the development costs of java from J2EE licenses.
Whether that’s the case or not, Java Desktop (Sun’s biggest strategic threat to Windows) is over. Sun now goes back to being just a maker of big Unix servers intended to support a Windows-centric IT world.
There’s a slim possibilty that Sun might be able to make a few bucks selling $399 pcs at Wal Mart with Java Desktop installed. They might want to give it a shot and I hear they will be(under the micron name or something).
The worst thing about this deal is that Sun brought it upon itself through a campaign of ridicule and hate promulgated personally by CEO Scott McNealy. This is McNealy’s failure and nobody else’s. The quotes last week from McNealy were laughable, the about face nothing short of shameful. How are Sun’s big customers going to believe what the company says in the future in the face of such a change? How can they base huge technical investments on the word of Sun?
McNealy’s rabid fascination of trying to take Microsoft head on has probably done more harm to Sun than anything else. He should have worked with Microsoft on letting Microsoft add extensions to Java for the windows platform. Now Java is dead on windows. Hehe, that about face must really hurt inside. He must have trouble looking at himself in the mirror in the morning. He brought it on himself.
So what happens now that Microsoft is essentially unfettered thanks to a few payoffs and a $10 million per month legal bill. What I see coming is karmic retribution that begins with a phase I think of as “the fleecing of the customers,” in which we will be forced to buy more and more stuff we don’t really want or need. Here’s an example from someone in a position to know who prefers to go unidentified:
“A company wanted to hold off on upgrading Microsoft Office for a year in order to do other projects. So Microsoft gave a ‘free’ copy of the new Office to the CEO — a copy that of course generated errors for anyone else in the firm reading his documents. The CEO got tired of getting the ‘please re-send in XX format’ so he ordered other projects put on hold and the office upgrade to be top priority. This is an implementation of Microsoft’s treadmill way of abusing its customers. Put them on a treadmill and start spinning it so fast that the customers can’t look at anything else besides Microsoft products.
Hehe, I guess it’s Microsoft’s fault that they suckered in the CEO.
The final stage I call “missing the boat,” which involves a significant advance in non-Microsoft technology that Redmond chooses to address by not addressing — they just dictate that it shall not be so, thinking that as always their word is law. Maybe this last stage has to do with Open Source but probably not. This stage has to be something beyond Netscape’s browser or Sun’s Java, because Microsoft was willing to embrace those and destroy them. Missing the boat means a zig that threatens the heart of Windows, probably associated with a hardware platform shift. Only this time, Microsoft will be too slow and customers, feeling abused and tired of the treadmill, won’t be so afraid. Bill Gates (it will still be Bill, because this will happen in the next decade I am sure) will again turn his corporate supertanker and add full power, but this time the competing ship will not only have a head start, it will be able to accelerate faster than Microsoft.
It has happened before. In fact it ALWAYS happens.
Time will tell if Microsoft stagnates and Open source can take the lead. Of course, according to 1998 slashdweebs Microsoft should be dead by now.
P.S.
signing off from my Gentoo/Gnome 2.6 system zealots
“As for Linux: It’s a non-factor unless it becomes a desktop *platform*.”
A one-two boxing in effect will do nicely.
[BOFH (IP: —.plus.com)]
“Would you prefer if Microsoft stopped making good software? You’d be left with no alternative to the crap which is produced by companies like Sun and Real, then.”
Sounds like a good definition of a monopoly.
[Leo (IP: —.adsl.proxad.net)]
“The best way to beat someone is to become he’s best friend.
”
I wonder if Stacker, and Mosaic were good friends?
[Jimbo (IP: —.adelphia.net)]
“When was the last time you read the bottom of ANY small product that did not have “made in China” written on it?”
*looks at side of soup can*
Made in Cincinnati, Ohio.
[Rayiner Hashem (IP: —.dc.dc.cox.net)]
“2) Who cares where you buy your products from? Its the capitalist way — and therefore the American way — to buy products from whoever can sell them to you the cheapest. Buying from more expensive companies just because they are American subverts the free market, and makes the economic pie smaller for all of us.”
This is ignoring of course all those qualities OTHER than price. e.g. quality.
[Metic (IP: —.pp.htv.fi)]
“People, economy and society need IT standards, something that they can trust their money, IT infrastructure and business on.”
They need open data standards more so than open os. Remember os and apps are a means to an end. e.g. data generation and manipulation.
[Lumbergh (IP: —.107.196.227.charter-stl.com)]
“God forbid that people have to drive a couple blocks to their local PC shop to buy a PC without an operating system installed.”
Looking at the bell curve part of history, how true would you say that was?
[J.F. (IP: —.kingman.az.npgco.com)]
“Microsoft NEVER gave us “the world’s first” ANYTHING. It was always available somewhere else first before Microsoft stol… er, BORROWED it. ”
MS Bob.
[ Foo Bar (IP: —.client.comcast.net)]
“That consent decree was in the early 90s. Some people can’t seem to move on. ”
Consequences never seem to have that problem.
“Caveat emptor. It doesn’t just apply to software. If you’re ignorant about what you’re buying, you deserve what you get.”
All I will say here is; I hope life doesn’t treat your decisions as badly as it treated theirs.
[Lumbergh (IP: —.107.196.227.charter-stl.com)]
“True”
For that to be true, you have to assume the “Windows world” consists solely of desktops.
“There’s a slim possibilty that Sun might be able to make a few bucks selling $399 pcs at Wal Mart with Java Desktop installed. They might want to give it a shot and I hear they will be(under the micron name or something). ”
You’re ignoring the OTHER stuff that Sun does. They also produce Solaris, and make server hardware.
“He should have worked with Microsoft on letting Microsoft add extensions to Java for the windows platform. ”
And the wisdom in that? Ignoring rabidism for a moment. Were’s the sense in allowing one company to make changes, without allowing others to make their own changes (ever seen a taffy pull)? And more importantly what does that do to the principle goals of Java?
“Hehe, I guess it’s Microsoft’s fault that they suckered in the CEO.”
Your compassion for your fellow man is duely noted.
Bear with me – this is on topic.
Over 100 years ago, cameras were large and cumbersome, and required a high degree of technical knowlege to operate. Along comes Kodak, “You take the picture, we do the rest” with the box Brownie and gets a virtual monopoly at the consumer level, because everyone and his dog could operate a box camera. The heavyweight tech stuff was still around for those who needed it. But eventually over 60 or 70 years their market share dwindled until thet were merely one strong competitor in a field of equals, Japanese innovation, personal preference, etc. – then along came digital and the whole pack of cards is thrown up in the air. They are still a strong company, but by no means a monopoly.
This is how I see the MS story going. Anyone who goes “Wow look, here comes Linux, Microsoft is finished!” is an idiot. So is anyone who fails to notice the steady progressive takeup of alternative OS, point of percentage point at a time.
I don’t actually see this taking 100 years in this case, times move faster now, and in many parts of the world there is a real resistance to getting tied in to US techno-lockup which shouldn’t be underestimated. But we’re still surely looking at 20-30 years of slow change – unless, that is, some new hardware technology (compare digital imaging) comes along and breaks the mould – in which case it’s anybody’s guess.
For that to be true, you have to assume the “Windows world” consists solely of desktops.
The funny thing about that a couple of my friends who do J2EE stuff regard it as overly-complex and pretty much a pain to work with. When they look at ASP.NET they see something they like and are awaiting the Mono 1.0 release. Microsoft has had plenty of hindsight and money to “correct” some of Java and J2EE’s problems. What do you think Project Rave is all about? It’s whole purpose is to compete with Visual Studio and ASP.NET.
And the wisdom in that? Ignoring rabidism for a moment. Were’s the sense in allowing one company to make changes, without allowing others to make their own changes (ever seen a taffy pull)? And more importantly what does that do to the principle goals of Java?
Let’s go back to the mid-90’s and look at what McNealy’s position was. He expressly stated that Java was the platform and the underlying OS is meaningless. His vision was thin clients running some form of java and Sun servers serving up apps. So what happened. The browser became the interface for many apps and you’ve got PHP, Perl, Python, and Java running on commodity x86 boxes serving up these pages. So his vision was wrong. Web apps serve a role, but there’s still a need for the rich client. XAML and whatever open source comes up will probably finally bridge that gap between the rich client and the web app.
Now as far as your main point about why should Sun should have let Microsoft add some extensions to java. Well, if they could have worked out some kind of licensing deal then at least Sun could have had their hands in what Microsoft was doing and maintained a bit of control. Think about it. Even though there would be a native gui for windows and maybe some other extensions to leverage the operating sytem at least you would have a lot of code that would be OS agnostic and developers would be still using java for the desktop. Now we come to the present. Java is dead on the windows desktop and pretty much dead on what I see of anything meaningful on the open source desktop except for some good IDEs because of the whole Swing debacle. Personally, I think WORA is overrated anyway. So in the end Sun basically gained nothing by not letting Microsoft have a license that permitted extensions.
Your compassion for your fellow man is duely noted.
I feel so sorry for the CEO of a company…poor man. Give me a break
I basically completely agree with everything you said.
If the zealots would step back a bit, have a little bit of patience, they would realize that Microsoft’s market share will eventually fall – it’s just not doing it at the pace that they want it to.
Longhorn with XAML and whatever Microsoft has in it will probably have some interesting bits that open source can learn from and hopefully improve upon, but the thing is Microsoft doesn’t sit still and even though open source is closing the gap right now it doesn’t mean that they will be any closer in the near future.
Once Linux hits some magic market share number ISVs and others will take notice and then things will get real interesting. In the meantime, things like Project Utopia have to get done so plugging in a digital camera is done like it is in Windows and OS X.
Except you forgot that in Kodak “Evolution” (?) They STOLE Polaroids “Instant” technology.
This damn near killed Polaroid. You see … Kodak had the financial clout to mass market the “instant” technology immediately… All without paying a bean to Polaroid.
It took many years … But Polaroid eventually won the lawsuit… But look, The world is now taking up digital “BIG TIME”, So because of Kodaks illegal action, Polaroid missed the “Gravy Train”. (Kodak sure as hell didn’t)
I think comparisons can be made. Anyone know the history of Internet Explorer for example.
Thats just ONE example (There are MANY)
Paul, Peterborough, Uk.
Polaroid were never big-time like Kodak, Fuji. Instant pictures were never a significant proportion of the total market, because of cost and poorer quality, until digital came along, nor would have been. Kodak, who incidentally manufactured Polaroid’s films for them, did try unsuccessfully to circumvent their patents, but never outsold Polaroid in the instant market anyway.
This is beside the point, Kodak had established their position 60 yrs before Polaroid came along. Polaroid regained their niche market and hold it now. There will always be these byplays in the history of things, but the overall trends are generally unaffected in the long run.
This whole thread goes to prove one thing. The law is an ass. The whole judicial system is incapable, and more importantly in such cases, has its hands tied behind its back.
Even though it might have seemed that the MSIE vs. Netscape issue and the WMP issues are important, they focused so much on particulars that they are outdated by the time the trial begins.
The big mistake in those trials is that they didn’t go for fundamentals (such as the prevention of the typical “Adopt, badly implement, drop” technology scenario, or whatever you might want to call it).
Even the secret API issue may have been better, but I am sure MS would have found a way around it, e.g., by publishing their secret APIs to proclaimed MS solution providers:).
One reader brought up taxing bad behaviour.
I am all for this approach. Rather than trying to convict MS, the authorities should set up legal rules that impose taxes on uncompetitive behavior. This is a good capitalistic approach. It pushes the market in a given direction, without being too restrictive. Also, an all-or-nothing ruling has such big implications that the forces that be will always be influenced to such a degree that the outcome will turn out to be inconsequential (or worse, in favor of incompetetive companies). Gradual taxing may not be seen by MS as a big threat, but it may reshape the market (either by “changing” MS; or if MS doesn’t get the message, by reducing MS’s market share directly).
That consent decree was in the early 90s. Some people can’t seem to move on.
MS hasn’t stop trying to prevent OEMs from carrying other OSs. About for years ago when some OEMs tried to pick up BeOS for example. Oh, and quite recently as well IIRC, when companies started selling Lindows.
It’s easy to move on if you weren’t affected by it, but when you have invested a lot of time and money in something and MS just puts it out like that it’s rather hard to just move on without justification.
>the problem of what to do to bring Microsoft into the civilized world.
Can’t say an author does not start on a high note.
>Where the governmental resolve would come to dissolve one of the greatest successes in world business is beyond me.
Are you implying that only uncivilized villans can become a great success in the world of American business? As well as when they are “civilized”- they become business losers? I see an irony in your logic.
>Nor would Microsoft’s pricing be considered predatory if its chief opponent was free software.
This is correct. Unfortunately, you just almost dismissed Netscape case against Microsoft as wrong, and put a big dent into Real case against Microsoft.
>most non-free software from commercial developers would also die
Wow! Imagine that, you have courage to critisize Open Source! Be warned: they can’t let you do that.
Let me explain: by your logic, Open Source is free as in $0 software. Now, if Microsoft to join that $0 software league- most non-free software from commercial developers would also die. All it takes to kill commercial software industry is for Microsoft to embrace Open Source.
Which also means by your logic: the root cause of commercial software death is Open Source.
>when the decks were cleared and Microsoft was down to, say $20 billion in cash, you can bet the rates would go back up in what might be properly perceived as traditional monopolistic behavior…
Hold on a minute! First of all, we know “pure” “honest” “clean” companies like Red Hat who play these tricks.
Second of all, assuming you are right, commercial software is dead, Microsoft is alive- where is OpenSource? It must be alive and kicking!
At the end, it will be Microsoft vs. OpenSource, all other commercial software already dead. Then, when $20 billion of Microsoft cash depleted, it will be OpenSource alone- if following your logic.
So, you again claim that OpenSource will kill all commercial software. You should allow Bill Gates qoute you in his speeches.
> it is too late for Java to succeed in the Windows world. .NET is now too good.
So, Java on Windows desktop and Windows server is dead too.
Again, wow! How much Microsoft pays you?
>Here’s an example from someone in a position to know who prefers to go unidentified: So Microsoft gave a ‘free’ copy of the new Office to the CEO — a copy that of course generated errors for anyone else in the firm reading his documents.
Here’s an example from someone in a position to know who prefers to go unidentified: So Sun gave a ‘free’ copy of the new StarOffice to the CEO — a copy that of course generated errors for anyone else in the firm reading his documents saved in XML format…
You see, I can make scary stories, too.
>”Never hate your enemies, it clouds your judgement.”
How true, how true…
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
So, bottom line, according to author who would like to scream “Microsoft must die!”:
1. American corporations successful in a business meaning of this word are all crooks. They must be dissolved, or made unsuccessful- for common good.
2. If your competitor gives his product for free, it is OK to follow the drift, even if you are a monopoly.
3. OpenSource will kill all commercial software.
4. After OpenSource will kill all commercial software, it will also kill Microsoft.
5. Java is dead, .Net rules.
6. Never hate your enemies, it clouds your judgement.
What’s needed is to end their monopoly on the desktop market, and to prevent it to spread into other areas.
But don’t worry this is happening right now.
It certaily looks like Microsoft is feeling the heat. We hear things like that they are going to ship longhorn without some of the previously announced features to get it out earlier. And they need that.
By 2007 Microsoft have planned to end the life of win2k. People who by then haven’t upgraded to WinXP probably havent done so because XP doesn’t offer them any advantages already found in win2k.
At the same time Gnome and KDE is advancing very fast. Gnome plans a new release every 6 months. By 2007 we would be running at least Gnome 3.2. Given how much especially Gnome have evolved the last few releases we can expect it to be one of the best desktop environmnets there is. Giving both Apple and Microsoft very hard competition with regards to usability. Even now, at version 2.6, Gnome looks like a good alfa version of the best desktop environment ever. (As a die hard KDE supporter I can’t belive I wrote that:-))
In the very near future we can expect Gnome to be based on vector graphics and more use of xml technology all making Longhorn, when it finally arrives, seam like yesterdays news.
We will have at least one major upgrade to OpenOffice in that time, and perhaps some new desktop applications. In 2006 press will be full of articles describing how fast, scalable and secure the new Linux 2.8 kernel is.
Furthermore, Linux live CD distributions will end the Linux is difficult myth.
So when our win2k users will have to chose a new OS by 2007 they will have a very real alternative. Even without Microsoft end of lifing win2k at 2007 we can expect Linux to get 10 to 15% of the desktops by that time. And that costitutes a market worth a lot of money, meaning that more and more desktop applications will be made available for Linux. Even Apple will probably strengthen their position.
Given that 5% of the windows users leave for other platforms each time Microsoft ends the life of a desktop product. The Microsoft market share will soon be down to about 70% for their desktop OS, and we can expect that some of these users will run other office suits than Microsoft Office. Today the market share of OpenOffice is already about 10% and most of that runs on windows. We can expect that figure to rise, as Microsoft products get harder to pirate due to software activation. Famillies are not going to buy multiple copies of MS-Office. They will run OpenOffice instead. And by doing so, they will become ambassadeurs for OpenOffice in places where people pay for software. To counter this, Microsoft could give 90% familly discounts, but that would probably lower the percieved value of the product in the business market. The commoditization of Office software is probably a much greater threat to Microsoft than Linux and Gnome.
We can expect Microsoft share holders to be worried (and rigtly so). The Microsoft stock price will go down and giving stock options to their emploees will no longer be so attractive.
Of course Microsoft could prolong the life of their products, but that would make little sense as there is likely going to be more open source developers than Microsoft developers available. So delaying would only put them in a worse position with respect to competition from open source, and it would also make their support costs go up.
To stay in business Microsoft will have to shift their business model from selling schrink wrapped packages to a support and customer related business model, and do business the same way most Linux related companies do now.
The problem for Microsoft is that they most likely pay licence fees to other companies for some of the technology in Microsoft products. That makes it expensive to give avay free copies of windows to increase the possible market for their new service based business. They will also have to provide service for old legacy versions of Windows. And being a large organization is not going to help them being flexible enough to quickly follow the needs of their customers in this area.
I think Microsoft have seen their best days, and we don’t need to worry about how to kill it, or if it is going to commit suicide. It will simply die from old age probably after a long time of irrelevance.
Like a crappy GUI bolted onto a DOS kernel. The registry and all the crap that has plagued Windows since. FAT32 which was a pathetic file system but unfortunately seems better for Windows than their NTFS which although tries to achieve much craps out without constant maintanence. What else. Oh year, DLL hell where apps would overwrite system and other app dynamic linked libraries with their own without checking for compatability and date signatures. Only really rectified with Windows XP (where every thing stores it’s own set of dlls from my understanding adding to storage waste and file duplication, but hey please enlighten me if I’m wrong). I prefer an intelligent modular system of sharing code and system resources. Nothing really achieved with Windows 95 and it was a P.O.S. that fell way short of the promise known as Cairo. All very rudimentary, but unfortunately with their move, computing “innovation” took a back seat for around 10 years.
I don’t give too much as to what the GUI can look like, I care about what I can do with computers. Spose it’s the creative side in me but give me Video, Audio, 3D and the rest, not pretty suedo 3D window frames. Thank God, hardware was able to keep up with the code bloat Windows added with every version released. As for stability, that’s the funniest thing I’ve ever heard.
<A billion to Real and another to Apple, and Microsoft will have silenced all of its victims, bolstering its European legal appeal and making the EU look stupid in the process. You heard it here first.>
Look I start to question the real attention that people put at things.
Again and I hope for the last time.
EU did NOT do what it did (meaning sentencing MS) because it felt like doing, or it did to have some favour to Sun and Real and surely not because it searched for something to do Saturday night instead of ending in a pub drinking a good Belgian Beer (Prost! buurrrps.)
The EU sentence has a reason of existing only in one dimension, that is: MS DID SOMETHING THAT IS ILLEGAL UNDER THE EU LAW!
They are delinquent, crooks, criminals, which sinonim should I use so that people understand?
They are monopolist that abused of their position. It does not really matter what they do with Sun and Apple in US, because this decision has value ONLY on the EU territory.
So, if they think to have any legal revenue from paying Sun europe they are sadly mistaken, because even if Sun decided to leave MS alone, it would not matter, because the decision has to do with the fact that MS attempted at the regular functioning of the market.
Thing that (for EU law) is ILLEGAL that Sun says something or not. A judge, (meaning even an antitrust commission) can act on a signal from a third part (like Sun) or on his
own istance if he thinks that there is a danger for the market.
At least it does work this way in EU.
So, what should we care about Sun selling itself? Good for it for their bucks. MS will be sentenced the same and in future they will be controlled and sentenced again if needed.
That’s it Folks.
Well, I really hate ms, but I don’t think that neither Linux nor Apple can stop ms, because win will be always the OS what everyone use, what everyone know, which is used. The Linux DEs are all like MacOS or Windows. People want sth. better than Windows, not the same. They don’t see a reason to change to Linux if Windows will be a bit better as in the moment. There was a change for Linux around 2000 where Linux was much better and much, much more stable than Windows, but it wasn’t ready for the use of home users. Than XP came and many people who aren’t experienced in computers (they are many) liked and they don’t see a reason to change to Linux because Linux don’t have any special programs or functions. I think we need an new OS with much innovation, because innovational products like the Amiga and BeOS were always liked by the people… If nobody program a other, really different ms will win, tcpa will win and we lose our freedom and ms will have the hole force.
with a hope, Ben
—
Well, sorry for my bad english… I didn’t read all the other long posts, because I don’t have the time and I only wanted to say what I think and maybe here is the right place to give motivation to people who want to make sth. new.
Capitalism is basically about economic competition, and MS monopoly prevents effective competition.
Because of monopoly MS can ask so high prices for their products, or have MS Windows preinstalled on almost every PC sold. That is simply unacceptable. Only the few people working at MS and totally tied to them can benefit from MS monopoly. All others suffer from such monopolies.
Some MS software is OK in itself, nothing against that. But I have a feeling that we would have even better MS AND other software from other manufactures if there was no MS monopoly. That’s just how the economy works in normal conditions. Competition brings better products.
Nope, not buying the comparison to US Steel or Standard Oil. The barriers of entry are low for software.
They are not low for *OSs*, which is the market from which Microsoft derives much of their money (about 50/50 with Office). In order to release a competing OS, you not only have to produce a better OS (cough, BeOS), but you have to produce the software base that goes along with that OS. This is precisely the problems faced by competitors to AT&T and Standard Oil. The ability to provide telephone service or refine oil meant nothing without the infrastructure of telephone lines and oil pipelines to go along it. The only reason Linux is even making a blip on the “Microsoft competitor” chart is because they’ve been able to establish the beginnings of such a software base.
OEM’s made the deals with Microsoft. Why don’t you blame them. Nobody forced OEMs to bundle windows with their machines.
Nobody forced OEMs to bundle Windows, but Microsoft did force OEMs to not bundle competitors to Windows. That’s called leveraging your monopoly power to quash competition.
Now you’re being ridiculous. The computer industry is “fledgling” and microsoft has cut its off at the knees?
Yes, the computer industry is “fledgling.” It has so much more potential than where it is know. Computers still suck. They are still hard to use, far too unstable, and require too much maintainence. The lack of competition in the software industry is holding it back. Contrast a highly competitive market (PC graphics hardware) to a low competition market (Office Suites). In the five years, graphics hardware has become an order of magnitude faster and more featureful. Can you honestly say that Office XP is even twice as good as Office 97? Is that because there is no way for office suites to innovate anymore, or because preserving the status quo is far more profitable for the Microsoft monopoly?
The crux of your and others arguments always boils down to people are too stupid to be aware of other options for software in the marketplace.
The crux of our argument is the same as the crux of any other anti-monopoly argument. Even when people are smart enough to be aware of other options in the software market, market forces prevent them from exercising that choice. Beyond that, there is a much simpler argument: Microsoft broke our laws. There is no reason to believe that these laws were unjust, and lots of reasons to believe that they are very benificial. Thus, Microsoft must be punished under those laws.
> They broke very *important* laws.
Murder? Rape? Treason? Did they give millions of people cancer and cover it up? Did they falsify the health of their company and in so doing destroy people’s retirement investments? Did they lie to the world about why they wanted to invade another country?
*Important* indeed.
> They have done immense damage to the software industry.
They built products people wanted to buy. Companies that build software that people didn’t want to buy died. I’m sorry if you feel that everyone is entitled to success no matter how they perform.
> It does not matter what else they have done, they must be punished.
They have been. Just because every zealot wants the death sentence means that it given.
> Justice cannot work on a case-by-case basis.
And yet the Antitrust laws apply restrictions to one company that do not apply to others. Every action Microsoft took could legally be done by some other company and has. This is an institutionalized double standard.
Perhaps more disturbing is that the Antitrust laws do not provide clear guidelines for determining exactly *when* you become a monopoly. Is there a hearing that determines the monopoly status of a product? No, a company finds out 5 years later after someone’s hurt feelings and a few political favors result in an attorney general taking action. Of course the AG is only in it so they can get themselves relected anyway.
Such is our “justice” system.
if you’re in the business of developing software then you can probably the cost of Visual Studio.
If you can afford a license for Visual Studio, you can probably afford a license for Qt. And before somebody chimes in that MS’s compilers are free — those are the unoptimizing standard edition compilers!
At least with Visual Studio you don’t have some crap per-app license that QT forces you into.
Don’t make me print out the TrollTech Qt manual and beat you over the head with it. Qt does *not* have a per-app license fee. It has a developer license — the library itself is freely redistributable.
You are correct, by you give Microsoft too little credit. This is the company which used to learn on its mistakes and turn their business 180 degrees faster than you spell “Mark Andreessen.”
Here is what Microsoft can do to stay in business, if it has to:
1. Extend life of Win2K. This one is easy, and with annual license fees from corporate subscribers is even profitable.
2. Extend life of Win XP. Most agree that it is good enough OS- as good as most of today’s Linux distros. Not so tomorrow- but tomorrow may never come or will come 3-4 years from now.
3. Drop retail Windows XP Home price to $40 to kill Linux penetration into mom-n-pop computer shops.
4. Get MS Office real cheap for home users: like their ‘Student and Teacher Edition” that can be installed on up to three computers, I believe.
5. Optionally, bundle MS Word into every OEM XP Home license for extra $10.
6. Optionally, offer home users Win XP for free, with optional subscription services in the range of $10-15/year, bug fixes and antivirus updates included.
There may be some other tricks. You know what Microsoft’s greatest friend is? It is economies of scale. It can afford to charge just $45 per copy of their OS for OEMs + free bug fixes included for up to 5 years, and still make profit on it.
They can continue to drop prices, and squeeze Linux “services” market.
Linux is not free- someone pays Linux developers, testers, QA, tech writers, managers, VPs and CEOs of Linux for profit companies.
Linux is often given for free- but it is not free as in $0 to produce and support. Microsoft needs to locate revenue stream for Linux corporations, which is in software subscriptions a.k.a. services subscriptions- and use the same model for its advantage.
Murder? Rape? Treason? Did they give millions of people cancer and cover it up? Did they falsify the health of their company and in so doing destroy people’s retirement investments? Did they lie to the world about why they wanted to invade another country? *Important* indeed.
” . . . [A prince] must abstain from taking the property of others, for men forget more easily the death of their father than the loss of their patrimony.” – Niccolo Machiavelli
A monopoly keeps you from acquiring property that you otherwise could have, which is equivilent to taking away property that you do have. It is important to our economy that we prevent such things from happening.
They built products people wanted to buy. Companies that build software that people didn’t want to buy died. I’m sorry if you feel that everyone is entitled to success no matter how they perform.
Nobody is begrudging them their success. But they didn’t just build software people wanted to buy. They used illegal tactics to quash competition. Such actions cannot be tolerated. Look: the fact that monopolies are a bad thing is not under question. We have monopoly laws for good reasons. If Microsoft doesn’t like our monopoly laws, they can stop doing business in our country.
They have been. Just because every zealot wants the death sentence means that it given.
Even Microsoft apologists agree that the ‘punishment’ Microsoft recieved is wholly inadequate for the magnitude of their crimes. Nobody wants the death sentence for corporate criminals like Kenneth Lay and the Enron executives, but nobody wants to see them get off with a slap on the wrist either!
And yet the Antitrust laws apply restrictions to one company that do not apply to others. Every action Microsoft took could legally be done by some other company and has. This is an institutionalized double standard.
Our laws are largely designed so that entities can act freely provided that they do no harm to others. Economic theory shows that monopolies do harm to others when they take certain actions that non-monopolies can take without harming anyone. Ergo, we have different standards set in law for monopolies and non-monopolies. If you disagree with the logic behind anti-trust laws, feel free to challenge the laws. You cannot, however, promote the uneven application of those laws!
Of course the AG is only in it so they can get themselves relected anyway.
AG’s don’t run for election, not in the United States anyway.
You expected a piece of software to work flawlessly? What are you, stoned or stupid? Can you look me in the eye and tell me Linux, BSD, OS X, Solaris have no bugs?
Nobody expects software to work flawlessly, but they do expect it to work adequately. Linux/BSD/OS X/Solaris/Windows NT work adequately. Windows 95 did not. It is a testament to their monopoly power that Microsoft managed to continue selling the Windows 9x series as long as they did.
So what you mean is, you didn’t understand VC++ and the MFCs… It’s almost infinitely harder, due to the lack of ‘sensible’ syntaxes, such as you’d find in VB .NET.
1) Syntax means little to real programmers.
2) You could figure out MFC, but find ObjC syntax an impediment to its usage??? And are you seriously citing VB.NET as an example of a “sensible” syntax???
And that statement just shows how little you know about the economic value of information. If I install Linux on a mission-criticl server, and then (god forbid) turn the machine off without running init 0 first, bye-bye data.
And this is not true on a Windows machine? In what parallel universe? Mounting the root filesystem syncronously has always been an option on Linux, and journaling has been available for ages!
Surprise surprise. And how about iTunes? Again, every platform apart from UNIX.
Eh? Somebody should go tell Apple that OS X isn’t a UNIX!
:They built products people wanted to buy. Companies that build software that people didn’t want to buy died. I’m sorry if you feel that everyone is entitled to success no matter how they perform.
Nobody wants to buy Windows. It is the worst professional OS out there (if you can call it professional) QNX,*nix,MacOS,RiscOS wipes the floor with it and BeOS,Geos,AmigaOS,OS/2 wiped the floor with it in their time. Windows lost technically big time with every compeditor and was always a generation being.
The reason Windows is standard is due to MS being a monopoly. There is no one OS that fits all as of yet and since no effort has been made to make consumers smart, they don’t know how to shop for an OS. Of course now it makes no sence since Windows is so big they are punished for using anything else.
:Nobody expects software to work flawlessly, but they do expect it to work adequately. Linux/BSD/OS X/Solaris/Windows NT work adequately. Windows 95 did not. It is a testament to their monopoly power that Microsoft managed to continue selling the Windows 9x series as long as they did.
I have never had a problem with QNX
On The Screen Savers on Techtv, they said OS X, has just had 2 viruses sofar. How many has Windows had 100+? If MS really cared about its customers, they would do something about security. If linux has better scurity without billions to back it, MS should be ashamed of themselves for windows.
Linux users’ obsession with beating Microsoft on the desktop is a bit backward-looking. The new hardware platform that Cringley mentions is already here: Smartphones, webpads, DVR/file server/router boxes. People don’t expect the interfaces on these to be _exactly_ like windows, so they won’t mind a new platform as long as it’s easy to use. If Linux/OSS developers were as obsessed with small/simplified form factor platforms (e.g., GPE, OPIE; we don’t even have a distribution designed for DVRs) as they are with Gnome and KDE, in three years Linux/OSS could completely dominate the small/simplified form factor. We have the added advantage that the hardware for these will become cheaper every year and consumers won’t want to pay $200 for the software. Instead, much more energy goes into the desktop, which is like the mainframe of our day.
Lumbergh, Linus Torvalds is the original author of Linux operating system, he authored it while he worked and studied at the Department of Computer Science at the University of Helsinki 1988-1997. Get your screws tighter before you open your cake-hole…..
“Yeah, your nick fits you perfectly
I still think Microsoft resembles a Dictatorship more that capitalism.If they were operating capitalistically, why then are they getting all these fines?
“Been drinking a little bit too much tonight? That is so funny that I’ll let you ponder the nonsense.
Maybe Finnish-Socialism(Linux)will eventually beat Microsoft at its on windowing system game,,I hope.
Haha, that one is just as ridiculous as the last one. When did Finnish socialists start running Linux development. Linus lives in Silicon Valley and despises hard leftists. Read his book.”
Uh, wake up; what do you think many small devices are running on? And there is a whole new set of competition outside of Microsoft when it comes to small form factor devices.
You people wonder why Linux lover’s wanna beat Microsoft on the desktop? Duh, it’s the same reason professional football players want to win the superbowl: That’s the goal. Remember the phrase “it’s the economy stupid?” Well, “that’s capitalism stupid.”
Anyone who does not enjoy winning please speak up. And people who don’t enjoy winning as the under dog please also speak up. Now, if you are so inclined to massochism that you would not enjoy defeating seeming insurmountable odds than by all means please say so.
What do you guys expect, that Linux lovers will simply roll over and beg Microsoft for a truce? Come on, I can’t believe fans of a company famous in capitalism would actually complain that it is being competed with (no matter what your opinion of the level of competition). If you are criticising Linux for competing with Microsoft on a level that you believe it to be inferior on than you need to look back through Microsoft’s history to Netscape. Remember that? Whether you thought it, illegal, immoral, or everyday business it still bears striking similarity to Linux competing in an arena where it certainly is the underdog.
Linux on the desktop is here, no matter how popular it gets.
Oh, and the reason developers are working on desktop linux is because we use desktop linux. We work for our own computing experience, and that is what makes linux beautiful. Our only boss is our own pride.
People use msft products because they were lead to believe, by means of massive marketing, that msft products were better. A product only exists to consumers if it has a huge publicity campaing behind!
I really don’t care if msft has a monopolly as long as it doesn’t prevent my favorite OS from supporting my favorite hardware. I wouldn’t mind if I were the only guy using Linux/*BSD…
The biggest company the world has ever seen , and never will face
such a huge company , was the Dutch VOC. It existed for nearly 200 years and did collapse in the end. Companies like GE etc. were
compared with the VOC cornershops in a middleclass city. So M$ will collapse sooner or later. NO doubt about that:-).There is NO need for suicide:-)
regs
hgm
I guess everything -and nothing at all- has already been said in this discussion… The same can be said about the original article itself, though. I mean, is it useful, is it anything more than fuel for people to set flamebaits -and bite them- around the net? Hardly. (See example in these 90+ comments.)
By the way, who is this Cringely anyway? Oh, wait… 20 years writing about the PC business. Ahm… one of those… tsk. Move along, nothing here to see.
On The Screen Savers on Techtv, they said OS X, has just had 2 viruses sofar. How many has Windows had 100+? If MS really cared about its customers, they would do something about security. If linux has better scurity without billions to back it, MS should be ashamed of themselves for windows.
Please do not take this the wrong way, but either TeckTV is missinformed, or you heard incorrectly. MacOS has had one (1) concept virus that was made public 4 days ago, but nothing to hurt the system yet (Can you believe over 2 years without 1 virus that does any system harm!?!?). As far as the Windows part of it, I think i heard a few years ago that there were close to 60 new/variants to viruses made each day for those computers. What a joke.
For MacOS X Anyways!
Nobody wants to buy Windows. It is the worst professional OS out there (if you can call it professional) QNX,*nix,MacOS,RiscOS wipes the floor with it and BeOS,Geos,AmigaOS,OS/2 wiped the floor with it in their time. Windows lost technically big time with every compeditor and was always a generation being.
That’s right! Nobody wants to buy Windows. But they don’t give a damn about QNX, MacOS, RiscOS, BeOS, GeOS, AmigaOS,
OS/2,*nix either.
For the hundredth freakin’ time, people care about which applications they _want_ to run, not the OS. Macs are in 2nd place because they at least offer this. Get a clue: Most OSS desktop apps are outclassed. Stop trying to fight the whole commercial world, and help Linux become an OS that encourages porting.
If it was a matter of an Open Source OS like Linux, and a variety of familar commercial apps (and games), believe me, people will hop on the Linux bandwagon — because very few care about the OS.
Linux users’ obsession with beating Microsoft on the desktop is a bit backward-looking. The new hardware platform that Cringley mentions is already here:
Agree with everything you said, which is why I think the Playstation (a game console for heaven’s sake) has a better chance than Linux right now.
Linux and other alternative desktops are already light years ahead of windows. In both Linux and OSX you just have to plug in a digital camera and guess what it works flaulessly ! No fishing for the correct drivers or trying to figure out why that dll file or that registry key got corrupted!
What version of Windows are you using? I’ve got Macs, a Linux box, and a Windows box in the room I’m at, and they all recognize my camera the same way (plug-it-in, voila).
Dang! There’s a lot of Microsoft shills and astroturfers on this thread. They refute logic and facts while spouting the Holy Microsoft Chant.
I’ve been using Linux since it was pre-fucking-1.0 asshat. And UNIX systems before that. What do you have? Mandrake? Also, I prefer Macs if anything. Just because I see the value of Windows doesn’t mean anything.
We’re fanboys? ROFL. You’re the ones that can’t accept the truth. Windows has trounced Linux in every area since Win 2000, and it will continue to do so until Linux is relegated to those with an interest in the history of failed OSes, just like those people who still use VMS and OS2.
Trudat bro.
I agree with practically every single one of stray’s comments; here’s someone who (like me) uses alternative platforms, and yet realises the benefits of Windows over the others.
(Specifically: BOFH, stray, Lumberg)
I’d like to thank you for settling once and for all that Windows advocates can be as rude and condescending – not to mention foul-mouthed – than what OSS advocates are regularly accused of being.
In fact, it had been a while since I’d read such aggressive postings, using insults and such. At least now we can put the “Linux zealots harm their own cause” debate.
Stray
Macs are in 2nd place because they at least offer this.
You do realize that Linux is about to surpass Macs in terms of market share, right? (That is, if it hasn’t already.)
Get a clue: Most OSS desktop apps are outclassed.
That is an opinion, not facts. In my view, quite a few OSS apps outclass proprietary offerings. Konqueror and K3b are some fine examples, as are Evolution, GIMP, and many others. Some proprietary apps may be better in some aspect, but to say that OSS apps are “outclassed” is not fair, IMO.
Agree with everything you said, which is why I think the Playstation (a game console for heaven’s sake) has a better chance than Linux right now.
Comparing apples and oranges, aren’t we? In any case, this is quite a nonsensical comparison because there is a very high chance that the PS3 will run a version of Linux as its primary OS. So in fact Linux may come to challenge Windows through the PlayStation, not in competition with it.
I’ve been using Linux since it was pre-fucking-1.0 asshat. And UNIX systems before that. What do you have? Mandrake? Also, I prefer Macs if anything. Just because I see the value of Windows doesn’t mean anything.
Yeah, these kinds of claims are easy to make, but on the Internet one can claim anything. To me, it seems that someone using terms like “asshat” and “pre-fucking-1.0” doesn’t have much credibility in the first place, but it is possible that you did indeed use Linux since the early days, and UNIX before that. I don’t believe, personally, but it’s quite possible. In any case it’s irrelevant: I’ve been using Windows since 2.0 (and DOS before that, on the very first IBM PCs), and I don’t go claiming that I can criticize MS because of that fact.
The problem is not with seeing the value in Windows, but failing to see the threat in Microsoft. No company should be allowed to have as much weight and clout as MS – it’s become a menace to the very industry it helped create, and should be cut down for its own good.
Oh, and don’t BS me with “capitalism” – everyone who knows anything about economics knows that capitalism died in 1929, and that our economic systems are mostly mixed, with some socialist elements thrown in with a good dose of Keynes.
Yes, you are fanboys.
Windows has trounced Linux in every area since Win 2000
Except for security, stability and value-for-price. Oh, and access to the source code – you know, that little thing that is about to cost Microsoft most of East Asia?
You have been aggressively trolling this comment section, trying to provoke yet another OS flame-war while defending the actions of a company whose main goal is to shut out all competion through unfair use of its monopoly status. You keep denigrating the work of tens of thousands of talented developers while turning a blind eye to the substantial advances achieved by Linux (especially abroad).
In short, even MS takes Linux more seriously than you do. And that, dear BOFH, qualifies you as a bona fide fanboy. You may start insulting me now.
here’s someone who (like me) uses alternative platforms, and yet realises the benefits of Windows over the others.
Apart from the fact that this is an unproven claim, it means literally nothing. I use Windows and Linux about equally, and have in fact used Windows for much longer – and yet I realize the benefits of Linux over it. So drop down the condescending “I use both Linux and Windows, so I know what I’m talking about” attitude, as it cut both ways. Moreover, in your case I personally believe that you’re only making it up in order to give yourself more credibility. Well, it ain’t working – another argument for dropping the facade!
It smells better. It looks prettier. But it’s still shit. No matter how many times you drag your feet on the grass, you cannot get rid of it.
So, how did MS get so BIG? Well, it sure ain’t cause they make A+ software. You have to thank those idiots at HP, DELL, GATEWAY, ZEOS, COMTRADE, COMPAQ, PACKARD BELL, and every other DICKHEAD who signed that stupid freaking bootloader licences to save a wopping $49 dollars off the cost of a PC, which by the way, was never passed to the consumer as savings. It those narrow minded a-holes who gave MS the Means to get the power! (Golden Rule: He Whom has the Gold Makes the Rules)
Really, you would think that after Billions of Dollars Windows would be perfect, NOT! It’s time for a change…..
Hum…..how bout these FACTS:
30 Million Dollars Invested.
Best Multiprocessor Kernel ever created. (Better than Linux!)
Easily add new technology to old applications. (A Trick no OS Can Do!)
Considered by may top PC Programmers, as the Best OS Every Created. Killed by the boot loader licences, Thanks A-Holes!
New Life given by Yellowtab. (www.yellowtab.com)
Support it and you will be set Free from the Grips of Microsoft. That’s a fact, not a promise! Get the Power!
“Now as far as your main point about why should Sun should have let Microsoft add some extensions to java. Well, if they could have worked out some kind of licensing deal then at least Sun could have had their hands in what Microsoft was doing and maintained a bit of control. ”
MS could have honored the terms that SUN gave them instead of going off on their own, and extending it. The fact that you have to pay a kind of tribute to MS to get work done strengths the monopoly argument.
“Think about it. Even though there would be a native gui for windows and maybe some other extensions to leverage the operating sytem at least you would have a lot of code that would be OS agnostic and developers would be still using java for the desktop.”
Sounds like a monopoly to me. If you have to get Microsoft’s permission to run on the desktop, then there’s a problem. Besides we’ve seen what do your own thing can do to a market e.g. Unix market.
“Personally, I think WORA is overrated anyway. So in the end Sun basically gained nothing by not letting Microsoft have a license that permitted extensions.”
As opposed to MS WOROW (Write Once Run Only On Windows)(1). And once again we have an affirmation that SUN needs Microsofts permission to run on Windows desktops.
(1) Another reason people stayed with MS. They didn’t want to do the cross-platform work necessary. Also WORA threatened to make a particular OS irrelevent.
Yeah, these kinds of claims are easy to make, but on the Internet one can claim anything.
I didn’t say I was some rockstar or hot chick, did I? Lol, man, why would that be something worth lying about (maybe for you it is)? I’m only making a point: I don’t appreciate it when someone wants to color me bad and generalize things because I defend Windows, when I’ve used Unix, including Linux, and Macs, longer than I’ve used Windows (And I barely use Windows at that).
I’m not a Windows lover or Linux hater, I just use
“whatever” technology in “general”. If that isn’t good enough for this emerging “Linux community”, that it’s not 100% loyalty to your beloved OS, then that’s sad.
To me, it seems that someone using terms like “asshat” and “pre-fucking-1.0” doesn’t have much credibility in the first place
I know it’s Easter and all, but if you think using the word “Fuck” is criteria for thinking someone has no credibility, then it’s you that needs to grow up.
Comparing apples and oranges, aren’t we? In any case, this is quite a nonsensical comparison because there is a very high chance that the PS3 will run a version of Linux as its primary OS.
Why do you say “very high” chance the “primary OS” will be Linux? They’ve only said it will run Linux. That doesn’t mean they’ve decided to redesign everything and throw all the work on the Cell OS out the door or something.
:For the hundredth freakin’ time, people care about which applications they _want_ to run, not the OS
Not true. People don’t want MS Office they want compaiblity with documents from their work and freinds. People buy Windows out of ignorance. I gave newbies computers with QNX NC installed and they have had no problems. I do have to keep reminding them that it is not Windows and Abi Word is not MS Word yet they never keep bugging me about problems like newbies that use Windows and they seem to have a far better computer experince then new windows users.
I hate that Windows newbies think computers are not reliable but once I introduce them to QNX they realize it is just Windows that is not reliable and computers in general are not to blame. My mom used mainframes in the 60’s and now is getting into PCs she hated Windows since the mainframes at the railway she worked on never failed so once I got her on Linux (that she found familure yet rusty on) she enjoyed her PC.
I didn’t say I was some rockstar or hot chick, did I? Lol, man, why would that be something worth lying about (maybe for you it is)? I’m only making a point: I don’t appreciate it when someone wants to color me bad and generalize things because I defend Windows, when I’ve used Unix, including Linux, and Macs, longer than I’ve used Windows (And I barely use Windows at that).
I’m not a Windows lover or Linux hater, I just use
“whatever” technology in “general”. If that isn’t good enough for this emerging “Linux community”, that it’s not 100% loyalty to your beloved OS, then that’s sad.
He didn’t paint you any color than the one that was suited to you. The fact is that you are trolling. So of course you’d be painted as one.
Its not about you ‘defending’ the windows OS or the fact that you use whatever that you use for the job. Its the fact that you use the same FUD over and over again. The world isn’t going to change just for you. Its round so you might as well get used to it.
Lying to yourself and others does nobody good! Expecialy when on the topic of a criminal corperation.
Why do you say “very high” chance the “primary OS” will be Linux? They’ve only said it will run Linux. That doesn’t mean they’ve decided to redesign everything and throw all the work on the Cell OS out the door or something.
Because it is already the market trend. Linux IS already futher ahead. So being what it is already, its the first OS that truly is getting better and not based on a market scam.
It’s STILL not a matter of choice. If people had a variety of OSes offered to them when they bought a PC we might well see a proprietary unix or linux as the standard. But they don’t, they have Windows shoved down their throats whether they want it or not.
It’s STILL not a matter of choice. If people had a variety of OSes offered to them when they bought a PC we might well see a proprietary unix or linux as the standard. But they don’t, they have Windows shoved down their throats whether they want it or not.
I totaly agree!