__/ [ Rex Ballard ] on Thursday 21 September 2006 06:17 \__
> Au79 wrote:
>> WebProNews - Lexington,KY,USA
>>
>> The potential for Linux making an impact on the European Union economy
>> isn't covered in an IDC whitepaper sponsored by Microsoft. ...
>><http://www.webpronews.com/expertarticles/expertarticles/wpn-62-20060920LinuxOptionsOmittedFromVistaSurvey.html>
>
> I'm surprised that Microsoft allowed this one to be published in this
> form. Essentially, they are explaining how they will radically
> increase the amount of money spent on IT to support Vista.
...At the expense of European citizens, whose money will flow outside of
Europe rather than float therein. This is an argument that South Africa used
at the time in order to defend Open Source policies.
> This is supposed to be a "Good Thing" because it means that more people
> will be employed babysitting Vista.
More like sitting on a baby. Or a 'pig'...
> If this is ever referenced in an SEC filing, it would be securities
> fraud. They are predicting 75% market saturation within 12 months,
> even though Vista won't even be released until 2007. This indicates
> that Microsoft does indeed plan on doing another force-feed.
Live OneCare can be characterised as a force-feed. It's charged for annually
and it serves as a a surrogate to bugfixing.
> This means that Microsoft will force OEMs, corporate customers, and
> resellers to accept "shipments" of nearly 100 million licenses that
> will not be deployed, just "counted" to "prove" massive market
> penetration. This is what happened with XP. But it triggered a
> "covert revolt" among corporate customers, who formulated plans for a
> "disaster recovery plan" that included a mass-migration to Linux,
> should Microsoft try to "put the squeeze" on them again.
Parts of Europe are already migrating to Linux on the desktop. Clearly they
have had enough. And I don't think that astroturfing and lobbying helps
either, namely the type of thing that encouraged software patents and
legistlation pushed on by corporations. Why, for example, should it be
illegal to play DVD's on Linux, an open and unieversal platform?
Side note: Google seems to have joined the same wave recently, quite sadly.
> We'll see whether these companies are still ready to execute those
> plans. Or whether they will sit there and pay triple again what they
> have been paying for Microsoft's "support" program, and accept "force
> feed" shipments of Vista licenses that they will not be able to use in
> the existing hardware, try to "panic buy" enough machines to actually
> get these users into Vista systems over 12-24 months.
One wonders if neglect of older versions of Windows (IE7, for instance, is
not compatible with Windows 2000) will be a strategy.
Best wishes,
Roy
--
Roy S. Schestowitz | "Computers are useless. They only solve problems"
http://Schestowitz.com | SuSE GNU/Linux ¦ PGP-Key: 0x74572E8E
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