__/ [ John Bailo ] on Sunday 20 May 2007 03:17 \__
> Roy Schestowitz wrote:
>
>
>> | "Said another way, Microsoft achieved record breaking earnings during
>> | the Vista launch quarter by taking money out of its assets, not
>
> I wonder if they've been doing this since Day One.
>
> I mean, think about it.
>
> How long have they been having 10 billion dollar quarters.
>
> And how much do they really have to spend since they only update their
> products every 5 years.
>
> You'd think that after 10 years of 10 billion dollar quarters they'd have
> something in the bank like at least 200 billion dollars...but it's more
> like a quarter of that.
>
> Where's the missing money?
I've observed this for a while and I suspect that Microsoft won't publish
Vista 'sales' figure for much longer. It needs that initial brag while it
channel-stuffs the OEMs, who are forced (or will be forced in 2008) to sell
Vista on all PCs. The deal with Lenovo is an example of this.
The money is being extracted from savings that have been piled to create
mounds of cash over the years (the 90s were good times for Microsoft). These
mounds of cash have been used not only for propaganda purposes (advertising,
including anti-Linux propaganda and crusades). Cash was also used to catch
up, e.g. by building colossal datacentres, which are intended to compete
with Google on search. The big and mighty cash cow is Office. Most other
divisions are as successful to Microsoft as PS3 has been successfull to Sony
so far.
I'm still waiting until the ODF epidemic spreads around the world. It is
already happening in Europe in Asia, but Microsoft lobbies aggressively. It
won't last for long. Office becomes less necessary. Along with that, Windows
becomes obsolete. Then, security issues and woe relating to cost go away.
Microsoft is fighting. It gets ugly. We said something about this last
year... Microsoft will not go down without a fight... this year we saw
bullying in Florida (interception of pro-OpenDocument bill) and Capone-like
tactics against Linux, with a lot of placements in the press.
Microsoft will be remembered as a company that became more powerful than a
government. It became oppressive and militant. Inevitably, it lost the
fight. It could not fool /everyone/.
--
~~ Best regards
Roy S. Schestowitz | "This sig seemed like a good idea at the time..."
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