On Jan 3, 5:06 pm, The Ghost In The Machine
<ew...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Sinister Midget
> <fardblos...@xxxxxxxxx>
> wrote
> on Thu, 3 Jan 2008 15:12:54 -0600
> <mnvv45-p3e....@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:
> > MS seems to be past it's heyday, too. Rigor mortis just needs a little
> > more time to become so evident that even the armchair medical experts
> > (tech press, Windummies, DuFuses, Quooks, Timmies, etc) won't be able
> > to deny the state of its death.
> The reports of MSFT's demise are greatly exaggerated,
> presumably. After all, we're talking a corporation that is
> making over $54B of revenue and $14.88B of income a year,
> with no debt and 23.3% quarterly year-on-year earnings growth.
Don't forget that $25 billion in cash and short term investments.
They also have a $4 billion advertising budget that buys a lot of good
press. In addition, they use their control over trademarks very
aggressively to control almost $20 billion in OEM advertizing budgets.
Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer own a huge percentage of the company, and
only if State Street and Vanguard agreed together that Bill or Steve
should go, could they be fired, which means that ever if they commit
criminal acts and admit them in court, they are pretty pretty much
immune. Microsoft spends nearly $1 billion in legal fees and $2
billion in settlements each year, most of which goes to settlements of
lawsuits involving criminal activities such as fraud, extortion,
sabotage, blackmail, obstruction of justice, and collusion.
Microsoft could probably continue to pump $5 billion/year into funding
it's revenue stream for a few more years if they think it will help
them retain their monopoly control over the market.
> This is not to say Windows is any good from a technical
> standpoint; it's pure crap.
Windows has always been technically inferior to competitors, including
Mac, OS/2, Solaris, UnixWare, and Linux. On the other hand, it's
"good enough" to maintain their monopoly control, when they can strong-
arm OEMs into excluding competitors by making it too expensive not to
do so. It's "good enough" when they can get CIOs to force every
employee to use Windows, often to the exclusion of all others, by
threatening these CIOs with license audits, including CALs for servers
and other expensive audits.
> However, it's highly
> profitable crap...and I for one have no idea how we'd
> unseat this monster,
Go through my postings in the COLA newsgroups, and my links and
archives at Open4Success. There is a strategy, it is being
implemented, and it is working.
Linux is doing the right things right. They have worked to make it as
easy as possible for Windows users to take Linux for a "test drive"
without having to wipe out Windows. This has gotten progressively
easier each year. In 1993, you had to repartition your hard drive,
install Linux in the new partition, and boot either Linux or Windows.
Today, Windows users can boot into Linux using a Live-DVD and a "thumb
drive". They can also install VMWare Player and a Linux "Appliance"
and have a LInux desktop running in a few minutes with no installation
effort. Magazines like PC world are even offering the Linux
appliances on DVD now.
Linux then makes it possible to run Windows applications from Linux.
They can use WINE, or desktop virtualization to run Windows from
Linux. This makes it easier for Windows users to make the transition
from Windows as the primary desktop OS to Linux as the primary desktop
OS, yet they can still have all the capabilities of Windows as well.
Linux provides as much driver support as possible, and lets customers
and OEMs alike know what devices, such as DirectX/10 will NOT be
supported by Linux. They also make it easy to use those Live-CDs or
Live-DVDs to boot Linux on a machine they might purchase (or purchase
in quantity), and determine immediately whether it will run Linux or
not.
Linux Distributors work with OEMs to formulate public announcements as
to which of their products are "Linux Ready". In some cases, the OEMs
even announce that Linux is "available" for that line of PCs. This
allows them to monitor the sales of Linux hostile vs Linux Ready
systems and adjust prices appropriately. When they start to see that
"Linux Ready" PCs are more profitable than "Window Only" PCs, more
computers will become Linux ready.
Linux encourages distributors to maintain their diversity, while
maintaining a common standard framework (LSB). This will allow OEMs
to create a wider range of offerings from $100 kiddie laptops to
$3,000 power-user laptops.
In additon, Linux opens up new markets that were "under the radar" to
Microsoft. Linux distributors worked with companies like Dell, HP,
IBM/Lenovo, and others, helping them ship lease-return laptops too old
to run modern versions of Windows and Office, to 3rd world countries,
or give them to extremely low-income families, where they could be
quickly, cheaply, and easily loaded with legal Linux licenses, and
given to these most needy users.
These users then had the chance to learn how computers actually work,
rather than just how to play video games. The result being that they
became more motivated to study science, math, English (primary
language of the Internet), and communication skills, including social
sciences, art, music, and literature. This better trains them to
learn about business, engineering, politics, and economics. Their
close ties to extremely poor communities enables them to lift up other
members of those communities, creating a whole new market for PCs in
general.
> especially if Bill Gates sees a
> threat to his business and runs to someone like George
> Bush for protection.
It's ironical that George Bush's "protection" may have actually done
more harm than good. The court case illuminated Microsoft's RICO-like
practices, their strong-arm tactics, and their illegal activities, and
ties them directly to the highest ranking executives at Microsoft.
The lack of enforcement of the settlement has led the industry, and
regulators in other countries to become much more determined to break
the Microsoft Monopoly, without setting up a new monopolist. This is
one of the reasons that the OEMs are so interested in Linux rather
than SCO Unix or Solaris.
The case has also made Microsoft's competitors, past, present, and
future, much more determined to break the monopoly as well, and adopt
a more "open" technology framework. Apple adopted BSD Unix, and
showed the world that UNIX could be made user friendly, then put those
user friendly UNIX systems on retailer shelves. From there, UNIX
powered Macs have been showing up everywhere, especially places like
Starbucks, Airports, and other places where executives want a
reliable, secure, and useful system they can take on the road and to
meetings.
> The good news: Microsoft has proven itself quite proficient
> at shooting itself in the foot.
Microsoft has "bet the farm" several times, and lost. They lost with
Windows NT 3.1 and 3.5. They spent $billions developing it, and had
to spend $billions more to come up with Windows 95 before the market
started a mass migration to Linux.
They lost with Windows ME. They tried to come up with a "Linux-proof"
operating system that would lock out competitors by requiring hardware
with drivers that only Microsoft could license, they tried to extend
the Windows 9x franchise into the 21st century. And it backfired.
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