Re: Microsoft edging toward the brink? -- Novell will break MS

["Bryan J. Smith" <b.j.smith@ieee.org>]

On Sat, 2005-02-12 at 19:39 -0600, Robert Citek wrote:
> I'd agree if they did outsource everything.  But as you mention, MS 
> does have their own development team.

But they don't develop much beyond the core components.

> Also, I can't think of one instance where MS has acted like a venture
> capitalist or angel investor.  Instead, they tend to purchase the
> competing business outright, or crush them.

You're not looking at their minority stakes in major blue chip
companies.  They've been doing that since the mid-'90s.

> But I'm curious to know, how do you see MS as an investment company?

Starting 2 years ago, over 33% of their profits were from investments
outside of the software industry.  Again, they own minority stakes in
major Blue Chip companies.

But most people don't know this.

> That is very true: if you knew about FLOSS and where to get it, you 
> could.  That's also true of pirated software: if you knew about it and 
> where to get it, you could.  But MS is making it harder and harder to 
> get its software, even pirated versions.  For one, each new OS required 
> a more powerful computer.  Then, with each new OS there were more hoops 
> to getting it to run, with the most recent hoop being "activation."  A 
> future hoop: hardware authentication.  As time goes on, those hoops 
> that MS puts up are beginning to look like enormous obstacles.

You're telling this to a guy who boots XP so little, that there is a 50%
chance I have to re-activate it.  ;->

> Now enter FLOSS, BitTorrent, and inexpensive broadband.  With FLOSS 
> getting more and more press, people are beginning to realize that they 
> could keep their existing hardware and install FLOSS instead.  But how 
> do they get FLOSS?  Answer: use BitTorrent and download the FLOSS over 
> your inexpensive broadband connection.

Again, how did this differ than CD swaps or downloads from friends
before?  I don't see this causing an increased adoption of Linux.  It's
merely an avenue.

BSD, Linux and other development and adoption was going on well before
cheap broadband.

> Agreed.  But I think that more and more businesses are realizing that 
> they don't have to go to CompUSA or Best Buy to get their software.  In 
> fact, they are realizing they don't even have to go to CDW to have 
> software shipped to them.  Businesses are getting more and more 
> comfortable with getting software over the Internet.  We do.  In fact, 
> we even get MS software over the internet.  For example, we never 
> installed IE6 from a CD at work.  We got it over the 'net from 
> Microsoft.   For some other software, we downloaded the ISO and, after 
> purchase, we were sent (e-mail, fax, voice, etc.) the software key to 
> install it.  We are becoming very comfortable with getting software 
> (and other items, e.g. orders, contracts, etc.) over the 'net.

At the same time, we have rampant spyware issues.

> If businesses can get MS software over the 'net, the obvious question 
> then becomes what other software can they get over the 'net?  Answer: 
> FLOSS, with perhaps the biggest example to date being FireFox.  And how 
> can we get FLOSS quickly and reliably?  Answer: BitTorrent.  (Although 
> Mozilla has not provided BitTorrent as an option, most distributors of 
> ISOs that are including Mozilla FireFox do, including the OpenCD, 
> Fedora, Xandros, and Knoppix.)

And yes, I have been recommending The OpenCD very often since I first
heard about it a few years ago.

> So, while I agree that business consumers will challenge Microsoft, I 
> believe they will be looking to non-traditional distributors and 
> non-traditional distribution methods, such as BitTorrent.  And, 
> initially, they will not be looking so much to linux (except maybe the 
> IT department for their servers), but rather to desktop applications 
> like FireFox, OpenOffice.org, Thunderbird, that extend the life of 
> their existing desktop hardware and run on their existing familiar 
> desktop operating system: Windows.

But there is still a lot that comes from the traditional OEM channels.

> Thoughts?  BTW, the above is just an opinion and I reserve the right to 
> be wrong.  :)

-- 
Bryan J. Smith                                  b.j.smith@ieee.org 
---------------------------------------------------------------- 
Community software is all about choice, choice of technology.
Unfortunately, too many Linux advocates port over the so-called
"choice" from the commercial software world, brand name marketing.
The result is false assumptions, failure to focus on the real
technical similarities, but loyalty to blind vendor alignments.



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