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ESR Says as PCs Get Cheaper, Windows Will Die
james writes "Eric Raymond reckons Windows will be obsolete because people won't be able to afford it soon." Owning the OS gives MS too great of
an advantage. They'd sell the client for 5 bucks if
it meant that they could still control Office, the
server market, and the zillions of other markets that
their OS monopoly lets them crush.
No, Eric, microsoft will not go away like you've claimed for several years. Linux won't win the desktop 'war'. Get over it. Nobody cares anymore.
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News flash: Product fails because no one's buying it.
Anyways, PC's are a LUXURY, not a necessity. You can either afford the box or you can't. Plus, how much of that cost is actually Windows? No one knows, no one's talking.
The average consumer thinks Windows is "included" with their PC purchase. That means that in their mind it's free, not a major portion of the actual cost. As long as that price is hidden it won't be a factor in a purchasing decision.
The single best thing we could get out of an MS settlement (since we're not going to get the break-up that they deserve) would be to require all PC sales adds to prominently display the cost of Windows and the percentage of total cost that it represents. That would certainly open a few eyes.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
ZDnet's infalliable crystal ball has never lead us wrong.
Okay, so the idea here is that once PCs drop to a certain level of cost, the idea of paying Microsoft a huge sum goes out the window. Two problems. One, which has already been noted here, is that Microsoft can just lower their own prices.
But two, and most importantly: What ELSE are you going to install on that computer if not Windows? Linux? Then we get into the 'is Linux ready for the desktop' thing. It doesn't matter if Microsoft charges your first born son, if they're the only viable, usable OS available for Joe Q. User to check their e-mail and read the web with, they'll still get payment even with ultra-cheap computers.
Of course, if some OS steps up to the plate to replace them for free/cheap AND the PCs drop in cost, then we've got something. Perhaps OEMs will start developing their own user-friendly, stripped down blends of Linux to ship with new PCs?
Wow, this is shocking. First ESR claims that Microsoft is doomed. What's next, RMS claiming that the GPL is the One True License, or JWZ saying that Netscape sucks now?
Just because an MS product is not profitable does not mean it will "die" as in go away.
If MS has to give away windows for free, that will just cause windows to proliferate even more. Which means that MS will have an even tighter grip on the industry.
Apparently the
Walmart.com is selling PCs without Windows. In a Cnet article (sorry, don't have the link) Walmart announced this because the cost of Windows is offsetting the cost of cheap hardware and Windows is making the computer too expensive.
There is no reasonable defense against an idiot with an agenda
:wq
Dear Linus,
I have always felt that Linux is a nice operating system (for hobbyists and geeks), but there are some areas where it is seriously lacking, especially when compared to its main competitor, Microsoft Windows.
With Windows XP, Microsoft has again improved multi-user support. Not only does Windows XP come with a large library of user pictures that are displayed on the login screen, such as a guitar and a flower, it also has "quick user change". This makes it possible to login as a different user with a simple keyboard shortcut, and the good news is: programs from the old user keep running in the background! Beat that, Linux!
I also find it disappointing that Linux has not embraced new technologies such as Digital Rights Management which will finally make it profitable for artists to sell their intellectual property on the web. The content industry has calculated that it loses about 450 trillion dollars per day to piracy. If this continues, the economic effects will be devastating. Richard Stallman has supported DRM for years and made it a fixed part of his GNU/Hurd operating system -- Linux should not hold back progress in this important area. DRM should be made part of the Linux Standard Base (LSB), and Linux distributors should put "DMCA-Compliant" buttons on their websites. We all know that Linux would never have been created without strong intellectual property protection as enforced by the FSF, so let's not be hypocritical.
On the plus side, I have found Linux an absolutely superior operating system for viewing pornography. Porn is loading much faster than on Windows, especially with the Cox and Love kernel patches and powerful porn browsers such as Pornzilla. This is truly an operating system written by geeks, for geeks!
Sincerely,
Bruce.
Didn't he also say NT 5.0 would be DOA because of it's bloat and tardiness? I really wish ESR would stop making so many "predictions." It'd be a good move for his reputation and everyone else in the OSS community that feels the effects of the blanket associations with his comments.
This is a good point, I must admit I never though directly about this as a consequence of the reduction in PC costs, BUT theres a flaw in the Logic, software has ALWAYS cost more (since the late 70's) than the hardware itself, it may cause a shift, but certainly not the demise of MS.
MS would sell..hell give copies of Windows away if it meant they could continue their other markets, Less than 1/3 of MS income comes from desktop operating systems. Now that said they dont want to loose it but certainly it wont kill them.
Sig went tro...aahemmm.....fishing........
Ok lets just go along with this for a second and assume MS has no business sense whatsoever and would not adjust the OS price accordingly, will $350 pc's really be the norm? Even as PC prices continue to fall, it seems that most people are continuing to pay around $1500 or so for a computer because that is what they expect to pay for a computer. Systems that are really cheap have a negative stigma amongst consumers because they assume the computer is obsolete and will not meet their future needs. People are gobbling up multi GHZ machines even though a pIII would work for must people's needs.
Thay can't lower prices. To ensure their massive cash flow they need stock prices to keep rising and the only way it will do that is if they post revenue increases.
The Desktop market is already dead for them. Too many buisnesses don't see the point of upgrading beond W2K. Office has the same problem. THis all has nothing to do with Linux.
The server market is the one place Linux is actually doing damage.
CE isn't making it's development money back.
WebTV was a big flop.
What's left X-BOX. Cell phones?
We have a company too used to being the dominant player to be able to break into new markets and going by the spew of new products into new markets lately they know the old revenue stream is dying.
Like this little gem. Conspicuously absent link from the story, don't you think? ESR prediction story on /., clearly topical.
+5:offtopic,but anti-American
Exactly. In fact, by making the claim that Microsoft can not lower their prices and survive, ESR is making the argument that Microsoft is not a monopoly.
The classic definition of monopoly power is that a company has the power to price above marginal cost - or the cost of producing an additional unit. While we know that real life is a little more complex than this classic definiton, by making the argument that M$ will crumble if forced to lower their prices, ESR is actually saying that Microsoft is not a monopoly...that the current pricing scheme used by M$ is driven by the market.
In one statement, ESR just poked a hole in his own argument without even realizing it. Nice job!
As for his whole palm vs PC argument, his premise is wrong. Palm and PocketPC have two very different approaches to the market. Palm knows its market is the PDA market, i.e., handling contacts, appointments, and other daily tasks, whereas PocketPC is about being a mini-laptop (which largely attracts the techies and trendy types). Well both the PocketPC OS and the tasks themselves demand a lot more expensive hardware. PocketPC also eats batteries for its intended uses like none other. I'd also argue that Microsoft's vision for PocketPC is fundamentally flawed given the battery limitations, the hardware for the next couple years, and the problems with data entry/input methods and screen size on anything the size of a PDA. The point being is that we have a lot of good reasons to believe the difference in sales has a lot more to do with other issues than just the licensing price difference between the two OSes. For instance, completely ignoring the price of the total costs of either units, I would not want PocketPC if I all I want to do is use the PDA as a PDA (the battery life and other issues are too significant to me).
ESR is being an optomist. While I agree that this is a possibility, I don't see it happening soon. There
are a few reasons why.
1) These PCs must be everywhere. There are cheap PCsnow that you can get. Someone mentioned that you can get cheap PCs w/o Windows at WalMart. That is all and good, but these types of boxes must be available everywhere, from every manufacturer. I doubt we'll see Dell advertise a $350 box without Windows anytime soon.
2) There has to be an operating system to replace
Windows on these boxes that is cheap. Linux is
not it. This probably would be a great place for
BeOS to have stepped in. I always envisioned
BeOS as being the ideal non-MS OS for the average
user. Unfortunately, they no longer exist.
Another unfortunate aspect is that there needs
to be an OS that essentially will need to have
a monopoly on these boxes.
Of course, it could be an Open Source OS.
3) The said operating system needs to have a few
good applications for it. One would be a fully
standard compliant web browser. Another would be
a word processing program with features roughly
equivalent to MS Word. There are some other
necessary apps, like perhaps a simple image
editing program, email client, media player, etc.
Basically, programs to cover all the bases.
4) There will always be people who still buy
computers that price in the thousands. These are
people who need and want more powerful PCs.
I doubt most gamers would care for the $350 PC.
I think that the number of people willing to pay
thousands for a superior PC is still high enough.
If the economy gets worse, however, this might change.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
I'm a college student, and I know that I can't afford anything near the amount of money that Microsoft wants to charge for office.
You're modded as funny, but I'll answer anyway: isn't the Student Edition of MS Office something like $99? And even if it was too expensive, as a student, you are unlikely to need the full features of office anyway and could buy the much cheaper but still quite useful MS Works.
Next time you find something that's News for Nerds, and it hasn't been posted to slashdot, submit the story as you normally would, but include comments from some Open Source luminary who ISN'T quoted anywhere in the story or even remotely related to it. Guaranteed front page post.
[o]_O
The whole problem with ESR and RMS is they're preaching a religion when all we want are tools and options to get our jobs done. People don't liked to be preached too, they just want thier options. It doesn't matter if you're right and you have the insight of King Solomon, people still don't want to hear you preach.
.COM bubble. (1993-1997)): Cheap communications medium offered by vast range of carriers (ISPs)
Now, If you can explain the *REAL* benefits of a *SPECIFIC* Open Source tool, or *SPECIFICALLY* how the open source model may benefit those involved (Benefitting usually implies the bottom line somewhere), THEN you will get people listening to you.
Look at the evidence:
The IBM PC clone didn't need a spokesperson, it's value being a commodity tool available from hundred and thousands of manfacturers spoke for itself.
As did the birth of Internet's commercialization (Not the
These products worked because:
1. They were cheap
2. They were valuable
3. They provided business opportunities for people to sell cheap and valuable products.
If you want Open Source to really take off, forget about a spokes person. Meet these three criteria, and Open Source will speak for itself.
"Communism is like having one [local] phone company " - Lenny Bruce
For example, the studentdev.org thing they set up. Part of those programs was that students would get free copies of Visual Studio and Operating systems, to keep the students interested in developing for MS.
Lately, I haven't seen this so much, but I have seen the MSDN Academic Alliance, where they sell a massive license to a school for relatively cheap, and then allow all students in that school/deparetment to download all kinds of software for free legally. Included is stuff like Win2k Advanced server (which has a sticker price of nearly 4,000 dollars), and tons of applications. They will put the prices on the OS and development tools as low as they have to, just to keep corporations buying into their products.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
The cost of Windows to small OEMs is about $50, less at high volumes.
It's a mandatory component, just like a CPU or RAM or a keyboard. You don't say that when the price falls below X, you can no longer afford a CPU. The cost is whatever the cost is when you include all the components. The big players will use their purchasing muscle to get lower component costs and price so as to drive smaller players out of business, but nobody is going to price in a way that is independent of the cost of a mandatory component.
On the other hand, MS wants a broader consumer presence, so they may choose to create a separate "lite" version that they sell for less in order to make $350 computers possible. They could go all the way down to free for lite versions built around access portals to MS online services.
ESR's open source experience has apparently been more about politics than economics.
"Those who have never entered upon scientific pursuits know not a tithe of the poetry by which they are surrounded."
- In order to keep satisfying its investors, and to keep using its stock options as currency, the price of MS stock has to keep increasing.
- In order for that price to go up, investors have to believe that MS profits will continue to grow.
- In order to keep growing its profits, MS must have lots of current profits that can be reinvested in developing future products (or future versions of current products).
If pressure from low hardware prices makes MS profits go down -- because MS cuts its prices or because more consumers buy cheap OS-free computers -- then this cause-and-effect chain runs in the other direction.send all spam to theotherwhitemeat@ropine.com
There's also another issue. The rise of the $350 is only ONE of Microsoft's problems. "Real PCs" are now getting to the point where they don't need to be upgraded as often. Hardware prices have managed to sufficiently outpace bloat growth for the time being. "Real PCs" continually get cheaper while continuing to add features that many "consumer" PC users don't fully utilize.
In general, consumers in general are bound to come to the realization that they really don't need a new PC, they really don't need a new OS, a new OS may not be any better than the old OS, or that they don't need a new version of MSoffice.
Once this occurs, and once consumers at large begin to revolt against the costs associated with the upgrade treadmill, Microsoft is going to be in deep doo-doo.
Mundane consumers may not give a damn about product quality, but they do tend to care about cost.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
As PCs get cheaper, if Microsofts high price becomes an obstacle to market domination then they will lower it. They only charge that much because they can. Bill Gates will do what he must to stay on top, if that means lowering the Windows price, he will. Then, he gets legions of sheep buying computers for the first time because the most important man in the world was nice enough to lower prices for them.
ESR is a smart man, I'm sure. But Bill Gates- I honestly do not believe he is after money. He just wants his software running everything in the world. I don't think he actually wants domination, but he wants a piece of every pie just to have it. If it got to the point where to keep the windows dominance he had to subsidize Windows out of pocket for a while, I am convinced he would do so.