Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Targeting Indian Developers
Pranjal writes "An Indian Business magazine, Business World is reporting that in it's war against Linux, Microsoft is taking the battle to the Indian developers. The logic is simple. India has 10% of the developer population of the world. If a significant number of these developers commit to work on MS platforms then the number of developers working on Linux platforms can decrease significantly and thus the number of applications. As Dilip Mistry, a director at Microsoft India's Bangalore office puts it, "This country can affect our (Microsoft's) destiny." [Quote From article] Local linux user groups are trying to counter this threat by targetting school and university students and increasing the awareness about development on a linux platform. Read the full story here. [Nice cover don't you think?]"
In related news, Bill Gates is visiting India and gave $100 million to fight AIDS in India. Although I geniuinely believe Bill Gates to be a humane person (really), _perhaps_ this action has something to do with leveraging Microsoft position in the Indian government?
I think MS will suceed in this war. The linux groups in India are all small and pretty restricted in terms of their activities. And Bill is doing his level best to woo the India programmers. There is a place in Delhi where you can buy any pirated MS software. Everyone knows about that. But there are hardly any raids there. I think MS is knowingly encouraging pirated software in India, so that they can get more developers.
Another thing is that software industry in India is mostly a services business, as in they sell services to other companies. They dont make any software products. Now its easy to guess what work do they get more, linux related or Windows related.
What's under yellowstone?
This article's arguments are as valid as if it were saying "Microsoft is sabotaging the open source movement by recruiting the best minds at the best Universities. Give me a break...
Mother is the best bet and don't let Satan draw you too fast.
Then they'll regularly send someone by to see how things are going, talk up their latest "inno-cough-vative" offering, and see if the target company is _motivated_. Sometimes, if they're lucky, one of the new programmers will have some "happy fun intranet site, or happy joy widget" made with said technology to show off (you know, the port of something which has already been working in PERL, PHP, or both using Sun, or Zeus) that will probably score them some nifty t-shirts, a mug, or hey, maybe another dousing with the developer-cd firehose.
And then if they really want to see how things are going, they'll ask for a tour of the _server room_, the holiest of the holies for said company. The annointed one will be walked around, and they'll look for familiar names, like Compaq, or Dell. But, if they see "SUN", or beige boxen then the annointed one will carefully steer conversation towards determining the nature and purpose of these boxen. Depending on the cluefulness of the tour-guide, things could either go well, and the annointed one will leave, only making note of a possible hardware upgrade deal, or they will become wrathful, and the sales-calls, port-scans, and off-hours questioning through "chance meetings" will take place until they have enough information to confront the president of the company. They will act hurt, or betrayed, and say interesting things like,
"I thought we had an understanding that you were a Microsoft Development shop", or
"How can we help you fully become a Microsoft Developer?", or my favorite,
"How has Microsoft failed to meet your needs? We are eager to help you in any way we can."
Of course, years later when the BSA sends out their letters to the less-than-faithful, and begins bringing in the police to follow up on portscans and megabytes of downloaded header logs showing all of the boxen development-only copies of software running. there will be those who remember these honeyed promises aimed only at the hearts, minds, and struggling companies or schools.
M$ has much to gain, but in the end, as they squeeze diversity and skill out of developing countries, they will also loose these possibilities forever. Linux is safe, becuase just like the smart people in Africa who refused flawed crop-seed to avoid a hideous cycle of dependency, developers in India and around the world know that freedom is more important than easily made promises. Held to a hard-line of artificial ability and capability(M$ API's are Black-boxes...no lookee, no touch-ee, no-feelie) with brittle security, smart developers and business leaders will realize that there is no get-rich quick incentive to supporting a core of fatally flawed intractable components supplied by a company which is really incapable of doing anything more than strong-arming hardware and software developers(even savvy developers need support--and when they become the support they are no longer developers), coercing companies with hideous licensing schemes by buying legislation and counting coup on the legal system of the United States. Companies seeking to get rich by suckling at the four-paned teat would do well to remember that M$ eats it's young, and often the young of others too.
Every new form of media has it's own Requirimento