Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Names Linux its Number Two Risk
Jorkapp writes "Microsoft has officially moved Linux up to the Number 2 Risk to the company (With Economic Environment at No. 1). Bill Gates has taken the threat very seriously, and has identified Linux and non-commercial software as 'out there and very pervasive.' In response, Microsoft has dropped the price of Windows CE and opened the embedded OS to developers. This will not only allow developers to view and modify CE, but also distribute software incorporated to the modified code."
Isn't Microsoft just making more and more people aware of Linux and how good of a Windows replacement it's becoming? Seems sort of counter-productive to give your #2 threat a lot of free publicity. Doesn't seem like the sort of thing a huge company would tell the public. But hey, I'm not complaining.
Linux is part of the "economic environment". It might make more sense for Microsoft to combine a bunch of things as "#1: Our Outdated Business Model". I'll just hold my breath for that to happen.
one of course being unix :P
--
Coincidentally, when I clicked the view comments link, a large advertisment for Linux.com appeared under the article.
Mr. Torvalds, Mr. Cox, Mr. Stallman.
I lay the blame solely on you!
(Good Job, and thanks for everything!)
How nice of Microsoft. That's like someone asking for a steak and being given in-flight peanuts. Maybe a glass of water, too.
It's a start, I guess.
SecondPageMedia - Wha
1. They ignore you
2. They laugh at you
3. They fight you <----- YOU ARE HERE
4. You win
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
...to the products that Microsoft actually does well at.
If Microsoft would stick to hardware, such as keyboards, mice and joysticks, elements that Linux and the Open Source movement, and Free Software Foundation has no interest in, Microsoft would soon realize that their only competition is Logitech.
-Rusty
You never know...
#1 risk should really be that their software is crap!
oops...
Thats not a risk, its a fact
anyone actually know what 1, 3, 4 and 5 are?
--
Perhaps if Microsoft wouldn't have exploited their monopoly, 'geeks' wouldn't have been as infuriated at them and determined to knock them down. If they were more fair in the market, I highly doubt that the MS borg icon on slashdot would exist.
---
1-800-759-0700
Microsoft has officially moved Linux up to the Number 2 Risk to the company (With Economic Environment at No. 1). Bill Gates has taken the threat very seriously, and has identified Linux and non-commercial software
.NET. I don't think he meant Open Office vs MS Office, tho'.
What he actually said was "Linux and non-commercial software" (emphasis mine). The question is, what is the greatest threat to MS - Linux vs Windows? Or maybe it's NetBSD versus WinCE. Or SAP/DB vs SQL 2000. Or Java vs
There's a lot more to "non commercial software" than just one OS kernel, you know. Also remember that Linux is a bigger threat to Unix vendors than it is to MS, because the barriers to migration are lower. I would be very surprised if Sun didn't consider "Lintel" to be its #1 threat.
...to make the soon to be president of the U.S. "aware".
We are now up to Gandi's "They will fight you" stage of revolution.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
First risk: Prospects who believe anything they read from the press, including Slashdot!
-
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Free publicity :)
Tho I personally believe Microsoft's biggest threat are themselves. They sometimes do make cool stuff (Media Player 6.4) but then quicky ruin it (Media Player 7+).
well i'd rather have this than more of that GNAA crap. any post with the acronym GNAA should be automatically rejected by the lameness filter. But it could conceivably be an acronym for a new GNU project.
On one hand, MS is losing sales ... on the other, MS doesn't look like the monopoly that it once was. Maybe this will get some of the DOJ and politcal heat off of MS?
There is no spoon or sig.
is Tux. That badass penguin has them running for their lives.
I wonder how long it's going to take Microsoft to figure out that it's not Linux that's the threat, it's open source. Linux is fine, but what do you DO with Linux? Linux is just a platform (like BSD), the other things you do like run a webserver, file server, database all require some sort of software (Apache, Samba, PostgreSQL). Most of the really good software packages aren't specific to Linux.
I thought Steve Balmer was. With all hi running and jumping, you'd think he'd be a short to long term disability risk if he hurt himself.
--
"I'm not bright. Big words confuse me. But Wanda loves me and that should be enough for you." - Cosmo
'non-commercial software' is different of 'free software' (Free like Freedom). You can commercialize 'Free software'.
Freedom is more dangerous than price free. (proof : see the success of shareware/freeware in comparison)
Both are making lists of their worst enemies.
Luckily Microsoft just can't use real weapons to beat them. They will have to make better products for cheaper price.
Competition is good if there's no weapons involved.
for a very high % of business users (80%? 90? 99?) the only justification left for using windoze is the Office suite. OpenOffice is getting closer every day to being a true replacement, and as IT and department managers come to realize this, Linux on the desktop inside the corporation may become reality. The savings for most companies will be hard to ignore, allowing them just to purchase sloth products for those who truly need the OS to run non MSFT applications. But that means secretaries, administrators, middle managers and the like can be switched. Does one really need XP and WinWord to write a memo?
I predict that very soon MSFT will have to lower substantially the cost of Office, further eroding its margins. Better start cashing in Bill.
By even giving away Windows CE, they lose nothing. It is highly outdated, but by getting hardware manufacturers to stick to the MS line of products, their monopoly is secured. Is a device running WinCE more or less likely to ever have Linux drivers?
---
1-800-759-0700
Actually the article refers the no. 1 risk as:
The Economy!! How can the economy be a 'risk'??
Okay I see... Economy bad--> People find MSware expensive --> People start to think --> discover MS is lousy despite all Gartner reports --> read Slashdot --> get to learn about this thing called Linux --> adopt it...yes!
All risks lead to Linux!!
-
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Considering how MS deals with problems, it can't possibly win.
1. MS can't buy the economy
2. MS can't buy Linux
So traditional MS strategies don't work.
I'm quite surprised that Linux isn't #1 on the list of threats. I don't think Microsoft has too much to worry about individual use of Linux, but rather companies switching to Linux to avoid paying the hefty licensing fees. And I don't think lowering the price of CE will help much. As I stated, the threat's with companies getting fed up with licensing.
I don't think opening the source code will help much either. It costs a lot to get the code, you aren't allowed to recompile it, and you're probably bound by a bunch of other restrictions.
If I were Bill Gates, I'd be worried sick about it and I would probably have nightmares about giant penguins chasing me with pitchforks.
/usr/bin/complain >
To whoever modded parent Informative
So Bill saw that opensource and Linux is their biggest enemy, so they opensourced parts of their operating system? Well, I dunno, but it seems like the opensource community has just won. And isn't this what we have been waiting for - more opensource software?
"What people tend to forget is that there are gatekeepers in the open-source community, too"
This is subtle but very, very important. Open Source "gatekeepers," like Linus, only get the job of gatekeeper because they are the most popular. And there is nothing stopping anyone else from releasing their own version and taking over the project. However, non-Linus releases must COMPETE with Linus' releases for MINDSHARE based on MERIT. This is truly an evolutionary process.
MS is simply the gate keeper because they have a monopoly. There is no competition based on merit, no evolution takes place. If MS is the default gate keeper, what you contribute automatically belongs to them. Congratulations, you are now the most poorly paid employee at MS.
Sdelat' Ameriku velikoy Snova!
Hm, if my memory serves me right CE wouldn't be that open. I don't remember any details, but it was not anything like open source. The whole thing was featured on slashdot some time back. On the other hand, nobody expected Microsoft to open any source at all, and it's a good thing that they did it.
Martin
goes: to identify the problem is [not] to solve it. ;)
Aure entuluva!
I'm curious is they are batching apple in with this in any obscure way.
I think apple is a much larger threat to M$ now than they've ever been do to os x and the attraction of developers they've been able to aquire over the last few years.
I switched six months ago and have been encouraging a lot of others to do the same.
I'm also curious what the next big app. that directly threatens M$ will be- I'm sure keynote was just a starter!
Creationists are a lot like zombies. Slow, but powerful and numerous. And they all want to eat our brains.
How can the truth be flamebait?
No matter what approach Microsoft takes, I don't see it taking a major blow to Linux. Short of open sourcing Windows, all they are doing is reducing the difference, but the fundamental differences still exisit. Either Linux is NeXT and will take over the world or it is just for us geeks. Only time will tell which of the many theories about linux and how it fits in with the market share are correct.
Slashdot news from the future: SCO readies new Linux licensing program
"The SCO Group is preparing a new Linux licensing program that it claims will allow users of the open-source operating system to run Linux without fear of litigation."
Watch what comes up with, say, an article about spam. Slashdot has been tailoring ad placement for some time. (Not that that's a bad thing.)
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
And the flames rose higher and higher, and a million emails were fired in anger...
Script kiddies and geeks, UN*X gurus and bearded free-software prophets all sharpened their r00tkits and compilers and started beating louder and louder on the war drums...
Gee, I love the smell of FUD in the morning... It smells like... like... Victory! =)
[and all of this is said with tongue firmly in cheek, of course!]
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
It's interesting to note that Windows can't become that much more advanced. It seems to me that it has reached a point were there isn't that much use in upgrading anymore. Like the word processor or web browser there aren't that many innovations people are longing for. Personally, I still use Win2k and I am quite happy with it. Given a choice, I even prefer it over XP.
At the same time, all Linux has to do is play catch up (becoming more user-friendly and so on) to seriously threaten Windows in the next few years. Being free, it is quite competitive.
I can only see Linux gaining territory in the future, while Windows has everything to loose. If Linux attains a critical mass where game developers start making games for it, I will probably switch. And I bet I wont miss Microsoft one bit.
Bill Gates has all the reasons in the world to feel threatened. I mean nobody expects to pay for any of the software you download anymore. The market is becoming increasingly eroded as it only takes one good free alternative for everybody to choose that one over the one that costs money..
Will code a sig generator for food
This is just MSFT trying to act all big, oh pshaw, Linux, one can hardly muster a whim about it. Well, it is a tried and true method. I mean, at Coca-Cola back in the day, they barely even considered a little startup called Pepsi. They mocked it internally, thinking that they were the big guy and the "P-cola" would never amount to much. Of course, when it gained steam by targeting a younger audience, they panicked and launched "New Coke". Yeah. I think we know the rest of that story.
WinCE may or may not be close, source-wise, to actual Desktop Windows of any flavor, but doesn't this raise the spectre of copyright violation? If WinCE source becomes easily available, Microsoft will soon be able to run around accusing all kinds of Open Source projects of stealing their stuff. Never mind that none of it may be actually useful... Just the possibility of being able to stall OSS projects might be enough to persuade Microsoft to start down the same road as SCO.
Good point, but still, I remember an article on the front page of the business section of the USAToday about Linux a while back. Not exactly my favorite news publication, but obviously there were a huge number of non-geeks reading about Linux vs. Microsoft that day. You never know who's going to pick up the story.
"Dancing Steve" Ballmer has to be on that list somewhere. What's his number?
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
The CFOs name is John Connors, coincidence, I think not! Time to Terminate boys.
Linux and non-commercial software as 'out there and very pervasive
Remember, there's open source software available for Windows. Quite a lot of it actually. Open office clones are more of a threat than an operating system kernel (which is what "Linux" is).
When MS says something like this, you can bet your keyboard that there's an underlying agenda. In this case, it seems obvious: Make it look like there's more of a threat than there is, so that your future corporate performance will be seen as more important than it is, and all your actions won't seem so, well, evil and monopolistic.
"People are using Linux for the same reason that others are still using Windows 2000 or Office
...that's not why I use Linux
Open source airline -
GNU-is-Not-AA?
Due to technological advancements, better ways of doing things, old industry is being flushed out.
This includes proprietary software. (isn't that what MS is saying?)
It also includes flushing out the old music industry and more...
So much has been integrated into a larger system of "old business" that as one industry reacts to change other industries tied in integration are as well tugged on.
Note that it's the software industry that tugs on the entertainment industry....
The wave being caused by open source (OSI definition - not MS's definition) is being felt further than just the old software industry.
Economic Environment....
Don't nobody tell MS that there list is incorrect, they will eventually figure it out, when they no longer can ignore their old ways are not working, cause everyone else knows it.
Guess this tells us what MS's next line of irrationality is going to be with the politicians.
"To save our (double speak meaning MSs personal economy) economy you have to outlaw Open Source and then sentance all criminals to have to use our software. A matter of homeland security, you understand...??"
Makes me wonder if Microsoft isn't on their own list of risks. ;-)
But seriously, the article stated that "The general economic environment is risk and driver No. 1," he said. "Linux and non-commercial software is risk No. 2." That means that the top risk to Microsoft is something they have no direct control over. Now we all know that a company as big as Microsoft DOES have an effect on the economy in some respect, but there's nothing that they're going to do on their own to pull the country out of an economic slump. If there was, they would have done it by now so that people would buy more Microsoft products.
So that means that out of their list of the top five risks, the #1 risk that they can actually compete directly against is Linux and open source (and other non-commercial) software. Now doesn't that put things in a bit more perspective?
-Through the server, over the router, off the firewall... Nothing but 'Net!
No, that's just what Ballmer does in his pants everytime an entire city chooses Linux over Microsoft. Hell, if it were my job, I'd be doing that too.
To me the threats higher on the list should be: - product activation - DRM - forced upgrades And the corporate mentality that lets the PR department say, with a straight face, those are things the customer wants.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
This also makes microsoft look like a good guy. Being concerned with the economy.. wanting to be a team player and all.
For me, this kind of thing is my Number 2 reason for liking free software (Number 1 obviously being, well, freedom).
Free software sets the level for what people can do without help from companies. So, if a company wants to sell me some software, it has to demonstrably do something that I can't do for myself (with free software).
By forcing companies like Microsoft to lower prices, rethink strategies etc, free software improves condition in the industry, even for those that don't use it.
Microsoft is attempting to spin the situation even in admitting defeat, by referring to Linux as "non-commercial" software.
Open source software is, of course, "commercial" software: it's at least as good as closed source software, it's used by many commercial enterprises, and it's sold commercially.
In response, Microsoft has dropped the price of Windows CE and opened the embedded OS to developers. This will not only allow developers to view and modify CE, but also distribute software incorporated to the modified code.
hmm.. does that model of software development sound familiar to anyone? open source? is Microsoft finally realising that someone outside of Microsoft may be able to write some better code/improvements? sounds like a step closer to Microsoft to move into open source - which, is what Linux is.
Large forces and trends ultimately win; like the desire to be free. MS has simply begun to recognize that the inputs required to overcome the market's natural forces will soon exceed the outputs. this is partly due to an increasing realization that consumers have become satisfied with existing technology.
what will MS do? they have hundreds of very talented programmers, incredible distribution & support capacity, not to mention $30 billion in cash. after all, customers simply want the outputs of all that technology.
if MS would embrace OpenSource as another input to its products and add credibility and customer service they would have an incredible value proposition.
i predict an MS-Linux release in 2-3 years.
First they ignore you.
Then they laugh at you.
Then they fight you.
Then you win.
Linux is firmly at #3, well on the way to #4.
"What people tend to forget is that there are gatekeepers in the open-source community, too," he said. "It's not a free-for-all. On every one of the open-source projects, there are two or three people who are the gatekeepers. And you have to make a pretty good case, accurate and technically astute, to get them to allow changes. That's how it should be."
interesting; they assume that no one would ever want to make a modification just for private use. yes, there are gatekeepers in the open software world, but only if you wish to get your changes committed to the "official" distribution. with shared source, since you aren't allowed to compile, the source access gets you diddly squat, whereas with most OSS, you can actually benefit from being able to modify the code. you don't even have to make your changes public if you never distribute that changed program.
i guess that gives us insight into their model of customers: dumb users with a minority of dumb developers.
This is FUD intended to align "Shared Source" with Free Software/Open Source. The main difference is of course, that if you disagree with the so-called "gatekeepers" (what a weird analogy), you can just take the source code and run (make a fork).
You can not do that with "Shared Source". And Microsoft knows that. And most of us here know that. But Microsoft hopes that many people will not see the difference (or won't care).
Microsoft's strategy is scaringly obvious.
Yeah - he knows that he'll have to come in and clean the mess up afterwards, and god knows what flaky hacks he'll find.
Their number 1 risk should be their own security holes.
*cough* Slammer *cough*
Then Linux.
I thought Microsoft's products were more #2 than anything else.
and to know that Microsoft thinks that Linux is more threatening than you by a long shot. How sad.
Yes, many Linux distros are good desktop OSes. It's important to realize that the UNIX aspects of it are why we geeks use it.
I'd rather have Linux with no dos/windows/macintosh emulation on a nice UltraSparc than Lindows on a PC, even if that latter had a perfected fork of Wine installed.
I think that Microsoft knows they can't best Linux in the server market, where buyers are more educated. They are more afraid of losing bundling with the smaller PC companies. How many people are running a $199 Walmart C3 with an illegal copy of Windows?
As for the Windows CE source, where is it? If they expect us to pay money to work on their code for them, they are sadly missing the beauty of OSS.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
Actually, in my physics department, we use Linux, not because it is GOOD ENOUGH (?!?), but because it is the ONLY acceptable solution for what we need to do. For scientific computing, (or security, etc., etc.) it is the best option, not "good enough", and certainly no comparison with outdated programs from MS.
Is non-sense. Of course, HIV does not equal AIDS. HIV causes AIDS. AIDS can also have other causes, but HIV is the primary cause.
To suggest that millions of scientists around the world are in on a government scam to ??discourage homosexual sex?? is bullshit.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Really, that's the big issue for MS. There is another OS that is free. IF MS dropped Windows development and switched all their applications to Linux, they might make their earnings targets.
This is my sig.
When I saw Microsoft's top concern I immediately thought they meant this:
current economic environment=>MS not owning enough of said environment
read my blog
musings on politics and technol
I still prefer the taste of Dr. Pepper.
(-1, Irrelevant)
The DoJ be damned, Microsoft was never a monopoly.
;))
The simple monopoly test: Were you forced to use Microsoft products?
That's a resounding no. True, almost all vendors sold computers with MS products preloaded. Not because they were forced to at gunpoint, but because they were reaping a monetary advantage from doing it.
In truth, at the time of the accusations, there was BSD and Linux, which you could of course, install on your computer at any time. Ignoring the differences between x86 and Apple hardware, there was indeed Apple OS as well. I believe BeOS was still kicking back then, too.
OS - Not a monopoly - check.
Now, for applications. We'll go with MS Office for this one, since everyone's familiar with it.(tm) Did Microsoft hold a monopoly on office suite software? Nope. Lotus Whatever, StarOffice, blah di blah. Just because everyone else in the business world used MS Office doesn't mean Microsoft had a monopoly - there *were* other choices.
The truth of the matter is Microsoft was (and still is) no more than a very large and rich corporation that carried out (and still carries out) some very shady (and likely illegal) dealings.
I am glad they're slowly getting what they deserve, but I don't kid myself about Microsoft having been a monopoly, or that the DOJ and politicians ever placed any heat on them.
The DOJ may have wrongfully convicted them of being a monopoly and using their powers for ill, but then - where were the penalties?
A slap on the wrist isn't a penalty, it's the equivalent of giving your wife a slap on the ass. Both parties involved enjoy it. (Or at least, they should, unless you're some kinda prude.
Second, I can't believe you say you like Win2k better than WinXP. Perhaps in a geeky "I like to do everything for myself, no help please" type of way, but for the general user (and the people who buy computers nonetheless) they want to be able to just plug their new digital camera in and Windows to be able to install the correct drivers and even pull up the correct program to download their pictures.
In terms of usability, Microsoft needs to play catch-up to Apple, but Linux needs to play catch up to MS. In terms of security, etc. Microsoft (if implemented correctly, ie. not everyone is given admin rights!) is par for the course. I will guarantee that if Linux were the market leader, you'd see large amounts of virii for Linux as well. Many times it's the admin who doesn't update/secure it properly who's to blame -- not the OS.
I agree with you mostly, but there will never be a plateau in technology. Not until my computer's name is HAL.
This is my digital signature. 10011011001
The rest of the story is that coke still holds a tangible advantage (about 10 percentage points) in the US market while it has about 90% marketshare in the rest of the world. So, while Pepsi may be a big company, Coke still isn't really threatened by it.
Time makes more converts than reason
Yeah because as long as it's Microsoft Open Source is a BAD thing.
Linux moves up to the #2 position, replaced with the monster that is slashdot.
Brad
"The truth suffers from too much analysis"
"I used to use Gnome until they merged with KDE. But my friend was telling me the Microsoft Windows window manager is not that bad..."
-- A cat is no trade for integrity!
Dr. Pepper is a Pepsi brand.
(-1 Uninformed)
Well Microsoft is doing well in the embedded space.
According to this report, developing with Microsoft embedded products is 43% faster, and 68% cheaper.
Look ma, a competitor is fostering competition! This is exactly what's supposed to happen in a free market!
Cyde Weys Musings - Scrutinizing the inscrutable
Essentially, Microsoft has had to make the concession in order to rally their own troops to fighting Linux aggressively. To continue saying, Linux is worthless and not a real credible answer, is to look like you have your head in the sand. The Munich deal made them realize that Linux is no longer being used to just squeeze a better deal out of MS, but people will actually implement it if MS doesn't come up with a good deal up front. I think that is what surprised them: they probably never believed that Munich was serious about putting in Linux.
They've simply been hoping that this point would never come, when they had to actually acknowledge Linux as a serious competitor (and not just for anti-trust reasons; they would call a Vic-20 viable competition in order to get DOJ to leave them alone).
Damn it, man! Just because "asshat" makes a nice insult doesn't mean you can just slap "ass" on the front of any other word.
"What people tend to forget is that there are gatekeepers in the open-source community, too," he said. "It's not a free-for-all. On every one of the open-source projects, there are two or three people who are the gatekeepers. And you have to make a pretty good case, accurate and technically astute, to get them to allow changes. That's how it should be."
Here, he confuses the way that people are free to chose what software they would run with what Microsoft choses to give their customers. Anyone who thinks for more than an instant will realize that Microsoft choices are made for completely different reasons free software projects make their decisions and even more different from the reasons free software users might modify code themselves a thing the Microsoft user can not do, yet.
Face it, no one is going to learn about free software from rags like InfromationWeek, Byte, ComputerShopper or anything that makes it's money advertising M$ on pulp. You learn about free software by getting Red Hat, Debian, Suse or what have you and running it.
Microsoft will never go free because it's run on the priciples outlined here. The same threats are repeated again and again, but it does not work.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
I think we all know what the biggest threat to Microsoft is:
http://images.mkronline.com/tuxzilla.jpg
I don't care what others may say; this is probably the most significant victory for open source to date. I think that Microsoft opening its code to modification and redistribution is unparalleled compared to previous inroads made by open source. True open source evangelists would probably say that although the impact this may make is small, what it says is certainly not; Microsoft has budged in its previously-unyielding attitude toward closed intellectual property.
The Economy!! How can the economy be a 'risk'??
Okay. Let me explain it to you.
The economy is starting to show signs of getting somewhat better. This is bad, because people will begin to spend money again. This means some money will be spent on computer upgrades. This means that vendors of non-Microsoft products might see an improvement in their business. This is bad.
When the economy is bad, this is good for Microsoft. Microsoft can weather the storm just fine. But vendors of competitive products might go under.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
The rest of the story is that coke still holds a tangible advantage (about 10 percentage points) in the US market...
My intention wasn't to say that Linux will destroy M$, but rather that in the final analysis (assuming this well-worn analogy holds true), initial size doesn't necessarily matter and it will come down to a matter of personal preference. And a "tangible" advantage of 10 points is a lot different than a near-complete monopoly.
Microsoft should not worry: SCO will fix things.
They should just sit back, relax and wait.
Linux will be gone by the end of the year.
www.vanheusden.com - home of Multitail, HTTPing, CoffeeSaint, EntropyBroker, rsstail, bsod, listener, nagcon, nagi
They call it that because the very thought of it makes them go number two.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Yes. Microsoft bad, linux good. Now, speaking of Commodore.
"Currently there are about 300 commercial websites that use the name Commodore or Commodore 64 without having a license from Tulip. Tulip will not allow unauthorised use of the Commodore brand."
I kid you not. The only reason the Commodore brand is worth more than a stamp is the fan community, and now the brand owners are going to piss all over it (references to "commercial" not-withstanding, they're talking about the fan base here).
Belief is the currency of delusion.
There's no way Microsoft can compete with an open source development as large as Linux. Microsoft will soon realize this and be forced to embrace it or fail, even with the amount of money they have in 10 years Linux will have an even greater amount of market share in the server and desktop environments, constantly improving upon itself meanwhile Microsoft will be struggling to keep up with the constantly changing computer world, as we have seen with Whistler and we will see again with Longhorn. Microsoft might as well just base an OS on Linux while they are developing Longhorn and Blackcomb, and see how it does, there would be a lot of aggression against, the Linux community would be skeptical about the hidden reports back to the Microsoft collective but it may bring about the standardization of Linux, which is what Microsoft was founded upon.
I am a recently converted FreeBSD user, but I do have to dual boot because FreeBSD lacks some the features XP has, which are mostly driver issues, such as not being able to use the my 7.1 sound card in anything but stereo mode and the application compatibility, I'm not able to run the Linux binary of Maya for example.
The open source community has come a long way, but it is still in its infancy, I hope in a couple years I'll be able to run one OS with the customizability of *NIX, the standardization and compatibility of Windows.
I bet some lips are trembling and eyes get teary at apple hq right now...
-t
Excuse me for feeding the troll..
Microsoft was proven to be a monopoly. A monopoly is not just 100% control, it is effective market control.
When that happens, it is illegal to use that business to leverage unfair business advantage in seperate markets.
It was proven that MS used their OS monopoly in order to leverage position in other markets. As well, they used that power unfairly to keep out competition.
That, is what is illegal.
In a down economy, the next cool thing better be cheap! and online! and be really useful! ...did I mention cheap...
Remember Bill made his money selling STOCK in something cool and using legal contracts to keep the ball rolling. MS as just a software company with profit is a dime-a-dozen [look at what wall street did to IBM with profits!] They have to be cool to justify their stock price or the whole thing collapses.
Linux doesn't have to do anything but be itself. What it's always been...get the picture.
CE is not a threat either. They have lowered the price, maybe, but let's put it this way - those working with embeddable linux aren't necessarily going to go with CE. Cost is still more costly than free at the front end. Long term is probably irrelevant - a lot of suits don't necessarily see past the short term cost. On top of that, why switch if a product is demonstrated to be superior?
This sig no verb.
In the article they state the number one risk is the state of the economy, and the number two risk is open source.
I would argue that Microsoft's number one risk is actually the free spread of information over the internet. This is something that can not be controlled (yet).
In the old days IT decisions were made with very limited information. Possibly Gartner group published recommendations, maybe from reading trade journals that were several months out of date.
A popular saying was "well nobody got fired using [insert company here] products". It was all about risk management. Go with the biggest baddest company, and at least you're protected in some way if things blow up. That was the theory.
With easier access to information folks are realizing that this theory doesn't always hold true. When the latest windows/exchange/internet explorer vulnerability is unleashed, now you're just part of the bigger collective that is screwed.
It becomes harder for companies to do damage control when the facts spread quickly and undergo so much analysis by people not on their payroll.
When the internet functions as a self regulating corporate BS filter, then it becomes the biggest single threat to Microsoft.
Gnu's Not Anything, Actually?
The Economy!! How can the economy be a 'risk'??
They consider the economy a risk because if it goes much further south, they might have to start dropping their prices.
You know, like, from $499 to $479 for office.
Fuckers.
~Will
sig?
'People are using Linux for the same reason that others are still using Windows 2000 or Office 97,' Cherry said. 'It's good enough to do they job they're deploying it for.'
You ever notice that comparisons are made between Linux and Windows, the Windows latest release is automatically considered the defacto best choice. I interpret articles like this one as Microsoft propaganda simply due to the fact that the author didn't even attempt to get an Linux-centric point of view.
'What people tend to forget is that there are gatekeepers in the open-source community, too,' he said. 'It's not a free-for-all. On every one of the open-source projects, there are two or three people who are the gatekeepers. And you have to make a pretty good case, accurate and technically astute, to get them to allow changes. That's how it should be.'
I guess he hasn't been to SourceForge lately...
If Microsoft's worried about Linux, it can take some solace in recent numbers from NetCraft, a server monitoring firm in Bath, England.
If Microsoft was taking their cues from Netcraft, they would have scrapped IIS about 5 years ago and would currently be releasing Microsoft Linux Server 5.0.
I was crazy back when being crazy really meant something. (Charles Manson)
They actually designed some of Microsoft's hardware, not really a competitor. I bet there's a bit of price fixing between the two.
What a shame for Microsoft anyway, they're not used to having competition. As you can see competition brings its rewards, lowering prices and working hard with developers to give them what they want (ie. open source embedded OS).
This story needs to be put in context with recent developments and crowing about Windows being chosen over Linux. The biggest story out of this surprising admission is that analysts and large organizations are starting to recognize the value proposition of Linux and Open Source, as described in the rejected post below. The most telling comment is in the quotation in boldface, which lends support to Mitch Kapor's predictions.
Microsoft Ranks Linux its Number Two Threat
While most media are focusing on Microsoft's growing sales and Microsoft Windows Server 2003 replacing Linux servers based on the June 2003 Netcraft survey, (also at SMH, but disputed by the Register) there's a more interesting story to Microsoft's latest earnings report and conference call. Speaking about the top five risks for Microsoft, CFO John Connors said, ''The general economic environment is risk and driver number one. Linux and non-commercial software is risk number two.'' The recent Munich win for Linux is partly credited for making Microsoft take Linux and OS software seriously. Said one analyst about future threats, ''People are underestimating Linux on the desktop. They're going to be surprised at how quickly Linux's threat will be an issue on the desktop.''
Nice Copy & Paste, you fucking idiot.
P.S: Vlad is a fat fucking shit bag retard.
> All risks lead to Linux!!
All your risk are belong to us?
Wait, that actually sounds bad...
If they went that way why on earth they wouldnt just fork some bsd and keep it closed instead of forking linux? Besides they're more familiar with bsd anyways from ripping it off. Now, ms isn't worried about anything but what the os looks though.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
I have said before on Slashdot that if someone like John Carmack were to build a highly efficient (non-bloatware) GameOS based on Linux and write his Quake games for it, there would be an overnight mass exodus from Windows.
To have an open source OS with REAL major league games support would be nirvana. No memory sucking apps lurking in the background, just a nice clean DirectX style (OpenX perhaps?) API and top notch driver support (proprietary or otherwise but DEVELOPED for open standards).
Make Ogg Vorbis for audio, OpenGL for graphics etc. part of the OpenX standard.
And when you're finished playing games, each game exit routine drops you back to a normal GUI desktop environment for your normal computing tasks.
You could have competing (but OpenX standards based) distros that would try to eek as much performance out of the game kernel as possible.
Give me that and I'll ditch Windows 2000 tomorrow.
Quizo69
Visceral Psyche Films
Best case scenario, this makes people take Linux more seriously. Worst case scenario, Microsoft starts making Windows a competitively priced and featured OS. Might we be seeing NFS and Ext3 support built into Windows soon? Perhaps even a better set of console tools and a free development environment? MSVC 5 bundled with Windows would do nicely.
As far as private computers at home are concerned, I wouldn't expect a significant part of the population to switch from Windows to GNU/Linux. OS X is a much stronger competitor of Windows in that area. It seems that mostly people with a special interest in IT and OSS are using Linux (often, they know several operating systems). Sometimes, they can convince "normal" computer users they know to use Linux, as well, but I don't believe that this way of spread can result in a massive rise of the number of Linux users.
One important reason is that the difference in price doesn't matter so much for private users. Of course, Linux is free, but most users - and "normal computer users even more so" - usually want to have a convenient up-to-date distribution on a DVD or CDs, and if you buy new versions from time to time, Linux won't be much cheaper any more.
That is, of course, very different for companies and institutions, even if they always buy the latest version of their distribution, they can use it for an unlimited number of computers. Therefore, I think it can be expected that more companies and institutions will use Linux (of course, some can't because they use specialised software developped for Windows, but many can), cities like Munich or Schwäbisch Hall are a show what might happen in many other places, as well. Then, many people will get to know Linux at work, and because they get used to it, many of them will also use it at home and recommend it to others, and educational institutions will have to deal with Linux "because that's what you will be likely to see at work".
I think that if Linux is going to take over a significant share of the desktop, it is probably going to happen in such a way. The grassroot movement for Linux is quite strong, but I don't think it can reach more than a few per cent of the population if companies and public organisations choosing Linux to save money don't play their role.
For ages I've been telling people they should try Linux because it's got MS worried and must therefore be worth a look and all I've had is the mumblings of market analysts and the odd journalist.
Now I've got it from the horses mouth I can tell people they should try it because Microsoft are shitting bricks and giving their own software away 'cos it's doesn't justify the price.
Hmmmmmm..... Deep fried and look like Squirrel.
Interestingly, this "HIV==AIDS myth"-thing appears in a "6. Profit"-thread.
There are some scientists (like the (in-)famous Peter Duesberg, see here and somewhere in here) who strongly argue against the fact that HIV usually causes AIDS. They even argue that drugs against HIV (like AZT) cause AIDS.
Especially some african governments appreciate this view.
So, here we go...
1. Deny that HIV causes AIDS
2. Say that drugs against HIV cause AIDS
3. Ban all those drugs from your (banana republic) country
4. Profit !!! -> less uneducated, sexual (over-)active people to care about
5. Even more profit -> no need to pay for drugs against HIV and a working infrastructure to bring them to the patients and ensure a steady treatment
Notez bien: The "???"-step is not necessary, instead you get two "profit!"-steps!
Although the average slashgeek likes to jump down Microsoft's throat over everything they do, isn't this sort of move exactly what should happen? Aren't things like lowering prices and opening source code some of the long-argued benefits of Linux competing with Microsoft?
Kudos to Linux!
At least 10%. I'm quite sure Microsoft made them sign a non-competition clause before they got the money. This is why OS-X will never be sold for PCs and why Mac monitors are made to not work with PCs.
Someone should buy that bit of Apple back. Apple could make a fortune selling PCs that look like Apples. Remember the Emachine? And if they ported OS-X to Intel they'ed be the instant number 2 DESKTOP OS.
If there ever was a time to ENCOURAGE comparisons between Windows and Linux, THAT TIME IS NOW. You need to consider the audience, people. The audience is NOT GEEKS. It is all of those under-trained, under-skilled folks who still need a computer to do something for them with a minimum of input or instruction.
Microsoft wants those people looking at Linux TODAY, not a year or two from now, when Linux is much better, or when skill sets have improved to make it less difficult to do a proper install.
For every battle against Linux that Microsoft loses today, they will win 20-30 others, because lets face it, the bulk of the people who use computers, both in business and in a personal setting are blithering idiots compared to those of us who know how to use and extend Linux.
Microsoft is brilliant(as usual) in encouraging people to start making comparisons NOW as opposed to later, because if people are turned off by the complexities of Linux now, they are unlikely to revisit the issue anytime soon. Once Microsoft has their dollars, the battle is over for at least a decade.
Some of you folks need to go out and buy "The Prince", and learn a little about winners and losers.
From the article:
According to NetCraft's June analysis of the software running Web servers, Microsoft's newest operating system, Windows Server 2003, made significant inroads into the Linux market--and 5% of its growth has come at the expense of Linux, with more than 8,000 systems having migrated from that open-source operating system to Windows Server 2003.
I replied to this message, because the other one was an AC.
Dr. Pepper is NOT a Pepsi product. Maybe in YOUR area, the same company bottles both, but Dr. Pepper is not produced by Pepsi.
So Mr. AC- I think you owe Windex an apology. Not only did he NOT say that Dr. Pepper was a Pepsi product, but you attacked him with false information.
Here is a list of Pepsi drink brands- they also sell food, but that is not on the list.
http://pepsi.com/pepsi_brands/all_brands/index.phNo reason to lie.
Not necessarily. I see problems #1 and #2 as going hand in hand. Linux isn't yet the biggest threat to microsoft. Spending is. Companies aren't willing to spend megabucks on big windows machines, thus Linux looks like a good deal. But, when the recession is over, I think Linux will move up to the #1 spot. More and more shops will have gone over to linux, and it's benefits will be even more well known and widespread than they are now. So many places are still stuck using old equipment, and companies tend to try to postpone upgrades if they can force their old stuff to continue working.
-- Having a Creationist Museum is like having an Atheist place of worship
> I wonder how long it's going to take Microsoft to figure out that it's not Linux that's the threat, it's open source.
Err, how about when Linux zealots realize that MS is just playing to their vanities. Where exactly is the great Linux desktop rollout? Sure, there are inroads to the server-side of things, but Linux is also pushing out Solaris, not just NT.
Why would MS list linux as their #2 threat is they don't mean it? It answers a couple important questions:
1. Why do your products cost so much?
Umm, Linux.
2. Are you still a harmful monopoly?
Umm, no way. Linux. Its killing us!
3. How would you compare OSX to Windows?
Umm, Linux. Linux is everything, haven't you heard? I don't even know what "ooosssexxx" is. Sounds like porno. Next question!
etc.
Microsoft needs a real enemy to play off its "evil empire" image, preferable one that isn't really a desktop threat like Apple. You guys are falling for this hook, line, and sinker.
Not to mention I still cannot see how opening CE is a "reaction to Linux." Opening advanced server would be a reaction to Linux.
MS didn't get where it is by playing fair or by telling the truth. This article is no exception.
IAWTP
Oooh, you're so 133t!
You fail it, fuckhat.
Coincidence? I think now!
Hey! Stop that! This is slashdot!
Don't let me catch you thinking again!
During the 2nd episode of the chapelle show, they did a skit to rip up on Kinko's (a copy and office-supply store). They had a line in there to the effect of - "If they give you a Windows disk, tell them we only run Mac. If they give you a Mac disk, tell them we only run windows. IF they give you both, tell them we use linux. And if they give you all three, tell them the computers are down"
I think it's safe to say when Dave Chapelle uses you in one of his skits, you're reaching the forefront of public consciousness.
Stop the Slashdot effect! Don't read the articles!
I hope this doesn't come off like some kneejerk /. anti-MS rant, because I really do see so much waste, and I really do think that Microsoft is responsible for enough damned lossage to have effected the economy. I really do.
My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
I have to ask... What would you be using your OS X servers for? File/Print? Those are obviously well supported. But once you get into database land, clients are OFTEN chosen based on what database server you choose (ie: the server is chosen before long the client). Here's one area OS X would fall flat. I don't use a Mac, but I know for a fact that none of the BIG 3 (yeah we could argue there are more than three) DB vendors run their software on OS X (or have any plans to, AFAIK).
I know there's Filemaker Pro, but no one in their right mind would consider that anywhere close to Oracle or DB2. You could also run an opensource DB on OS X (MySQL, Postgres, Open Base), but, again, they don't compare in Enterprise features.
The Dr Pepper/Seven-Up corporation is owned by Cadbury Schweppes plc
--
the strongest word is still the word "free"
"What people tend to forget is that there are gatekeepers in the open-source community, too," he said. "It's not a free-for-all. On every one of the open-source projects, there are two or three people who are the gatekeepers. And you have to make a pretty good case, accurate and technically astute, to get them to allow changes. That's how it should be."
There are no gatekeepers. They just maintain a tree. You are free to build yoour own tree. Sheeshh!! When will these *analysts* get the details right?? Moron!!!!
Microsoft is taking the Linux threat seriously. So seriously, in fact, that open-source software comes in at the No. 2 spot on the company's top five list of risks.
Microsoft's perceived Top 5 list of threats:
1) Economic Environment
2) Linux
3) Growing the installed base in today's tight-spending climate
4) Litigation
5) Executing plans on multiple fronts.
Microsoft's actual Top 5 list of threats:
1) THEMSELVES
2) Doesn't matter
3) Doesn't matter
4) Doesn't matter
5) Doesn't matter
Ruby on Rails Screencast
...is offering big bucks to port Perl, Python and/or Ruby to .NET and come up with a dry well. Story is that the CLR does not allow for dynamic languages, at least that was the conclusion after an ActiveState attempt financed by Redmond failed to produce byte code with full dynamic functionality.
.NET roadmap.
So, you may have put your finger on the exact source of Microsoft's concern: Linux-Apache-MySQL plus one of the dynamic, not-just-for-scripting-anymore languages. They just don't have an answer in this niche for their
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
OpenEmbedded is the consolidation process of the different Linux PDA & Embedded solutions.
Linux PDA projects like OpenZaurus, and the Open Palmtop Integrated Environment (OPIE) will lead to more flexible and widely supported Linux platforms. Just have a peek at the long list of Linux supported platforms: HP iPaqs, Dell Axim's, Sharp Zaurus, Samsung's Yopy, Siemens SIMpad's, etc...
Now that Microsoft has admitted that Linux is one of their primary threats, we can attempt to deduce their opinion of the SCO-IBM lawsuit.
Fact 0: Microsoft could buy SCO for a single day's worth of revenue.
Fact 1: SCO claims that without their permission, nobody can use Linux.
Fact 2: Microsoft knows that Linux is one of their biggest threat to profits.
Fact 3: Microsoft has not bought SCO.
The natural conclusion of these facts is that Microsoft feels SCO's claim has no merit, and will be struck down in court. Rather than buying SCO and expediting the court-case so that Linux can be quashed immediately, they've chosen to sit back and allow the unsettled allegation to stir up uncertainty and dissuade potential Linux adopters.
Note: this doesn't mean that Microsoft considers it impossible for SCO to win the case- only that they don't think there's a high probabilty of victory. They benefit from allowing the FUD to continue for as long as possible before the dice are rolled in court. In fact, there's another way they benefit from holding off the verdict: if some companies deploy Linux and then have their operations interrupted by C&D orders in the wake of an SCO victory, it will discourage future corporate adoption of all kinds of Open Source software.
Windows has everything to loose.
You either meant to say "Windows has everything to lose." or "Windows has everything too loose."
Either is correct since Microsoft is not known for their tight code...
From excellent karma to terible karma with a single +5 funny post...
But the economy is still on the number 1 spot ! ... well, Linux will take care of *that*.
There is nothing like competition to make an overpriced perveyor of second-rate products see the light. Good work Open Source hackers. Keep it up!
I think it's interesting that M$ lists the general economic environment as their Number 1 threat. In some ways,the general economic environment can be an asset for Open Source Software. Speaking exclusively for myself, If I were to be laid off (due to poor performance by my company), I'd certainly spend more time working on worthy Open Source projects...
that's GHANDICON THREE you know! remember to be a real hacker by speaking real hacker-speak from the hacker's dictionary esr didn't just pull that from his ass, he put GHANDICON into the dictionary because that's what all the hackers are saying!
Does my bum look big in this?
More recently, the company has been stepping up its efforts to convince potential European clients that they should steer away from Linux and towards its products. But even though Ballmer intervened in the attempt to win over the city of Munich, Linux won out.
... Windows. I'm not a big fan of Gartner, but they've issued a report, correctly titled, "Munich's Choice Doesn't Prove Linux OK for General Desktop Use," that raises some interesting issues. First, many of the Windows desktops they're migrated are very old Windows versions like Windows 3.1, making the switch to Linux less painful (it would be equally painful to switch to XP). Gartner says the cost of switching to Linux will cost 30 million Euros, or 3 million Euros more than it would cost to switch to XP, not including any steep discounts Microsoft would have no doubt provided. And finally, because most of the Linux machines will use VMWare to run Windows anyway, Linux is really being used as a hosting environment, and not as a replacement. In other words, this isn't exactly a good business case on which other companies can base a decision to migrate to Windows desktops. And, not coincidentally, that's why we're not reading about a lot of other high-profile Linux switchers.
This is very good for Linux, and I'm not trying to downplay it, but I just heard about this over at WinInformant:
Fun Fact About Those Linux PCs in Munich
And speaking about Linux stories you don't hear much from the Linux-loving mainstream press, consider the following. Remember that story about the city of Munich choosing Linux to power 14,000 desktop computers? One aspect of this story that most people don't know about is that up to 80 percent of those Linux desktops will be equipped with VMWare, a virtual machine emulator, under which they will run Windows and Windows applications. That's right, folks: The majority of those "Linux desktops" will be used to run
Yes, this is probably a biased site, but Slashdot can be sometimes, too. You can also read the Gartner article for more information. What do people think about this? Has anyone read any other articles about the VMWare situation? Do you really think this affects how Linux people should feel about the deal?
-Shippy
As much as we all like to believe that MS fears Linux/OSS/etc they have a much bigger, and more thoroughly entrenched enemy that is the bane of their existance - previous versions of their own software. How many companies are still running Office97 or Windows 98 or NT? That software takes a bigger bite out of their potential revenues than anything the OSS community is doing.
Altough to mention most geeks are not very talented in the arts of PASSIVE resistence like your citate from ghandí.
I disagree! The most passive (and perhaps most effective) form of resistance against Microsoft is simply to not use their software, and that seems to be very popular among geeks nowadays.
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
It isn't Linux itself that Microsoft is scared of: it is deployment of services across a network that linux enables. This means that the LAMP (apache mysql php) approach is really what concerns them.
Does "business value" mean having a bunch of point-and-clickers take over your IT department? It takes a sixth-grade education to get through a Windows Server 2003 patch upgrade. Know how to click "OK" and you've got the job!
What Microsoft is missing is this: unix sysadmin skills have real value, a value tied up in automating business processes. Investing in off-the-shelf boxed products so you don't have to invest in quality skilled IT people is short-sighted.
Get it straight from the horse's mouth: Microsoft Lessons
http://tinyurl.com/4ny52
with a Big Cannon aimed right at it.
While we are all waiting for the inevitable MS vs Linux Showdown, perhaps it has occurred much faster than we all expected or were prepared for.
The SCO IBM drama? Perhaps its not just conspiracy thinking that MS is indeed using SCO to destroy linux, which is it pretty much has to. I think that the idea that different OS will live in peace is no longer panning out as more and more of business goes electronic, they need *ONE* system that works. MS of late has actually been working quite hard, my XP has crashed only one in the past 6 months (rahter a program lock up) that also can happen in linux. Perhaps MS realizes that if linux keeps getting better, they will lose of the money issue and so need to take linux out as quickly as possible. I myself think the SCO IBM issue is just the tip of the ice burg.
But I cant figure out where the BIg Bomb will drop from? Does anyone have any ideas?
Sigs are dangerous coy things
Yea but pepsi sucks. RC or kroger cola is much better than pepsi. GNU/Linux is a very good operating system. With the exception of games it has already replaced windblows on all of my desktops.
I hate that RedHat has dropped the retail boxed set. I always got it from a friend or a book but I sent them 60$ even though I use apt-get to stay updated. Why? to support the distro I use and keep the Linux movement going. And Yes I hate the blue curve and the blurring of gnome and kde. but it is still better than SuSe and Mandrake. I think I am going to try Debian or Slackware next. but I am probably not in tune enough to configure those distros to my needs.
I don't think he meant Open Office vs MS Office, tho'.
I think OpenOffice is the biggest threat to MS. Two-thirds of MS's profits come from MSOffice. Any Office replacement is a big threat even without desktop Linux threatening the other one-third of MS's profits (MSWindows). If all the major companies switched to OpenOffice on Windows, which seems possible once v2 is released, then MS loses most of their income. That must be considered a major threat to MS.
The process can avalanche. If a few powerful companies migrate, and insist that all communications are in a format they can read, then everybody who deals with them will migrate too. This affects home users too. If a company only accepts resume submissions in OpenOffice format, then home users will need to install it to do their resume.
MS has used this process for the last 10 years to force everybody to upgrade to the latest version of MSOffice. A major company upgrades. All of their vendors have to upgrade to keep the business. Many associated businesses have to upgrade, and the process keeps spreading.
But the next "upgrade" will probably be to OpenOffice, wiping MSOffice from corporate computers in less than 3 years. MS could slow the process by teaching MSWord to default save to the new format. MS cannot extend the format when embracing it since just adding this feature is admitting that MS has lost control of the word processing document file format.
Once the users are comfortable in OpenOffice, the switch to another OS becomes much easier (and MS could lose the rest of their income.)
I spend my life entertaining my brain.
When they proposed giving IE away, BillG's initial response was to call them communists. When they said it was a standard monopolists' tactic, he got comfortable with it.
Microsoft is afraid of an operating system born out of the same commodization of PC/computer expertise and talent that allows Microsoft to outsource programming chores overseas?
Simply stellar! I hope they enjoy it.
A good part of the reason for poor PC sales and a poor economic environment, at least in the high-tech world, is non other than Microsoft itself.
Now combine this with the RIAA, the DMCA, DRM, bugs, viruses, worms and guess what, PC sales are down!
Now suppose that along comes a genius who could fix all of these problems and restore the PC to itd former promise. What would happen? It is obvious, nobody would invest in such a startup when they could just invest in Microsoft! Yes, naive business people do think this way!!!
asswhy assnot? assI assmean assif assit assworks assfor asshat assit assshould asswork assfor assany assword!
I am very amused this turned into a micro-flamewar while I was gone. I already knew it was owned by the same folks who do 7up. :)
>>They're going to be surprised at how quickly Linux's threat will be an issue on the desktop
Indeed. The advances on the desktop are stunning. I watch kde closely and the speed of development, improvements and completeness of the desktop are stunning. Kde 3.2 will be a major release, making 3.1 feel old, and it's just 6 months old now.
There are two very good browsers, Konqueror and Mozilla. Two very good desktop environments, Kde and Gnome. Each has it's good applications, with some overlap. Each steals good ideas from the other, while going in slightly different directions. The holes are slowly being filled, ie. Openoffice, and others.
Microsoft has reason to be afraid. Right now, linux is almost at a point in the desktop that there is no good reason to not use it. Almost, very very close. Once it is, why sell a box with OS, Office, photo editing stuff, etc for money when it's available free?
Derek
i predict an MS-Linux release in 2-3 years.
Well written post, however it doesn't seem to have any facts or arguments to back it up besides emotional ones.
Please answer one, and only one question for me: If Microsoft were to release a version of Linux what is in it for them?
Where exactly is the great Linux desktop rollout?
:) Well, primarily some regions of Spain and a couple of German cities, so far. But when (note, I don't say "if") those deployments prove successful and effective, more will follow.
Europe.
2. Are you still a harmful monopoly?
Umm, no way. Linux. Its killing us!
Of course, in your scenario (no desktop penetration), this would be a bald-faced lie, since their monoply was judged to be on the desktop, so Linux owning 99% of the server market wouldn't change that at all. And of course, it's still really too early to call Linux a real competitor on the desktop, even with what's going on in Europe, so it really would still be a bald-faced lie if they try to claim that today. Not that they're above bald-faced lying, of course.
MS didn't get where it is by playing fair or by telling the truth. This article is no exception.
Now there you hit the nail square on the head. This is clearly an attempt at spin by MS, and they deserve to be called on it. OTOH, that doesn't mean they're not right. What other competition do they face? Apple? Hah! Apple's the fancy luxury model, and will never compete in the cheap commodity markets where MS is so entrenched. Popular with rich geeks and yuppies? Sure. Essential for certain niche markets? No question. Deployed in the thousands across corporate/government desktops? Dream on!
But while I quibble with a lot of your details, I still agree with your conclusion that this announcement needs to be viewed in light of MS's normal methods of playing the game.
Oh, but by the way, your response, while an interesting post on it's own, was not a valid response to "[when will] Microsoft figure out that it's not Linux that's the threat, it's open source." The answer to that is, they already have! They didn't just say that Linux was the #2 threat, they said Linux and other non-commercial software.
> Let's realise that Linux is successful 'cos MS divided the h/w folks, and that led to competition and commodity pricing, at the same time market aggregation.
:->) and put Palladium on it, that could cut off Linux entirely, since this XXBox would be $150 for h/w and s/w would be $50 per year!
Wrong. The hardware innovation occurred because of free market competition.
In other words, it happened because Microsoft was NOT involved.
In fact, the only thing Microsoft did was to hold hardware innovation back. For example, look at how many years the 80386 had been out before Microsoft finally supported its memory protection features. Or look at how badly Windows performs on 64-bit platforms.
Or for that matter, just look at Microsoft's performance in their own market, software. Microsoft let DOS stagnate for years until DR-DOS gave then some ideas to copy. Microsoft didn't have a modern GUI until Windows 95, which was ten years after Apple, Unix, Amiga, and Atari. And, after they finished copying Netscape, Microsoft has made virtually no improvements to the browser for five long years.
> In a way, MS not getting into h/w is good for Linux. OTOH if they make a modified XBox, say XXBox (what about XXXBox
Nonsense. If Microsoft enters the hardware market, then innovation will cease for Windows-ready hardware.
Meanwhile, Linux-ready hardware would continue to become cheaper, more powerful, and more innovative.
For twenty years, Microsoft software has continued to become less efficient, and more expensive. But people didn't notice, because the hardware became more powerful, and less expensive.
If Microsoft tries to control the hardware business, then they will be signing their own death warrant.
"dey 5uX0r as bizn3ss", "Linux r00lz j00", and "M$ Wind0z3 iz l4m3" seem to be the primary "points" people make here.
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
hahaha, dispite the technical inconsistancys that where pointed out :P that was hella funny!!
1) Legal BS (SCO )
2) Microsoft
3) Developer burnout
I admit being dumbfounded to hear Microsoft worries about the economy and lists it as the number one threat to MS. The only concern of a monopoly is their relative amount of power, and extending that power into other areas of business to grow more monolopies.
Monopoly politics always improverishes the society.
The current OSS movement exists largely because Microsoft has single handedly destroyed most the promising avenues for creating money with software development.
OSS exists and P2P is collapsing the music industry because people are fed up with being impoverished by the power politics of monopolies.
Since politicians are scared shitless about the recession, I would think MS would be delighting in it since the recession creates a climate where it will be easy to prosecute people who share music files and rule against OSS in court cases.
The recession means more and more power in Bill Gate's hands.
"Microsoft will take some considerable encouragement at the number of sites that have switched from Linux," NetCraft said in the report.
But the server arena isn't really the one to watch how Microsoft reacts to Linux, said Cherry.
"People are underestimating Linux on the desktop," he said. "They think it's all about the servers, and how Microsoft responds there. They're going to be surprised at how quickly Linux's threat will be an issue on the desktop. Linux will get to be 'just good enough' for the desktop faster than people think."
Maybe that will make Microsoft bump Linux to the top of its risk list.
This is what I've been saying since I first saw screenshots of Enlightenment back in 1998. The moment I, sitting in Front of Windows95 and some ancient Explorer, saw
this, I knew M$ would lose in the end. Software wins by widespread use. Widespread use is achieved by public awareness. And, believe me, public awareness is *not* achieved on servers, no matter how much the difference is. Public awareness is achieved on the Desktop. That's the bottom line.
Having seen previews of KDE 3.2 at the LinuxTag I conclude: Not only has GNU + Linux gained momentum but it is close to reaching critical mass.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Use a tripwire system with the tripwire wrapped around the inside of the case and the screws, so that it cant be opened without breaking the wire; the tripwire should be attached to a NOT gate attached in turn to a detonator with a strong enough explosive charge to destroy the device. Another method however is X-Rays so you should use a metal case(which will stop most EM radiation at every frequency except extremely high frequencies, ie beyond gamma rays) just inside the tripwire. This also prevents waves from inside the device escaping, and giving away the location of the source, and the functional form of the voltage. There are other waves to worry about, in particular sound waves. Anything with a sufficiently high acoustic impedance surrounding the hardware its self will reflect most of the sound wave. Most other waves are not significant in this case. The biggest remaining problem is that someone conceivably could reconstruct the temperature and the thermal conductivity at each point from thermal images at 2 different points in time separated by a small time interval, using the heat equation, C*pho*partial T/partial t = k *laplacian T + grad T dot grad k (I know this notation sucks but ascii doesn't have those symbols so im just putting it in bold; C is specific heat). the innermost casing should be filled with an inhomogenous mixture of a wide array of molten plastics(which solidify afterwards; an air pocket must be maintained around the explosive charge however), some of which preferably have specific heats and/or thermal conductivities that change significantly with relatively small changes in temperature(making the equation nonlinear; the specific plastics and their locations in the material are not known, so there does not exist a unique solution now that these constants vary with temperature, and thus have more degrees of freedom; this can however be circumvented if an approximate functional form is known for the constants), so that k is not susceptible to any special approximation techniques, and thus requiring a large amount of detail in the imaging, and a computationally intensive approximation. However the thermodynamic constants can be found by using thermal imaging when the device is off and the external heat sources are known, so there must also be heat sources with unpredictable power inside, which like the tripwire system stay on when the device is switched off. The techniques described can still be used to reverse engineer it given sufficiently accurate measurements.
"We have got to make Stan understand the importance of voting, because he'll definitely vote for our guy." - South Park
A nice idea, but Microsoft isn't gonna be doing that anytime soon. Mice/game pads/Keyboards are nothing. Bill Gates's toilet water probably costs more than he could make from those. Why go fishing in the puddle, when the ocean is around the corner?
Karma: Bad. Mostly because the only moderators that notice me are conservatives.
There is a very real chance that you will die from Ebola. Considering you are a healthy person, that chance is very low. Mentioning Ebola by name will not increase your risk.
Now imagine that you are talking to your friends. If you are truly sick with cancer (knock on wood), it is unlikely that you will tell your friends, "I have a low chance of dying from Ebola." Instead, you might say, "My cancer treatment is currently doing well. I'm fine--but thanks for your concern though."
At this point, your odds of dying of cancer are much higher than your odds of dying of Ebola. You mention cancer because you are actively seeking to reduce its effects, and perhaps even eliminate it.
Imagine you are Microsoft. Take this example, and for each instance of Ebola, insert the name "OS/2 Warp" instead. Now replace cancer with "GNU/Linux". You may quickly realise Microsoft's predicament at this point.
I am very impressed with the low quality of trolling on slashdot these days, it makes me proud that my continued murderous rampages against known trolls is preventing them from breeding into better trolls..
i predict an MS-Linux release in 2-3 years.
It's MS-GNU/Linux, dammit!!
An unjust law is no law at all. - St. Augustine
Very true but the hardest thing for Microsoft is that they are the authors to a large degree of there own nemesis see what I wrote above, I very much doubt Microsoft can change fast enough, they have already begun to pay for their own missdeeds, but still they try to blame everything and everyone else.
in my life God comes first.... but Linux is pretty high after that
Francis Smit
Careful - american assGreetings might sue you for infringing their assStrawberry assShortcake property.
The battle between Microsoft and Linux isn't necessarily about cost. Sure, that may be a factor, but the most important thing is the quality of the program. That is Linux's strongest point, although total cost is another strong point of Linux. If Microsoft makes CE shared-source, and improves CE so that it truly is better than Linux or some other open source OS for embedded systems, then they deserve to win. On the other hand, if Linux is better, than it deserves to win. It's all about the best tool for the job. My guess is that WinCE will continue to maintain a good hold on the PDA market for the same reason they have a stranglehold on the desktop marked (everyone knows how to use it), but for other embedded devices, Linux or any other OS will probably do much better.
Microsoft seems to be (slowly) improving their code stability, and now they just need to add security. If they really focused on building a solid OS instead of bells and whisles, they would probably be able to have something equivalent to Linux. Above cost, we should be pushing "Linux is a solid OS" to people who are debating between Linux and Windows.
Although Open Source may be morally better than closed-source, when it comes down to running a program, if the closed-source version is better, and at a reasonable cost, I'll take it over the OSS alternative. We have to realize that people aren't OSS purists, and to the end user, the fact that the source is open doesn't directly affect them (they're not going to go reading the source and change it. They want it to work out of the box).
I think the poor "economic climate" for Microsoft and the "Linux threat" might be connected to each other. People switch to various Linux-based servers and sometimes even for desktop usage since they find Linux "good enough" and perhaps cheaper as well, in the long run as well. And with the current economic climate, price is important and so is the "good enough" factor. A poor economic climate might speed up the Linux adaption and I'm not really that surprised to see Linux that high on the list simultaneously as the "economic climate", since I'm seeing those as connected. Not saying that people will switch back to Microsoft when/if the climate improves, but the Linux adaption might slow down a bit.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
I submitted this a few days ago, but for some reason it was never posted... :o)
Sites switch from Linux to windows 2003
The Netcraft article states:
Comparing the sites which are now hosted on Windows 2003 with their operating system in December 2002 shows over 42% of these to be new sites, 43% (68K) to be upgrades from other Windows platforms (mainly Windows 2000), 5% (8K) to be migrations from Linux and 1% from other operating systems.
So the Information Week article spins the data...
According to NetCraft's June analysis of the software running Web servers, Microsoft's newest operating system, Windows Server 2003, made significant inroads into the Linux market--and 5% of its growth has come at the expense of Linux, with more than 8,000 systems having migrated from that open-source operating system to Windows Server 2003.
Not systems... sites.
This could be one computer with a bunch of little domains hosted on it that switched over to windows.
Dr. Pepper is not a Pepsi Co. product, but Mountain Dew is. I like Mountain Dew, but I've stopped drinking it because it contains brominated vegetable oil. The thought of drinking oil grosses me out.
cpeterso
The latest issue of IEEE Spectrum has an interesting article on Why Apple, Sun, and Red Hat must merge.
Or rather an announcement of an MS-Linux release in 2 to 3 years, but nothing on shelves for, oh, 4 to 5?
We are talking about Microsoft, after all.
...I was citing the ActiveState attempt as the reason some people believe the CLR doesn't support dynamic languages. I have some doubt whether this is true or not. Perl, Python and Ruby are all implemented in C, so it seems to me they ought to be able to be done in byte code. But, if ActiveState with the full cooperation of Microsoft decided it was not possible, maybe they know something I don't.
I never claimed to be doing more than repeating a rumor from a source I trust. I am certain I did not misunderstand my source as thoroughly as you misunderstood my post. Actually, I heard this from several people, although I would not rule out the possibility that it all originated from one source.
I have checked with ActiveState and found no evidence to contradict this story. They list no Perl.NET product which would disprove the rumor. Their PerlNET product does not appear to be a byte-code implementation of Perl. It appears to run a separate Perl interpreter with the ability to communicate with ASP.NET. I do not think they would be pushing this product if they thought they had a version of Perl.NET producing byte code waiting in the wings. But maybe I'm wrong.
Anonymous Cowards never are.
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
Just thought you'd like to know, we haven't been in a recession since 2001. This is just a period of slow growth."
Basically.. NBER sold out.
For the first time they used the Governments fudged up GDP numbers as justification for declaring the recession ended.
Now for the skinny on BOGUS GDP numbers..
You do realize that Government spending numbers are included in the GDP reports. So when the fed's whip out the old gov' spending card the claimed GDP numbers rise. We've gone from 140B annual surplus to 500+B deficit in just a few years.. (Hmmm.. That's at least 4 to 5% of GDP).
Here is a truer picture of the US economy.. Fed's tax receipts.
Since the peak of tax collections Oct 2000.. The BEA claims GDP has grown by 3.7%
But,
1. Real Fed tax receipts are down by 14% since Oct 2000. (and still dropping)
2. Inflation Since Oct 2000 up by 7%.
(claimed GDP numbers are already adjusted, but tax receipts are in current dollars. )
3. Work age pop growth since Oct 2000 up by 3.2% (Vast majority of taxes come from workers).
So in REAL terms taxes receipts from the private sector is down by ~27%.
And the divergence from claimed GDP numbers is something like ~31%.
Isn't it fun how they can cook the numbers and come up with growth?
In summary.. the US economy is definitely in COLLAPSE MODE.
Windows NT/2000/XP
95% bugs and securtiy risks, 5 % OS.
Ian WJ
Open Source "gatekeepers," like Linus, only get the job of gatekeeper because they are the most popular.
Linus is popular because he is quiet, kind, well spoken, and reasonable. He is the kernel "gatekeeper" because the kernel is his, he is reasonable, he values the technical merit of solutions over the "popularity" of the proposers, and has the necessary technical ability to manage a complex distributed development task that incorporates the ideas of thousands of coders with differing ideas, methods, and objectives for kernel development.
Stallman, OTOH, is unpopular becaus he is outspoken, judgemental, coarse, and opinionated. He is the GNU "gatekeeper" because the project is his, he is tenatious, he values technical solutions over the popularity of the proposers, and he has the necessary vision to manage a project consisting of hundreds of small interacting parts developed by thousands of coders who often dissagree strongly with him about the ideas, methods, and goals of the GNU project.
Popularity is not a requirement for respect in the Free Software movement. This is one of the strengths of Free software. Imagine RMS in a corporate environment. (I try to imagine the look on the bosses face every time I'm reading something he wrote.)
Read, L
Given that Microsoft is publically held, it's management will disclose information on competitive threats to the shareholders. Those filings are all public.
;-)
Unless you're Enron, WorldCom, Global Crossing, Adelphia...
It seems you know nothing of the new/classic coke story.
The attempt to launch "new" coke had all to do with moving something from schedule IV to schedule I. When coca cola capitulated and came back with "classic" coke due to tremendous loss of sales, and investors and the business establishment not understanding why coke was sticking with "new" coke, the wished for move to schedule I was no longer possible.
So even today, one ingredient of coke continues to be transported to a single location in the country, protected by barbed wire and armed guards, where it is processed or combined with other ingredients so that it can later be made into syrup.
The Wall Street Journal had an article on exactly what I'm talking about. And the Wall Street Journal article admitted that tremendous pressure was brought on them not to print the story, but they did anyway. So did another publication years earlier than the Wall Street Journal. Do a lexis nexis search on some of the terms I used in this post and it should come up.
If I remember correctly, it started as a large article on the back or front page, possibly one of the "business" sections, or the main section.
Nobody who has used StarOffice or OpenOffice for a longer document would EVER return to MSOffice. StarOffice with usable paragraph, text and page styles is much better at handling long documents than MS Word.
When I was responsible for a book of our university institute, we found that MSOffice was not able to meet our (modest!) requirements. We switched to StarOffice-5.2 and came up with an excellent ready-to-print copy after just one day of work. Previous attempts with MSOffice had already cost us 2 days.
Many interesting features of StarOffice are missing in Word or the Word equivalents are so buggy (lists e.g.!!) that no one in his right mind would ever use them.
Just because you did not know how to activate a feature in OpenOffice.org does not mean it is not implemented!!
Moritz
Just that he could build an OPEN one.
I (and many others I'd wager) would gladly pay for it. He (or someone else, I only use his name because it is well known to us geeks) could just as easily bundle the GameOS with his next version of Quake or Doom and say "Here's my new game, and here's the best OS to run it on, included for the bundle price of just $5 more."
And why the anonymous coward posts??
Visceral Psyche Films
...I took out with a colleague three years ago.
I said that within five years Linux would be a tangible, realistic desktop option for the mainstream and a true challenger to M$ - he disagreed. I can't remember just now what percentage inroad I stated (my p.d.a. knows) but it looks like I'm going to be getting that posh dinner for me and the missus after all.
Ah, sweet victory is in sight.
Go permanent? In your dreams and my worst nightmares.
why wouldn't MS used BSD? i believe they understand the power of the momentum building in the LINUX brand. it's not about technology. LINUX (as a brand) is (or soon will be) identified as the useful, reliable, satisfactory, cool OS that won't have the DRM/LICENSE baggage that MS-WINDOWS has.
MS will simply be segmenting their market, (like they have with HOME/PRO versions) and co-opting their only serious competetor.
...doesn't seem to have any facts or arguments to back it up besides emotional ones.
:)
...If Microsoft were to release a version of Linux what is in it for them?
:)
yes, it doesn't have any facts to back it up. i believe that some clever MBA student could build a well reasoned defense of the proposition though. if i was still doing that, i'd give it a shot. right now my time is devoted to building linux servers and competing with MS...rather successfully if i do say so myself
MS needs to defend their flank against a sure assault from a product they can't buy or ignore. i think that they will hire a LINUX evangelist, devote a cadre of programmers to projects near and dear to the LINUX community to offset the hew and cry from the purists, and compete with RED HAT and SUSE.
if RED HAT and SUSE think they can make money doing that, why shouldn't MS?
the interesting thing will be watching MS spin an involvement with LINUX as a customer service. (they've accomplished similar paradigm shifts before.) IBM and HP did it. but they hadn't spread the vitriol MS had. maybe MS will just fire those responsible for those 'outdated' views...or send them to 're-education' camps
somewhat less interesting theatre would be watching MS differentiate their products from LINUX...but apple did it and doesn't MS have to do that anyway? and as a bonus, they'll be able to port MS Office to the their LINUX platform with a clear conscience!
...It's MS-GNU/Linux, dammit!!
:(
yes, absolutely, sorry. i won't make that mistake again. novice poster
At least they treat linux and thier users like nuber two.
If Microsoft openly says that they are worried about Linux regardless of if they are or not, it will make any sneaky businness tactics look like they are simply protecting the company from what they see as a serious threat rather being seen to make sure it doesn't get to a position where it could be.
"Microsoft has officially moved Linux up to the Number 2 Risk to the company..."
This is not correct. The number 1 and 2 risks to Microsoft are the terrible ways the company treats its customers and the poor quality of its product, for example, billions of dollars in damage because of viruses exploiting the poor security of Windows.
Anyone who needs more evidence should see: Unpatched IE security holes. There have been at least 15 unpatched but well known security vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer for the last 2 years. Apparently Microsoft just doesn't care. Or, possibly the U.S. government's secret agencies are using the vulnerabilities to spy on users. The fact is, the quality is poor.
= Introduction =
I barely use Office programs:
- MSWord is used for the resume, and I only update it when companies ask. I have about 5 projects to add this year, so I may need to install it again.
- MSExcel is used by me for reformatting code to a pattern. I could be using any spreadsheet program, or even a word processor that has decent pattern matching. MSExcel is extremely annoying: there are constant annoying dialog boxes, and a single typo can cause code to disappear. I usually write the formulas in Notepad, then paste it into Excel; and always regret when I forget to do so.
I prefer my information as information rather than entertainment. It is probably because I read books that have hundreds of pages of uniform text with chapter headings every 20 pages and a few blank lines to break the monotony. And I read pages of code where the only formatting is indents.
The latest Harry Potter liberally uses italics, ALL CAPS, bold, and full paragraph indenting. This helps keep the interest of the general public, and explains why the books sell well. Most people are unable to concetrate on plain text. Word processors fill the human need to make information pretty so that it might be read.
= Response =
I'll believe that [OpenOffice is the biggest threat] when OpenOffice is a feature-complete competitor. Sure, the word processor component is fine for smallish [< 200 pages] documents
I do not trust MSWord much. My resume is only 5 pages, and MSWord has destroyed the formatting a couple of times. I have managers that make my reports pretty, and some of the reports can be 50 pages, but I do not have to worry about the formatting: I just tell them what changes I want and they beat on Word until it looks right.
I cannot imagine the headaches of using Word with documents larger than 200 pages. Why aren't you using software meant for publishing?
the [OpenOffice] spreadsheet isn't anywhere near Excel, and Excel is far more firmly entrenched than Word is. There are people who've been using it their entire careers and have a whole arsenal of tricks and macros that only work in Excel, and they'll never give it up.
[Excel is] getting ever closer to high-end statistics packages.
They said the same thing about WordPerfect and Lotus123. The legal industry is still standardized on WordPerfect.
Excel may be more firmly entrenched, but it is used by far fewer people. I doubt anybody could make a program meant for the general public as annoying as Excel. (Sometimes MS is able to amaze me.) OTOH, most techies know the difference between a spreadsheet and a database. The arsenal of tricks and macros is used to force a spreadsheet to act like a database. Your example is perfect: statistics need to be processed in databases, but spreadsheets are easier to understand so people hack at spreadsheets rather than using the proper tool. You can blame this on Borland: if they had not killed DBase, then MS would have made Access competitive.
I am always surprised how many people use Access. I saw a listing of number of job postings by technology, and Access was one of the most popular. Access is truly awful, but people rarely look for alternatives. I keep hoping the PostgreSQL people finish their port to Windows. That MySQL is more popular than PostgreSQL demonstrates that ease of use is more important than being usable.
a lot of Slashbots like to criticize Access and Powerpoint too, but a lot of people rely on them far more than they rely on Word.
I have hated Access and PowerPoint since I first saw them about the time they were released. I have had to use them for specific uses every few years, and they have not improved much. Joining Slashdot was like finding long lost family.
If every presentation programs' files disappeared from the world, we would not lose much information. But they give managers somet
I spend my life entertaining my brain.
Well, I see 15 sparcstations with Solaris, 2 sparcstations with OpenBSD, 1 Sparcserver with Solaris, 1 iBook with Debian, 1 iMac with Debian, 1 celeron with OpenBSD, and one StrongArm palmtop with Linux. My network is thuroughly non-windows.
I think the whole point about smaller networks is that we aren't supposed to be able to look into them. I know the local supermarket and veterinary clinic both use UNIX. One local computer store uses Linux for their servers, the other uses Windows; the latter is about to go under.
To be fair, the local high school has quite a few "print servers" running Windows 98. If you consider those servers, then you also need to consider all the p2p "servers". Don't forget the email worm "servers" and chain letter "servers."
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
For years now Linux has been a key threat to Microsofts monopoly tactics.
By being open then whole gnu/linux system has become a place Microsoft can't crush. A holy ground sort to speak. A place Microsofts tactics fail.
As Linux gains momentum is dose not become more a threat but mearly more obveous. The threat it is it has always been and always will be.
But right now is a unque time for Gnu/Linux. A challange faced before but never quite so sereous and like it or not Microsoft faces it as well.
SCO has reduced the threat of Limux for now and may eliminate it entirely. They don't plan to stop there. They plan to use Linux as a test case to see if they can establish ownership of many key features found in most operating systems including Windows and Microsofts name has come up as a possable target.
So realisticly Linux should be priority 5 right now.
If this SCO BS blows over then yeah Linux is threat number 2 behind the ecconomy.
Microsoft is sales driven. No sales mean no Microsoft.
I don't actually exist.
Does that mean they'll destroy Linux once they've destroyed the economic environment?
I was not going to be quite so thorough, but I might as well explain this a little further, should someone read this 'literal' interpretation the wrong way.
Microsoft is sick with GNU/Linux. Linux is almost viral to Microsoft. It does its job better than its Microsoft counterpart, and thus, like a diseased limb, that piece of Microsoft software is no longer marketable. Microsoft can say "OS/2" as much as they want, but it's no big threat. However, they assure us that they are dealing well with the Linux threat. We can then realise that it is, in fact, Linux that is causing Microsoft the most ailment.
I would recommend modding the parent up, as it hit the nail on the head, but I disagree that I was a troll in the grandparent post.
True, but an overwhelming marketshare in the rest of the world is very similar to a near-monopoly.
Time makes more converts than reason
As Sevn pointed out he's a newbie. We don't want to frighten him or scare him off just yet. He's bound to fall for all the dumb shit everybody posts for a while and be an endless source amusement like all microsoft wonks are for the first few months until they actually install linux and get converted.
Yeah right. ...
So terrible that most people prefer to pay money for Windows than use free Linux.
You are fucking dreaming my friend
obviously it means Red Hat Linux X where X == the current version number of Red Hat's desktop product.
I'm pretty good with L/N news searches and I can't find it. a hint perhaps?
The "Score: -1," part I understand, but "Redundant"? "Offtopic" seems to fit better. Not that it realy matters. There's really no reason for me to post this. Maybe I've been browsing at -1 too long...