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The Company Everyone Loves To Hate
In honor of Microsoft's 30th year, Epeeist writes "The BBC is running a Have Your Say article on Microsoft at 30." From that article: "Microsoft will always adapt and buy into other areas to keep themselves at the top. They're the company everyone loves to hate." While they're reflecting, most people are focusing on the now. teslatug writes "Brian Jones, a Microsoft PM on the Office team, has just confirmed that the new default XML format of Office 12 is not compatible with the GPL. Brian believes that LGPL may be compatible, but others have raised issues about the ability to redistribute." Relatedly, shades66 writes "Microsoft's Alan Yates tripped over his own words in responding to the Massachusetts Information Technology Division's late-August declaration for OpenDocument and other open software standards." For some more colourful commentary, smooth wombat writes "John Dvorak has written an article for MarketWatch in which he postulates that the reorganization by Microsoft is actually a prelude to its breakup into three separate entities."
Wow, I'm breathless and speechless! Just read the litany of comments posted on the BBC article, collectively of which these posts represent the general sentiment of the posting community.
If this is so, I'm devastated (but maybe I shouldn't be so surprised, as it is consistent conversations I have casually with friends and family). The general feelings seem to include:
Most disturbing is a seemingly cavalier attitude about what are historical data regarding Microsoft's business practices, products, etc. As an excercise, note that in the list above, each "what's wrong with that?" can be interpreted in two ways.
As for Dvorak's speculation Microsoft is prepping to split into three companies, I don't get that. Why would they? One of Microsoft's major takeaways from the DOJ's penalty phase was not having to split up as a company. I'm am not a businessman, but I can't see Microsoft splitting unless forced to. (Though I wouldn't discount it as some huge PR spin to make it look like they're taking steps to not be the evil empire anymore while behind closed doors (and through underground tunnels) continuing to operate as a single company to ensure their continued position in the marketplace.)
Indeed, I would hate to see what a truly efficient Microsoft could do to Apple, Sun and the open source community. Considering their resources, and if they can whittle themselves down to a highly efficient company, they could put up an effort against their competitors second to none. Now, perhaps that wouldn't be a bad thing. An innovative Microsoft will force the open source community and other companies to become just as competitive, if not more so.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Let's ask slashdotters what they think of Microsoft. Again.
That's bound to produce an enlightening, well balanced, polite thread.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
No, I hate hating them. I'd rather not have such annoyances in my life. I'd just like safe, secure software that does what I want, and nothing that I don't want.
And I'd like them to secure the current operating system before moving to the next one.
For a programmer an improved operating system is one with less program faults, less resource requirements, and better performance on the same hardware. Microsoft seems bound and determined to go in exactly the opposite direction.
Cheaper would be nice too. Darn, they missed that one too.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
"Standards" designed to make a competitors entry into any given market controlled by microsoft impossible."
An endless FUD compaign against competitors
and choosing to stifle innovation in self interest of controlling the direction of the market to areas they already control.
I bought a bunch of MSFT stock in 1987 and rode it up until selling in 2000. However much I despise Bill Gates, I figure I owe him my financial independence at least. So, stick it only partway up your backside, Bill.
Wow, don't look at the comments on the BBC page. It's the anti-Slashdot!
Splitting up the company in such a fashion seems like a good idea to me. Stockholders have the potential to be well rewarded by such a move. The Motorola Freescale split-up was a good deal for everyone involved. Freescale's stock is up (from $14 to $22) and they are doing fine on their own. If some stuff dies then it dies. Products that fail the test don't need to be on life support indefinately.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
If you RTFA a little closer...
an IPO of the Xbox division would generate a metric ton of revenue. Revenue that would ride out the first few years of losses. The article explicitly mentioned that the XBOX division was getting the best and the brightest, much like an early Microsoft, whereas the other divisions were getting stagnant. A seperate XBOX company therefore would be a group of intelligent bright people who would turn a profit shortly, and whose stock would rise much like an early Microsoft.
The reason you seperate was very clearly stated: with three cash cows in one barn, things get stagnant. Seperate them into seperate entities and you spur a little more innovation (that's the theory, anyways).
-everphilski-
namely, SCO.
Are they dead yet?
In the South Park movie, Bill Gates got shot in the head and everyone in the theater laughed. Once South Park wants to kill you, the teeming masses will follow.
No, I think they're more worthwhile sources of news because the news they provide is more accurate and truthful than that of their right-leaning counterparts.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
How can an XML file format be incompatible with the GPL?
Does that mean we can't link them directly, or include them embedded within a binary?
It's a file format. They going to patent XML?
I'm confused.. I think he only said that for FUD factors, becouse it makes NO sense at all.
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
The parts that torque people:
1) Changing licensing schemes, raising costs for companies dramatically, and having the nerve to call it "to lower customer costs".
2) Sending nasty letters to school districts at the end of the semester saying that they are about to have an audit of their licensing scheme, when they are short staffed as it is.
3) Purposely building their technology so it won't work well with other environment, thus preventing interoperability.
4) Illegal contracts regarding what computer companies can or can't sell if they want to be able to sell windows.
Just because they aren't found guilty of a crime in court, doesn't mean their activities are moral or ethical.
Ok, I give up, why you?
Microsoft started as a company full of innovation, looking to bring the world together thru the use of computers, to make life easier and less complicated thru the use of a lot of their brilliant software.
Thirty years forward from the embarkation of a noble dream seems a company likened to a powerhungry politician -- they want to be number one, at all costs, and want to have the say and press their voice into the 'law' that is what we know as personal computing. Hordes of Microsoft employees are leaving citing 'poor work environments' for companies like Google, who treat their employees as their number one commodity, something not suprising -- Microsoft did the same in their inception.
Right now, as a network administrator myself, I see Microsoft falling further and further off of the map. Organizations such as my own, and I'm sure many more, look for interoperability, compatibility, and the ability to use the latest and greatest technology with the greatest ease of lateral movement. Linux as a whole is conducive to this environment, embracing open standards so that everybody can view a document in different operating systems, different platforms, etc. And companies realize this -- Microsoft's ease of use will be lessened as time passes, while the brilliant programmers depart to work for the MS counterparts -- be it Google, Sun, Apple, or whomever. And those programmers will bring to Linux what Microsoft brought to computing in merely an idea thirty years ago.
For Microsoft's birthday, I think a good look at their road travelled is important. It will show them how they started, how they innovated, and how they succeeded. Now instead of innovating, they are eliminiating competition, stopping people from innovating, and stopping interoperability. Look back at your history Microsoft, and see that the noble and humble beginnings you had play a huge part in where you are today. It's still not too late to make a u-turn and take a different road than you are travelling -- because the one you are on leads to a cliff.
The price is always right if someone else is paying.
The tragedy of it all is, MS persists in this at it's own expense. Imagine waking up tomorrow to see MS touting it's new open documant formats, company-hosted utilities for converting to and from other OS's native file formats, a new release of their OS (call it "good neighbor" Windows!) that accepts it's place in a hard-drive's file system and even co-operates with Lilo. Wait, don't faint, yet! How about a live Windows-CD that runs on top of Linux systems, an OS release that includes a free compiler (which creates fully capable binaries with NO STRINGS ATTATCHED!) and a Windows utility that can handle a man page, a .png file, and run .elf binaries? Now, don't you think that would change the ill will to good will? Wouldn't this be a new selling point - "Why *switch* to Linux when we'll generously let you have both?" I mean, come on, would there be any end to the marketing potential? MS is frantically clawing, looking for a foothold in the changing field - and this most obvious answer is staring them in the face, and they can't see it. So down they go, and the rest of us will have a more peaceful co-existence when they're gone.
Hell, I don't hate Microsoft, I pity them. They might have more money than me, but I sleep soundly at night with a serene conscience.
Trying not to sound a lot like a Bible whacko, I can't stop from pointing you to the Parable of the widow's mite. It concisely demonstrates the parent poster's point.
If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you