Gates Successor Says Microsoft Laid Foundation for Google

thefickler writes "According to Bill Gates' successor Craig Mundie, there would have been no Google without Microsoft. 'I mean, the fact is: Google's existence and success required Microsoft to have been successful previously to create the platform that allowed them to go on and connect people to their search servers. Now, Microsoft's business is not to control the platform per se, but in fact to allow it to be exploited by the world's developers. The fact that we have it out there gives us a good business, but in some ways it doesn't give us an advantage over any of the other developers in terms of being able to utilize it.' This comment comes from a lengthy interview between Mundie and APC magazine, which talks with the newly installed strategy and R&D head. Other interesting topics discussed include the future of Microsoft and Windows, OOXML, and and the 'rise of Linux' on the desktop."

Comments

What's he smoking?

[kmac06]

I think I want some.

Re:What's he smoking?

[Anonymous Coward]

but... but... ./sarcasm --on

If it werent for microsoft, there would have been no internet, or at least no web browsers for it!

I mean didn't Microsoft invent networking?
The first web browser (Internet Explorer, the Mosaic thing is a LIE!), wasn't that created by MS?
And everyone knows IIS was the first web server!
Certainly BSD, Sun, Apple, and the rest didn't have any internet access before they stole it from Micrsoft. ./sarcasm --off

*ahem*
I feel dumber even after typing that, knowing it is sarcasm and false...

Re:What's he smoking?

[TheRaven64]

He's completely right. If Microsoft hadn't invented TCP/IP, the network Google runs on would not exist. If they hadn't written Linux, Google would not have had the platform they use for hosting services (they'd have had to use BSD or something). If they hadn't written Apache, Google wouldn't have been able to serve web pages. If they hadn't written Mosaic or Netscape Navigator, then the web on which Google runs would have been a small scale research toy.

This post was brought to you by Microsoft Minitrue(TM)

Re:What's he smoking?

[elyk]

Hey Microsoft - Al Gore called. He wants his credit for the internet back

Create the platform???? BWAHAHAHAHAHA

[Anonymous Coward]

Funny, I didn't know MSFT created the internet, desktop computing, and web browsers.

Google would work just as well if MSFT had been nothing more than a long-forgotten BASIC provider.

Standing on the shoulders of giants

[LiquidCoooled]

So, what microsoft are saying is google is standing on the shoulders of giants.

Well, I suppose they have to; there are no seats left to sit on ;)

Re:Standing on the shoulders of giants

[rwsilva]

Nah... what they are saying is that Microsoft laid Google

It's completely true

[MarsDefenseMinister]

Al Gore was working for Microsoft when he invented the internet.

Re:It's completely true

[MarsDefenseMinister]

We need a smug moderation, obviously.

Re:It's completely true

[Just Some Guy]

The difference here is that this is a statement by Microsoft, whereas Gore never said he invented the internet.

You're "that guy" at parties, aren't you?

I think they both forgot...

[pieaholicx]

That without Benjamin Franklin neither of them would be in business. So where's his praise MS and Google? Huh?

Re:I think they both forgot...

[chrisd]

Here you go: Mad props to Benjamin Franklin from Google.

Chris DiBona

Almost right...

[WebHostingGuy]

Microsoft didn't invent the net. Google owes its success to Al Gore.

Australopithecus Africanus threw a stone first

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Well, the logical conclusion is that everything became possible because the Australopithecus Africanus discovered that the stones could be used as projectiles and gradually learned to use it as a tool. From there it is just a short skip and jump to the taming of fire, the domestication of dog, invention of agriculture, domestication of other animals, the invention of wheel, invention of script, invention of paper, invention of the printing press..

Next thing you know another Boreopithecus Redmondanus is throwing chairs instead of stones.

Re:Australopithecus Africanus threw a stone first

[Just Some Guy]

Next thing you know another Boreopithecus Redmondanus is throwing chairs instead of stones.

Or, for intelligent design types:

Windows is the end result of Noah saving a pair of jackasses.

They're right, of course.

[Phat_Tony]

Just look at the evidence. There's no way they could ever make Google compatible with Macs or Linux.

He he ...

[gstoddart]

Now, Microsoft's business is not to control the platform per se, but in fact to allow it to be exploited by the world's developers.

Well, it gets exploited all the time, so they're succeeding. :-P Though, maybe not the way they think.

Cheers

Job Opportunity

[Tablizer]

The Bush administration has taken a liking to Microsoft's public relations and historical accounting techniques and wishes to hire them.

Re:What a heaping pile of poo

[Nom du Keyboard]

Please tell me what Microsoft contributed that made this possible?

Minix.

Experiment

[moeinvt]

Let's send a machine back in time(running Linux on a PowerPC architecture so they don't get any bad ideas)
to assassinate Bill's mother before he was born, thereby erasing his entire existence. We can then observe the effects on the present and determine if the statement is true.

Re:Yeah - so?

[walt-sjc]

Yes. Without Microsoft, the Mac, Amiga, Unix, BeOS, etc. would never have existed, and people would still be using model 33 teletypes over acoustic-coupler modems.

Please.

The personal computing revolution would have happened with or without Microsoft. It was all a matter of timing and nefarious business practices that allowed Microsoft to be the dominant player and their resulting "defacto monopoly". We they a part of "bringing computers to the masses?" Sure, in a sense because they were THERE, not because of what they actually DID (outside of the "nefarious business practices" of course.)

No, Luke...

[greg_barton]

Microsoft/Vader: Sun/Obi-Wan never told you what happened to Netscape/your father.

Google/Luke: He did. He told me you embraced and extended / killed him.

Microsoft/Vader: No, Google/Luke. I am your father!

Google/Luke: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Re:Yeah - so?

[flyingsquid]

And what if the Nazis had won WWII, like in Philip K. Dick's Man in the High Castle? Instead of having little Windows icons on our start menus, we'd have little swastikas!

Then again, given that the Allies were the leaders in computing during WWII, a victory by the Third Reich would probably have delayed the PC revolution by many years. So really, Google couldn't have happened without Germany's disastrous decision to assault the Soviet Union... and we all know who made thatdecision. What that means, of course, is that Google really owes their very existence to Hitler.

Re:Yeah - so?

[skuzzlebutt]

Yeah, and if Jobs and Woz hadn't built Lisa, where would the Birkenstock industry be today?

Re:Yeah - so?

[eno2001]

If the Newton hadn't been born, we wouldn't have clever jokes about really awful handwriting recognition on early PDAs. Your point?

I think Mundie has a point

[NickFortune]

I feel dumber even after typing that, knowing it is sarcasm and false...

That's not really fair.

I think it's fairly clear that Mundie is referring to the sudden increase in global data flow that coincided with the advent of the Internet. In effect, I think he's making the claim that without Microsoft's valiant attempts to choke off this dataflow, without its deliberate obfuscations and distortions, without the calculated policies of embrace and extend... I think he's suggesting that without these factors, there would be no need for Google; that without Microsoft fscking it up for the rest of us, we wouldn't need Google to find useful information. And to that extent at least, I think he has a point.

All the same, I still think he's giving MS too much credit: The main problem was that even despite MS' best efforts, there was still to much information to easily organise.

Still, I can see where the man is coming from.

Re:I think Mundie has a point

[blankaBrew]

Didn't Al Gore already take credit for this?

Re:A simple test

[thephotoman]

You can keep your NeXT box. I'll be sitting here on my Mac--same operating system, 17 years later.

Well... duh!

[Anonymous Coward]

The entire tech boom in the 90s wouldn't have been possible without Microsoft... specifically Windows 95. Win95 really did change everything, and it brought computers out of the PC lab and the office, and into people's homes.

Since the demand increased, it allowed the price to come down, which allowed even more demand, and further lowered the price, etc. We went from at least $3000 for a home PC setup to today's sub-$500 home PC setup... and NONE of it would have been possible had Microsoft not started the ball rolling.

You can also attribute the rise of the internet back to MS, the iPod would have not been possible without MS enabling all those people to get on the internet (especially when they offered an OS which didn't require people to pay $50 for a WinSock, $50 for a TCP/IP protocol stack, and $60 for Netscape).

Thank God for Microsoft. The world would be a much poorer place without their existence. And seeing as how Bill Gates is now the greatest philanthropist in human history, we can also say thank God for Bill Gates, and know that many people around the world would not be alive today if Microsoft did not exist.