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Steve Ballmer on MS Server, Linux, Yahoo & More
yorugua writes "Furniture trembled as Steve Ballmer was to be interviewed by InformationWeek. He then went on to talk about Linux: 'How does Microsoft beat Linux? The same way "you beat any other competitor: You offer good value, which in this case means good total cost of ownership," Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer says.', Embrace-Extend-Extinguish: 'We say when we embrace standards, we'll be transparent about how we're embracing standards. [...] If we have deviations, we'll be transparent about the deviations.'"
Microsoft will beat linux the same way they beat any competitor: by purchasing a rival (or in this partnering with Novell) and offering the same product with ten times the marketing force.
If you're deliberately not complying with the standards, that's not really embracing them, is it?
Though it's nice that they'll now start being up front about how they're introducing incompatibilities, as opposed to the quiet evil way they used to do it. Baby steps, I guess.
If we have deviations, we'll be transparent about the deviations
And if we're threatening IP litigation through surrogates, we'll be transparent about setting up pipe funding to finance IP litigation through surrogates.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
Eventually it will believed to be true. I think even the liar will start believing it.
Sadly many IT professionals believe Windows saves money because its an integrated platform. But ignore the reboots and being forced to buy alot more servers as Windows is not friendly with using one or 2 more apps on a single server compared to Unix.
Oh and lets not forget about the blanket licensing fees. What is the average? $12,000 per year for licensing and support per desktop? Uh yeah thats true TCO.
If it were not for Microsoft already setting the standards for Office the corporate world would have abandonded them years ago. Linux is alot cheaper and has 1/10th of the issues if only it could the VB apps and Office.
http://saveie6.com/
Because, frankly, Debian is making my life easy.
Deleted
They wouldn't need to mess around with protocols, etc.
But they already admitted that lock-in was necessary to stave off competition - in the famous "Halloween documents".
Bill Gates also said that open file formats and interoperability could be the death of Windows.
So this is all just spin. What's really going to happen is delays, obfuscation, API churn... and as many other spanners in the works as possible while still "complying" with the letter of the law, if not the spirit.
No sig today...
... who called Linux a "cancer". Somehow I imagine what he has to say about Linux is neither going to be informed, balanced or interesting, just more deluded BS from the king of deluded BS.
...apart from cmdr taco raking in cash (in the form of ad revenue) off of the slashbot hordes that are queing up to post the usual "M$ sux" comments (which will race to +5 insightful) and lame jokes about ballmer throwing chairs (which invariably get rated +5 funny)?
No point at all.
You can't handle the truth.
Just let them state that they intend to continue with their undermining of standards, compatibility and other dirty tricks against 'partners' and other 'Microsoft Friends(tm).' Let them state that they are willing to take huge losses against just about every activity they are involved in and that these losses, which are propped up by their abusive monopoly, are designed to keep any competition down and prevent them from becoming a threat.
Though it's nice that they'll now start being up front about how they're introducing incompatibilities, as opposed to the quiet evil way they used to do it. Baby steps, I guess.
One small problem - they'll be transparently disclosing the deviations through patent filings.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
I wonder why I had never heard of TCO until relatively recently (measured in years), and in terms of a comparison of Linux to Windows.
I now know: becuse TCO is a meaningless measure which is not used in the real world. The real world measure used is ROI (return on investment).
As a silly example, a windows box might have 50% of the TCO of a Linux box. If it does nothing useful then it has a vastly smaller ROI.
That said, it's a somewhat dubious claim that windows does have a lower TCO.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
First they ignore us.
Then they laugh at us.
Then they fight us.
Then we win.
Unfortunately for Balmer, the world just continues laughing at him.
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
Well, Mr. Ballmer, if you think that adding even more crap to Windows is going to make Windows appeal to Linux users, go right ahead.
As corporate visions go, it is fairly typical, and (as usual) completely missing the point. You don't get better by saying that you're going to get better.
'How does Microsoft beat Linux? The same way "you beat any other competitor: You offer good value
He makes some sense here. This is how markets are supposed to work, when competition exists. The existence of a FOSS Operating System does happen to provide competition to the "marketplace". Imagine the shitball we'd be rolling in without FOSS competition (or Mac OS).
But the scope Ballmer and his company operate in is limited. Software isn't just something that "offers value", to be "traded" in a "marketplace". It's something that works better with collaboration than competition. The marketplace can only go so far to produce useful tools when so many people can contribute to their own utility.
Sure, they might "beat" GNU by "offering value" by their own lights. All they are is a profit-seeking enterprise. But as a user, and not a "consumer", of software, I don't care about that. They can monopolize the entire software "marketplace" for all I care. I'll still be using software that grants user freedom, because, unlike Microsoft "products", it exists outside the marketplace entirely. From the narrow parochial market perspective, FOSS is undead. You can take away its marketshare, but you can't kill it.
You can't buy - or sell - freedom, despite its well-established value. You have to fight for it. And mere market "value" is no substitute for freedom.
Embrace-Extend-Extinguish: 'We say when we embrace standards, we'll be transparent about how we're embracing standards. [...] If we have deviations, we'll be transparent about the deviations.'
Liar.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
...is do do away with the concept of CALs altogether, and sell their server OS for dirt cheap.
He will never live that down *here*, on Slashdot. Please stop mistaking that for the rest of the world where they could care less.
You're missing the Total part of his equation. Basically, their premise is that Linux isn't free (as in beer) as you put it, it actually has a cost attached. TCO includes not only license costs, but support personnel costs, hardware cost, training costs, maintenance contract costs, actual maintenance costs, etc..
Their argument is basically that Windows has lower cost because there are more professionals out there that are trained to support/maintain Windows based system, and these professionals usually have lower wages/consulting fees than their equivalent Unix/Linux professionals. They also argue that Windows training in general is cheaper, that it is easier to maintain through their many support/update tools and include some highly dubious claims about Linux legal costs by up there because you don't have a single vendor backing you and that you will be liable for copyright/patent infringement and that the IP holders will go after you directly as a customer.
So that's basically why he thinks Windows is better TCO.
"Not to mention all the idiots who use words like boxen."
Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04, @06:49PM
Slashdot didn't evolve into a "Microsoft sux" since you joined. It always was one. You're still here after all these years.
It's self moderated and you're right -- posts that disparage Microsoft and discount Ballmer do fly to the top of the moderation. That's not because some corporate sponsor has a geek lab in Bangalore with 1,000 blogdrones astroturfing the moderation. It's because Slashdot attracts geeks and that's what the geeks really think. That's honest opinion survey for you. I think a lot of that is because the observation that "M$ sux" actually is insightful, and the Ballmer's futile thrashing of a chair in helpless frustration over Google really is funny.
When you add that slashdot is still one of the popular sites on the intertubes you have to ask: does Microsoft have a problem?
And remember, an answer to every Microsoft problem is available all over the web.
They have to be running scared now. Vista has been out for a year and a half and OEMs are still introducing new machines that not only don't run Vista -- but never will be able to, and people are buying them up like crazy.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
You can actually run headless Microsoft servers with approriate third party hardware and software but it boils down to the equivalent of having a KVM switch wired up to all the machines so you can give it a head when required.
Why do people always say OS when they mean GUI/UI?
***Quis custodiet ipsos custodes***
A new machine is usually cheaper than single day wasted by a highly skilled member or staff. If you are taking about some executives then a single hour can buy a laptop.
Buying a new machine is a lot of time wasted. And you're usually not buying only one machine.
Since everyone out there is familiar with windows from their home machine Windows gets it's much lower TCO from the money saved by not having to train your staff in the use of a new OS. The occasional inconvenience windows throws at us is not enough to justify the loss in productivity of training all our staff to a new and unfamiliar OS.
Did you know that Vista is a new and unfamiliar OS ? You're going to stay running XP forever ?
wtf.n0x.org
It's not stupid if successfully addresses the problem at a lower cost than the 'right way'. Engineers generally hate ugly solutions but this does not render the latter invalid.