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Microsoft vs. Google — Mutually Assured Destruction
jmcbain writes "Robert X. Cringely asserts that nothing good will come out of the ongoing war between Microsoft and Google: 'The battle between Microsoft and Google entered a new phase last week with the announcement of Google's Chrome Operating System — a direct attack on Microsoft Windows. This is all heady stuff and good for lots of press, but in the end none of this is likely to make a real difference for either company or, indeed, for consumers. It's just noise — a form of mutually assured destruction intended to keep each company in check.'"
Edison used to say that Tesla's newfangled alternating current was dangerous, unstable and just plain dirty electricity. I guess that's why a hundred years later, we don't use it anymo- oh wait.
How is competition between brands not good for the customer?
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
I don't think the author of the summary understands the meaning of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD).
If the MAD policy were in effect and "shots" were being fired, both companies would fall...
If by MAD the author presumes that Google will somehow be able to use its operating system as an assault on Windows, that would also assume that Microsoft could/would use Windows as an assault on Google AND since Google cannot reciprocate in kind, Microsoft would somehow have the ability to kill off Google currently. The day Microsoft hardcodes into Windows the inability to access Google, that'll be the day Microsoft Windows officially begins its death spiral...
I just don't see this analogy making sense...
Are not Ballmer intentions to destroy Google notorious ("I will fucking kill them")?
Why should launching a Web OS for netbooks be considered a declaration of war, while launching a search engine (Bing) be considered business as usual?
As another poster wrote, this is called competition and let the better OS win.
A monopoly is not just the lack of substitute (or competing) goods - it's about the lack of viable competing goods. So in this case, MS still fits the bill (e.g. Being the most popular platform, and with the win32 API being very heavily embedded in many products, targeting Windows is the only viable option for a lot of companies. It doesn't necessarily mean it's the only one)
The vast majority of Google searches are, of course, done on PCs running Microsoft Windows and Internet Explorer. It is not in Googleâ(TM)s real interest to displace these products, which have facilitated so much of its success.
So Google doesn't make money from people running other OS's? Google ads don't appear in my browser when I'm running Ubuntu? Would the Google Chrome OS or browser presumably block its own ads? Now I understand why this has the tag diecringleydie.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Of course if you read the article, I know it is a lot to ask, you will find that he is not talking about competition. For the very short summary.
MS Makes money from Windows and Office.
Google makes money from search based advertising.
Nothing else really matters to either company.
MS attempts at the search ad market and Google's attempts are the OS market are not intended to succeed. They are just the corporate equivalent or "be nice to me or I will fuck your girlfriend". Both side know the other has no chance, but the media loves to talk about it.
Today...
why?
why cant google create a successful operating system? would it be so out of the realm of possibility to see "google os" displayed alongside microsoft windows, in shrink-wrap packaging, at your local best buy? and perhaps significantly cheaper, and catering to a certain market who do not require Office but simply internet access with a few applications?
Here's what would be a "direct attack" on Windows:
Attempting to hack into Microsoft's corporate intranet and delete the source code and documentation for Windows.
Releasing into the wild malware that targets windows installed base and destroys systems that run Windows.
Taking on a project to come up with your own operating system isn't an attack on Windows. It's competition. Windows doesn't have any inherent right to its marketshare.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
What is this commie liberal pinko "competition" bs. This is the United States of America. Everyone knows that capitalism works by litigating your competitors into oblivion, not by creating better products and services. Why, just look at the telephone, cable, satellite, and **AA providers.
Considering the huge number of users who know nothing but how to use a web browser, I think you're quite mistaken. I think it's very likely that Chrome OS will replace Windows for most non-geek consumers -- and because it's going to be open source, a lot of geeks will probably adopt it too.
Caveat Utilitor
If it wasn't for Google Chrome and Firefox, we would still be using IE6.
If it wasn't for Linux, there would probably not nearly the investment in Vista and Win7 that there has been.
And, I guarantee you, that if there were no Linux free IDEs, there would be no Visual Studio Express. I doubly guarantee you, that, if there was no gcc, there would be no standards compliant C++ in Visual Studio.
Google may not conquer the world with Chrome OS, and I think will ultimately lose to Microsoft, but, competition benefits everyone.
What will Google do to bolster search to respond to Bing? How will Adobe respond to Silverlight... you can laugh at Silverlight 1.0, dismiss 2.0, but MS has away of just chugging away like the borg when they want to attack a market.
It's all bound to keep people on their toes. What would be the alternative? A treaty between Google and Microsoft keeping each other in the browser and desktop, respectively? That would suck.
This is my sig.
Of course if you read the article, I know it is a lot to ask, you will find that he is not talking about competition.
Of course not. This is Robert X. Cringely. He's talking about "war ... destruction ... horrible nasty ... look at the bones!"
He's a loud, but relatively uninsightful prognosticator of tech markets. Nothing to see here.
More to the point, he's wrong. Microsoft and Google aren't involved in a "war", they're involved in a re-alignment of the market. Google is attempting to assert that the market for operating systems is so moot that there's no longer a value in productizing the OS itself so much as the service of maintaining it. Microsoft is asserting that "uhh... we can do search just as well as Google did 5 years ago. So there."
Feel free to select your "winner" in this non-war.
Considering the huge number of users who know nothing but how to use a web browser, I think you're quite mistaken. I think it's very likely that Chrome OS will replace Windows for most non-geek consumers -- and because it's going to be open source, a lot of geeks will probably adopt it too.
And the same huge number of users when asked "what OS do you want on your new PC, Windows or Google Chrome?", will say "Windows" because they don't have a clue what an OS is and "Windows" sounds vaguely familiar. The only way the clueless masses will use it is if it's the only choice on a cool-looking netbook or laptop and they're hooked on the color of it.
As far as I can tell, Google Chrome is a glorified web dumb terminal that some people will happen to run Linux apps on. Businesses won't flock to it because it will lack Windows application compatibility. Clueful home users won't use it for the same reason ("Hey, why can't I use iTunes on this laptop or pull pictures from my Kodak camera using their Windows application???")
I like open source just as much as the next guy here and I'd love to see a competitor to Windows, but my need to get work done supersedes my desire to make a statement about open software. With what we currently know, the Google Chrome OS is as much a competitor to Windows as Google Docs and Gmail is to Microsoft Office and Outlook/Exchange.
Tired of being "punished" by the Slashdot $rtbl since 2002. I'm now over at http://soylentnews.org/ .
If there's anything I've learned from the current browser war, it's that the best way to take down Microsoft is not another monopoly, but healthy competition.
i.e. FireFox has done a bang-up job in being a strong competitor to Internet Explorer. Yet it remained fairly niche until Safari, Opera, and Chrome all worked there way into people's lives.
They're all still niches in of themselves, but they add up to a whole that presents a serious competition to Microsoft. Worse yet, they've captured enough marketshare to where the idea of IE being the "only option" has mostly gone the way of the dodo.
Competition for Windows will need to be the same. No one Operating System will dethrone it. Not Linux, not OS X, not Google Chrome OS. But together, in competition, they can become more than the sum of their parts.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Of course, the whole point of a Doomsday Machine is lost, if you *keep* it a *secret*! Why didn't you tell the world, EH?
It was to be announced at the Party Congress on Monday. As you know, the Premier loves surprises.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.