Why Microsoft Is Being Nicer To Open Source

itwbennett writes "Is open source's growth in emerging markets what is driving Microsoft to say 'we love open source' with an attempt at a straight face? 'The emerging markets (like the BRIC nations) are a huge potential market for Microsoft,' says Brian Proffitt. 'And I believe Redmond is wisely not taking the FUD route on open source software in those markets. Why? Because open source already has some strong roots in the BRIC nations (heck, in Brazil, open source is the whole darn tree), and any attack on open source would be seen as a foreign company attacking local software projects. If Microsoft attacked open source publicly in this environment, a lot of potential customers and developers in those countries could react in a protectionist manner and start giving Microsoft the stink-eye.'"

Comments

Microsoft's strategy is as dumb as their software

[harlequinade]

It is necessary to get behind someone/thing in order to stab them in the back.

Do Not Trust Microsoft

[QuietLagoon]

The only thing that Microsoft cares about is profit. There have been far too many companies that have been sucked devoid of life by Microsoft in the past by those who falsely belived that Microsoft played "by the rules".

imo, the reality is that one of Microsoft's major contributions to business is the questionable exploitation of the far fringes of business legalities.

Re:Not the main reason

[HermMunster]

Giving away a product for free is not the same as open source.

Re:When the cheese moves you follow it

[westlake]

This was at a time when Microsoft was a quasi-dominant force in the server market, when their IIS server platform actually had a reasonable install base in production environments, and Windows was totally unchallenged by Linux and pals.

Microsoft is doing quite well in the server market:

x86 server revenues were up 31.7% to $7 billion on shipments up 25.8% to 1.8 million servers, positively impacting Windows server demand. IDC put Windows server revenue at $5 billion, representing 46.5% of overall quarterly factory revenue. Linux server revenues were up 30.1% to $1.8 billion, representing 16.8% of all server revenue, up 2.5 points over last year. Server Sales Were Healthy in Q2: IDC [August 29]

With the second quarter server market figures tabulated and analyzed, it looks like SMBs rule the roost. Basically, there's been dramatic market growth among x86 servers--i.e, the PC-derived kind that SMBs buy. The high end of the market, meanwhile, continues to dry up.
IDC, the market research firm behind the figures, says that there was a 28.2 percent 2Q year-over-year increase in Windows Server shipments, as users not only bought new x86 machines, but found broader uses for x86 machines.
Linux servers (which also often involve x86 machines) showed even better growth, with vendor revenue up 30.1 percent. Linux servers now account for 16.8 percent of the server market, an increase of 2.5 points over the last year. Server Field Becoming An SMB Market

Re:Not the greedy evil company you think they are

[symbolset]

In the recent months MSFT has been pushing PHP on IIS...

If this isn't evil, I don't know what is.

Oh, yeah it's a trap. It's always a trap.