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IBM & Microsoft Rift
About 30 million of you wrote in to say "This article at ZDnet describes the problems IBM went through when it kept selling OS/2 even after Microsoft asked them to stop
" Essentially, MS quintuplied royalty fees to IBM, when IBM refused to stop selling competing products. This came out in a deposition from IBM execs.
1) You can not sell any other operating system without
threats and damage from Micros~1
Unless you are small reseller who pays retail price for
Windows anyway. Most of the "treatening" appears to
revolve arround how much MS charge for their software
to OEM's
Years ago in the by-gone era (er, 1994-6) of a boy newly inducted into teenhood, I assumed my responsibilities as a civic member of the Kirksville, MO (pop. 17,904) area computer community. I fell in love with this funky, thought-out, multitasking GUI that showed more depth than anything I or my Kirksville-entrapped camarades had ever seen (ie, Windows and MacOS). OS/2 quickly won the race with Windows and DesqView for processor-ticks and mind share thus winning the honor of hosting Kirksville's third one-line BBS, "Society's Forgotten's BBS." Although they now may seem modest at best, I'll admit that I'm more than naustalgic for the countless conversations my friends, some strangers, and I churned out, and that I secretly basked in the faux glory of being custodian to discussions on religion, communism, and OJ Simpson.
/ignorant/ remarks.) The real bad guys were the PC magazines. They loved Windows and superficial beauty, hated OS/2 and artificial character. Their articles were glorifed press releases. They _never_ dared do real journalism. They stepped in no mud, manipulated no dirty characters, and never penetrated the blue walls of computerdom.
Of course, my Dr. Jeckel sysop turned Mr. Hyde on usenet in '95. Evil, dark, inflammatory. Not one step back. Fight the foot soldiers who dare to infiltrate *.os2.advocacy. Remember, though: They are minor pests who have no real power. (Nevermind that I empowered them by dignifying their
Not that anyone would care. If wisdom comes with age, I've changed without aging. Sure, now I've taken classes in media. I read my ojr.org and cjr.org, but I'm now one of a million seventeen year old males, disillusioned with high school and non-Unix operating systems, who runs Linux and obligingly, hopefully turns to slashdot everyday.
What keeps this message from being lost as "Offtopic"? The fact that it's "Flamebait" -- almost a "troll." In the spirit of naustalgia, I revert to my bitterness for ZD publications. More, reading this article aroused in me memories of the ideals of the institution of journalism. Investigative reporting. Finding the bad. Independence from government. Above all, though, reading this article made me wonder sardonically: Where was ZDnet when when Norris heard, "As long as you're shipping competitive products... you will suffer."
But why can't volume discounts be given a la carte? Logically speaking, if a vendor sells 500 copies of Office, what's the difference whether the user got to pick or not? The contract must be written ethically. I think that the deal should be something like this: your first X copies of OS9x cost $25, the next Y copies cost $20, the next Z copies cost $15, ... and the same for Office. The only stipulation in each contract would be that they had to be sold as an OEM part with a new system, possibly with a 30 day window for the user to come back to add more options at the same price.
--
Richard R. Klemmer
WebTrek L.L.C.
Richard R. Klemmer
WebTrek L.L.C.
http:/www.webtrek.com
What are you talking about? IBM *still* preinstalls OS/2 on commercial computers.
not true. MS made them not pre-install os2, rather it could be purchased with the machine, or you could return your win95 cd and they'd send a os2 one. MS forced IBM to pre-load win95.
You cannot *REMOVE* software from a windows installation, you can add anything you like. Lots of OEM's including Toshiba and IBM have been shipping Netscape for years, just not at the expense of removing IE. You also can't alter the boot up sequence.
But shouldn't that read: You can add any software you like as long as you don't alter the boot up sequence.
And does that conflict with the first statement? He's not saying you can't add software, he's saying you can only add software under very certain conditions...which you just outlined.
Face it, jar jar is just a gee-whiz incarnation for the lucas folks to show off their special effects prowess. and they couldn't have chosen a more ANNOYING character to do it.
Reminds me of all the M$ user interface/gui. The pretty windows, papers flying through the air when a file is being copied, dancing paper clips capitalizing my words for me. Argh, maybe cutesy the first time you see them, but heavy annoyances just like jar jar!!!!!
1) You can not sell any other operating system without threats and damage from Micros~`
Interesting. Why is it that lots of OEM's do sell other OS's, including Dell and Compaq.
2) You can not add software to that package except under strict scrutany by Micros~1
You cannot *REMOVE* software from a windows installation, you can add anything you like. Lots of OEM's including Toshiba and IBM have been shipping Netscape for years, just not at the expense of removing IE. You also can't alter the boot up sequence.
3) You can not write software that competes with Micros~1 in any way and still sell its OS on your PCs
Well, since IBM is really the only company that both sells commercial software and sells PC's, it's hard to judge based on one case.
1) You can not write software that competes with Micros~1 in any way.
Strange that many companies DO compete with Microsoft, and still stay quite up to date. Intuit for instance.
2) You can not write software for any other operating system and keep up-to-date on Windows.
Strange that Intuit does this. So does Corel. So does IBM (remember, they write more software for NT than anyone else besides MS right now). So does Perforce, Rational, and more companies than I can name.
3) You can not grow your business very large or Micros~1 will see you as a threat.
Strange that Microsoft doesn't see companies like SAP as a threat. They're one of the top selling companies on the market.
4) If Micros~1 decides your market is desirable you should be prepared to exit that market.
Only if you're incompetant and have only managed to stay in business if you have no competition. Clearly, lots of companies compete with Micrsoft and win. Again, Intuit is one. Lotus is another. Microsoft doesn't automatically dominate in every market they enter.
I think the fear and hype surrounding MS as an omnipotent being is what causes them to continue being so successful. They win by image alone, nothing more. It's been proven that if you have a good product, a good marketing department, and are willing to stay on top of things, you CAN beat microsoft.
Sheesh, it makes one wonder why any company would think of signing any business deal with M$. Maybe it will help out in the beginning, but then it seems you'd be hampered by M$.
Take a look at Corel for an example of a company who wouldn't sign a business deal with M$. M$ has systematically gone after their biggest cash cows, and nearly driven them to bankruptcy.
As far as I know (I'm just a coder, down in the trenches, so this shouldn't be considered gospel), PCDocs has signed a deal with M$, and they're still moving into our area. But at least they gave us some warning, and so we can go somewhere else, or build on top of what they will be offering.
Later,
Blake.
I speak for PCDocs
I live in a country with only one phone company. It sucks big time. Expensive, lousy service and of course, I can't switch. Internet service? Give me a break. The same company controls it. The smaller ISPs all have to go through the big one. SLOOOOW. Expensive. Why? NO COMPETITION!
Back in the day (remember the 50+ free floppies IBM would give out if you'd beta test OS/2 2.1?), I saw a 386/16 MCA-bus IBM machine with 12M RAM that would SMOKE my 486/33 with 16 running OS/2.
The MCA bus kicked ass back then, and we'd all be running a variant of it now (maybe some whiz-bang 100MHz 64bit MCA-3 or something) if it hadn't been for IBM's proclivity to proprietize EVERYTHING.
They saw that open architectures meant they'd not have a total lock on a market, and instead of making a new, better standard for everyone to use, driving forward the technology, they only gave out programming specs on the hardware to a few business partners.
EVERYONE, especially IBM, lost.
That's the reason I can't understand folks like NVidia today. They could be THE STANDARD by which all others are judged (they are now, sort of, but I digress), but instead they err on the side of propriety.
Gah. Stupid. What ever happened to KOSH?
--Corey
Not only will they not deserve liberty or safety, Mr. Franklin, they will be DENIED both!
I agree. All contractors would be switching to systems/software compatible with the non-Microsoft systems and so would state and local governments. That one thing would put a huge dent in Micros~1's profit margin and reality bites when you lived a fantacy for so long.
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
OK...
so where does Gary Kildall fit in?
>>>please remove "nospam" from email address
IBM was never broken up. It was investigated for anti-trust behavior, and I think it even had government monitors installed into the document chain, but it wasn't broken up like AT&T.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
Outlook Express (read 'express == lite') :-).
is standard on Win 98, you can remove it from the desktop if you really try
(I wanted to upgrade from 3.1, and 95 (original version) was £10 more)
My old Aptiva came with Win95a preinstalled. OS/2 wasn't even an option. Never-the-less, all the manuals and documentation talk exclusively about OS/2. I have to wonder how many users that confused. I can't see how switching the OS without re-writing the documenation is a real bright move.
It's interesting. You're proposing that the solution to the problem is to hamstring Microsoft so it's so balkanized that it's as weak as the Unix vendors. That's an interesting approach. Are you proposing that the government also reimburse all the businesses damaged by the new balkanized computer industry? Or can people like yourself instead by found liable?
Oh, I forgot, Open Source(tm) will save the day.
We can use all the help we can get. Linux is going into battle against the evilest bastards of all: Microsoft. IBM still matches up pretty well against Microsoft in terms of company size and
engineering talent. You may have "lost the battle" as you put it, but you can still help win the war. Thanks for the help.
I think the problem isn't that they are underused, it is the fact they are used, way too much for everything. Windows everywhere it seems. I really don't like the whole Windows NT line including 2000. I think they'll try to put it in everything. There are already 4 version of it, and 3 more will be on they way with the 64 bit version and then there is the personal that will come along in 2-3 years, and then Windows 2000 CE...you get the picture. Microsoft wants to give you choices, just make sure they are all Microsoft.
I thought I'd add some additional thoughts from inside Big Blue to this interesting conversation.
It should be noted that IBM has no plans to offer a commercial PC OS. This should come as no surprise, given our past failures and recent support of Linux (I think after we handed a big fat layup to M$ and the recent rise of Linux have squished that idea quite nicely).
However, it is also worth noting that IBM has created more than a dozen different OSes during its lifetime (AIX, VM, OS/2, OS/Open, OS/390, OS/400, the list goes on...) . It would be fair to say that we have no real emotional attachment to any one of them, which is why I think we're in a better position to support Linux than Sun or HP, who are clinging to their *NIXes like they're going out of style (- hey, a colloquialism that really fits!). Don't be fooled by their flashy press releases patting Linux on the back; I don't expect to see them really put Linux in the driver's seat for many years. Granted, IBM will probably follow the same road map, but at least we're more used to cutting our losses and switching out OSes than our other workstation buddies.
It is also very true that IBM once attempted to make everything electronic IBM proprietary. That mentality still survives in some areas in IBM, but being that IBM is primarily composed of engineers, most of us are completely sold on IEEE, ITU, and ISO standards. I hear a lot of people shouting vehemently of how IBM is the evil proprietary empire, but I don't think that's a fair assesment anymore.
I work in the Networking Hardware division (Slashdot reader: Networking? I didn't know IBM MADE switches and routers...), and there's only a few products I know of that use proprietary tech, and they are all going end of life. Gone are the glory days of 3270 and 3274. Everything else is purely IEEE and ITU, or else the safety and homologation guys come back and yell at us. All ATM, Ethernet, Token-ring, ISDN, FDDI, and T1/E1 are all our bread and butter now, not proprietary busses.
Anyways, I don't think IBM is worth criticizing anymore for proprietary behavior. We pretty much lost that battle soundly.
Comments welcome.
The opinions I post here have nothing to do with my employer.
All government would need to do is issue an executive order banning the purchase of M$ products with government money and ban the use of any M$ standard by a government agency. Your pal Bill C. has the authority to do this. Our government spends so much on software, it would be a huge fund injection for the competition, and M$ would crumble. Plus, our civil and military service people would get better software.
Every one of these industries have been deregulated due to the industry wide ineffeciencies caused by regulation. EVERY ONE. It would seem that the clarion call for the regulation of OS's as a government monopoly becomes a bit less sharp when viewed in that light. Government regulation is rarely the answer, and inviting it into a realm where the government has repeatedly shown itself to be incapable of understanding from a regulatory standpoint (remember the communications decency act?) seems to me to be a bit foolhardy. This is not to say that the DOJ should not address the monopolistic practices of Microsoft, merely that extending itself to cover the commoditiy-in-general (OS's) is a less optimal solution than dealing with the monopolistic company.
wake up and find out that you are the eyes of the world.
Linus=Luke
RMS=Yoda
or maybe K&R = Yoda
--Cowlings
You misunderstand what is going on. OEMs can offer good deals on bundled software percisely because it is bundled and they are getting a volume discount. Your scheme has no economy of scale. If they forced you to buy software at retail prices, you probably could buy it cheaper somewhere else.
If you are a big customer, the OEMs/System Integrators will put any damn disk image on the machine that you give them. If you are a small customer, find a clone shop - they usually will preinstall what you want to get the business. If you are an individual, do it yourself or pay someone to do it, because the fact that every computer doesn't magically come with the exact software you want is your problem, not the vendors'.
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
Just like municipalities have Public Service Commisions that regulate the rate the utility monopolies can charge, there should be a commision that oversees the "Microsoft Tax" to ensure OEMs and customers are not screwed.
Breaking up Microsoft will just create several monopoly companies.
This is amusing. :) (let the rehashing begin.)
It's funny. People are taking this so personally.
To be honest, I don't care what happens to Microsoft. They're just another big corporation trying to rule the world. I don't use their products. It's as simple as that. If they crumble, I'll still be running the same system, developing free, useful software. If they don't, I'll still be running the same system, developing free, useful software.
I laugh at my friends when their windows pc's go down in flames, and they lose all their work. Sounds cruel, but they laugh just as hard when I hit a web page that requires the "spiffy" plug-in, only supported by Windows. Competition (Microsoft isn't playing fairly, but they're still playing) is good. Without competitors, there's no motive to innovate. There's no doubt in my mind that if we were all happy with Windows (meaning end users, vars, developers, "el1t3 c0d3rz", admins, etc.), or some other OS, Linux wouldn't be enjoying the enormous support (and hype) it's experiencing now.
In a hundred years we'll all look back and laugh. Many of us are doing that now.
My two cents.
A computer operating system isn't a natural, unavoidable monopoly like the phone company.
There's an argument that it is something of a "natural monopoly", because of compatibility issues. Once you've spent thousands of dollars on software to run on OS Foo (much of which may be available for that OS only), and once all of your friends and business partners are using Foo, switching to OS Bar can be impractical and expensive, even if Bar has tremendous technical superiority. The quality of the operating system itself is not the only issue.
There is no need to regulate a free market for software unless some companies break the law.
IMHO there is no need to regulate any free market unless it coagulates and becomes un-free, or unless mindless, irresponsible cretinism (a.k.a. free enterprise) in that area is too destructive to be tolerated, as in the case of finance. I mean, if upper management at Pepsico is a bunch of babbling morons, that's okay, because Crystal Pepsi is harmless. By contrast, the securities industry is very heavily regulated because those morons are genuinely dangerous.
Anybody who actually gives a rat's ass about money is a hopeless mental and moral cripple, and can't be trusted with anything important. Pepsi, for example, isn't important. Let 'em do as they please! Are operating systems important? Only in a practical sense, but I guess you could argue that practicality is enough.
Who really cares, anyway?
As for merely breaking the law, that in and of itself doesn't call for regulating the market; it calls for imposing penalties on the guilty party.
"Once a solution is found, a compatibility problem becomes indescribably boring because it has only... practical importance"
"Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law." --
There are other issues here.
If you sell IBM compatible PCs:
1) You can not sell any other operating system without threats and damage from Micros~`
2) You can not add software to that package except under strict scrutany by Micros~1
3) You can not write software that competes with Micros~1 in any way and still sell its OS on your PCs
If you write software for Windows:
1) You can not write software that competes with Micros~1 in any way.
2) You can not write software for any other operating system and keep up-to-date on Windows.
3) You can not grow your business very large or Micros~1 will see you as a threat.
4) If Micros~1 decides your market is desirable you should be prepared to exit that market.
There will only be 3 places to be in PC technology. One is working FOR Micros~1 on software, selling services fixing Micros~1 products, or selling PCs with Windows on it. This is what I read from how Micros~1 treats its partners, OEMs, and ISVs. Look at this IBM information, look at how Netscape was delt with, look at how Borland lost its employees and thus its technology, look all around and everything says that you either make hardware only, provide service for Micros~1 products, or work for Micros~1.
A dim future if you ask me. Unless.......Linux??????
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Not necessarily off topic if the topic is MS!! It seems that MS is trying to buy as much time as it can. It may even be going light on all the retailers and IBM etc who are now supporting linux not because it is afraid of looking more like a monopoly, but rather because the longer they can delay the ruling and the case itself, the more likely it is that linux/be/bsd will be a true competitor and the basis of the case 'MS is a monopoly' can become an debatable reality. If this happens by the time the case is completed, MS may be hit with a whole bunch of fines (which they can afford to pay) but not suffer anything disastrous like splitting up the company. Maybe they are willing to have a competitor in the short run so that they can succeed in the long run. Lets face it folks... linux is a geek OS and it is going to be years and years before a newbie can be productive on it from day 1. MS isn't going to lose much market share in the early stages because linux appeals to a niche. Why would IBM and Intel support linux anyway??? So that Microsoft looks less like a monopoly by the time the case is done?? Are there any articles published on this?
No, we hate the fact that he made billions off of garbage.
To extend this analogy, go back further, to when the ibm pc was new. Microsoft *was* the good guy, who was going to save us from the dominion of IBM.
Microsoft sold MS-DOS for other computers, so that you could run man (later almost all) of the programs for the IBM on other 8086 hardware. In 1982, it was ibm that was seen as the dark side.
IBM *expected* you to buy ibm software to run on that pc, and only ibm hardware--though they couldn't force you. We had a *wall* full of ibm software for it, but I don't remember ever selling a single copy of it (mainly because it wasn't any good).
With MS-DOS, though, you were safe, and could by someone else's hardware. In 1982, this didn't mean a clone, either. There were several other 8086 machines out there. And the 640k limit was peculiar to ibm (and the clones); iirc, Victor could access 768k.
But along the way, things changed. Someone through young Microft through a Window, disfiguring it horribly, and creating the dreaded Micrso~1 . . .
Now we see the emperor, err, ibm, coming to our rescue to protect us from microso~1 . . .
Personally, I would rather have some government agency regulate it than Bill Gates. At least we can vote to affect some change in the way government rules, with Bill Gates you have no
say at all...
>>>please remove "nospam" from email address
By the time Micros~1 was in existence, Bill was no longer an "innocent kid".
--
--
The Internet is the Suppository of All Knowledge. You get it in the end.
Posted by FascDot Killed My Previous Use:
How is more choice going to hurt consumers? The only possible answer is "because then Joe Consumer will have to know more before purchasing a computer".
That's something I'd really like to see happen, wouldn't you?
--
"Please remember that how you say something is often more important than what you say." - Rob Malda
I read a book called "The Making of Microsoft" , I don't recall who wrote it. It was pro MS of course, but the story about the early days was pretty interesting.
:)
Bill was actually a "hacker" when he was a kid. In fact he got tossed off of some mainframe that he had access to (I think having wealthy parents gave him certain advantages) because he brought the whole system down by hacking something he wasn't supposed to. According to the book he was kind of a rebel, not too differnet from your average computer geek.
It would seem that timing had a lot to do with the success of MS, they were in the right place at the right time. Then they hired some killer marketing people and the rest is history.
It's easy and fun to believe that Bill is the evil anti-christ but it's really not true. It's a shame that he ended up in the software industry and not tupperware industry
Yeah, I kinda agree. But why bother ruining Microsoft? The consumers made Microsoft what it is today. We bought their damned products. I say, let the novice computer users use Windows. People who demand more can use Linux/FreeBSD/etc. Just leave the MS crowd alone and focus on doing our own thing.
Just a thought.
I certainly can't speak for Mr. Gates, but I've gotten the distinct impression that he is into being successful more than anything else. Power is part of what he sees as success.
Oh, and he's been pretty successful, too.
(many people are very envious envious of his success. Of course they won't ever admit it. They get very shrill about denying it.)
Most of your posting is irrelevant. An important consideration in legal matters is intent. The question should be not what Microsoft's market share is, but what was their intent in attempting to destroy Java, in attempting to destroy Netscape, in attempting to destroy OS2, and so on ad nauseum.
The important point is whether they intended to gain monopoly pricing power by their actions. And take a look at whether they actually have monopoly pricing power. In the latest low-cost computers, the Microsoft OS is one of most expensive components. While low end hardware has come down in price at an amazing rate, the Microsoft OS has become more expensive, both in dollar cost and the exorbitant resources it requires on your system. The usual reason given for the low cost of hardware is competition. Do you think it is just coincidence that the largest provider of PC OS software doesn't seem to have much competition? Do you think that it is just coincidence that over its history Microsoft has done everything in its power, fair or foul, to kill all competition?
And whether IBM once was a monopoly, comparable to Microsoft, is now ancient history. After their DOJ trial, IBM saw the light and completely changed their business practices.
ZD actually didn't write the story. It's from Reuters, and this story actually appeared first on Wired.
I'm so sick of all this shit with M$... Everyday it's the same story written by someone else. I'm sticking to Linux!
Pengwins
I can see why IBM found it difficult to include OS/2 on their computers. It's not just preinstalling the software on the computers. You have the associated support costs for 2 operating systems, Windows and OS/2. Plus, you are plugging an operating system that people did not want in the first place.
While it is disappointing to see no competition in the OS market, IBM has to make a buck.
It's called PCI...
When did they start doing that?
l mor/docs/dg052899.htm
Well, both Dell and Compaq (and several other OEM's) are selling Linux systems. Small vendors have been selling such systems for years since they don't get the steep discounts the larger OEM's get, they have less to lose by losing volume.
Gateway owns Amiga and sells those (what's left of them to sell). HP has been selling Unix systems for years. (I believe that some of these even run on x86's, though I could be wrong there.) Compaq sells Digital UNIX systems (although as you point out, this is a somewhat recent thing but still about a year).
Data General now sells Pentium II/III based systems that run both NT and DG/UX. (http://www.dg.com/aviion/ for some very nice servers that can go up to 64 PII/PIII's)
IBM said it themselves, they pissed Bill Gates off (he was annoyed by the lack of respect that IBM showed MS). I would imagine this had something to do with their nasty negotiations.
Wasn't Compaq threatened to lose its license to Windows because it installed Netscape?
No, MS threatened them because they removed the IE icon, not because they installed Netscape.
They can't put those products icons on the desktop though can they?
Toshiba did. My company bought dozens of Tecra's that had the NS icon on the desktop. For over a year this practice continued (then we stopped buying Toshibas, so I can't comment on whether they continued or not).
HP and Compaq have software divisions but why don't they have anything that competes with Micros~1?
HP's software division is primarily embedded systems and Unix systems. I don't think you or anyone but HP can speculate on why they haven't been in the PC software business. If you'll note, HP's primary software is in support of it's hardware.
IBM is about the only one willing to stand up and fight and even thought they are making alot of money supporting broken Windows installation/products they are also paying for it. As the current news stories are showing us.
Not really. The news story also tells us that IBM *UNDERPAID* it's revenues for quite some time. The figures of gross increase in sales were related to IBM's underpaid pricing (they paid 40 million and should have paid 90 million, yet the 40 million price was being used to show how much the increase was). Still, the figures show an increase from 90 million to 220 million in the span of 3 years. Nothing was said about how many machines were sold in 94 versus the number of machines sold in 97. Nothing was said about the fact that IBM was selling Win 3.1 in 1994 and Win95 in 1997. The numbers don't reflect a lot of facts which could seriously change how those figures are being represented.
IBM had a steep discount on win 3.1 in 1994. More so than any other vendor in the industry. So in 1997 they paid about the same price as every other OEM. And you call that unfair? You call that "paying the price"? Whining that you no longer have the best discount because you pissed off the vendor isn't the same thing as having your prices jacked far above what everyone else is paying (which didn't happen).
Funny the government already told Micros~1 to stay away from them and you chose them as your one example.
No, not really. The government never told them anything, they simply were investigating the deal. Microsoft on their own backed off and didn't pursue the matter. No ruling was ever made to deny MS from buying Intuit. MS didn't want to go through the trouble, which shows exactly how much MS really wanted them (not enough to even wait for a ruling, much less appeal it).
Your version of history in several places here seems to be quite skewed from what really happened.
There goes Intuit again. Do you really think Corel gets the time of day from Micros~1? They are fighting the good fight with what they have but since MS Office has been bundled with Windows, they don't have much market left. Again, IBM pays for dearly for doing this, they are just big enough to be able to afford it.
When did Microsoft begin selling Office with every copy of windows? I must have been asleep.
Microsoft offers good prices to vendors that also choose to bundle other MS products. That's not the same as MS bundling windows. The OEM makes this choice.
Besides, most customers *DO* want Office and every bundle i've ever seen has given the option of deleting Office from the sale (and getting money off the base price), since they're afraid of file format incompatibilities. Sad, but true.
But the point here is that Corel get's the same access to information that most other software vendors get. MSDN. This gives you everything you need to develop for windows (information wise). Hell, you can even get the same info for free by logging into their web site. Microsoft *WANTS* people to write software for their OS. The info is so available that even if MS tried to cut you off, they couldn't since it's too easy to get without them knowing you were getting it.
Sure, they might not get priveledged information anymore, that just puts them in the same boat as anyone else who wants to write software for windows, and millions of people do it just fine without it. Don't confuse not being priveledged with not getting information.
This is a desktop product? We are talking aobut Microsoft's leverage of the desktop here. If they are allowed to continue into the server space, SAP will be attacked the same way others have been.
There was no specification of "for the desktop" in the original comment. In any event, SAP writes software for NT and NT is their largest platform (SAP/R3). They also have desktop clients.
"continue into the server space"? That's what they do. They make billions of dollars off of NT every year. Clearly that's a large market that Microsoft could go into if they wanted, but they apparently don't want to.
There is Intuit again.... Lotus has IBMs $$ behind it and they are putting up a good fight. Exchange should be no competition for Notes but look at what it has done so far. Boy it is even at something like rev 6 even though it is only a couple of years old. FUD and Micros~1 is attacking it with MS LookOut by preinstalls in Windows.
I use Intuit because they're a great example of how to compete with MS and win. Exchange and Notes are really two different markets with an overlap in the groupware domain. Notes is primarily a document database with groupware capabilities, Exchange is primarily a message transport system with Groupware capabilities. Exchange started at revision 4 to sync up with the Exchange client which was at version 4 because it shipped with Win95 (which was version 4). It also didn't hurt the marketing. So Exchange is really at version 3 (when 6.0 is released. 5.5 is the current version.) Exchange is 4 years old BTW. Notes is only about 6 or 7. That's not a huge difference in these terms.
Also, Outlook is not installed in windows unless they also install Office. Outlook is a generic client that also has Exchange connectivity (also internet connectivity). Theoretically, Outlook can talk to any MAPI source, including Notes.
Kind a poor case you put up there. The history is there, you just have to be more then 20 years old to have actually seen it happen and be aware of it. Some 15 years of it. IIRC
Which you have proven that you don't. Lots of things are not as you recall them. I'm 35 for what it's worth, and I've been in the industry since 1985 (professionally, unprofessionally since 1977). I've seen it all happen. I've followed everything closely. I owned an Apple II, an IBM PC, a PC Convertible (remember those?), a PS/2 model 30 (286/ISA bus). I was running OS/2 in 1990 (1.3).
Here is an interesting article to read.
http://www.mercurycenter.com/svtech/columns/gil
Microsoft has gotten to where they are by the ineptness of it's competition. Competition that was paying attention (such as Intuit) can counter Microsoft and nullify everything they do (since they're so slow to do things in the first place). It's people like you that continue to spread the myth that Microsoft is indestructable and Omnipotent that gives MS it's power. It's only in the belief that MS will destroy you that they can succeed.
as he obviously has no respect for the consumer, as shown by the trash he forces down our throats.
Bill Gates comes from a wealthy, well-to-do, positioned family that fostered/fosters a very competitive enviornment. Many of Bill's childhood friends have commented on the competitive atmosphere whenever they visited.
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I am a lawyer, but this is not legal advice. I am probably not admitted in your jurisdiction. If you need advice on this topic, see a lawyer licensed in your jurisdiction.
That said, IBM's version of MS's behavior (assuming the truth of it for the moment) is about as illegal as it gets.
*Having* a monopoly is not illegal, unless you got it in an illegal manner. The original microsoft mnopoly was lawfully acquired by most counts, and owes more to IBM pricing CP/M-86 at four times the price of PC-DOS than to anything Microsoft did.
However, having legally acquired a monopoly, it is illegal to use market power for just about anything. ANd one does not have to be a monopolist to reach this prohibition, but merely to have market power. Here (again, assuming that it is true), they attempted to use a near-monopoly to eliminate a competitor. This creates two great sins against anti-trust law: 1) the use of the power, and 2) it is an *attempt* to monopolize, an offense on its own.
It is possible to make economic arguments that what MS has done is good for the consumer, and that the law *should* permit the alleged behavior. THere have been several of these as op-ed pieces in the wall street journal over the past few months, and generally rely on the notion that microsoft is innovative.
I haven't been persuaded by the arguments, but they can be honestly made. However, that is not what the law *is*. While antitrust law gives the courts far more flexibility than just about any other statutory law, and modern antitrust law acknowledges consumer interest rather than protection of competitors as the ultimate test, the definitions needed to permit the alleged behavior not only bend the meaning of the statutes, but requires that they be outright ignored.
None of this is surprising. ZDNet must come to its senses, and start bashing Microsoft like everyone else or they'll end up with the short-end of the stick on ratings.
Newsflash: There is no good news about Microsoft that people will believe. Their products are overrated and underused, yet bloated and overpriced.
This is a rediculous situation, where they are producing inferior products, and we have no choice but to use them.
Can't wait for Windows 2000 Lite, the predicted new version of Win2000, for free. The eventual realization will be that the operating system market is dead by Microsoft's hand, and yet in the death and waste they left behind, we see Linux thriving.
i don't know exactly what antitrust law is like, but this is quite definately a violation of it, right?
:P) Where do you draw the line?
[note: possible trolling ahead]
this brings us to the point of what, exactly, is going to be accomplished by the government attacking microsoft.
It's all very easy to say "split up microsoft", but along what lines? and what would that accomplish, exactly? having three seperate Microsofts would do nothing _except_ confuse consumers,with no benefits.
I think if they cut up MS into an OS company and an applications company, with the OS company not allowed to show any preferential treatment to the app company. The app company could integrate with the OS all they wanted, but it would have to be through open, clearly defined standards, so that Netscape could be integrated into the OS just as easily as MSIE (OpenDoc, anyone..? -_-).. then that would work well. It's hard to claim though that it would help anything Word and Outlook Express to be made by different companies.
But this begs the question of where you draw the line between OS and applications. I think we could all agree that a web browser is an application, but aren't there certain internet-related functions (such as ping, telnet, time servers, etc.. yes, the windows telnet program SUCKS) that really ought to be handled by the OS? If MS wanted to let you mount an FTP server as a hard drive (which is definately innovative, and someting that makes sense) would they no longer be allowed to do that? Where do you draw the line? And what about Windows Media Player? I call WMP an application, and i believe that microsoft ought to bundle RealPlayer and Quicktime with Windows for the sake of their customers. But you could easily argue that WMP _ought_ to be part of the OS. For instance, look at apple's Quicktime, which is more a basic low-level library than a movie display program. If apple wanted to have the Finder use Quicktime for basic low-level bitmap display functions, they could do it very easily. But if MS did something like that, would it be a bad thing? (this is just an example. obviously WMP isn't that sophisticated.
And if certain non-MS products start to get bundled with windows, which ones? Netscape of course, but what about Opera? We could probably say Quicktime and Realplayer ought to be included, but what about Vivoactive? there's no good reason to include vivoactive-- nobody uses it-- but you could argue that if QT and Real get in, so should vivo. This might get messy..
Another thing that would probably work is greatly reducing the power MS has over computer makers-- for instance, allowing them to bundle any non-MS software they want freely, or ship computers with other OSes or no OSes. This is, remember, why Netscape started this lawsuit to begin with.
Is this an option for the government? i don't know antitrust law.
It might be difficult to enforce though unless MS standardized the contracts between different computer makers, and MS wasn't allowed to turn away any buyers. After all if a company starts shipping Linux computers and their windows prices immediately double, it could be very easy to claim this is a coincidence when everyone is paying different prices for windows anyway.
The worst idea from my point of view is forcing MS to open-source its code, since the court is unlikely to take into serious consideration liscensing or future MS operating systems. Also that sets scary precedent. (and now that source code is legally free speech, doesn't MS have a right to withhold it if they want?)
I'm not arguing any one point of view, but i think the government really ought to have a clear idea going in of what exactly they're going to do if they win. Right now they don't seem to be worried about that at all; they'll just deal with it when they come to it, and don't seem aware it's the most important part of the case.
Because there is a very real danger that they'll either set up some kind of wierd precedent that could attack other software companies later, or even worse do some very small insignifigant thing that helps no one. Because if even if the DOJ's final desicion is something unhelpful, they will likely never do anything else to MS because hey, they won the Microsoft case! Their work here is done!
Rememeber, MS is supposedly already supposed to be prohibhited from tying products to the OS, but they do it anyway. this is what this lawsuit's about. if they didn't follow the earlier no-tying agreement, will they keep their promises after this one?
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
But "volume discounts" on software should not be legal. It's a positively ridiculous notion (although it is true). The software industry is so absurdly corrupt it's painful to even think about it.
OEM's should be able to offer various OS's at little cost. The real economies of scale come into play where a company like Dell invests in assembly line style manufacturing of PC's where windows is installed on every PC. But even here it should be that difficult to offer additional OS's. Mainly it's a matter of having people who know how to configure the OS.
support gun control: take guns from cops
This guy must be a M$ plant. No one else would have his attitude. We want Linux first and then choice here at /., Bud. Move on.
In 1994, the year Warp v3 shipped IBM was selling 1 million copies of OS/2 per month. They could not break into the preload business and we now know why. The total OS/2 install base was around 15 million worldwide and until March of 1995 IBM was heavily advertising OS/2. Nun ads and the like. One million copies per month at mostly retail is an amazing number. I was actually having people finally start asking me about OS/2 because of all the press and even in spite of the constant harassing Ziff-Davis and others published. Fighting a ghost for 3 years, Chicago, was appearently taking its toll on IBM and after all, Micros~1 kept advertising all the amazing things that this ghost would do real soon now.
OS/2 would have kicked butt had Micros~1 not been allowed to use the press to lie to the public and be allowed to annouce a product that was not going to ship for 3 years. I'll say it again, a Ziff-Davis reporter in Europe told people that IBM was killing OS/2 around 1995 and that lie made it all over the world. The head of a Denver CO hospital was evaluating OS/2 for a complete replacement of DOS/Windows until he heard the lie that IBM was killing OS/2. THIS IS WHAT KEPT WINDOWS ALIVE. Illegal marketing practices by Micros~1 and it PR arm, Ziff-Davis and company. IMHO
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Microsoft is a business, people. They don't work for free, and they don't take courses of action that would gut their revenues. This absolutely cannot be a real plan- not even a backup plan- not even if you ignore antitrust statutes. Why? Because THEY NEED THE INCOME. Their valuation is paper. The last thing they can afford is a collapse in their valuation, and conceding the OS business (for the consumer) as unprofitable, in hopes of totally controlling all of it and making up the loss in control of media, is a damned dangerous game.
This can only be vapor. If they were fools enough to _do_ it, it would be time for rejoicing- because they can't turn sustainable profit on that model. They cannot simply abandon profit centers so lightly.
What do you think drives Bill Gates (or any big-shot computer CEO) anyway? Money? If the game were just about money, it's over. Bill won, the first person in history worth a hundred billion dollars.
No, what drives Bill and other authoritarians is some fundamental psychological insecurity, a need for "respect", perhaps driven by a domineering father or some high school bully. Who knows? We'll leave that to the posthumous shrinks.
How many times have we seen industry pundits at a loss to explain Free Software, because they simply cannot imagine a motivation other than fiscal profit? The same is true of Bill Gates. If you think greed drives him, you've underestimated him.
Hand me that airplane glue and I'll tell you another story.
Lack of functionality? What functionality was missing in OS/2 in 1995? Functionality is why I got ahold of the beta of OS/2 v2.0 in 1990(IIRC). Up until some recent (2-3 years) new devices like DVD, OS/2 has been far more functional then Windows. Applications is a chicken and eggs thing. As far as users installing it, you have to have hardware that supports it just like every version of Windows has to have hardware that supports it or else Microsoft wouldn't have PC9x specifications. IMO, if OEMs were allowed to preinstall it without retributions from Micros~1 we would have far better support for devices today.
I don't think that they would drop OS/2 again if they could go back. They had/have very large fortune 500 (redundant) companies that rely on OS/2. Mission critical applications that MUST stay running and run correctly. Can you immagine if ATM machines were running Dos/Windows? I think that bug that crashs Win9x after 49 days would have been found out long ago. IBM just made a deal LAST YEAR worth 1.2 Billion dollars based on mostly OS/2 technology. Could they have made that deal with Windows if IBM gave up OS/2 in 1995 or earlier? I don't think so.
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Just kidding. Manual cut 'n' paste maybe? ... of text approved by Microsoft's anti-linux research division and tested on focus groups!
Walk into a CompUSA, Best Buy, etc. and attempt to purchase a system(other than a Mac) without any Microsoft software installed on it. Even if you purchase the system and reformat the drive, you're still going to be counted as yet another happy Windows user...
Good quote in your sig, but he spelled his name: "Adlai Stevenson".
Anakin starts out innocent enough.
Micros~1 was never from its inception a nice guy.
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The Internet is the Suppository of All Knowledge. You get it in the end.
It's interesting that Bill Gates demanded 'respect' from IBM. What an ego. Were it not for a boatload of dumb luck and a LOT of help from IBM, Bill Gates would likely be sweeping floors in university computer labs, still rooting through the garbage to try to learn how to program.
ZDNET has a lot of nerve 'coming out' with a story like this. ZDNET played an eager role in helping promote garbage like Windows and to FUD non-Microsoft OS's like OS/2 into oblivion. The trade press is almost as guilty as Microsoft, in my opinion.
Yes!!!
Even so, destruction is not an option that's being considered. Splintering into smaller units is, and that could be very good.
oh sh*t. THis is not good. IF this was true with NT version4, I would have never even tried linux. This will severly hurt linux. I am sorry guys but not all computer users like unix and would prefer windows and if its free then screw linux will be there attitude. Too bad we can't sue ms.
In ftp.exe for sure, possibly elsewhere.
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Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
That sounds so thuggish.
Slashdot is starting to become an ingrown little fiefdom of thugs preaching to one another. It's fairly repulsive to some of us who use a lot of different OSes for various purposes.
Anybody who doesn't sing along in the chorus of war songs against Microsoft is basically branded as a fool or an evile spy. Any counter arguement to anti MS storm trooper fantasies is shouted down. It's sad really, because it becomes obvious that its just the Usenet phenomenon taking hold here.
The more vocal segments of the Linux "community" seem to be more anti- than anything else. And it's sad, because Linux has so much potential for use in a lot of ways. But regular folks get driven away by the reek of cultishness.
Band together, little men. Preach to one another about how cool you are for not buying into "The Mans" establishment. You look like bloody fools.
but I believe if IBM had been allowed to create OS/2 properly and recoupe money for it, that by now OS/2 would be everywhere
Yes, if IBM had been allowed to do what it wanted, we'd all be running OS/2 on our overpriced, slow, and proprietary IBM brand MCA hardware. But the 5250 emulation would be very good.
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Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
He did go through the trash learning how to program! He said so himself!
It used to be my sig on Slashdot:
You've got to be willing to read other people's code, then write your own, then have other people review your code.
-- Bill Gates
So I made a webpage explaining it (it has a lot of typos since I made it in 5 minutes). See Gates himself admit that he went through the trash looking for source code here
was why IBM didn't start an all-out blitz when windows 95 was delayed. It could run the existing w3.1 programs, and multiple dos programs. But instead, ibm chose to wait and add more features. The market was their plum waiting to be plucked, and they decided to plant another tree, instead. This gave MS the time to impose another api that os2 couldn't emulate, and ended the game.
We pretty much lost that battle soundly.
It's pretty much an unwinable battle after everyone else catches up. M$ take heed and you won't almost drowned in the deep blue, like Big Blue did.
+&x
OEMs can offer good deals on bundled software percisely
because it is bundled and they are getting a volume
discount.
Bundling and volume discounts are two different things
there is no reason for one to follow from the other.
INCONVENIENCE???
The inconvenience here is everything written for microsoft, and nothing else. Get rid of them, and the developers will be more open. Not to mention the general instability and absolute clunky clumsy inconsistencies in windoze. It's definitely the bottom of the food chain where quality is concerned in every aspect.
I have windoze for games. Everything real is done under OS/2 and linux, thank you very much. If we get rid of MS's monopoly and illegal practices, maybe the cool games will come to the superior platforms.
I wouldn't jump to conclusions until after Microsoft has had a chance to cross-examine the individual.
Uh...this all came out in a deposition TO the Microsoft lawyers.
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Okay, I got Linux installed. So where's the free beer everyone keeps talking about??
I'm wondering why nobody is in prison for perjury after all the backtracking that went on in round one. What was up with those videos? Funny how Bill G. says he didn't know anything about the Java case yet he was right in there pulling strings to get Apple to drop Netscape and Java. Can a civil perjury case be filed against them?
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
WOZ FOR YODA! ;)
a monopoly IS NOT just their line of software. It is all the other communication mediums they are buying. And the communication mediums they are trying to control by "supporting" them with their propriatary software. Microsoft owns or is a joint venture-partnership-partial owner in many companies all around the world. One company trying to the end-all be-all source of information is what we call a monopoly. They are slowly trying to own as many forms of media as they can get their hands on. Cable companies, ISPs, hardware manufacturers, ect., if you dont call this monopolistic then you need to buy a microsoft brand dictionary (soon to be released) and look it up, it's cross referenced with Microsoft and Windows.
Just think about how much the average computer user sees the Microsoft logo. It's everywhere, they see it when they boot up the computer, run a program from the start menu, cuss at it because it crashed. That is alot of free exposure that other companies would normally have to pay for, but since Microsoft can leverage companies into using their products so the users are bombarded with Microsoft. This is one of the main reasons why applications like Access and Excel like to only allow you to view their files in the Microsoft program...unless you want to make a VB (also made by Microsoft) program to run your database or spreadsheet. It's all about increasing exposure so you can never get away from the logo, name, or business image. "Need an answer? look to Microsoft...". Exposure is why Microsoft pressed IBM into getting rid of OS/2. Whenever someone had the ability to choose a non-Microsoft product to put on their workstation or terminal they often would. Microsoft needs to have their OS be pre-installed in new computers, otherwise people wouldn't use it. What i want to see from the government's anti-trust case is for microsoft to be split up into smaller companies, one company should not be able to purchase all of the public's form of communication.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
Absolutely true. When IBM created the original "open" PC, it was only open because IBM was trying to get to market quickly so they used off-the-shelf designs. It never occurred to them that someone might clone it (although it certainly occurred to Intel and Microsoft.)
In my opinon, the key event in PC hardware history was in 1987 when Compaq chose to dump the IBM-licenced MCA PCs that they were about to release and instead release the Deskpro/386 with an ISA bus (and to go on and develop the EISA bus). If Compaq had chosen to go MCA, others probably would have followed (including Intel's motherboard division), and ISA would have died out after a few years.
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Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
> 1) You can not sell any other operating system > without threats and damage from Micros~`
>
> Interesting. Why is it that lots of OEM's do sell other OS's, including Dell and Compaq.
When did they start doing that? Compaq just bought Digital so it has a base large enough to require support. Wasn't Compaq threatened to lose its license to Windows because it installed Netscape? Not a very friendly thing for a friendly Micros~1 to do. Compaq is not very close to Micros~1 any more. Recent history too.
> 2) You can not add software to that package except under strict scrutany by Micros~1
>
> You cannot *REMOVE* software from a windows installation, you can add anything you
> like. Lots of OEM's including Toshiba and IBM have been shipping Netscape for years,
> just not at the expense of removing IE. You also can't alter the boot up sequence.
And they pay dearly for installing those products too. They can't put those products icons on the desktop though can they? Customers have to go find those packages instead of having them right up front.
> 3) You can not write software that competes with Micros~1 in any way and still sell its OS on your PCs
>
> Well, since IBM is really the only company that both sells commercial software and sells
> PC's, it's hard to judge based on one case.
HP and Compaq have software divisions but why don't they have anything that competes with Micros~1? Same reason why nobody will stand up againt them in court. Fear. IBM is about the only one willing to stand up and fight and even thought they are making alot of money supporting broken Windows installation/products they are also paying for it. As the current news stories are showing us.
> 1) You can not write software that competes with Micros~1 in any way.
> Strange that many companies DO compete with Microsoft, and still stay quite up to date.
> Intuit for instance.
Funny the government already told Micros~1 to stay away from them and you chose them as your one example.
> 2) You can not write software for any other operating system and keep up-to-date on Windows.
>
> Strange that Intuit does this. So does Corel.
> So does IBM (remember, they write more
> software for NT than anyone else besides MS
> right now). So does Perforce, Rational, and
> more companies than I can name.
There goes Intuit again. Do you really think Corel gets the time of day from Micros~1? They are fighting the good fight with what they have but since MS Office has been bundled with Windows, they don't have much market left. Again, IBM pays for dearly for doing this, they are just big enough to be able to afford it.
> 3) You can not grow your business very large or Micros~1 will see you as a threat.
>
> Strange that Microsoft doesn't see companies
> like SAP as a threat. They're one of the top
> selling companies on the market.
This is a desktop product? We are talking aobut Microsoft's leverage of the desktop here. If they are allowed to continue into the server space, SAP will be attacked the same way others have been.
> 4) If Micros~1 decides your market is desirable you should be prepared to exit that market.
>
> Only if you're incompetant and have only
> managed to stay in business if you have no
> competition. Clearly, lots of companies compete
> with Micrsoft and win. Again, Intuit is one.
> Lotus is another. Microsoft doesn't
> automatically dominate in every market they
> enter.
There is Intuit again.... Lotus has IBMs $$ behind it and they are putting up a good fight. Exchange should be no competition for Notes but look at what it has done so far. Boy it is even at something like rev 6 even though it is only a couple of years old. FUD and Micros~1 is attacking it with MS LookOut by preinstalls in Windows.
Kind a poor case you put up there. The history is there, you just have to be more then 20 years old to have actually seen it happen and be aware of it. Some 15 years of it. IIRC
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
I've been to Warpstock '97, took my brother to '98, and plan to attend '99 as well. Follow the link above for more info.
It is about advertizing dollars. When I asked why the 2 latest NOS shootouts didn't include OS/2 Warp Server or e-Business I was told that IBM wasn't marketing the product and it didn't have marketshare. Capability was not even mentioned. Put that with the $$ Micros~1 spends on advertizing and you have Ziff-Davis doing anything Micros~1 wants. That includes drumming up news about other operating systems. Didn't anyone notice last year that OS/2 and Linux press coverage started when the court case started? Will all this end when the court case ends? I say it will but that also depends on the remedies imposed on Micros~1 by the courts.
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
You suggest that market share does not indicate a monopoly, without providing any backing statements. What does define a monopoly?
Rockefeller held a lesser percentage of the market share of oil when he was prosecuted for anti-trust violations. He, at the time, owned the commodity for the time - when people thought of oil, they thought Rockefeller. Now, Microsoft owns the commodity for our time - INFORMATION - when people think of this, they think of MS. Where is the difference?
That said, holding a monopoly is not in and of itself illegal. Microsoft has, however engaged in illegal product tying (Sherman Act) in order to leverage their monopoly in one field (OS) into a monopoly in another. Caldera has also alleged that MS abused their monopoly in one field (OS) to obtain a monopoly in another (GUI) by illegally tying the Windows GUI to the DOS kernel.
Microsoft has continually attacked smaller upstarts with potentially competitive technology with tactics like vapourware and FUD. Do you remember who produced the first pen computing device? Hint- It wasn't MS and it wasn't 3Com.
Microsoft's maintenance of their monopolies is also concerning. Microsoft's strategy for corporate and business deployment requires an intense belief in the concept that homogeneous networks are the ONLY answer. When Sun came out with Java, Microsoft saw that position threatened. What did they do? They chose to completely undermine the Java standard. They decided to destroy the one major threat from Java - platform interoperability.
Microsoft's business practices are repugnant because they hold the indsutry back. Microsoft's business practices are illegal because they seek to obtan monopolies (the one MAJOR failing of the capitalist system).
This is one of those analogies that the closer you look at it, the more it falls apart.
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The Internet is the Suppository of All Knowledge. You get it in the end.
Maybe they're Sith lords then. Always there are two, a master, and an apprentice.
There can only be two, because once one becomes as powerfull as the other, it will destroy the master.
IBM was the master, and Microsoft the apprentice. Once Microsoft became powerful enough to destroy IBM, it did so, to have all the power for itself.
he he... Darth Maulcrosoft.
Vote Technocratic! Government by killer robots!
Installations can be automated, even under Windows (here at work we have scripts that automagically install everything). Such a script can install software of buyer's choice. No one needs to touch the machine/boxes at shelves and install by hand.
Just add one more thing: Lotus Smartsuite as a Productivity selection. Other than that, YES!
Visit http://www.os2hq.com/ for more "Warped Perspectives."
... however, your best comparison, i.e., the telcos, is different. Long-distance telephone service is an open-standards commodity, as is local service provider dial tone. What I mean by this is any company can make a phone (application) that will work with any local service provider and make long distance phone calls regardless of long distance provider. I still have a phone I bought back in 1987 -- it's been through seven locations, two countries, and four states. It worked in all of them -- Talk about application portability.
The fact that it is (damn near) impossible for ACME software to produce a 100% binary compatible Windows clone is why competion is so difficult on the x86 PC platform.
That is why I think that MS-Windows 98 and NT Workstation licensing fees should be set by a PSC. There is no other provider of 100% Win32 compatible operating systems.
Nor could there be. Unless MS GPLs their code. Now there's a solution.
The anti-trust laws are distracting the DoJ from the real problems such as violation of contract & copyright, fraudulent sales of " * software", frivolous patent filing, IP abuse, the problems in the IP system, frivolous lawsuits (e.g. your domain name is my trademark), and I could go on.
This scene is remniscent of the Romans throwing Xians to lions while their empire crumbled.
My suggestions for DoJ:
1) Was Digital v. Seattle-company-Gates-bought-DOS-from ever resolved? Or is Win311,95,98,2K still using cpm?
(and where does the slash go?)
2) MS and IBM co-develop OS, MS pulls out, takes toys home, whose toys?
3) All the patent stuff we all know and hate.
4) If it doesn't comply with the w3c standards is it really a web browser? If I sell you a toaster that frappes bread, is it really a toaster? Is it fraud to sell an operating system that doesn't operate? (ref. If MS built cars)
5) Linux is open source, MS is closed source. How do we know they aren't violating GPL, besides the fact that they haven't got things working yet?
6) All the 1st amendment stuff. Or more importantly the 9th amendment, even if no one ever noticed it.
And one more for the rest of the country:
Why would anyone ever agree to the ridiculous terms of MS licenses? Unless MS held people at gunpoint or ground-zero, the haven't forced anyone to do anything, hence no violation of rights (in this regard), nothing illegal, no case. The real problem is how so many people could be so foolish. Let's start by blaming the schools!
Or maybe we could relax, confident in the value of free software, and go do some programming.
The media will never look at the unpopular. The only reason that article appeared on ZDNet is because of the anti-micros~1 buzz that's going around now. Even if the journalists have good intentions and seek truth, their bosses and editors just want money. I'm sure that doesn't hold true for all media, but it does seem to apply to large groups such as ZD.
ZD has been pretty critical of Microsoft in it's trial coverage.
The truth is ZD is secretly owned by computer users who by-in-large use Microsoft stuff or stuff that runs on MS stuff and like to read articles about that stuff and consume advertisments about that stuff. Big consipricy!
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Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
It's funny, because IBM was everything that Microsoft is now back in its heyday. IBM made Microsoft what it is today. This may be a stretch, but IBM and Microsoft fit nicely into the roles of Obi-Wan and Anakin/Vader. IBM takes Microsoft under its wing, supports it and makes it a driving force in the industry. Then Microsoft turns around and bites the hand that feeds it, turning the Dark Side of the monopoly. Now, a much older and still much more experienced IBM is undermining Microsoft yet again, with its support of the new challenger, open-source software. IBM itself is too much of an old, slow behemoth to actually do much to counter Microsoft, but by supporter this new contender, they're encouraging not an anti-Microsoft sentiment, but a more inventive philosophy that is driving the software industry to new ideas and new successes. Even Microsoft is taking heed, even if it is in their own twisted way. Obi-Wan never actually defeated Vader, but he did train the little kid that did.
Star Wars analogy aside, IBM can only be helped by these maneuvers (both past and present). By standing up to Microsoft back then, IBM paid a painful price, but set the stage for others to do the same. Hopefully, Dell and other companies currently trying to work in other (more productive) solutions will be more successful.
Journalist sometimes seem suprise when people "hate" MS. Well read this article and then it should be of no suprise.
Sorry I'm not a North American but what is the 9th ammendment about (I only know well about the first one).
The only way the government would ever stop
using Microsoft products is IF it turned out
that Microsoft was the culprit selling secrets to
China via secret hooks in their operating systems.
>>>please remove "nospam" from email address
Linus himself said that he'd probably not have started Linux if DOS was not as crappy as it was. So yeah, I guess in a really twisted way, M$ is the father of Linux.
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If you think big enough, you'll never have to do it.
The idea I get from this article is be very very wary of conducting business with micros~1. IBM helped 'em out in the beginning, and got totally screwed, as it were. IBM's lawyer Norris was told, "As long as you're shipping competitive products ... you will suffer," by M$, in response to M$'s request that IBM not ship OS/2. It's actually pretty frightening.
Sheesh, it makes one wonder why any company would think of signing any business deal with M$. Maybe it will help out in the beginning, but then it seems you'd be hampered by M$.
Maybe IBM just happened to get the shaft (yeah, and so did Caldera, netscape, and thousands of others)...
I just bought a BTC 40x cdrom drive....on the front of the box it says "Support OS/2 Warp". You know Warpstock will be in Atlanta this year?
Can you immagine if ATM machines were running
Dos/Windows?
IIRC there are ATM's which run Windows, also some sort
of deal with MS for WIndows to be in various embedded
applications.
Indeed it's in some ways surprising that the US Government
hasn't banned Windows on grounds of national security,
"Oh dear our navy's just BSODed.."
Maybe so, but what is M$ doing to help anyone. What M$ did was completely wrong. IBM has helped them. M$ sucks. This thing never would have happened to a Linux company.
Well, I totally agree with you there. If IBM had succeeded with OS/2 then, we will be fighting IBM on software ( with Linux ) and Intel/clones will be fighting with IBM on hardware. What are our chances ? Remember what happened with Mac clones ? We will be doomed and still be paying $5K for a PC.
However, now with hardware basically very open and competitive, we can fight Microsoft with a good chance of success. We want open and competitive software. If Microsoft can compete, then good for them. If not, we want the best competitive technology to win; we don't want MS to win using marketing muscles.
I should first note that the first clone was not a surprise; compaq licensed the bios for their first luggable.
:)
that aside, what made microchannel a non-starter was the licensing terms: Royalties not only on microchannel machines, but on all past machines using the AT bus. For some reason, noone found that extra royalty payment desirable
I disagree. This is the solution suggested by Robert Bork. His logic is compelling. I feel that this is the only solution which will:
- Restore competition to the marketplace
- Not involve the government in long term interference with the computer industry.
The splitting off of applications and OS has the problems which you aptly cite:I'm not one who is paranoid of everything that the government touches, but I'm not at all comfortable with the courts, or any other branch of government, deciding a dividing line between app and OS. The best way to avoid this is to just take this off the table altogether. It's an idea which sounds good, but utterly fails in practice.
For many of the same reasons I am against any regulatory solutions. Again, my reasons are less about mistrust of the government than they are about mistrust of Microsoft.
Presuming that Microsoft has broken the anti-trust laws--I hear very few outside of Redmond who doubt that, but the judge has yet to speak--have they indicated that they would change their practices one iota if a regulatory solution were imposed? The answer to this important question for me is quite simply, No.
The previous consent decrees have been blatantly and totally ignored by Microsoft. Their shenanigans during the trial are further evidence that Bill Gates is not going to "do the right thing" about the charges against him and his company. I suspect that the DOJ is close to bringing perjury charges against more than one of the defense witnesses, almost all Microsoft executives. In other words, regardless of how badly the trial is going for Microsoft, they continue to exhibit many of the behaviors which brought them into court.
It is my prediction that Microsoft will be found guilty of breaking the anti-trust laws. They are going to lose big. The solution Judge Jackson will make is going to be severe. My recommendation would be to break Microsoft up into teeny-weeny pieces so that they can never darken the world again with their anti-innovation, anti-consumer, monopolistic practices.
Give Windows and all the applications to three, four, even five new companies who will then be competing amongst each other for the 90+ percent of the desktops Microsoft currently has. This will assure that the products on which the industry has come to depend remain in the marketplace. At the same time, it prevents any of the Baby-Bills from immediately taking control.
Further, I would impose a corporate death penalty on Bill Gates. The court must forbid his involvement in any of the Baby-Bills so that the playing field will remain level. (None of the Baby-Bills should be able to say that they are the real Microsoft because they still have the real Bill Gates.) With his money he can start another company or go into retirement. One thing he shouldn't get is the Microsoft software.
I am probably for the first time in my life siding with Robert Bork. I think that breakup of Microsoft is essential to a future which isn't substantially dominated by Bill Gates and the innovation-stifling Microsoft.
Bork 'em, Danno.
Thanks for the opportunity to comment.
Arne W. Flones Long Ship Software
It is ironic to see the old monopoly-IBM-be replaced by the new one-Micro$oft. Had a friend that worked for IBM. He said that they used whatever OS the user wanted on products--usually Windoze 95 or NT.
Micro$ost is now moving into more and more IBM territory with their terminal server. They are trying to replace IBMs business systems--the AS/400 line. They are touting NT as a workstation OS to challenge AIX (along with Solaris, Linux, IRIX, etc.) Now, Win2000 Pro is supposed to do everything (except games)? (We all know that this is the perception by a lot of business people.)
It's no wonder IBM is forgetting about development of low end products and is focusing on its high tech technologies--quantum computers, cognition, and AI user interfaces.
MS won't be able to touch mainframes, though (not that they need to). Judging from NT, their systems are too bloated, complicated, and feature-ridden in the name of user frindliness and power to ever support hundreds of users at once.
Oh, and before you continue to embarass yourself in public, head over to Caldera and take a look at their finding of fact filed in the lawsuit their inhereited from DRI. These are not the actions of any ethical company and are at best dubious under antitrust law and were not "perfectly legal at the time".
Finally, not everyone has choices. We're all happy you have them at home. Try talking with people who work at places that gone with Microsoft because it's too painful to do otherwise and deal with all the barriers Microsoft has erected to prevent such a thing. There's a good reason why Microsoft breaks compatibility with every version of their products.
What are you talking about? IBM *still* preinstalls OS/2 on commercial computers.
They used to have a duel boot configuration with Windows 3.1 and OS/2 (which booted in to OS/2 by default), but the stopped because the customers were sick of deleting 100 MBs of OS/2 stuff off of every computer. (And the OS/2 customers were probably sick of deleting the Windows stuff.)
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
There are two issues here. The first is that OEM was told by other OEM's that Microsoft wouldn't allow them to ship OS/2. Second, there is the issue of Microsoft coming down on IBM for supporting other technologies.
Issue 1:
Something that everyone seems to forget is that IBM is a competitor to all the other PC OEM's out there.
Tell me, If you were Dell, or Gateway, or Compaq, or whoever. Would you prefer to pay Microsoft, who isn't your competitor for your OS, or would you prefer to line the pockets of your biggest competitor with extra money to help crush you with?
This is a one-sided story. IBM says that this is what they were told by OEM's. But consider this? If you were a PC OEM, and IBM contracted you about shipping their OS. What would you say?
Die! you gravy sucking pig, i'll do nothing to help you!
Or
Well, we'd love to use your OS, but our existing contracts won't allow for it.
Clearly, OEM's didn't want to anger their other Goliath, so they used Micrrosoft as their excuse.
Issue 2:
Again, this is a one-sided issue. We're only hearing what IBM (and even then, one guy inside IBM, not IBM's corporate position on the situation). I wouldn't jump to conclusions until after Microsoft has had a chance to cross-examine the individual. I think it's likely that some of the statements may be retracted and/or modified to reflect both sides. But we'll see.
For microsofts part, they're not completely denying it. They are saying that they did nothing wrong though. And that wil remain to be seen.
What it boils down to though, is that Microsoft did liscense Windows to them, and they did pay a typical OEM price for it, and they continued to support Microsofts competition.
Microsoft aren't fools. They don't want to lose companies like Dell, Compaq or IBM. It would be a huge profit loss for them, and it would start a precedent that they don't want (major OEM's going with a competing OS).
So I think that while MS may threaten a lot, they won't follow through with them. That's the lesson that IBM learned, and the lesson that almost all large OEM's should learn from this.
OK maybe you have more trouble, but you no longer pay out the @$$ for long distance either ...
Competition is GOOD
$.02
DONT TREAD ON ME MOÎΩN ÎABÃ
OK, not sure which version of OS/2 he was using but I had nothing but problems with mine, not to mention lack of functionality and lack of apps. Thus it was quickly erased from my system.
:]
But come on now, you don't think this is Big Blue fealing a little pissed cause they made the wrong dicision. Over half the freakin world is use that damn WinBlows crap.
So if IBM could go back and re-live the situation when Billy boy says, (paraphrased) 'I got a product here that I think is gonna sell big, do you want some of this action?' You think they'd say "no" again? No way, IBM would eat it up, and today they would be MAKING money on the situation instead of PAYING royalties.
Sounds like jelousy cause 'scabble' wasn't as good a game as 'monopoly'
Those words work in a free market economy, which Microsoft has spent uncountable billions of dollars to destroy. They have repeatedly engaged in a pattern of destructive and illegal behavior, so therefore they'll be subject to punishment under the law. When we get to a free market OS economy, "supply" and "demand" will be back in force.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
When something becomes necessary to the daily operation of the nation, it needs to be regulated and controlled by the government. OSes have reach this level of dependence for the nation's economy.
The same happened with electric power, telephone service, and so should it be with OSes. Something critical to the nation (its business economy) should not be in the hands of corporations with their own intrests. Would you support privatizing the army? Of course not, because then they wouldn't be there for the good of the country anymore (which is not always a good goal for a private business).
But IBM changed their behaviour profoundly, after their anti-trust trial, and they weren't even broken up. All it took was the threat of never ending trial after trial into the distant future. IBM took the quick way out, of following government oversight and ensuring that IBM would follow strictly all anti-trust laws.
In my opion, this resulted in IBM handing to Microsoft, on a silver platter, their present monopoly position in OS's for Intel PC's.
Some history to support these arguements:
1. Microsoft has publicly stated that they intend
to own 100% of the software market.
2. According to someone I worked for, Microsoft
sent him an NDA requiring that he give them
rights to all intellectual property of his
company.
3. Microsoft got 3Com to develop LAN manager on
OS/2 to compete with Novell. 3Com took a bath
on it, and Microsoft turned around and bundled
it as NT Server.
4. Microsoft was reselling DCA's Com Manager SNA
gateway product on OS/2. When NT came out,
they rolled out their own binary compatible
SNA Server product.
Changes aren't permanent, but change is.
The subject is the question. Did they actually comply w/ the license?
It's obvious you belong in charge of the bulk granola at the Co-op and not anywhere near a marketing organization. Let's get real here.
Economies of scale do not work when there has to be somebody integrating 10,000 different possible combinations. Preinstall versions of software don't get picked off racks by little elves and installed on each hard drive on an as-needed basis. Pre-installs are built on one drive, which is then duplicated 10,000 times on drives before they are put into machines.
...As soon as I saw the favorable comparison of Mac to Windows in the above comment, I instinctivly *knew* that some very bright slashdotter out there would correct the supposed error.
:) It only takes about 10 seconds to reboot anyway.. No biggy.
Keep up the good work.
-ad
BTW, I don't even mind anymore when my Mac crashes.
I guess the topic says it all.
I don't know about you, but as evil as MS is. Breaking them apart (shuuld the DOJ win its case) is going to hurt consumers more than if the gov't just let MS be. If they must "do something" (whatever that means), then REGULATE Microsoft, like most public utilities (excepting telco and cable comapnies, which are not currently regulated).
>like MacOS, Linux, *BSD, OS/2, etc. Every one of >them is arguably superior on the technical front
> to Windows today.
Don't get me wrong, I love my MacOS, but I don't find it technologically superior to Windows NT. In fact, it's not better (at least in stability) than Win 95/98.
Don't get me wrong, I'd use MacOS >=7.5.5 before Windoze 95/98 any day because its easier to use and I know how to deal with it when it gets moody (and it doesn't have a registry or DLLs to get screwed up...just freakin' extensions).
My point is, 7.5.5 = MacOS
1. No (or very little) memory protection. I love when I see my pixels scrambled on my screen (because screen RAM on my machine is normal memory). I also love when my mouse pointer freezes and I have to press option+cmd+power.
2. You can't print and do anything at the same time. Even with the print queue on.
3. No command line (even though you don't need one).
4. Using ResEdit to change file types.
etc.
MacOS is faster and still is the easiest OS to use and troubleshoot. Windoze is impossible to troubleshoot, even for an experienced user (even for me as a programmer) usually because of it's so very useful error messages. Of course, I'm trying to port all of my documents to Linux/AfterStep, later KDE or Gnome (no comments please, I'll judge for myself) from my Mac...Just too busy with other stuff (gota hate that).
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon? :P)
(If you can't figure out how to E-Mail me, Don't.
I think Gene Amdahl coined the phrase "FUD" (for Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) to describe the way IBM mainframe salespeople tended to operate, steering customers away from younger upstart companies with arguably superior products (like Amdahl) by using questionable statements which tweaked at underlying user concerns ("Sure Amdahl makes faster machines, but will Amdahl be around as a company tomorrow?")
Also, if I recall correctly, it took action on the part of the US government to induce IBM to behave, and IBM was forced to operate under a series of consent decress starting as early as 1956, which severely limited their ability to preannounce products or tie some combinations of product together, and which had a profound impact on IBM's corporate culture.
Kind of ironic, actually. Microsoft Corporation's very existence might well be largely due to the government's action against one of their predecessors. Had IBM total freedom to do what they wanted, they might've had more incentive to create and bundle their own OS with the first IBM personal computers...
--
-Rich (OS/2, Linux, Mac, NT, Solaris, FreeBSD, BeOS, and OS2200 user in Bloomington MN)
Mainframe/UNIX Bit Twiddler and long time Windows/Linux Hobbyist.
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.
People always hide behind this like it is a truth.
It's a theory.
Ah, the worlds greatest zealotry areas:
GUI systems
Computer OS's
Politics
Economics
and Religon itself
Most people hate it when religous folks force their perspective on others. I hate it equally when people force their economic beliefs on me.
It dosen't always work that way.
As long as you are throwing out capitalism buzz words, I'll spit out "MONOPOLY".
Thank you, and good night.
If the Feds get into the position of regulating MS they will in effect become complicit in MS' various oligopolistic business alliances and monopolies. Bad mistakes --even the honest ones!-- that let MS gain unfair control here or there will be officially whitewashed and covered-up. And, like any large corporation, MS will have a huge, almost veto-like power over who 'regulates' them (remember how they removed Judge Jackson's special counsel-for-technology ?) Meanwhile, like the sea eating away the chalk cliffs of Dover, or a swarm of insatiable locusts on a mulberry bush, the MS litigi-horde (codenamed: ActivePhuX.2000) will be incessantly whining and sniveling in the courts and Senate committee-rooms about the big bad government regulators (whose most cherished ambition will actually be just to become lobbyists for MS in a few years.) In the course of time, you see the erosion of the regulatory agency's power, and simultaneously the erosion of political support for its existence: thus when/as the agency approaches the status of a completely hollow, impotent shell, it's very subversion and ineffectualness becomes an excuse used by those who corrupted and weakened it to get rid of it altogether. By then the constant, concerted drumbeat of criticism in the pre$$ insures that ordinary citizens have long since stopped caring about this issue when the final knife is stuck in. Corporations are legal persons, but unlike real people, they never, ever give up; and they have this shit down to an exact science.
I for one do not want to spend the rest of my life listening to such shite -- break them up or do nothing!
At least if we do nothing this go 'round we will have the option of pouncing on even more egregious criminal acts from Gates & co. in the future and then doing what needs to be done. Regulate them and watch them 'capture' the process in about 5 minutes. Then they will bend it to their will, and have the rhetorical cover of being "reglated" to hide behind.
The Justice Dept. probably does have an idea what outcome they'd like to see; they're just not letting us know what it is. And they won't get everything they want, even if the judge does agree with their main assertions.
Now what I'd like to see is to have MS broken up into 3 pieces, each with identical rights to their existing software. As with antitrust breakups generally, any large owner would have to dispose of ownership of all but one of the pieces within a certain time (you'll have to sell 2 of your children, Bill, but you'll have plenty of dollar Bills to wipe away the tears).
The outcome will get rid of the monopoly, and with three owners of the software, we'd actually see some innovation as well as competition in the marketplace. Three threads of OS (and app) extensions would be fewer than in the xnix arena, and the common base (Win as existing at the breakup) would be the target for development.
Yes, your work has scripts to install things, but you also probably have a standard set of software packages, a standard set of hardware, and techinicians to fix anything if it breaks.
The complexity of managing and QAing a bunch of Windows auto-installation scripts for 50 software packages on 10 hardware plaftform is mind boggling. (Oops, Netscape 4.61 just came out - better go back and retest everything!) Unless you think "DLL Hell" is a good "out-of-box experience".
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
Why should volume discounts on software be illegal? I am having a hard time following your logic as to why it's a ridiculous notion. You're coming off as being rather absurb.
When companies like Dell offer a bundled OS with sale of a computer they also become the support organization for that copy of the OS. Unless they suddenly decide they want the headache of supporting a whole bunch of new software they know little about, it isn't economically feasible for them to distribute it.
You wouldn't happen to be saying the government should force them to sell alternative OSes with their equipment would you? In that case your reasoning makes more sense, and is far easier to refute.
I am sick and tired of self appointed anti-trust afficianado's proclaiming that MS is - beyond any doubt - a monopolist. It is laughable that anyone would argue the position that XX% market share is proof positive of a monopoly. Market share in and of itself does not a monopoly make. Large market share is only a symptom of a monopoly. Large market share is also a symptom of a highly successful company. Basic economic theory tells us that a company could have 100% market share and still not be a monopoly.
A. Nguyen: Check your facts at the door before you post such a silly argument. Coca-cola bottling company is the leading distributor of soft drinks world wide. Last I heard, they owned 92% of the world wide soft drink market. They have exclusive cross promotional contracts with fast food restaraunt chains to thank for their dominant market share. Does this make them a monopolist? Nope. Does this mean that they are not a monopolist? Nope. Why doesn't this make them a monopolist? Because the only thing we have discussed so far is market share. There are many more factors to consider before we can classify Coke as a monopolist.
I also take issue with your characterization that 90% of the entire PC consumer market had no choice other than MS OS's. That is total bunk and you ought to know that by now. I can't tell you the number of posts I see from readers of this media outlet who don't use Windows and do use MAC, Unix, Linux, OS/2, etc, etc. ad nauseum. Somehow, someway, these folks were able to CHOOSE an OS different from one written by MS.
As for what IBM is doing I just have 2 words: PU-LEASE! IBM proving MS is a monopoly? Give me a break! You have got to be kidding? I don't suppose IBM or any of its executives have anything at all to gain from stretching the truth or coloring it at all in regards to this case? IBM has an old score to settle with MS and would just as soon throw MS to the wolves to suit its own purposes. Any testimony given by any IBM exec in this case should be highly scrutinized and definitely taken with a grain of salt.
When I read the statement in this article about how IBM gave MS its opportunity years ago, I just about fell right out of my chair laughing so hard. "Gave?" Yeah, right. IBM didn't even think the PC would be a sellable item. MS whooped up on the biggest kid on the block and didn't take any prisoners. When the dust settled and MS went away with all the marbles, Big Blue still didn't know what hit them. Casting IBM in such a benevolent light is nothing short of revisionist history.
Get your facts straight, learn the terminology, understand basic economic principles, and get over yourself.
That IBM couldn't even package their own operating system, OS/2, with their own computers. I recall a little issue that came up during the Windows Refund protests, that customers couldn't get OS/2 bundled with computers even after persistenly requesting it.
As I recall, IBM didn't contract MS to write OS/2: it was supposed to be a joint development project. However, IBM marketed their extended edition (EE) version which had the database and comm built in, whereas MS marketed the SE version, so you could choose your own database and comm apps. Thus it would be fair to say the the IBM version was a lot more proprietary than the MS version.
They start talking about how popular this bread store is, but why? It's just another franchise right? Well (GET THIS) "it's different because it's open. Those who know marketing share with those who know more about bread machines. If one store needs advertising tips, maybe they trade with another who's figured out a more efficient stocking system..." (a paraphrase, but that was the gist). They were talking about Open Source enterprise!!! Microsoft! I wanted to vomit. You know when someone does something so unbelievably arrogant that it makes you physically ill? This was it.
So after neatly summarizing all the benefits of an open system (whether it's bread or software), they continue to be the world's greatest paragon of obfuscation, monopoly, and proprietary secrets. Can they really be that stupid? Time will tell...
----------------------
There is no K5 cabal.
I am not the real rusty.
IBM is NOT Obi-Wan. Memories are extremely short in the '90's, it seems. IBM's monopolistic role in the past is well documented, and in many cases IBM was MUCH WORSE than Microsoft.
IBM is the Great Enemy Morgoth. Microsoft is just a little Sauron, lurking in the shadows and learning from the master. When Morgoth/IBM was banished, Sauron/Microsoft decided to carry on the master's work. Microsoft/Sauron isn't as powerful as IBM, but they sure as hell learned from the master.
Nah, Richard Stallman is the only one annoying enough to be Jar Jar.
Thanks, it's fixed:
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
An operating system is not a public utility - maybe twenty years this was closer to the truth, but certainly not today. Utilities are regulated because they have high capital costs (physical infrastructure, like laying phone lines) when they are created. It's difficult for more than one utility to make money serving a particular market, because of these startup costs. Since this makes them de facto monopolies, they are regulated by the government.
Software is different. There is a capital cost to create it, but the current means of distribution (the Internet, computer stores, etc.) are widely available, so software companies can try to get into any market they feel like. There is no need to regulate a free market for software unless some companies break the law.
This is what the government is alleging in its lawsuit. A computer operating system isn't a natural, unavoidable monopoly like the phone company. Microsoft constructed their artificial monopoly by a number of unethical and possibly illegal marketing, sales, and distribution agreements, many of which are only now coming to light. It may be a temporary inconvenience for the public to have to deal with three or four "Baby Bills", but that is a small price to pay to encourage fair business practices and discourage monopoly-building in the software industry.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
than anything ever dreamed of in Redmond. What's funny is that since the Chernobyl Virus, I've been installing Warp systems all over...60+ in the past 4 weeks. People feel it's more stable, faster and just plain classier feeling than NT. Also, they don't have to spend an arm and a leg for hardware to run it. At one company, all the machines were Pentium 100s, 32Mb RAM, 1.7Gb HD and 4X Creative cdrom drives. The installs were quick and easy. They're thrilled. HAHAHA! Who says virii are destructive?
Bill Gates is a sick, demented, power-hungry person, IMHO.
Excuse me? He's a businessman. And regardless of the morality or legality of some of the things he has done, he is running a business. He is being prosecuted under antitrust, a body of law that is so vague that he has no way of knowing what is and is not a crime. Given that, it is not at all suprising that he often makes statements that border on lying. When he is asked to prove that he has not engaged in "anticompetitive practices," what is he supposed to say? That's his JOB--to outcompete the other companies in his field. So obviously he is engaging in "anticompetitive" practices. That's how you succeed, by doing better than your competition.
Now he may have done some specifically illegal or unethical things, and I am all for prosecuting him on those. But such laws need to specific--it needs to be clear ahead of time what is and is not illegal. With antitrust, the rules change every few years, and then companies are forced to prove that they did not engage in practices that were perfectly legal at the time.
So DESPITE your writing EVERY sixth word in capital LETTERS, I am not scared of Bill Gates. I use a Mac at home, Linux for work, and I pretty much never touch a M$ product. Microsoft is not holding anyone hostage. The fact that people are unwilling or unable to switch to another OS is not Bill Gates' doing. People have choices, they simply have not taken advantage of them.
Linus: He told me you killed him.
Bill: No, I am your father.
Linus: Nooooooooo!!!!
This whole issue is just a repeat of what has happened in many other industries.
:-)
IBM had a hold on the marketplace, and was broken up, with heavy restrictions on their competitiveness. It's only been in the past few years that those restrictions have been lifted. The breakup, for a while killed IBM; but IBM came out stronger than before.
Same deal with AT&T and the 'baby-bell' breakup. Most of the BB's started into new products (often at the expense of consumer-level services, but that's a point for another discussion).
Competition breeds Innovation : just look at how sad the utilities market has been : we used to have Norton Utilites, PC Tools, Mace, some other one that started with a 'B'. Symantec bought up most of them, and now we have the new bloated version.
I read about a proposal to break up Microsoft into O/S Division, Application Division, Consulting/Networks Division (can't remember where). IMHO it would force MS to develop better products because the Applications + Consulting/Networking wouldn't be able to keep paying for the development of O/S's any more.
Hey, if we get really lucky, some exec in the app division will decide to make MSOffice for Linux
IIRC, the fingerprint for NT 5 (Oops, Win2k) looks suspiciously similar to that of FreeBSD. Could be a coincidence (certainly wouldn't win a court case without a bit of disassembly/review), but worth looking at.
Recent queso documentation discusses this.
This is not quite accurate. I have not used Microsoft for at least 7 (seven) years. Never, ever, did to use MS Word. Many thanks then to RMS, and to Linus, and to Cox. They, however, are not the important people, my thanks belong to those who rightfully deserve them more. My gratitude belongs to the faceless developers, to the ones who send bug reports, and to the ones who give advise in the newsgroups. That means all of your. No Microsoft for me ever again. When I negotiate for a new research assignment, that is what I do for a living, my colleagues know better not to say it, and yet, they say it anyway: "We had solaris before, we use NT now", my answer is simple and well rehearsed:"It is no fun working here then, I think you are talking to the wrong guy." And I leave. Now I must to spend one extra week looking for a job. I have come to the conclusion long ago that it could not be otherwise.
That's a very interesting idea. Designate computing an essential service and regulate it just as you would a public utility. Tele-communications and computing are essential to business. Perhaps software, hardware and tele-communication companies wield too much power and there should be more safeguards in place to ensure that they do not abuse it.
Something to think about.
#include "mysig.h"
Don't forget that OS/2 pretty much bombed out of the corporate market in the 1990-2 period. By 1994 and the "Warp" timeframe, it was pretty much over but the shouting.
(The flame wars years later on comp.os.os2.advocacy, "Team OS/2", MS employees posting FUD. etc.)
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
I always knew that MS would eventually get called out over their schenanegans over OS/2. The DOJ has hardly touched the tip of the ice berg. MS did a lot of stuff that conviently hurt OS/2 even if you couldn't quite prove that was the intent. Stuff like the changes to a few DLL's in Win 3.11 which just happened to break Windows in OS/2 for Windows. Or the Win 32 API of the week club. Or VxD's. They seemed to go out of their way to make sure stuff wouldn't run on OS/2. They certainly did a good job of it.
Today's English Lesson: Oxymorons
Sanity.html - Error 404 not found
Whenever I got into an OEM to purchase a new system, I would like a select list on that page. Order by alpha.
Operating System
BeOS
Linux
Microsoft Windows
OS/2
Productivity
Corel Wordperfect (linux,windows)
Gobe Productive (beos)
Word (windows)
None
Browser
Internet Explorere (win)
Netscape 5.0 (win,beos,os/2,linux)
Opera 3.x (win,beos)
The consumer is king!!!
..than if you just say "give me a compaq xxxx". And what vendor wants to have to provide support for the 6.02e23 possible combinations of HW and SW that the consumer may pick? Assumed popular systems packages are chosen and then tested to make sure everything works together. With a-la-carte, you can't do this, or don't have 10x the staff to back up your product. And lots of companies won't but products without 24hr tech support. So a-la-carte vendors will sell less. Get it?
Posted by Phantom of the Operating Syste:
There are lots of sick, power-hungry people in the world. What separates Bill from the rest is more that he has vision, and is intelligent enough to carry it out.
His vision was to have the microsoft name everywhere. He had a stubborness that only his technology was good..a thumbing of the nose at everyone else's..and especially the technical community which rejected him.
He targeted the people who wrote the checks in companies..the people who made the purchases. Other companies targeted the nerds, but old Bill knew to talk to the PHBs.
What drives him is an unholy mix of love of money and a desire for the common people to love and worship him. I wonder if he despises technical people who don't grasp and worship his technical vision.
-phantom
Now you're getting shrill.
One person's garbage is another person's treasure. There are even people in the world who use their computer, instead of poking around being awestruck by what's inside it.
Rumor has it there are millions of people out there doing productive billable work using Microsoft products. Maybe someday poke your head out the door and notice them.
A mind is a terrible thing to waste by seething in hatred at something you don't understand and you can't change.
...needs to be present in *every* category.
--
Xenu loves you!
*begin quote*
Recall that OS/2 was originally developed as an attempt by IBM to take the system proprietary again. They were facing severe profit pressures from all those clone makers that MS was selling DOS to. So they contracted MS to write OS/2 for IBM and IBM alone, hoping to leverage their still-dominant brand name to allow higher profits. It's hard to imagine now, but in the context of 1990, DOS and Windows were relatively "open" systems, at least in the sense that they could run on generic hardware.
*end quote*
Interesting theory, but my Tandy OEM copy of OS/2 1.1 (1.0? don't remember) kinda blows it right out of the water. So does history. But hey...
I think there's a story like this (probably more than one) in almost every culture out there. It's fitting that Geek culture has it's very own ;)
-- The unsig...
As it stands today, yes you are correct. However, Microsoft has not always been as powerful and influencial (sp?) as it is now. Even in todays world, why do you have to buy MS products? I get by quite nicely with Linux and GNU licensed base software (games are the exception).
But, wouldn't it suck for the average joe-user if Microsoft got busted up? Think about it. Right now, joe-user can walk into the software section, pick out a game, and feel pretty confident that it will run on his system (excluding of course, CPU horsepower, etc). On the binary level, it will execute. Of course, joe-user doesn't even think about this, which is exactly my point. If Microsoft was forced to share the IBM PC OS market, then there will undoubtly be a whole slew of new OS's, each using a different binary executable format. Now, instead of worrying if your Riva TNT will handle the next gen of first-person shooters, you'll also have to hunt around to find the game packaged for the OS you are running on.
Yes, I believe Microsoft blows chunks. But hey, let joe-user have fun on his Windows machine. Let Bill Gates make billions. Let Microsoft run wild. I'm pretty sure the open source niche wouldn't be bothered in the least bit...
The Linux community still has a long way to go.
Wasn't that Spock's father?
...was Spok's father.
wow, that's off-topic.
"onward!" cried the copper man, little knowing brass corrupts...
First of all, as a former OS/2 user, I can tell you that OS/2 was (and still is) a remarkably stable and well-engineered product when compared to Microsoft's Windows family. Yes, it has a few weaknesses (and some SERIOUS ones, IMHO), like the Single Input Queue, and the ugly little kludge they ended up implementing in the end to fix it... I agree with anyone who says that Windows 9x/NT's multiple asynchronous message queue is better. But I still found OS/2 to be much more stable and efficient than Windows. I later switched to Windows NT when I saw the writing on the wall that OS/2 was dead (mostly due to a lack of native OS/2 applications). I was figuring that since NT was originally based on the work done on OS/2 at the time, it would be most like OS/2 with regards to stability, etc. But unlike OS/2, I was disappointed to see that NT still crashed more often on me than OS/2 did... And NT took about 3 times longer to boot up than OS/2.
Granted, as a 100% pure Linux user now (I don't even do the dual-boot thing), I think even OS/2 is bloated, inefficient, and buggy compared to other alternatives, but leaving all other technical comparisons aside, let me say that this MS antitrust trial is **NOT** mainly about technical superiorities of one OS battling another one for market dominance. The point I am trying to make here is that yes, there are LOTS of alternatives to Windows, like MacOS, Linux, *BSD, OS/2, etc. Every one of them is arguably superior on the technical front to Windows today. But face it, had Microsoft been competing solely on the basis of the technical merits of their software in the marketplace, they would have been killed LONG ago. I can think of NOTHING more bloated, buggy, unstable, and inefficient that MS products.
It is the ANTI-COMPETITIVE tactics of MS that have resulted in their market share, and the scariest part is that there is evidence that they will now do ANYTHING to maintain their monopoly... Just consider how they DELIBERATELY tried to undermine and fracture the Java platform for example, all because they did not like the idea of "write once, run anywhere..." They saw it as a threat because it might open the door to make other OS's viable if they have software that would run anywhere. THAT is the key to their stranglehold on the OS market: Windows has about 70% or more of the software market running for it, and if it lost that advantage, they would almost surely die, as everyone (okay, even if only half of everyone) flocked to other OS's to get away from the bloated vaporware of MS.
The Internet itself also constitutes a potentially major long-term platform threat to Windows, for much the same reason--it is currently possible for ANYONE, with ANY operating system to surf the web. That is why they spent MILLIONS on developing Internet Explorer, and distributed it for free, and tied it to Windows, and then proclaimed that it would damage Windows if it were removed (which as 98Lite demonstrates, is nothing more than a complete, straight-out LIE). Their ultimate goal is slowly to commoditize the infrastructure, and make the Internet proprietary, so you MUST use Windows to use it. Look at the Halloween Documents if you need proof. Remember this, people.
And also remember, Bill Gates is a sick, demented, power-hungry person, IMHO. I am not saying he is dumb; I think he is one of the SMARTEST people in the world. I seriously admire his knowledge and knack for making intelligent business decisions, too. But face it, when he says things like "I must admit, I find it hard to concentrate lots of resources on trials and things, when the Internet is eroding our power everyday" (quoted from ZDNet, thank you), I think this is a sign of a man who cares only about hanging on to POWER. That is NOT healthy, IMHO.
Please remember this folks. I do not want to be held captive by a company that is willing to LIE to the public, and CHEAT just to maintain a monopoly as Microsoft is doing. That is why I think there is even more serious evil to be seen if this trial does not do something to neutralize the threat. That is why I am an avid Anti-Microsoft advocate, and that is why I think it is necessary to speak up loudly like this for ACTION.
And remember, GO MOZILLA!! It is our single most promising hope of re-gaining the momentum of W3C STANDARDS-compliance.
I'm sorry, but the harm to consumers is entirely speculative. Do you understand the Fear part of FUD? Microsoft pricing is predatory, the constomer always gets the short end of the stick when dealing with Micros~1. How could we be worse off?
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
Maybe, IBM and Microsoft deserve each other. Neither is exactly a saint here.
Recall that OS/2 was originally developed as an attempt by IBM to take the system proprietary again. They were facing severe profit pressures from all those clone makers that MS was selling DOS to. So they contracted MS to write OS/2 for IBM and IBM alone, hoping to leverage their still-dominant brand name to allow higher profits. It's hard to imagine now, but in the context of 1990, DOS and Windows were relatively "open" systems, at least in the sense that they could run on generic hardware.
Today, of course, MS is threatened by a system that has taken openness to the next level.
Ever heard of voting with your feet? Why hand over control of an OS from one monopolistic power to another? There are other Systems you can use which offer more to their users.
"I have a cunning plan..."
Sorry to disturb you with a question that is offtopic but I'm not American and know only the 1st amendment. What is the nine amendment talking about and have you a link where I can refer for more information about the US constitution if i need it later??
Thanks
open-source is the chosen one, eh?
sounds fine to me.
+&x
I'm sorry. I find your argument somewhat shallow and obtuse. Saying that Bill Gates is a businessman hardly excuses him for violating federal anti-trust laws, no matter how vague you might think they are. I'll leave it to those more knowledgable of the law to argue the issue. Here's a couple of links which put Microsoft's actions in perspective of the law.
May I give you one rhetorical question to ponder?
If Windows were really the most technically advanced and innovative operating system on the planet, would Microsoft be in court against the DOJ at this time? Somehow, I doubt it.
It's the fact that monopolies stifle innovation as well as competition which has brought these issues to the forefront. This is why Microsoft has to resort to proprietorization of protocols--what Bill Gates calls innovation--to assure that their monopoly survives. See the oft-quoted Halloween Document for clear evidence of Microsoft intentions. See any account of the Sun/Java Case for an example where Microsoft exercised these proprietorization techniques.
I find the DOJ evidence against Microsoft compelling. Even Microsoft's own defense was a great embarassment. Don't take my word for it. Look for yourself. There are sufficient sites on the Web covering the trial. Check out CNN, ZDNet, Business Week, InfoWorld, etc.
Bork 'em, Danno.
Arne W. Flones Long Ship Software
Pay no mind to the chaos you are seeing. It is merely the shifting of paradigms.
Nice long rant. You managed to tell us all that that market share does not a monopoly make. You also conveniently avoided telling us what you think does make a monopoly. So if you really are smarter than all of us nuckle draggers, prove it....
While in hindsight it was over, OS/2 *did* gain significant marketshare from 1994-95 with the release of Warp - and people did somehow think that it would trouce Windows 95.
:)
Warp v3 really put OS/2 back in the limelight, but only for a short period. (Remember the Nuns commercial?
Of course, it was a silly thought, but it was hope, nevertheless.
-Stu