First, you make a product that really just seems to work well. In fact, it works so well that millions of people credit it with their successes and careers. So you have a core group of people who love and appreciate this product.
Then, you get a huge group of other people to attack this product. It works best if these people have never had to rely on the product, or they use another, markedly inferior one.
The first group circles the wagons, and adopts a seige mentality. Their joy in the product becomes defense of the product.
It's not such a mysterious phenomenon. Gun owners, religious groups, Doom vs. Duke Nukem, Tivo, cattle vs. sheep ranching -- you name it.
if microsoft offered to buy them im sure they would sell...
I'm sure you're correct, though Eolas' CEO would lose a lot of credibility if he flip-flopped like that.
Still, any bidding war that pits MS against its competitors for the right to make a usable web browser -- let's just say it's looking good for Eolas. And if the Eolas CEO has the courage of his convictions, it's looking bad for MS.
If Eolas wins its patent battle, its intellectual property will become the silver bullet to kill Microsoft -- for whomever buys Eolas.
IANAL (AFAIK), but whoever owns the patent will be able to issue an injunction against Microsoft. Eolas won't issue the injunction, instead it will be the mega-company that buys Eolas. AOL, Sun, Apple -- anybody who would like to stick it to MS. What would that be worth to a multi-billion dollar company in competition with Microsoft? What would that be worth to a company like AOL/Warner, who would then have the only widely distributed web browser to support plugin technology?
If you read the end of the Cringely article, you'll see that Eolas is actually making a sales pitch.
In fact, if you want to be really suspicious, you might suppose that Mike Doyle emailed Cringely so that he could get acquisition talks started. If someone bought Eolas right now, on speculation, Eolas wouldn't have to pay its legal bills all by itself... hence making the fight more winnable.
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These little guys were tool users with brains 380 cubic centimeters in size?
/all I got
Compare contrast with dolphins: 590-1880 cubic centimeters, depending on breed.
First, you make a product that really just seems to work well. In fact, it works so well that millions of people credit it with their successes and careers. So you have a core group of people who love and appreciate this product.
Then, you get a huge group of other people to attack this product. It works best if these people have never had to rely on the product, or they use another, markedly inferior one.
The first group circles the wagons, and adopts a seige mentality. Their joy in the product becomes defense of the product.
It's not such a mysterious phenomenon. Gun owners, religious groups, Doom vs. Duke Nukem, Tivo, cattle vs. sheep ranching -- you name it.
if microsoft offered to buy them im sure they would sell...
I'm sure you're correct, though Eolas' CEO would lose a lot of credibility if he flip-flopped like that.
Still, any bidding war that pits MS against its competitors for the right to make a usable web browser -- let's just say it's looking good for Eolas. And if the Eolas CEO has the courage of his convictions, it's looking bad for MS.
Well, the story is about how Eolas won't sell out to Microsoft. It was, in fact, about how they'd stick it to microsoft.
This is the opposite of what you suggest, which is that Eolas would sell out to Microsoft. You read a different story.
Regardless, what Eolas has is a bidding war between every billion-dollar company that wants to stick it to microsoft. Nice place to be.
If Eolas wins its patent battle, its intellectual property will become the silver bullet to kill Microsoft -- for whomever buys Eolas.
IANAL (AFAIK), but whoever owns the patent will be able to issue an injunction against Microsoft. Eolas won't issue the injunction, instead it will be the mega-company that buys Eolas. AOL, Sun, Apple -- anybody who would like to stick it to MS. What would that be worth to a multi-billion dollar company in competition with Microsoft? What would that be worth to a company like AOL/Warner, who would then have the only widely distributed web browser to support plugin technology?
If you read the end of the Cringely article, you'll see that Eolas is actually making a sales pitch.
In fact, if you want to be really suspicious, you might suppose that Mike Doyle emailed Cringely so that he could get acquisition talks started. If someone bought Eolas right now, on speculation, Eolas wouldn't have to pay its legal bills all by itself... hence making the fight more winnable.