That is not true anymore. Microsoft is in trouble and they need to realize growth.
Smart competitors threaten them to put their products on the market with different OS, what they get in return is better procurement conditions and better pricing schemes. As customers we can do the same and eliminate the components that make us dependent on their products.
Governments want open standards and the evil games Microsoft played with Open XML do not add to their interoperabilty reputation very well.
And Microsoft does not care what users need. I wonder e.g. why Vista still has no common dictionary infrastructure for applications.
I am protected. But most of my African friends have Malaria. Its normal. Two or three days per year they get a fever.
It is very basic and no rocket science to reduce the risk. The problem is that the governments are corrupt and not action-oriented and people are used to it. Sleep outdoors with no protection or with open windows. Swamps are not drained. Canalisation is not fully covered.
It is a domino effect, adapt or die. that sounds unrealistic given the market value and success but in fact the turning point is close. I am not sure Microsoft can learn quickly enough and catch up.
Have a look what elements of the Vista desktop and standard applications are not yet available for other platforms as well.
Office is e.g. a lock-in as OpenOffice is not the best competing product yet. The adobe suite is at least available for Macs. iTunes. Games. Hardware support. The remaining advantages are melting fast. All essential open source tools are also available for other platforms, web applications anyway.
Oh yes, Microsoft eee with a product that generates virtually no profit and has better competitors. A single one, Opera, even lives on selling its alternative.
That they don't open source IE is plain ideological stupidity.
The point is that the solution is very basic and does not require magic or large investment. Mosquitos would pose no great danger if not large parts of the population were infected and generally sleep without cover.
"A commercial corporation is a voluntary collective of investors who want to maximize their financial investment."
No, they can do whatever they want with their money and define the objectives the management needs to follow. You cannot make any normative statements about maximisation. They could e.g. also use their money in a complete irrational way. The problem arises when the investor is no capitalist himself e.g. not the owner of the money but arbitrage, e.g. a pensions fund. Intermediation creates the normative bubble of maximisation. But for the capitalist, the real owner, consumption and investment cannot be separated. He can choose a bundle of quantities he likes. If he does not want to invest in software but in furniture because his family was always in furniture its his free decision.
As a capital owner I can do with my capital whatever I want. No one forces me to make more money. I can pursue any objective I like.
Now, there is a public benefit function and its called taxes. Your corporation pays taxes, the government solves common problems e.g. education, infrastructure, health, military defense.
The idea that all world problems need to be solved by corporations or cross-financed by businesses is bullshit.
If you don't trust governments you can form an alliance of people or e.g. a cooperative or... etc. to pursue a certain objective, e.g. to build houses and flats. This is quite common in many of the worlds societies.
The idea is that you talk about solving problems (world poverty) as a substitute for activities but it appeals to an audience who regards you as the messiah. And it just works. This is how African politics works for the political class and Gates wants to participate in that innovative culture of political governance that is to be blamed for the rpoblems there. Talking good also helps you to overcome cognitive dissonance.
It is simple and possible e.g. to solve the Malaria problem. Dry the swamps and ensure that all small cottages protect their windows with mosquito nets. Additionally you can trap the mosquitos. All this does not require great efforts but I am sure Gates can't deliver.
Creative Capitalism is an attempt to repackage "capitialism" in a superficial American way and brand it with its magic effects against world problem X you talk about. But Americans don't even understand the basic conception of a free market. They turned the Austrian school into a religion with absolutely no clue what they were really talking about. Cold war madness. "Creative Capitalism" also attracts some corporate social responsibility lefties and brain dead US capitalism radicals. Misconceptions meet misconceptions. Blind and deaf. You feel like you want to slap them and reinvent basic social democratic principles that are shared among the whole spectrum in all those nations Gates did not attempt to understand.
It is even worse than that, the company believes that stifling interoperability is critical for their business model and you can bully foreign governments just for fun. Just have a look what they did to combat the European Interoperability Framework and open standards policies.
Microsoft under Gates acted as an extremist company. The rest of the market was smarter i.e. undogmatic, not fighting ideological battles. Microsoft was never honest about open source. All other players have real open business strategies.
Open Source and extreme programming also reflects the reclaiming of the software business by software professionals. If you fuck with developers by underdocumenting your platform, by lobbying for software patents and other wet dreams of the lawyer community, by stifling interoperability and free market developments, those affected players will conspire to fight back. A domino effect Microsoft is so afraid of.
Well, but Boing also invested into Cargolifter technology. Count Zeppelin would be surprised that his technology did not make it. Because it really looks still promising.
Slashdot Mirror
thanks for the links. Looks kool!
I was told it was based on German rfid hacker technology. Do you have a link to more background info?
So what was wrong? They gave media the stunt media wanted.
And furthermore, just because people can you don't expect them to do as a matter of professional convenience. You don't piss in our own pool.
But here people just show what can be done.
It is illegal when its without consent, that might be the problem. Time for an NDA.
Bogus-ky? Sounds crispy.
That is not true anymore. Microsoft is in trouble and they need to realize growth.
Smart competitors threaten them to put their products on the market with different OS, what they get in return is better procurement conditions and better pricing schemes. As customers we can do the same and eliminate the components that make us dependent on their products.
Governments want open standards and the evil games Microsoft played with Open XML do not add to their interoperabilty reputation very well.
And Microsoft does not care what users need. I wonder e.g. why Vista still has no common dictionary infrastructure for applications.
ACTA can be killed in no time.
I am protected. But most of my African friends have Malaria. Its normal. Two or three days per year they get a fever.
It is very basic and no rocket science to reduce the risk. The problem is that the governments are corrupt and not action-oriented and people are used to it. Sleep outdoors with no protection or with open windows. Swamps are not drained. Canalisation is not fully covered.
Pre-sales?
Read what they do fear:
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/789019/000119312508162768/d10k.htm
Right. But read their nightmare scenario to chose your favourite way to break their neck:
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/789019/000119312508162768/d10k.htm
It is a domino effect, adapt or die. that sounds unrealistic given the market value and success but in fact the turning point is close. I am not sure Microsoft can learn quickly enough and catch up.
Yes, you can, it is called the domino effect.
Have a look what elements of the Vista desktop and standard applications are not yet available for other platforms as well.
Office is e.g. a lock-in as OpenOffice is not the best competing product yet. The adobe suite is at least available for Macs. iTunes. Games. Hardware support. The remaining advantages are melting fast. All essential open source tools are also available for other platforms, web applications anyway.
http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/789019/000119312508162768/d10k.htm
Exactly, the desktop is getting obsolete.
The German government made a guide how to achieve platform neutrality. Great stuff.
The whole idea of vendor neutrality requires more mainstreaming.
Oh yes, Microsoft eee with a product that generates virtually no profit and has better competitors. A single one, Opera, even lives on selling its alternative.
That they don't open source IE is plain ideological stupidity.
The point is that the solution is very basic and does not require magic or large investment. Mosquitos would pose no great danger if not large parts of the population were infected and generally sleep without cover.
The absurdity is that if you have X billions your personal gain for getting more money decreases. gossen's law so to speak.
You have more money you ever want to spent. So maybe it makes sense to get less return but more fun and satisfaction.
"A commercial corporation is a voluntary collective of investors who want to maximize their financial investment."
No, they can do whatever they want with their money and define the objectives the management needs to follow. You cannot make any normative statements about maximisation. They could e.g. also use their money in a complete irrational way. The problem arises when the investor is no capitalist himself e.g. not the owner of the money but arbitrage, e.g. a pensions fund. Intermediation creates the normative bubble of maximisation. But for the capitalist, the real owner, consumption and investment cannot be separated. He can choose a bundle of quantities he likes. If he does not want to invest in software but in furniture because his family was always in furniture its his free decision.
As a capital owner I can do with my capital whatever I want. No one forces me to make more money. I can pursue any objective I like.
Now, there is a public benefit function and its called taxes. Your corporation pays taxes, the government solves common problems e.g. education, infrastructure, health, military defense.
The idea that all world problems need to be solved by corporations or cross-financed by businesses is bullshit.
If you don't trust governments you can form an alliance of people or e.g. a cooperative or ... etc. to pursue a certain objective, e.g. to build houses and flats. This is quite common in many of the worlds societies.
The idea is that you talk about solving problems (world poverty) as a substitute for activities but it appeals to an audience who regards you as the messiah. And it just works. This is how African politics works for the political class and Gates wants to participate in that innovative culture of political governance that is to be blamed for the rpoblems there. Talking good also helps you to overcome cognitive dissonance.
It is simple and possible e.g. to solve the Malaria problem. Dry the swamps and ensure that all small cottages protect their windows with mosquito nets. Additionally you can trap the mosquitos. All this does not require great efforts but I am sure Gates can't deliver.
Creative Capitalism is an attempt to repackage "capitialism" in a superficial American way and brand it with its magic effects against world problem X you talk about. But Americans don't even understand the basic conception of a free market. They turned the Austrian school into a religion with absolutely no clue what they were really talking about. Cold war madness. "Creative Capitalism" also attracts some corporate social responsibility lefties and brain dead US capitalism radicals. Misconceptions meet misconceptions. Blind and deaf. You feel like you want to slap them and reinvent basic social democratic principles that are shared among the whole spectrum in all those nations Gates did not attempt to understand.
It is even worse than that, the company believes that stifling interoperability is critical for their business model and you can bully foreign governments just for fun. Just have a look what they did to combat the European Interoperability Framework and open standards policies.
Microsoft under Gates acted as an extremist company. The rest of the market was smarter i.e. undogmatic, not fighting ideological battles. Microsoft was never honest about open source. All other players have real open business strategies.
Open Source and extreme programming also reflects the reclaiming of the software business by software professionals. If you fuck with developers by underdocumenting your platform, by lobbying for software patents and other wet dreams of the lawyer community, by stifling interoperability and free market developments, those affected players will conspire to fight back. A domino effect Microsoft is so afraid of.
But IBM is evil. Look what they did to Microsoft Open XML. Or how they gave punchcards to the Nazis...
Why not ReiserFS?
Why don't they just take ReiserFS?
It is cheap to buy and Hans won't start coding on it again anytime soon.
Support for Ext4. Open source IE, ODF and ogg support, better power management, virtual PC, bittorrent support,
Well, but Boing also invested into Cargolifter technology. Count Zeppelin would be surprised that his technology did not make it. Because it really looks still promising.
It will even get worse for the because the whole process triggered as a domino process pro open standards activities of governments.
How can you argue against open standards?
Microsoft does and throws money on it and leaves more fundamentalists back. Its burned soil policy makes the movement stronger and stronger.
The dominos keep falling.