Gates and the idea factory feedmag.com
Couple quotes:
The most striking thing about the whole affair turned out to be the impressive scope and subtlety of the Senators' questions, particularly Orrin Hatch's brilliant interrogation of Microsoft's policy forbidding Active Desktop channel creators from promoting Netscape. Whatever else may come out of this hearing, it will be difficult in the future for the tech world to dismiss lawmakers as a bunch of meddling rubes.
Oh, right. Somehow, I think the "beyond the comprehension of mere mortals" defense hasn't yet been put to rest. It'll live on, like the Chrysler car radio, or IE is just like disk defrag. On that last one, a couple numbers from Monday's NYT:
Disk space used, in megabytes Win95/IE3:77 Win95/IE4:134
Gates got to where he is today because the PC market "needed" a common standard, and in a dark age of flawed products or suspect business models, Windows was the leper with the most fingers. The lesson of Microsoft's rise to power is that in digital economies, the invisible hand can sometimes turn into a stranglehold. But just because the market made it happen, is that reason enough not to loosen the grip?
Of course it is. A technical lock aka monopolistic death grip is a necessity in business, you know. You could look it up.
Cheers, Dan. |
