The Microsoft minions are launching a full scale assault against the software industry in defense of their monopoly:
exchange2000.com
With "Who is John Galt" from the Ayn Rand classic, Atlas Shrugged as a rallying cry, they are telling the Attorneys General who are filing suit against Microsoft, as well as their congressional representatives, about how Microsoft, which according to them, stands for free enterprise and free society, is indispensible to the healthy US economy, vigorous competition, the consumer's well being, etc, etc. Those of you who feel otherwise are encouraged to spread this post to other threads and follow the above link to the email addresses of the AGs and mail your own representatives to present the non-Microsoft position.
Here's my response:
Who is John Galt, my foot! Ayn Rand would puke over the license some of Microsoft's supporters are taking with her work.
John Galt built something from scratch and without peer. He was not out to squelch anybody else's progress. Microsoft has borrowed (and that is being polite) the pieces of its empire and pieced them together effectively. They deserve credit for flawless execution and taking advantage of their competitors' miscues. But to imply that
Microsoft is an indispensible innovator is a huge stretch.
A fair take on Microsoft the "innovator" comes from Sybase's Mitch Kertzman:
crn.com
If you look at Microsoft's successes over the years they have been rarely done by innovation. They bought DOS, they copied effectively a lot of what was in the Macintosh into Windows. In fact Windows has gotten to look a lot more like that in 95 and 98.Windows NT is basically being built by the guy that built the VAX/VMS operating system. It is an Intel-based implementation of VMS. So where is the innovation? The innovation is the talking paper clip in Microsoft Office. Is that real innovation?
Kertzman didn't mention SQL Server's Sybase heritage and now with SQL Server 7, its IBM DB2 roots. And their programming tools' Borland lineage!! The only difference between Microsoft and Computer Associates is that CA buys entire companies, whereas Microsoft buys their competitors' bestpeople or it "borrows" their best ideas.
Microsoft is not an innovator, not a technology company. Microsoft is a monopoly defense and expansion organization that is putting a drag on the progress of computer technology by seeking out and destroying incentive to develop anything that remotely threatens the preservation and expansion of their monopoly.
Out of one side of their mouths Microsoft's supporters say that it's ok for Microsoft to give away IE and stuff it down everyone's throats, yet from the other side, they vigorously defend Microsoft's practice of trying to illegally subvert free, open and arguably superior competitive technologies such as Linux, Java, and CORBA. WHAT HYPOCRISY!!!
The John Galts of the world do not work at Microsoft; in fact, Microsoft is out to destroy them.
Microsoft's supporters just don't get it!! Microsoft is out to become another government organization, only it's a worldwide government: The Worldwide Department of software, complete with a tax collection agency. You want a computer? Pay the Bill Gates tax. Want to get something over the internet? Pay the Bill Gates tax.
A breakup of this insidious company is something that must be explored.
The OS unit would be forced to compete on a more equal footing with other OS's such as Linux, Rhapsody, Netware, etc., which are much better suited for many tasks than NT can ever be.
The Apps Unit would find itself without the benefits it had enjoyed in the past...such as instant market share for subpar version 1.0 products, as well as a healthy supply of seed money from the OS cash cow to finance predatory practices such as dumping and personnel stealing.
Consumers and corporate decision makers would be more inclined to buy the best OS for the job as opposed to the OS they're told to buy by their computer companies, who are told to install Windows by Microsoft.
It would be a huge boost to open standards network computing, which is without a doubt the paradigm of the future. But most important, the biggest winner would be free enterprise (unlike what the Microsoft Marketing Machine is spewing) since the cost of entry would be reduced by Java's universality and deployment benefits and the likelihood of making and sustaining a profit would be greatly increased with Microsoft unable to coopt and then dump on the market any more promising technologies it wants to gain control of or take out of the picture.
Who is John Galt. CERTAINLY NOT BILL GATES!! |
