'Microsofties' See Themselves as Right as Rain nytimes.com
And we all know how right rain is in Seattle. Back in January, the line was about the poor aggrieved Microsofties, demoralized that they were suddenly like tobacco pushers or something. Now, they're back to being the smartest people in the universe, in control of technology that's beyond the comprehension of mere mortals. Much less lawyers and judges. Ballmer rallying the troops to once again lead the march of progress. Now if they could just ditch all these lame analogical metaphors.
Much of the nation might have taken little notice of Ms. Reno's remark, but for the troops of technologists who breathe life into machines, it suggests a revealing explanation for the landmark antitrust suit against Microsoft -- a suit that otherwise simply did not compute here.
That presumably being "I do not at present have a close personal relationship with a computer". Some students of lame analogical warfare liked that line. Anyway, Reno isn't driving this forward, just backing up the staff.
The prevailing logic among Microsoft's employees holds that only rank ignorance could explain the Justice Department's attempt to block something so logical, so beneficial to consumers as blending an Internet browser with an operating system.
And only coincidentally, so beneficial to Microsoft, and so central to the business plan. Embrace and Demolish, and all that. I read two editorials yesterday in the Milwaukee paper, from random syndicated non-technical pundits, both with the line that Microsoft may well be guilty, or at least nasty, but who could deny the technical brilliance and inevitability of the integrated browser.
I can. Brilliant business plan, sure. But "web integration" without remote access to the "integrated" Windows machine is pretty lame. It makes sense for Microsoft to expand the "Windows hairball" to encompass the browser, but monolithic software which works in exactly one environment is not, in general, considered good software engineering. Oh, I forget, it's so modular, it's integrated! I apologize for my ignorance, I guess it's another one of these small mind things.
One final compare and contrast set of quotes, offered without comment.
John Brockman, author of "The Third Culture" (Simon & Schuster, 1995), which argues that the values and ethos of science and technology are trivialized even as the fields themselves become central to American life, says of Microsoft employees: "They're operating in a mindset that's outside the tautological knowledge structure of most of the people who run the country. Microsoft is getting all this flak for not paying attention to Washington. Why should they? Gates has created an operating system that's become the central nervous system for an entire global culture."
A former Microsoft executive put it less charitably. "They all drink the same Kool-Aid," he said of his one-time colleagues. "It's their biggest strength and their biggest weakness."
Cheers, Dan. |
