Did MSFT really do this? Did they flood our attention with Windows? I don't think so. They started out small and slowly built on DOS until Win 1.0 and 2.0 were created. Even then it wasn't very popular. MSFT had been public for 6 years before WIN 3.0 was finally a hit. How quickly we all forget, but Win 3.0 was sneered at from all corners. It took several years of gradual acceptance, from hackers, from the public, from the wild open market before it started to gather steam. The powers that be from AAPL to IBM considered Windows a toy. This isn't anything like what AOL has experienced.
It takes a slow advance to develop brand naming or "assaulting the user at every turn". AOL has a brand, but can they keep it in face of superior technologies? Does their position constrain their ability to adapt to changing preferences? The browser doesn't give them any more than what they would get anyway. If T and maybe MSFT can add juice, and if the FCC doesn't interfere, the AOL hoards would abandon them quickly and come to ATHM. I believe this is AOL's greatest concern and why they entreat the FCC.
That brings another thought to mind. AOL wants the NSCP browser because in most ATHM installations NSCP is default. Say AOL wants to invest more into the content of the net or how the content is expressed. They could leverage off ATHM's ISP function by providing the established front end of AOL through the auspices of cable broadband without getting involved with the constraints implied by the '96 Act or current FCC ruling. In this case both AOL and ATHM would benefit. I believe Jermoluk presented this concept to AOL, but Case rejected it because AOL was the big player and thought they didn't need a pipsqueek. Probably AOL wants the above and the cable broadband ISP function which they think they will get because they own the public.
It seems the public thinks MSFT is the bullying monopoly, but actually it is AOL. Wonder why all those civil servants, the whiners, the weaklings, the wimps, don't say a word about AOL. Politics, my boy, politics. Guess in the final analysis we're right about this ego thing. |
