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Technology Stocks : How high will Microsoft fly? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Paul Fiondella who wrote (4870)	1/30/1998 5:04:00 PM
From: Alan Buckley	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74651

[Little changed in the American auto industry until the overvalued dollar made it possible for inexpensive foreign autos with radically different designs to take hold in the American market.] I can certainly agree that a foreign company could easily be the one to write the OS to replace a crippled MSFT's. [It took decades to get air bags and other safety items, and fuel efficiency with performance into the mass market.] And now that they've discovered airbags aren't so hot in some situations the goverment has decided to write some people a note so they can turn theirs off. How wonderful. I'd prefer the government publish their data on airbags and let me the consumer decide if I want to buy one (and in this case I probably would). [The other tendency of monopolies is to take more money out of your pocket for less and less.] I agree, but that's not happening, is it? Prices DROP in every market MSFT enters.

To: Paul Fiondella who wrote (4870)	1/30/1998 5:05:00 PM
From: Gerald Walls	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 74651

The market will not displace MSFT Unchecked monopolies put everyone else out of business. By virtue of their monopoly (pricing power) they eliminate competition. Its happening right before your eyes with NSCP. IBM had an unchecked monopoly on the IBM PC-class computer. Using the automobile industry of the late 50's (and even there three companies had market share not one) INNOVATION gets sacrificed in a monopoly situation to STYLE. And obviously they put all their competition (like BMW, Mercedes, Datsun, Honda, etc) out of business. Not. Notice that when they stopped offering a product consumers wanted (in the 70's, not the 50's) consumers went elsewhere and Chrysler almost failed. BTW, the auto industry was an oligopoly. The other tendency of monopolies is to take more money out of your pocket for less and less. You should know all of this of course if you ever took a course in economics and studied trust busting. You're perfectly free to refuse to pay Microsoft's price and instead use Linux or FreeBSD. Or buy an Apple and get your OS from the same people that make the machine. Do you think you have the right to a Intel PC and Windows 95 or do you have the right to buy it if you think it's worth the price being asked? Why do you hate MSFT so badly?

To: Paul Fiondella who wrote (4870)	1/30/1998 7:52:00 PM
From: K. M. Strickler	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 74651

Good analysis! The difference that I see is that somewhere down the road, I won't need the next generation of software, since I won't be using any of the 'new and improved' whatsits, and I will just continue to use the old computer! It may become 'obsolete', but old cars last a long time! While the auto mfgs got together to decide what we would buy, at least in the computer, if you want to take the time and effort, you can do software development yourself. Pretty tough to 'cast' and engine block, but not impossible. Thoughts? Ken