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

To: Rusty Johnson who wrote (17070)	2/28/1999 3:48:00 PM
From: djia101362	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74651

If you were Corel and IBM (Lotus) why in the world would you NOT be thrilled about supporing and writing for Linux?? Those 2 companies are getting absolutely killed by MSFT in the applications market and really have nothing to lose by writing for Linux. For that matter, the potential Linux market for Corel and IBM may be bigger than the Windows based market. What I mean by that is MSFT has about 85% market share of the office applications market which leaves about 15% for Corel and IBM. That means for every Windows based computer that is sold, Corel and IBM have less than a 1 in 10 chance of putting their office suites on those computers. 1 in 10 because they are both fighting each other for the 15%. Now if both Corel and IBM are the only ones with office suites for Linux, they have a 1 in 2 chance of putting their respective office suites on Linux based systems. Anyone who uses Linux in most likely anti-MSFT and will therefore more than likely choose office suites from Corel or IBM. Let's not forget that techno-nerds are generally the early adopters of new technology and platforms but account for probably less than 2% of computer users. It's likely that 50% of that 2% population has already made the switch to Linux and the other 50% has no doubt already heard of Linux and is considering the switch. That doesn't leave a whole lot of potential Linux users left. Sure their will a few defectors from the 98% Windows camp over the years but the "masses" WILL NOT convert. MSFT may or may not choose to write for Linux. If they choose not to, how many people will actually be willing to go out and buy all new applications to run on Linux when they already have a whole slew of applications that run perfectly on their Windows based system? Another thing to consider is should MSFT decide to write for Linux, will they allow MSFT Office for Linux to be written as an upgrade version so that all previous owners of Windows based versions can upgrade for $199 or will that be considered an entirely different application that will cost $500? Personally I don't think MSFT should write for Linux since the whole Linux concept was started as an anti-MSFT movement. I'd also have to believe that margins will be much lower for Linux apps. Part of the whole movement to Linux is based on MSFT's monopoly pricing and therefore the switch to Linux is supposed to be a less costly alternative. Won't that be sticker shock if new Linux users come to realize that Corel Office and Lotus Office suites for Linux cost just as much Windows based office suites? If I were considering a switch to Linux, which I am not and will not, I'd expect a substantial discount in the cost of Linux apps to comparable Windows based apps. Let's look at company like Intuit for a minute, Intuit makes Quicken, the most popular (cough cough, c'mon Money) personal finance software for Windows based systems, Macs too I suppose. Why the heck would Intuit spend millions on developing a Linux version of Quicken with let's say a potential market of 2 million desktops a year v.s. the Windows population of say 25 million desktops per year of which they will get more than 50% easily. Linux will be a market that becomes saturated very quickly because of the "early adopter" population that it is targeted at. Like the DOJ, Linux is just another huge smoke screen. When the smoke clears, the 1000 pound gorilla will be standing bigger and stronger than ever.