I’m sure some people reading this are going to think that I’m either completely insane or I’m just stupid, but I tell you I am not my good sir. Okay so maybe I am a little insane.
Microsoft has one main source of income, licenses; these licenses are of two kinds OEMs and corporate site licenses. With out even one of those two sources of income Microsoft will be crippled, some what. I don’t expect huge numbers of corporations and organizations to move away from windows anytime soon so Microsoft is fairly safe on that front, however, With Dell already shipping PCs with Ubuntu and all the rumors of other vendors looking into Gnu/linux Microsoft may face a problem.
All it would take is for one major vendor (Dell?) to get pissed off at Microsoft and switch completely to Gnu/Linux, BSD, etc. If just one would make the switch it could cause a domino affect with the other vendors. I don’t think this is as far fetched as it might sound; vendors have to pay Microsoft, not that much though, which cuts into how much money they make. So from a purely it makes sense for these vendors to dumb Microsoft, however, I don’t see that happening. What I think is more likely is that Microsoft will attack one of these companies for doing something that is completely within their rights, such as selling linux, and the company will respond by giving Microsoft the figure; It won’t be that simple but you get the idea.
now to be realistic…
Gnu/Linux is not ready for the mainstream; Ubuntu might be more user friendly(not really) than some of the other distros it isn’t idiot friendly. My brother, who is an IT professional tried out Ubuntu about a year ago and every time he would have a problem he would ask me what to do; normally he had simple problems that could be solved by just installing something, however, after I would tell him what to install he would ask how to install it. I could never get him to understand that he didn’t have to download the program from the projects website because he was used to the way it worked in windows.
Also Microsoft isn’t really going to die they are just going to lose market share. Though after some time they could eventually die completely or just exit the computer market.
Microsoft will not make as much money doing FOSS but they can stay alive. They can sell their product and still be Open but people won’t pay as much for it so they would have to look into offering services, much like Red Hat or Oracle does. Novell seems to be doing just fine in the FOSS market.
What Microsoft can do to save themselves
One of my friends asked me a while back what I would do if I was could take control of Microsoft, my first response was kill windows and go to Gnu/Linux! I’ve given it some more thought sense then and changed my mind. Here is a step by step list I came up with of things Microsoft should do to not get killed by FLOSS.
1. Join them. FLOSS is taking over and the best thing for Microsoft to do to ensure their market share for the future is to join the crowd.
2. Play nice with others. Microsoft needs to release the documentation for their products ( the full documentation), and get ride of their modified standards, such as Microsoft java.
3. Fix security holes! the tech community is more likely to use windows if it isn’t buggy and full of holes.
4. integrate a package manager (that isn’t windows update). This is just obvious, I think.
5. Open up all of the code. This kind of goes with #1 and #2 and #3…
If you have anything to say please leave a commit, but be nice 
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September 21, 2007 at 4:08 pm |
As you probably know my blog was originally on blogger and I moved it. There were some comments on this post so I’m going to put them here.
Anonymous 1 said
“the first vendor who will offer only linux will bankrupt”
Anonymous 2 said
“from where they will make their money if they will make windows open source? as selling it will be no longer an option”
I replied
“When writing this blog I was very careful to use the term foss ,free open source software, not floss, because it is entirely within the gnugpl to charge for software. Free as defined by the FSF (see http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html) has nothing to do with price. Though that said most companies that sell linux, excluding Novell, make most of their money from selling hardware and support, but microsoft can make money in other places than just software. If Microsoft wants to make any money in the software business there will come a day when they will have to move to free software, this is what I meant by dyeing.”
I did make a reply to the first anonymous when he posted on digg but digg is down right now so I can’t get it.
October 7, 2007 at 9:38 am |
I agree with all of the said except for one point: To open (i. e. publish) the source code.
Microsoft spent a lot of research and development on their software, why should they give away the source code?
Does any engine builder company or car manufacturer give away its blueprints? So that the competition may copy the good ideas without having to go through the costly process of research and testing? Certainly not. That would be like digging your own grave.
Why does everybody think that this should happen with software?
Who on earth brought up this ideological software-communism shit?
That’s not the way software business works. Any software company giving away their source code would have to step down to a support company.
October 12, 2007 at 8:01 pm |
I respect your opinion but I do have an argument to make for opening the source.
all the cool kids are doing it… Okay so thats not the real argument.
Microsoft needs to open their source so that their software will stop sucking. Microsoft doesn’t seem to be capable of maintaining and upgrading their own code. For example Vista, look at how long it took them to make Vista and it Still sucks. Microsoft has a legal commitment to make money for their shareholders and you may argue that the best way to make money is to continue with what they are doing. I disagree, I hate it when people only think in the short term… If you produce crap eventually people will stop buying it. The only way to ensure that they make money for their share holders is if they stay in business and if people stop buying their stuff they wont be.
To go back to the cool kids thing, Red hat, novel, and even Sun are making a pretty good business of giving away FLOSS software, On top of that, like I’ve said a few times, it is not outside of the Gnu GPL or the BSD licenses to sell software so their is no reason Microsoft cold not Continue to sell windows.
I think that this might come out sounding a little more angry and defensive than I want it to sound. If it does try not to take it that way it isn’t how I meant it.
October 13, 2007 at 2:29 pm |
World’s History at Culture Club
I couldn’t understand some parts of this article, but it sounds interesting
October 14, 2007 at 9:20 am |
what don’t you understand? Maybe I can make it clearer.
October 14, 2007 at 9:23 am |
You forgot to take GOVERNMENTS and CORPORATIONS into consideration. Microsoft has locked down the government and corporation business. It’s really the governments and corporations that are driving Microsoft’s insane revenues and profits.
Let’s take some major corporation that uses Windows as their IT backbone as an example. Bank America. Countrywide. Citibank. Whatever. Some major huge megacorp. So, I ask the IT guys from some of those companies why they don’t switch from Windows over to something cheaper, like Gnu/Linux. As an outsider, I thought that seems to be cost-effective.
Here’s what they tell me: They don’t do business with Windows or Linux. They do business with Microsoft. They want strong SUPPORT from a stable company that they know will be here in ten years, twenty years, etc. They want to be able to know that if their computer systems breaks, they will be able to call up a company (Microsoft) and get it fixed and taken care of. That’s SUPPORT. They have a strong business relationship with Microsoft. They feel safe and secured in knowing that they are well-taken care of by Microsoft. They know Microsoft will still be in business 5 years from now, 10 years from now, 20 years from now.
So, let’s take Linux as an example. There’s a bunch of small companies that make and sell Linux or other OS, and they come in different flavors. These companies often go out of business in 2 years, 5 years, 10 years, etc. So. Let say a corporation switch over to another OS (like some flavor of Linux) from a new company. (First of all, it’s a headache to switch. But let say they switch.) What if 5 years from now that company goes out of business? Who will support the OS then? The corporation will be screwed.
Corporations have to think about this sort of things when they make a business decision. And they are conservative in thinking and outlook.
As long as those corporations continue their business relationships with Microsoft, and they like to know Microsoft will be in business to continue that relationship and support with them, it will be extremely difficult if not impossible for Windows to ever go away. It’s the same case with a lot of governments.
So it’s those governments and corporations that are keeping Microsoft strong and in business.
October 14, 2007 at 12:57 pm |
“I don’t expect huge numbers of corporations and organizations to move away from windows anytime soon so Microsoft is fairly safe on that front” from above.
You make some good points but I do feel that there might be a solution to that. I will admit that there are lots of little Linux companies that go out of business all the time and I completely agree with you there. However, There are a few larger companies that sell and support Linux/Unix that I don’t expect to go out of business soon, such as: Sun, novell, Red Hat, Apple. I want to ignore those though because they don’t make as good of an example as the other one I can think of, IBM. IBM has silently supported Linux for quite some time now and recently switched the kernal in AIX to Linux (AIX 5L). IBM has been around much longer than Microsoft and is likely to stick around. I can understand not wanting to use IBM software, especially until AIX 5L is thoroughly field tested.
I’m not saying that you are in anyway worng, because it is just the opposite, but I am saying that there is potential for the same kind of support you can get from Microsoft with a non-Microsoft product.
Feel free to pick this apart, I do rather enjoy it
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October 14, 2007 at 2:36 pm |
You ARE stupid. You are wrong and stupid. This won’t happen because microsoft is an evil monopoly that won’t allow it to happen.
October 14, 2007 at 2:48 pm |
Your argument has shown me my obvious fault, I retract all of my previous statements.
October 14, 2007 at 6:29 pm |
If Microsoft gives away their source code under the GPL or some other license that allows them to continue selling it, then it must also allow OTHERS to sell it as well. Mozilla may not care if people want to sell Firefox (because they’re giving it away for free), but if people undercut Microsoft by huge amounts, and they have no way of controlling it, then their only reasonable response is to reduce their prices (eventually down to nothing), and there goes all the money they spent developing it. Then the only way they’ll make any money is if they sell service and support. Perhaps official copies of Windows would include support and updates, while non-Microsoft copies would not.
In any case, opening their source is not necessarily going to make it any better. It might be feasible for them to incorporate some open code in minor applications, if only as a test run.
February 1, 2008 at 12:16 pm |
Microsoft Windows Vista Business full
haha gotta love Windows…
September 14, 2008 at 7:10 pm |
disagree: linux doesnot have many games
agree: Microsoft is spending much money for nothing (like buy website, etc.) than researching for better OS.
January 27, 2009 at 10:12 pm |
I tend to agree…I”m an old timer and remember how fast computers used to be. I wish Microsoft would just do software and not operating systems. I have a motto – Computer science existed BEFORE Microsoft and will exist AFTER Microsoft
April 26, 2009 at 4:15 am |
Trust me! This is not going to happen in coming 100yrs.. Did you check out Win 7. If not then please check and reply me.. It is going to kill Linux!
Just waiting for its release!
April 27, 2009 at 11:00 am |
Yes, I have tried the beta of Windows 7. It is much better than vista (especially the beta of vista which was complete crap). Windows 7 might slow the flow of converts; it may even get some people to switch back, but it will not kill linux. The hardcore linux users use linux will not go back to windows because no matter how polished windows 7 is it simply does offer the power you can get from linux. Windows 7 was ok to play with and it worked for the things I do with my second computer (web surfing mostly), but I wouldn’t want to use it as a main computer because I am just more comfortable with linux and linux offers me the capability to do the things I need to do without having to go find slow gui programs that do the same thing half as well (like you do in windows). Don’t even get me started on all the drm crap build into windows either; or the fact that no matter how good it is microsoft will find a way to make it suck.
If you want to use Window 7 go for it. I won’t because it just doesn’t do what I want.