Of course, this article caught my attention. So buckle up, boys and girls! It's time to ride the Rant-Mobile!
Given that I'm not sure exactly what the point of the article is, I can't really tell if I agree with it or not. If Malone's argument is that Microsoft is doomed in the long term without a dramatic shift in strategy, I absolutely agree. In fact, I'll bet if you ask anyone inside Microsoft off the record, they'll tell you the same thing. Microsoft's OS monopoly is doomed, and everyone knows that. Right now I think they're just trying to leech the last few years of ridiculously-sized guaranteed profits on it as they try to sleaze their way into future markets (mobile computing, home entertainment, etc.).
That isn't the same thing as saying Microsoft will be dead and gone in 15 years. It might be, but I doubt it. A company that big doesn't vanish. Say what you will, but Microsoft still makes more in a day than Google makes in 3 months. IBM had a similar monopoly on hardware back in the 80s that was shattered, and yet they're still around. Note that they just sold their PC division which is what they started out doing. They've shifted to business services. They adapted. So will Microsoft. You may believe their execs are evil, but they're not stupid.
Note also that the reason Microsoft will lose their monopoly in the long term is not Linux. I'm sorry, but Linux isn't better than Windows, boys and girls. Linux is an amorphous term for a variety of distributions (Slackware, Red Hat, etc.) that share, at best, parts of the kernel (the core of the operating system). What sucks about Windows is the crap built on top of the kernel (e.g., the shell) and the way it all interacts with each other. Not only is Linux not better in terms of its shell and UI, but I'll put the NT kernel up against the Linux kernel any day. Sure, there are things the Linux kernel does better, but there are also things NT does better (among other things, last I checked, the NT kernel dealt with multiple processors a hell of a lot better than Linux does). Viruses get written for Windows because it's the most predominant operating system in the consumer market. If Linux had the same market share, it would have a lot of the same problems with security and reliability that Windows does. Linux isn't a panacea.
No, the reason Windows is going to lose its monopoly is that the world is going to change. I've been saying for a while now (and so have others before me) that the days of the omnipotent PC are numbered. It doesn't make sense to have a single box that can (and more importantly will) run anything under the sun. It doesn't need to, and you don't need it to. Think about what you actually use your computer for. I'm betting it boils down to web surfing (which amounts to remote information retrieval), email, word processing, and maybe personal finance. Maybe games. But that's about it.
There's no reason to have a computer than is capable of running all of that, and a database, and a web server, and complex scientific calculations, and PVR software, and IM, etc. etc. etc. It's dumb. It's the complexity of trying to have a single machine do all of that that makes it so insecure and unreliable, which is what people hate most of all. You're much better off having several different minimally empowered machines that perhaps have a common way to talk to one another in your home. If you limit the functionality of any given device, it becomes much more dependable and easy to design as well as maintain. How many viruses have you gotten on your Tivo lately? Or even your XBox? Similarly, did you even notice the last time your Tivo updated itself? In that respect, it doesn't make any more sense to have Linux run every arbitrary piece of software under the sun on the same box any more than it does to have Windows do so.
Personally, I think Apple is far more of a threat these days than Linux in terms of the consumer market. Apple has poised itself far better to take over the electronics of your home than either Linux or Microsoft have. And Google is in a position to dominate the software and infrastructure you use to store and access the data in your life (they have the momentum...question is whether they can keep it going and not have their growing pains kill them). Linux is just the wet dream of basement radio-disassembling nerds, as well as ungrounded and shallow idealists, that won't die. I don't know that it will or even should die, but people really need to get a grip on what about it is objectively good and what isn't.
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2 comments:
Good observation. Your argument about having multiple devices instead of a single PC is on the mark.
Its not the Linux on PC but Linux on these devices limits Microsoft's ambitions to grow beyond its PC dominance.
My TiVo runs Linux (http://www.tivo.com/linux/linux.asp).
My Linksys broadband wireless router runs Linux (http://www.linksys.com/gpl).
For device manufacturers like TiVo its a no brainer. Why pay Microsoft even $5 for a license per device for Windows CE when you can customize Linux and do it for no further licensing costs?
Take a look at this:
http://www.linuxdevices.com/
Sure, Microsoft will continue to profit from Windows on PC for some time to come. But at the end, this has become a replacement industry instead of growth industry.
Wall street knows this. And thats why you see Microsoft's stock has been languishing for the last 5 years even after starting dividend payments.
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=MSFT&t=5y&l=off&z=l&q=l&c=^GSPC,^DJI
XBOX, MSN etc. will ensure Microsoft doesn't go away. But they will never be able to replace the profits generated by Windows and Office.
Damn...I was hoping no one was going to bring that up. :) My rant was already too long so I was hoping to dodge the issue...
First of all, let me say that Windows CE is crap. It's awful. It's worse than XP, and that's saying something. It was made by the rejects...not even the main designers!...of Windows 98. Everyone I know who has tried to interact with WINCE has sworn never to do it again. At some point MS will have to bite the bullet and turn something like XP Embedded into a viable alternative. But we shouldn't even talk about WINCE as part of a long term strategy because it's like considering building an auto bridge out of pretzels.
Yes, Tivo et al run Linux. But they do so because it's the most convenient alternative at the moment. Linux really isn't a good option in an ideal world because it too has all kinds of baggage that inextricably comes with it. It was designed to be a general-purpose OS, like Windows, and as such certain design decisions were inevitably made under that assumption that will cause a special-purpose device to run inefficiently. Sure, Linux works, but it could work much better, and companies will choose the option that strikes tha appropriate balance between cost, performance, and ease of implementation. I'm not sure Linux lends itself in the long term to either of the latter two criteria.
That isn't to say that some open-source alternative couldn't wander along. What you want is a strong componentized OS that amounts to a toolkit that you can pick and choose which parts you want and can be optimized for a wide variety of operating conditions. It remains to be seen whether it makes more sense to provide and charge for that toolkit or for a consortium of companies to develop that toolkit in common and compete in what is built on top of the toolkit as has roughly happened with Linux. That's a separate issue and a separate rant. :)
All that said, you're absolutely right about MSFT financials. Something I meant to say and don't remember if I did is that MSFT's growth potential is different from its viability as a company in the long term. It will be difficult for MS to find a similar kind of monopoly in the software universe of the future as the one it currently enjoys in the consumer PC and worker productivity markets. Not impossible, but certainly difficult. Given that, it's likely it will languish as a company. But it's equally unlikely to go away entirely, even in the long term. I still maintain it will likely do as IBM has done and re-invent itself at some point.
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