I’m new to this particular board so I don’t know if this thread ha already but even if it has recent events may merit it’s rebirth.
Microsoft, the corporation everyone loves to hate is in the midst of another lawsuit against them, this time in retaliation to one they started themselves. Once again, in their never ending quest to rid the computing world of any and all competition, they charged the Lindows Corporation with infringment to do a copycat name, given its similarity to their product, Windows.
That suit has already been thrown out given that, even with the similarities, Lindows is a reasonable iteration of what the product is, a linux based GUI which can run windows software. That company is now suing M$ for the invalidation of their trademark on the word Windows. Given that legal precedent is on their side (Microsoft’s trademark app was declined multiple times before finally being granted in '96 with the judge giving no reason as to the deviation from earlier decision) they stand a good chance of winning.
It seems unlikely. Microsoft is a formidable opponent–they’ve got a $40 billion cash reserve, and they’re smart enough to hire the best lawyers money can buy.
Sadly, no. M$ has waaay too much operating capital in reserves (something like two years worth) for this to be any kind of threat to them. The thing most likely to kill 'em is if someone were to manage to get the company broken up under anti-trust legislation and I don’t see that happening any time soon.
Lawsuits are not going take MS down. MS being stupid may take MS down.
MS has, IMHO, made some very stupid moves lately. MS’s new pricing scheme is really pissing people off. One analyst predicted that the new price scheme would increase small to mid buisnesses costs at least %33. I also just read an article where a CTO for a major bank is switching to Linux because he believes the new MS OS update feature and the EULA(End License User Agreement) might violate federal banking privacy laws(#1).
At the same time MS Office 11 requires an OS upgrade to XP. That requires about %60 of MS present customers to upgrade all their computers to install Office 11. All the IT people I know are very pissed about that little requirement.
And then there is the whole security issue. Despite Gates’ memo telling the company to focus on security MS software is still full of holes. MS still doesn’t know how to make secure software.
Linux is getting easier to use and the business software (Star Office and Open Office) are getting better. More IT people are looking at Linux since MS is raising prices and generally pissing people off.
Linux on the home desktop is a while off though Ximian has a pretty damned good package.
Anyway, at this point MS isn’t in trouble though they seem to be shooting themselves in the foot these days. But MS has a great record of totally screwing things up for a while and then getting a clue and fixing their problems.
Slee
#1. The problem with MS and the auto-update feature and the EULA is that the MS EULA gives MS blanket access to all the information on the computers. A new federal law prevents banks from giving out personal information. The CTO said something along the lines of “The MS EULA may give MS the right to look at our data. The federal law prohibits that. Instead of worrying about the legal issues I am going to switch to Linux.”
#2. I’d like to provide cites but all of the information I got was from ‘Info Week’, a IT trade rag that I get for free. I tossed out all the IW stuff I had yesterday. IW is pretty unbiased. Sometimes they love MS, sometimes they hate MS.
I was speaking in a very general term. For example, you have to face it, very few people like Microsoft and their products, but see themselves as stuck with them. These lawsuits, esp. the Lindows suit are bringing alternatives to the public eye and in recent years those alternatives are growing better and better and creating more of a market for themselves. Lindows especially is an excellent OS that I am in the process of migrating to and totally forsaking Windows. I guess I should have rephrased the question…it should not necessarily be will these lawsuits bring them down so much as could they start the process either directly or indirectly
I have heard otherwise quite intelligent people say MS Word or Excel or PowerPoint or Internet Explorer are great products, and they can’t imagine any way to improve them.
With thinking like that, it’s gonna be a l-o-o-ng time before anybody brings Microsoft down. Look for a change a couple years after Bill dies, if then. Seriously. There’s an often repeated phrase in NASA that a certain technology will change when the civil servants who are the experts in that technology retire. Same difference.
MS is in a bit of a weird situation: they’ve conquered the software world, they’ve taken all the “killer apps” about as far as the majority of people care about, they’ve got plenty of money to invest – and nothing to invest in. As a result, they’re continuing to fund such loser operations as what used to be WebTV – even though it hasn’t released a product after several years – and even though its major competition – which has released a product – isn’t doing terribly well. And that in a market where they have an open field.
That’s not to say there won’t be incremental improvements to Microsoft products. I just bought the new optical mouse to replace my old Intellimouse. It’s great! Lightweight, sensitive. Of course, at $25 it isn’t going to bankroll the company into 2010, either.
How does that happen and why would MS want to (or care to) look at anything on someone’s computer?
I handled some customer calls about Office and Windows XP activation and I got a lot of similar stuff, “Microsoft is looking at what’s on my computer and is reporting back to the Mother ship!”
Poppycock and hogwash.
As far as new technology, you checked out the new Tablet PC with handwriting software? It is suuuuweeet.
Well, hackers might very well want to know how to get into bank computers, and MS’s new “update” requires a security hole in the OS. I read the same story somewhere about banks considering going to something else because of the law. I’ve also read that some of the US medical industry has talked about it for the same reason: they are legally responsible for maintaining the security of patient data on their computer systems, and don’t want to be liable for a security hole that MS left in on purpose.
MS has already been stupid, it’s just going to take a while to visualize. Assuming that business users have no other choice is the big one.
~
If anyone wants some more fun reading material there’s
www.kmfms.com links from there include all kinds of fun stuff including a list of technologies they claimed to develop and the actual developers and also a list of companies they have acquired over the years.
How this happens is simple, when you agree to the MS EULA MS then has the right to ‘poll’ your computer and download updates to software. To know what updates are required MS must know what software is intsalled on the machine. As noted in the link provided by DougC the new EULA gives MS admin rights to your machine. At the same time if MS blows up your machine you have no legal recourse. You are screwed.
I totally forgot about the Windows Media Player EULA which gives MS the right to disable any software MS thinks may violate their Digital Rights Managment (DRM) scheme. cite. Maybe you think it is just fine for MS to decide what software you can run on your computer but I, and a whole lot of other people, don’t.
As far as the legal issue goes it is pretty simple. There was a new federal law passed that requires banks and other institutions to keep customer information private. (I believe that the law has not gone into effect yet). If the MS auto-update feature is going to work MS must have root access to all the machines. Therefore MS can access private data on banks servers. The customer data is not secure in this scheme.
CTO’s have a problem, either they give MS root access to buisness critcal servers and possibly break a federal law or switch to another OS.
I wish I had not trashed my issues of INFO WEEKLY because I’d like to give a cite. I checked out the site online and they are running at least a month behind in posting articles. I do know that the CTO I posted about earlier is a CTO for a major bank that has its main offices in Boston. (I knew there was a reason that cleaning my apartment was a bad idea)
MS is not going to get harmed by lawsuits. By the time lawsuits are resolved the issue behind the lawsuit is generally moot because the buisness moves so fast.
MS’s biggest problem, as far as I can tell, is that they are really pissing IT people off. I have been talking to some diehard MS IT managers and they are starting to ask me which version of Linux-Unix-OSS would be the easiest to switch to. (FreeBSD or Redhat is what I reccomend) The IT guys are annoyed with the new price scheme and the fact that MS is pushing very hard to make all these shops upgrade their computers to XP. (That costs a lot of money because about %60 of the machine cannot run XP)
I am fairly neutral about MS. My belief is that you should run whatever OS best meets the needs of your buisness. At the same time MS is going out of its way to kill it’s core buisness.