If you want to argue over what is or is not "natural," I think there's a case to be made that things like monopolists, dictators, oppression, and violence are more "natural" than free markets, democracy, cooperation, and peace. In nature, it's a brutish battle to the death for survival. It has only been through human civilization that these other ideas (free markets, democracy, etc) have come into being. I certainly prefer the artificial human construct of peace than the natural state of conflict. <...>
Says someone who has never studied nature, or even read many articles. Many/most animals and insects cooperate - some even between species - scarcity of resource leads to conflict for sure, but so many operate as packs, herds, pods and more. (There was relatively recent documented cases of humpback whales defending many other species from Orcas, even calling in reinforcements and extended standoffs, while reading about the recent ones it's mentioned that such things have been noticed for decades)
"Current management at Microsoft has mostly corrected course" - what? they have abandoned phones and most mobile devices other than 2-in-1 devices like the Surface. They have refocused on server & cloud more than anything. I guess the cloud part could be the corrected course - the rest is just defending monopolies.
The kind of cooperation you're talking about is the wrong analogy. That's members of a genetically related group working together to advance their genes. A human analogy would be tribalism.
And yes, refocusing on server & cloud, plus removing artificial barriers preventing Office from being on platforms where it can succeed, is changing course. They do not seem to be in the same mindset that led to their failure in mobile. I was not suggesting that somehow they are bringing Windows Phone back from the dead -- clearly that's too late.
If you want to argue over what is or is not "natural," I think there's a case to be made that things like monopolists, dictators, oppression, and violence are more "natural" than free markets, democracy, cooperation, and peace. In nature, it's a brutish battle to the death for survival. It has only been through human civilization that these other ideas (free markets, democracy, etc) have come into being. I certainly prefer the artificial human construct of peace than the natural state of conflict.
Nature is not so simplistic as you portray. There are many symbiotic relationships that exist in natural, evolved alliances among completely separate species, between animals and plants, the fish that dart in and out of sharks’ mouths to pick out stick bits of food that might cause decay or injury to the shark, for one example. For each cuckoo bird there is a cooperative pairing, and from all of this a naturally balanced ecosystem is formed.
It is humans and our imagined realities, our shared stories, of corporations and money and other fictional realities that now determine the fate of the natural world and the natural ecosystem. Very little of what we do, from conflict to cooperation, turns out in favor of the greater ecosystem to which we decreasingly see ourselves as a part. And that will be to the detriment of ourselves and all we share this earth with. There is no distinction as you would make it; the greater distinction is human versus natural. Period.
I agree that nature is not as simple as I portrayed in my paragraph. But I stand by the point that framing any argument as "natural" vs. "unnatural" is generally silly! Exclamation Point!
I think the results of his philanthropic facade are real, but these results are not a real indication of his intentions. The facade has changed, but what he cares about has not.
One point that I didn't see mentioned is that Android is free. When given a choice between several roughly equal OSs, one of which is free, a lot of companies will start with the free one. Windows Mobile as bad as it may have been had to be licensed for a fee. I suspect the same was true with Symbian and the others. Android was free though and all the companies had to do was agree to give user browsing data etc., to Google. Most went for it and the rest died. Windows Mobile just took longer than the rest.
Yes, ’free’ attracts those who believe in a ‘free lunch’ or who want something for ‘nuthin.’ Which just proves there a lot folks out there that make decisions (or who are lured) with that belief. But you end up getting what you pay for, like Outlook. And there are those who say ‘But, but Apple gives away their apps and OS for ‘free’?... And what does the quality of the apps say about the company?... And those same people complain about Apple’s prices on hardware (which in my experience are people who don’t own Apple products)... You get what you pay for.... Unless you are still waiting around for the ‘free lunch.’
One thing the article didn't mention, and I didn't see in any of the comments so far, is that Bill Gates's empire was built on the backs of stolen computer hardware. If the courts hadn't taken away IBM's personal computer design, or if IBM hadn't lost it (whose fault it was is an interesting question), Microsoft wouldn't have had a market for it's license of it's Disk Operating System, i.e. MSDOS/IBMDOS. IBM was just one of many, perhaps the biggest of many, computer vendors of its day. IBM, Digital Equipment Corporation, Apple, Apollo, HP, Sun, PR1ME, Sperry UNIVAC, Burroughs, PerinElmer, Radio Shack, Commodore, and countless others were playing on a field based on the idea that hardware designs and software designs were paid for and profit was made by selling the products of one's design labors. The computer technology was surging. It was great fun to watch. And then IBM's published it's schematics and interface design in a bold move to try to get 3rd parties to build add-in cards. The operating system licensing was already out there from Microsoft. Several companies, Compaq, Phoenix, and maybe others, decided that IBMs deal wasn't enough and went off to clone the one thing IBM kept close to its trademarked and protected vest, the BIOS. In furious court battles, IBM lost the exclusive on the key element of it's personal computer hardware, and the clone market was born.
In my opinion, this completely stifled computer hardware innovation for decades. Instead of a dozen companies throwing their all into out-high-teching each other in hardware design, the clone market wiped most of those companies out of the computer business entirely, wiped some of them out of business completely or rendered them so worthless that they were acquired at pennies on the dollar (or worse) and left Microsoft holding the $$. Microsoft didn't win on software innovation. It won by being the sole supplier of software for the clones. If Apple and IBM hadn't survived this debacle, Microsoft might never have brought us MSWindows.
The reason Microsoft wasn't able to compete in cellphones against Apple may be that they'd never competed on a fair playing field ever.
To think, I was planning to leave my wealth to The Gates Foundation. This recent re-imagining of the potential of what Windows might have been by Gates has caused me to recall his whole history, not just his recent history. I’ll find another beneficiary to write into my will.
May you live long and prosper.... sorry, can't resist ;-) - IMHO his foundation did wonder for good (low overhead, effective). Let me know if you get alternative (equivalent or better). thx.
Another well articulated piece of work DED! It's always great to go a trip down memory lane to get the facts straight. Back in the day Microsoft was a real bully and Google was considered the underdog in desktop search. I think Steve Jobs, in his best interest to protect the iPhone from being copied by Microsoft, got side-blinded and copied by Google instead.
Some people read articles like these and might think: the fact is Microsoft and Google won, let's just move on. Well here's the thing, Bill Gates in his "mea culpa" statement tries to establish how Google is yet another success story on how horizontal integration will always triumph over vertical integration. The common denominator between Microsoft and Google was that both CEOs:
were fortunate enough to partner with Apple and have access to Apple's innovations in potential disruptive-market products before public release,
managed to replicate key innovations with a quasi Apple experience,
and licensed their cloned software to OEMs and have them compete in producing products at a fraction of Apple's price.
When deprived from Apple's mojo, Microsoft did miserable in trying to compete in others markets where Apple succeeded:
MP3 players: they failed trying to answer Apple's iPod by licensing PlayForSure and later marketing Zune,
Smartphones: Microsoft had a head start before Apple and Google, and they still blew it.
Tablets: the iPad obliterated Microsoft's Tablet PC, Slate PC, and Surface RT efforts.
What about Google? After being deprived of Apple's mojo, where has Android been successful outside of smartphones?
Conclusion: horizontal integration does not necessarily always result in a natural win.
Comments
And yes, refocusing on server & cloud, plus removing artificial barriers preventing Office from being on platforms where it can succeed, is changing course. They do not seem to be in the same mindset that led to their failure in mobile. I was not suggesting that somehow they are bringing Windows Phone back from the dead -- clearly that's too late.
I agree that nature is not as simple as I portrayed in my paragraph. But I stand by the point that framing any argument as "natural" vs. "unnatural" is generally silly! Exclamation Point!
In my opinion, this completely stifled computer hardware innovation for decades. Instead of a dozen companies throwing their all into out-high-teching each other in hardware design, the clone market wiped most of those companies out of the computer business entirely, wiped some of them out of business completely or rendered them so worthless that they were acquired at pennies on the dollar (or worse) and left Microsoft holding the $$. Microsoft didn't win on software innovation. It won by being the sole supplier of software for the clones. If Apple and IBM hadn't survived this debacle, Microsoft might never have brought us MSWindows.
The reason Microsoft wasn't able to compete in cellphones against Apple may be that they'd never competed on a fair playing field ever.
Some people read articles like these and might think: the fact is Microsoft and Google won, let's just move on. Well here's the thing, Bill Gates in his "mea culpa" statement tries to establish how Google is yet another success story on how horizontal integration will always triumph over vertical integration. The common denominator between Microsoft and Google was that both CEOs:
When deprived from Apple's mojo, Microsoft did miserable in trying to compete in others markets where Apple succeeded:
What about Google? After being deprived of Apple's mojo, where has Android been successful outside of smartphones?
Conclusion: horizontal integration does not necessarily always result in a natural win.