 |
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
scott wrote:
>> It's the Microsoft philosophy: Why bother designing a superior product
>> when you can just eliminate all the competing ones?
>
> All (successful) companies work the same way:
>
> A = estimated costs for developing with X man hours of resources
> B = estimated sales income after X man hours of development
>
> Choose X to maximise (B-A)
>
> It's not quite that simple, but you get the idea that after a certain
> point your profit goes *down* the bigger X is.
My point being that other companies work by making a product that is
good enough that people will want to buy it. Microsoft works by
preventing anybody else making anything better.
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
> My point being that other companies work by making a product that is good
> enough that people will want to buy it. Microsoft works by preventing
> anybody else making anything better.
LOL, have you seen the number of patents and lawsuits between Nokia and
Apple, or Ford and GM, or ... and ...? It's part of business, MS is not
unique in trying to prevent its competitors making anything better using all
means possible. You'd go out of business pretty quick if you didn't
(because your competitors are sure as hell going to use those methods on
you).
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
scott wrote:
>> My point being that other companies work by making a product that is
>> good enough that people will want to buy it. Microsoft works by
>> preventing anybody else making anything better.
>
> LOL, have you seen the number of patents and lawsuits between Nokia and
> Apple, or Ford and GM, or ... and ...? It's part of business, MS is not
> unique in trying to prevent its competitors making anything better using
> all means possible. You'd go out of business pretty quick if you didn't
> (because your competitors are sure as hell going to use those methods on
> you).
Last time I checked, people buy Nokia phones because they're better
designed than the competition. That's how it's supposed to work.
Nobody buys MS because they like it. They buy MS because there's nothing
else on offer.
Still, there's nothing that anybody can do about it, so I guess we're
just stuck with them forever now.
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
scott <sco### [at] scott com> wrote:
> > My point being that other companies work by making a product that is good
> > enough that people will want to buy it. Microsoft works by preventing
> > anybody else making anything better.
> LOL, have you seen the number of patents and lawsuits between Nokia and
> Apple, or Ford and GM, or ... and ...? It's part of business, MS is not
> unique in trying to prevent its competitors making anything better using all
> means possible.
Patent lawsuits are done to stop others from stealing your technology,
not to stop them from developing their own technology. (Of course this
doesn't mean that patent laws are never abused for this purpose.)
--
- Warp
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
On Thu, 13 May 2010 02:01:38 -0400, Warp wrote:
> One shouldn't, though, forget the marketing tactics Microsoft used,
> and
> is still using, to enforce their products on people.
Oh, no, absolutely - there are many things they did once customers got
into the cycle to lock people in (something else they've done well is to
find the right price point so people will tolerate less than perfect
software; they may not love it, but they don't hate it enough to spend
the money to switch).
Jim
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
Invisible wrote:
> Nobody buys MS because they like it. They buy MS because there's nothing
> else on offer.
Right. Because neither Apple nor Linux are significant. And we all know
there were no competing operating systems available when MS-DOS hit the scene.
The basic problem is that an OS is a natural monopoly, and it's also an
ecosystem for the software that runs on it. Nobody buys an OS for an OS's
sake. They buy it to run programs, and MS if nothing encourages programmers
to write programs for non-programmers. Apple is a hardware company, and
while they do good stuff, their economic model is more limiting due to that
control.
Linux is free. And it's still not good enough to get people to abandon
Microsoft's (or Apple's) stuff for desktop work. Even when the product runs
Linux and there are thousands of Linux servers, the companies are still
using MS and Apple on the desktop, because the Linux apps just aren't there
yet to support business users. And the Linux apps that *are* killer apps
are open, so they get ported to Apple and Microsoft anyway. :-)
In the places where Microsoft competes but haven't quite hit exactly the
right price/performance/reliability/etc ratio, there's all kinds of
competition. What are the most popular cell phones? WinCE-based phones? Name
two other popular gaming consoles that Microsoft doesn't make? Name some
free email services besides Hotmail? Some desktop conferencing besides MS's?
There's definitely a network effect going on, and Microsoft definitely
squashed a lot of competition by contracting to have their stuff on every
machine sold for a while, but it's the network effects and the availability
of the kind of business software that you and I don't really use that keeps
Microsoft rolling.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Ada - the programming language trying to avoid
you literally shooting yourself in the foot.
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
On 13/05/2010 5:57 PM, Darren New wrote:
> Right. Because neither Apple nor Linux are significant. And we all know
> there were no competing operating systems available when MS-DOS hit the
> scene.
I remember PC-DOS and had a copy of GEM that ran on DR-DOS
I am a M$ user as all the companies I work for use Windows of one sort
or another. I’m also lazy and can’t be bothered to learn something new.
(Sorry Dr John)
--
Best Regards,
Stephen
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
>> One shouldn't, though, forget the marketing tactics Microsoft used,
>> and is still using, to enforce their products on people.
>
> Oh, no, absolutely - there are many things they did once customers got
> into the cycle to lock people in (something else they've done well is to
> find the right price point so people will tolerate less than perfect
> software; they may not love it, but they don't hate it enough to spend
> the money to switch).
Last time I checked, if you want an office suite, you can buy MS Office
or...
...uh, yeah, exactly. It's not that MS Office is good enough that nobody
will pay to switch. It's that there's nothing to switch *to*. Like I
say, MS carefully arranges it so that users have no alternatives. That
way they don't have to waste money on, say, making a product that people
want to use.
(Although there is hope. Give it another 5 years or so, maybe OpenOffice
will become good...)
--
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
>> Nobody buys MS because they like it. They buy MS because there's
>> nothing else on offer.
>
> Right. Because neither Apple nor Linux are significant.
If you want to use Apple software, you must buy Apple hardware. Last
time I checked, it's very pricey and available in only a handful of
configurations, which usually can't be upgraded in any way. (Not to
mention that there's only one possible supplier.)
> And we all know
> there were no competing operating systems available when MS-DOS hit the
> scene.
No, back then there *was*. Now there isn't really.
> The basic problem is that an OS is a natural monopoly, and it's also an
> ecosystem for the software that runs on it.
Granted.
There's no *technical* reason, however, why somebody can't go out and
implement an alternative office suite. (Apart perhaps from file
compatibilty.) Yet nobody has done this. So everybody has to buy MS
Office, because no alternative exists. That's just one example of what
I'm talking about.
(Heck, I hear even Apple make you use MS Office!)
> There's definitely a network effect going on, and Microsoft definitely
> squashed a lot of competition by contracting to have their stuff on
> every machine sold for a while, but it's the network effects and the
> availability of the kind of business software that you and I don't
> really use that keeps Microsoft rolling.
Maybe. Personally think it has far more to do with MS's careful plan to
remove all alternatives from the market. But anyway, we've had this
discussion before. Nobody is going to agree with me...
--
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
On Thu, 13 May 2010 19:23:45 +0100, Orchid XP v8 wrote:
> Last time I checked, if you want an office suite, you can buy MS Office
> or...
>
> ...uh, yeah, exactly. It's not that MS Office is good enough that nobody
> will pay to switch. It's that there's nothing to switch *to*.
Corel. OpenOffice. There are options for many people.
> Like I
> say, MS carefully arranges it so that users have no alternatives. That
> way they don't have to waste money on, say, making a product that people
> want to use.
>
> (Although there is hope. Give it another 5 years or so, maybe OpenOffice
> will become good...)
I use OpenOffice every day. It's good.
Jim
Post a reply to this message
|
|
| |
| |
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
