>> >> Q: Microsoft's Operating System is used over 90% of PCs. If that's >>not monopoly, i don't know what is. > > They got where they are by CHEATING. That is why they are evil, not > because they have a large market share.
no, they got their by clever marketing and generally having a product that was easier to use for the average user than anything the competition made and a lot more powerful than other products created for their main target market. Microsoft isn't evil, they're not a monopoly either. If they were a monopoly they'd have 100% of the market and there'd be no other software manufacturers at all. Prices would be far far higher than they are today, like they were back in the days before Microsoft started competing with the likes of Ashton Tate and WordPerfect corporation by offering similar products at 20% the price (which is the real reason they got to be top dog, they delivered a working product for a fraction of the price their competition did, and the competition couldn't drop their prices that much and remain profitable). Without Microsoft 90% of us would never have seen a computer more powerful than a ZX-81 and 90% of the rest of us would never have used only dumb mainframe terminals. IBM's prediction that there would be 5 computers (not counting game computers like the Comodores and Spectrums) by 2000 would likely have come true. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
