"Jeroen Wenting" <jwenting at hornet dot demon dot nl> writes:
>>> 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.
What you call "clever marketing" the DOJ calls "monopolistic
practices". The courts agreed with the DOJ. Having had several large
PC manufacturers refuse to sell me a system without some form of
Windows because MS made it impossible for them to compete if they
didn't agree to do so, I agree with the courts and the DOJ.
MS didn't start chanting the "Ease of Use" Mantra into it after Apple
did - which happened long after MS had a sufficient stranglehold on
the industry to force anti-competitive contracts down the throats of
their "partners". Ease of use is something that Apple is much better
at than MS, which is why Apple is dominating the market, right?
> Prices would be far far higher than they are today
I disagree. Before Gates decided to sell BASIC, software was very
cheap. It started getting cheap again in the late 80s. Now that cheap
software is threatening MS, they're doing their best to shut down all
the sources of quality cheap software, with there usual disregard for
truth, legality, ethics or the good of either the customer or their
business partners.
> 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.
Oh, horseshit. You clearly weren't paying attention to what the rest
of the microcomputer industry was doing while Gates was selling IBM
non-existent software. While IBM was introducing 16-bit processors and
DOS was doing a flat file system, Tandy was selliig systems - for a
fraction of the price of any MS-DOS based system - that were
multitasking, multiuser, had an optional windowing system that came
with a complete (for the time) office suite. Of course, that was while
Tandy still thought they could sell computers by selling better
computers than you could get running MS software. But it was already
to late for that. MS single-handedly set the industry back 20 years.
> 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.
I see. You're a troll.
<mike
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