Linux.com

I'm not worried about Microsoft fading away (or not), though I happen to agree that they probably reached the apex of their influence with the release of Windows 2000, and are on a downhill slide for both internal and external reasons. I'm more worried that the profit motive may become detached from general-purpose software, as a result of the rise of open source. Of course, users will benefit from lower costs for things which should be commodities, like operating systems and office suites. But how about cutting edge stuff. Let's say someone comes out with a great new mail client or web browser, with lots of innovative usability features. The reaction will probably be "if it's not free, everyone should ignore it except for the developers on the free projects, who should co-opt all its best features". In other words, competing against the GPL will eventually be a thankless task, similar to competing against Microsoft on the desktop today.

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