Posted by: Anonymous Coward
on December 24, 2004 02:42 AM
The Windows and Microsoft brands have their strongest power in the mindshare they represent. Although they continuously degrade their own image, there was a time when Windows genuinely felt like a quality product. It was then that Microsoft could have adapted to fit the new paradigm of open source infrastructure, with closed source solutions sitting higher on the application stack, the corporate "icing on the cake" (i.e. IBM Websphere on top of Eclipse or Apple's Aqua on Darwin).
In today's highly networked world, which demands the utmost interoperability, the idea of a closed source operating system sounds pretty ludicrous. Microsoft could have saved themselves if they had opened the Windows kernel, and shifted their focus to<nobr> <wbr></nobr>.NET, IE, and middleware. Such a move would have depressurised their monopoly and reinvigorated the company, moving foward.
But instead, we have a company that depends most heavily on a mountain of old, patched code for the majority of its revenue. The proper balance of open and closed source is the dynamo that keeps a company alive.
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Posted by: Anonymous Coward on December 24, 2004 02:42 AMIn today's highly networked world, which demands the utmost interoperability, the idea of a closed source operating system sounds pretty ludicrous. Microsoft could have saved themselves if they had opened the Windows kernel, and shifted their focus to<nobr> <wbr></nobr>.NET, IE, and middleware. Such a move would have depressurised their monopoly and reinvigorated the company, moving foward.
But instead, we have a company that depends most heavily on a mountain of old, patched code for the majority of its revenue. The proper balance of open and closed source is the dynamo that keeps a company alive.
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