Microsoft and the Commoditization of Software

Mon, 17 Feb 2003 11:03:09 -0700

 http://www.synthesist.net/writing/onleavingms.html

Interesting article by David Stutz.  He was a longtime employee of MS - The
bearded guru of development.

He is no longer an employee.

My favorite quote:

"Digging in against open source commoditization won't work - it would be
like digging in against the Internet, which Microsoft tried for a while
before getting wise. Any move towards cutting off alternatives by limiting
interoperability or integration options would be fraught with danger, since
it would enrage customers, accelerate the divergence of the open source
platform, and have other undesirable results. Despite this, Microsoft is at
risk of following this path, due to the corporate delusion that goes by
many names: "better together," "unified platform," and "integrated
software." There is false hope in Redmond that these outmoded approaches to
software integration will attract and keep international markets,
governments, academics, and most importantly, innovators, safely within the
Microsoft sphere of influence. But they won't ...."