| Lysander666 |
05-08-2019 04:42 AM |
Brian Lunduke's recent video on this is very good. His theory is that with MS using Linux, things will go the way of Android inasmuch as there will be a Linux kernel but with a lot of closed source stuff on top and everyone can just 'get on'. Linux would then become the recognised kernel for, well, nearly everyone. Having said that...
Turbocapitalist brings up some good points. We have to see the way the world is going - everything tech-related is being funnelled down to just a few companies. Google own most of the internet, Facebook is losing its mantle, Apple is the biggest company in the world, there are concerns that the PC gaming market will tank and give way to consoles in the next few years [effectively killing nVidia], and MS have their sites on Linux. Even though I think it's very difficult to extinguish Linux, it is not impossible ['extinguish', in this sense of the word, means removing the freedom that others have to copy, use and modify the kernel]. MS like to think several moves ahead. Notice that Google is now thinking generations ahead, and there's no reason why MS wouldn't do the same. I think it's perfectly possible that things will get to a point where MS find some clever way to effectively 'own' the Linux kernel which people can't currently deduce. Their monopoly is in one place and one place only - the desktop - and they have to do everything they can to keep it.
They have their sites on BSD too, so nothing will be safe. Of course, this is all speculation, but it's speculation based on many years of consistent behaviour.
Have a read of the Halloween documents, MS have been scared of Linux's power for years. Some of ESR's insights:
Quote:
Microsoft perceives a product to be a threat if it presents itself as any of these:
a revenue alternative -- somebody might spend money on a non-MS -- product
a platform alternative -- MS might lose its monopoly position
a developer alternative -- people might actually write software for a non-MS product.
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Quote:
The real battle isn't NT vs. Linux, or Microsoft vs. Red Hat/Caldera/S.u.S.E. -- it's closed-source development versus open-source. The cathedral versus the bazaar.
This applies in reverse as well, which is why bashing Microsoft qua Microsoft misses the point -- they're a symptom, not the disease itself. I wish more Linux hackers understood this.
On a practical level, this insight means we can expect Microsoft's propaganda machine to be directed against the process and culture of open source, rather than specific competitors
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Quote:
...in every release cycle Microsoft always listens to its most ignorant customers. This is the key to dumbing down each release cycle of software for further assaulting the non-PC population. Linux and OS/2 developers, OTOH, tend to listen to their smartest customers. This necessarily limits the initial appeal of the operating system, while enhancing its long-term benefits. Perhaps only a monopolist like Microsoft could get away with selling worse products each generation -- products focused so narrowly on the least-technical member of the consumer base that they necessarily sacrifice technical excellence. Linux and OS/2 tend to appeal to the customer who knows greatness when he or she sees it. The good that Microsoft does in bringing computers to the non-users is outdone by the curse they bring upon the experienced users, because their monopoly position tends to force everyone toward the lowest-common-denominator, not just the new users.
Note: This means that Microsoft does the heavy lifting of expanding the overall PC marketplace. The great fear at Microsoft is that somebody will come behind them and make products that not only are more reliable, faster, and more secure, but are also easy to use, fun, and make people more productive. That would mean that Microsoft had merely served as a pioneer and taken all the arrows in the back, while we who have better products become a second wave to homestead on Microsoft's tamed territory.
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These documents are 20 years old now, but I can't imagine much has changed. There is more proof than ever that MS sees Linux as a threat. |
