Well, that's the thing... Microsoft wasn't selling directly to these companies. They had a network of resellers and system integrators. And basically, outside o

Well, that's the thing... Microsoft wasn't selling directly to these companies. They had a network of resellers and system integrators. And basically, outside of a few niche industries, businesses basically had to use Microsoft by default. Once these system integrators were in, they would use those relationships to push new products -- because Microsoft. The more customers, the more product categories they own, and the more system integrators using Microsoft. It feels a lot like network effects to me -- but I think I was using a broader view of their non-consumer sales strategy (Ballmer was a freaking genius in this right -- just not so much as a product guy).