4 ms·

Microsoft is the heart of corporate America, it's a facepalm to imagine that any dollar they spend isn't in their own long term interest to make money. It would

Microsoft is the heart of corporate America, it's a facepalm to imagine that any dollar they spend isn't in their own long term interest to make money. It would be illegal for them not to. You can apply that to any large corporation but the problem is by definition how Microsoft makes money. How does Microsoft make money? They make money by renting from a platform which is monopolistic and enforced. What do they do to maintain this? They deliberately force people onto their platform by abusing their market position, and try to crush any opposition by any possible tactic, including dubious legal cases designed just to bankrupt their opposition. What else do they do? EEE, and also just blatant unnecessary reinvention /ripping off and lock-in when they get the chance. They didn't abandon some of the visible tactics and start paying open source because they had a moral revelation, it's a company with the same business model it's not possible. Those tactics were just inneffective and co-opting, more subtle EEE has to be the game plan. Why does that make me angrier than equally evil Facebook/Apple? Well if I was a farmer driving around one of those trucks with source code preventing me from fixing it I'd be pretty personally furious. But I'm not, I'm a developer and those guys are the ones trying to make everyone drive the coding equivalent. But it's worse, because coding isn't just my livelihood, it's a lot of how I think and express my thoughts. They're not messing with my job they're trying to restrict the way I think, so their shareholders can make a buck. "Microsoft is running Github for charity" have a word with yourself.

jhall1468 8y ago
> Microsoft is the heart of corporate America, it's a facepalm to imagine that any dollar they spend isn't in their own long term interest to make money. It would be illegal for them not to. You can apply that to any large corporation but the problem is by definition how Microsoft makes money. Feel free to show me which part of the criminal code "not making money" falls under. You want to rant about EEE (irrelevant for decades now) or some other silly plan to undermine open source development, feel free. But expect to be called out for your pointless drivel at the same time. I'm fine with being cautious about Microsoft. I think at this point it's no longer necessary, but sure I can understand that. But the EEE plot-line is a 20 year old joke. It's not funny anymore.
- rainbowmverse 8y ago
  The person you replied to is probably referring to the concept of fiduciary duty which is often mentioned alongside discussions of public companies. I don't know anything about it though.
  - jhall1468 8y ago
    I agree, but calling it "illegal to not make a profit" is patently false.
- mimimi31 8y ago
  >Feel free to show me which part of the criminal code "not making money" falls under. I don't really know anything about US laws, but I think they do have to act in the interest of their shareholders, i.e. make them more money.
  - jhall1468 8y ago
    Right but profit can be both long-term and short-term and often one requires sacrificing the other, which is why calling it "illegal" was completely incorrect.
  - coredog64 8y ago
    Not to dogpile, but it's essentially a naive take on the Ford vs. Dodge case. It's usually trotted out as "proof" of the evils of capitalism. As such it ignores nearly 100 years of evidence to the contrary. (My view of capitalism meshes with Churchill's view of democracy: It's the worst except for all the others)
- Teckla 8y ago
  I'm fine with being cautious about Microsoft. I think at this point it's no longer necessary, but sure I can understand that. But the EEE plot-line is a 20 year old joke. It's not funny anymore. It's never time to stop being cautious about megacorps. To think that Microsoft spent $7.5 billion for altruistic reasons, without a plan to actually turn a profit on the purchase, is dangerously naive.
wilsonnb2 8y ago
> it's a facepalm to imagine that any dollar they spend isn't in their own long term interest to make money This is true, but "long term interest" for Microsoft means 30, 50, or 100 years from now. People seem to forget that people actually liking your company is important for long term profits, and therefore doing good things is quite easy to align with the notion that companies only do things that make them a profit. I find myself saying this a lot - companies are by definition amoral (lacking a moral sense or understanding), not immoral. Just because they are driven by profits doesn't mean they don't do things that are moral or good, as many good things are in the interest of a company's profits. Especially their long term profits.
- hashkb 8y ago
  > w. People seem to forget that people actually liking your company is important for long term profits This hasn't been the case with Microsoft. They had their most successful era, and created (at the time) the richest man in the world, all while we hated them.
  - pjmlp 8y ago
    Speak for yourself please, I am not part of we.
  - wilsonnb2 8y ago
    Yes, but the world of software development is radically different now. Microsoft knows that the cloud is where most of their potential for growth is and they think (correctly, in my opinion) that developer goodwill is going to be important in getting more of the cloud market share. They aren't the biggest player right now, so their main focus is getting people to switch from a different provider (AWS) to Azure. A great way to do that is for the developers to like using Azure more than AWS. After all, most of Microsoft's "evil years" were when they were on top, not in a distant second place. I also think that developers have a lot more power in companies, especially smaller and newer companies, than they used.
  - ThrowawayR2 8y ago
    > ...all while we hated them Who's "we"? The open-source advocate reviled Microsoft in their own clique but the vast majority of the software industry just quietly went on with their lives.
zamalek 8y ago
> the problem is by definition how Microsoft makes money. That assumes that this situation is a zero-sum game. It's not. Microsoft clearly benefits from this, but so does everyone else.
walterstucco 8y ago
In what way MS buying GitHub is limiting the way you think? Can't you do it without GitHub?

jhall1468 8y ago

> Microsoft is the heart of corporate America, it's a facepalm to imagine that any dollar they spend isn't in their own long term interest to make money. It would be illegal for them not to. You can apply that to any large corporation but the problem is by definition how Microsoft makes money. Feel free to show me which part of the criminal code "not making money" falls under. You want to rant about EEE (irrelevant for decades now) or some other silly plan to undermine open source development, feel free. But expect to be called out for your pointless drivel at the same time. I'm fine with being cautious about Microsoft. I think at this point it's no longer necessary, but sure I can understand that. But the EEE plot-line is a 20 year old joke. It's not funny anymore.

rainbowmverse 8y ago
The person you replied to is probably referring to the concept of fiduciary duty which is often mentioned alongside discussions of public companies. I don't know anything about it though.
- jhall1468 8y ago
  I agree, but calling it "illegal to not make a profit" is patently false.
mimimi31 8y ago
>Feel free to show me which part of the criminal code "not making money" falls under. I don't really know anything about US laws, but I think they do have to act in the interest of their shareholders, i.e. make them more money.
- jhall1468 8y ago
  Right but profit can be both long-term and short-term and often one requires sacrificing the other, which is why calling it "illegal" was completely incorrect.
- coredog64 8y ago
  Not to dogpile, but it's essentially a naive take on the Ford vs. Dodge case. It's usually trotted out as "proof" of the evils of capitalism. As such it ignores nearly 100 years of evidence to the contrary. (My view of capitalism meshes with Churchill's view of democracy: It's the worst except for all the others)
Teckla 8y ago
I'm fine with being cautious about Microsoft. I think at this point it's no longer necessary, but sure I can understand that. But the EEE plot-line is a 20 year old joke. It's not funny anymore. It's never time to stop being cautious about megacorps. To think that Microsoft spent $7.5 billion for altruistic reasons, without a plan to actually turn a profit on the purchase, is dangerously naive.

wilsonnb2 8y ago

> it's a facepalm to imagine that any dollar they spend isn't in their own long term interest to make money This is true, but "long term interest" for Microsoft means 30, 50, or 100 years from now. People seem to forget that people actually liking your company is important for long term profits, and therefore doing good things is quite easy to align with the notion that companies only do things that make them a profit. I find myself saying this a lot - companies are by definition amoral (lacking a moral sense or understanding), not immoral. Just because they are driven by profits doesn't mean they don't do things that are moral or good, as many good things are in the interest of a company's profits. Especially their long term profits.

hashkb 8y ago
> w. People seem to forget that people actually liking your company is important for long term profits This hasn't been the case with Microsoft. They had their most successful era, and created (at the time) the richest man in the world, all while we hated them.
- pjmlp 8y ago
  Speak for yourself please, I am not part of we.
- wilsonnb2 8y ago
  Yes, but the world of software development is radically different now. Microsoft knows that the cloud is where most of their potential for growth is and they think (correctly, in my opinion) that developer goodwill is going to be important in getting more of the cloud market share. They aren't the biggest player right now, so their main focus is getting people to switch from a different provider (AWS) to Azure. A great way to do that is for the developers to like using Azure more than AWS. After all, most of Microsoft's "evil years" were when they were on top, not in a distant second place. I also think that developers have a lot more power in companies, especially smaller and newer companies, than they used.
- ThrowawayR2 8y ago
  > ...all while we hated them Who's "we"? The open-source advocate reviled Microsoft in their own clique but the vast majority of the software industry just quietly went on with their lives.

zamalek 8y ago

> the problem is by definition how Microsoft makes money. That assumes that this situation is a zero-sum game. It's not. Microsoft clearly benefits from this, but so does everyone else.

walterstucco 8y ago

In what way MS buying GitHub is limiting the way you think? Can't you do it without GitHub?