3 ms·

The moat and scorched-earth metaphor also describes Microsoft's development of Internet Explorer. IE was given away to protect the economic castle of desktop de

The moat and scorched-earth metaphor also describes Microsoft's development of Internet Explorer. IE was given away to protect the economic castle of desktop development. Incompatibilities delayed and added expense to web development for decades, all to defend Windows and Office sales.

mkuhn 16y ago
That doesn't really go hand in hand with my recollection. If i remember correctly Internet Explorer actually was the far better browser then Netscape at least once IE6 got released. But it is possible that Microsoft's refusal of continuing to develop its browser has had the effect you mention and has hindered the web overall from developing into an alternative to desktop apps.
- raganwald 16y ago
  Of course! If you give a crappy browser away for free, nobody will use it. However, if you make it good but you don't support Netscape's server-side integration, you kill their server business and their browser business. Then after they implode rewriting Netscape, you pull almost everybody off the project and rake in the billions. Until, inexorably, people work around your cruft and release cross-browser libraries that eliminate the "lock-in effect" of websites that require IE. Now you scramble to put people back on it and start active development again. I think the point about the moat and scorched earth stands. For a very direct comparison, consider Android. I believe Google are trying to make it superior to iOS, even through they give it away. Their plan is to scorch the earth so that neither Microsoft nor Apple can turn mobile devices into a Google-free browsing device.
  - yuhong 16y ago
    >Until, inexorably, people work around your cruft and release cross-browser libraries that eliminate the "lock-in effect" of websites that require IE. And also that they recover from the rewrite and released and marketed Firefox enough to make it real competition to IE.
- dstein 16y ago
  Microsoft was just hedging their bets. Development of IE was specifically to take Netscape down. Once they had won a majority of the web browser market they put it into Windows-style "churn" mode, where they release new garbage versions without any innovations or improvements.
  - yuhong 16y ago
    To be more precise, they tied IE development to Windows and forced on mostly adding features like the pop-up blocker and improving security, resulting in IE6 SP2 being only part of XP SP2.
joe_the_user 16y ago
Actually, The castle-and-moat analogy is much better for Microsoft. Microsoft's biggest cash cow is Office but Office isn't enough of "natural monopoly" that Microsoft can sit easily enjoying the profits. Instead, one can find a long list of the underhanded tactics MS has used to preserve it's position over the years. Search, on the other hand, currently does seem like a natural monopoly a la electric companies and phone companies. That is, Google doesn't have to destroy the competition but rather they are reasonably well protected by the immense cost and organizational challenge involved in a creating direct competitor. I think it's correct that Google other efforts are protective but they're protective towards the situation of open competition in which Google arose - protective against pipe-squeezers and walled-garden cultivators. Google is more like a "Mongol Hoard". Their defense isn't building moats and walls but clearing brush and obstacles so "everyone" has a open, level field - that Google just happens charge through more effectively than anyone else.
- jbooth 16y ago
  I dunno if I'd call search a natural monopoly at all -- Office has file formats and other forms of lock-in. Search just has a URL.
  - chris_j 16y ago
    I'm with you on that one. I've never understood it when people say that Google has a monopoly as powerful as Microsoft or Facebook. If a Facebook user finds a social network that's better than Facebook, tough luck. The value of Facebook is that their friends are on it so they can't switch to another social network. If a Windows user discovers an operating system that's better than Windows, tough luck if you rely on any applications that only run on Windows. If a Google user discovers a better search engine then switching is the easiest thing in the world. The main barriers to entry that exist around Google search are that search is really hard to do, not that Google have some kind of lock in that makes it hard to change search engines. I really like joe_the_user's Mongol Hoard analogy. Google aren't scorching the earth or building a moat or otherwise erecting barriers to entry around search. With Android, for example, they are attempting to ensure that no fortifications can be built on the surrounding land. That's a very different thing.

mkuhn 16y ago

That doesn't really go hand in hand with my recollection. If i remember correctly Internet Explorer actually was the far better browser then Netscape at least once IE6 got released. But it is possible that Microsoft's refusal of continuing to develop its browser has had the effect you mention and has hindered the web overall from developing into an alternative to desktop apps.

raganwald 16y ago
Of course! If you give a crappy browser away for free, nobody will use it. However, if you make it good but you don't support Netscape's server-side integration, you kill their server business and their browser business. Then after they implode rewriting Netscape, you pull almost everybody off the project and rake in the billions. Until, inexorably, people work around your cruft and release cross-browser libraries that eliminate the "lock-in effect" of websites that require IE. Now you scramble to put people back on it and start active development again. I think the point about the moat and scorched earth stands. For a very direct comparison, consider Android. I believe Google are trying to make it superior to iOS, even through they give it away. Their plan is to scorch the earth so that neither Microsoft nor Apple can turn mobile devices into a Google-free browsing device.
- yuhong 16y ago
  >Until, inexorably, people work around your cruft and release cross-browser libraries that eliminate the "lock-in effect" of websites that require IE. And also that they recover from the rewrite and released and marketed Firefox enough to make it real competition to IE.
dstein 16y ago
Microsoft was just hedging their bets. Development of IE was specifically to take Netscape down. Once they had won a majority of the web browser market they put it into Windows-style "churn" mode, where they release new garbage versions without any innovations or improvements.
- yuhong 16y ago
  To be more precise, they tied IE development to Windows and forced on mostly adding features like the pop-up blocker and improving security, resulting in IE6 SP2 being only part of XP SP2.

joe_the_user 16y ago

Actually, The castle-and-moat analogy is much better for Microsoft. Microsoft's biggest cash cow is Office but Office isn't enough of "natural monopoly" that Microsoft can sit easily enjoying the profits. Instead, one can find a long list of the underhanded tactics MS has used to preserve it's position over the years. Search, on the other hand, currently does seem like a natural monopoly a la electric companies and phone companies. That is, Google doesn't have to destroy the competition but rather they are reasonably well protected by the immense cost and organizational challenge involved in a creating direct competitor. I think it's correct that Google other efforts are protective but they're protective towards the situation of open competition in which Google arose - protective against pipe-squeezers and walled-garden cultivators. Google is more like a "Mongol Hoard". Their defense isn't building moats and walls but clearing brush and obstacles so "everyone" has a open, level field - that Google just happens charge through more effectively than anyone else.

jbooth 16y ago
I dunno if I'd call search a natural monopoly at all -- Office has file formats and other forms of lock-in. Search just has a URL.
- chris_j 16y ago
  I'm with you on that one. I've never understood it when people say that Google has a monopoly as powerful as Microsoft or Facebook. If a Facebook user finds a social network that's better than Facebook, tough luck. The value of Facebook is that their friends are on it so they can't switch to another social network. If a Windows user discovers an operating system that's better than Windows, tough luck if you rely on any applications that only run on Windows. If a Google user discovers a better search engine then switching is the easiest thing in the world. The main barriers to entry that exist around Google search are that search is really hard to do, not that Google have some kind of lock in that makes it hard to change search engines. I really like joe_the_user's Mongol Hoard analogy. Google aren't scorching the earth or building a moat or otherwise erecting barriers to entry around search. With Android, for example, they are attempting to ensure that no fortifications can be built on the surrounding land. That's a very different thing.