5 ms·

MS doesn't care about Stallmans GNU goals. What they do care about are developers not being annoyed with working on a Windows machine (or nowadays using their A

MS doesn't care about Stallmans GNU goals. What they do care about are developers not being annoyed with working on a Windows machine (or nowadays using their Azure clouds). Speaking for myself, I'm coming from the gamedev world (lately webdev) and as such was mostly tied to windows due to various tools(Photoshop,Modo,3dsmax in the past,etc) but that didn't mean that I was going to suffer by using IIS or spend a fortune on Windows server licences or higher hardware reqs for appplication servers for no good reason. So yes, MS will ignore OSS for their core Windows stuff, HOWEVER they will probably also play nice in the wider OSS (If not FOSS) community since they probably see Azure as the third leg of the future (apart from Windows and Office) and as such will ensure that everyone who uses it (be it for Windows or Linux deployments) are happy with it (And trashing things in the OSS community will thus be counterproductive).

lproven 6y ago
This is _precisely_ the sort of thought the company wishes to cultivate: * That they don't care about Free Software (they do, it is a hated enemy). * That they are ignoring the FOSS world (they're watching it closely and working out how to stealthily attack it). * That they'll play nice and so should be welcomed (they are a merciless enemy to be constantly wary of). In other words, their marketing team's message of "we've changed, we're nice and friendly now, trust us" is working perfectly.
- cjaybo 6y ago
  What motive does MS have to "watch and stealthily attack" the FOSS world? Which parts of that world threaten their existence? Looking at the last few quarterly reports, I'm inclined to agree with the parent commenter here, and your comment doesn't do much to substantiate your point as it stands.
  - lproven 6y ago
    This is the motive, as someone cited before me: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis... I was merely agreeing. Look at MS' history. It used this tactic to kill or maim a long list of companies: Netscape, Lotus, WordPerfect, Aldus, Novell, Sybase, STAC, Central Point Software, Quarterdeck, and dozens more. It tried it with Sun and Java -- it failed, but only just. It tried it with the WWW itself with ActiveX and IIS ASP. Again, this only just failed. It has a long long history of being the nastiest, most deceitful, dishonest, back-stabbing company in the computer industry -- and that is saying a lot. It is not a coincidence that Gates became the richest man in the world. Cory Doctorow's Twitter summary is pretty good (short thread): https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1304811968398729218 https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1304811968398729218 The LA Times did a great investigative piece on the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation _thirteen years ago_: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2007-jan-07-na-gatesx07-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2007-jan-07-na-gates... TL;DR -- it spends just enough money that Gates & Buffett don't pay tax on the interest of their wealth; it does not do ethical investment of any kind; its objective is whitewashing the reputation of a retired criminal, in which it is very successful. I have yet to see any evidence that the company culture that Gates created and Ballmer continued has changed in any substantive way.
    - jodrellblank 6y ago
      > "Look at MS' history. It used this tactic to kill or maim a long list of companies: Netscape, Lotus, WordPerfect, Aldus, Novell, Sybase, STAC, Central Point Software, Quarterdeck, and dozens more." Netscape defunct 2003, FireFox still exists. Lotus 1-2-3 last release 2002. Sybase still existed until it was sold to SAP in 2010 and SAP killed it in 2014. WordPerfect still exists. Quarterdeck defunct 1998. Sun, Java, ActiveX, ASP. 1990s. Anything from this last decade? And, how is "this tactic" going to stop you from using Linux? > "It has a long long history of being the nastiest, most deceitful, dishonest, back-stabbing company in the computer industry -- and that is saying a lot." Cruelty, ruthlessness, and exploitation goes with success in capitalism. > "TL;DR -- it spends just enough money that Gates & Buffett don't pay tax on the interest of their wealth; it does not do ethical investment of any kind; its objective is whitewashing the reputation of a retired criminal, in which it is very successful." Character attack on a retired man, based on bad things which happened a generation ago, while giving free pass to Google who are strongarming the web with AMP and unilateral changes to Chrome, and unilateral standards which were proprietary Google internals released to the world, because they use Linux in their advertising-spyware mobile platform, and to Amazon, a much maligned company run by one of the current world's richest people, known for its mistreatment of employees and abusive attitude to the publishing industry, and for using its cloud platform to steal and reimplement popular services and put them out of business, free pass for current bad behaviour because they let people run Linux cheaply?
      - lproven 6y ago
        The reason MS didn't have to do this stuff in the last decade or 2 is because it has already killed all its opponents. Name another big desktop app vendor will hundreds of millions of seats. Name another industry-leading groupware system. The last big dominant rival MS took down was Nokia's phones operation, but it mainly succeeded there because Google and Apple accidentally helped: Evidence: MS doesn't make phones any more. It derailed the #1 smartphone vendor's own OS efforts and planted an MS exec in charge so that vendor used exclusively MS phone OSes, but it wasn't good enough. The OS failed and the vendor left the market. Apple is in a different market. Apple sells hardware. Its OSes are free. It also makes a cut on content for those devices. Character attacks? Have you bothered to read any of the links I have supplied to support my argument?

lproven 6y ago

This is _precisely_ the sort of thought the company wishes to cultivate: * That they don't care about Free Software (they do, it is a hated enemy). * That they are ignoring the FOSS world (they're watching it closely and working out how to stealthily attack it). * That they'll play nice and so should be welcomed (they are a merciless enemy to be constantly wary of). In other words, their marketing team's message of "we've changed, we're nice and friendly now, trust us" is working perfectly.

cjaybo 6y ago
What motive does MS have to "watch and stealthily attack" the FOSS world? Which parts of that world threaten their existence? Looking at the last few quarterly reports, I'm inclined to agree with the parent commenter here, and your comment doesn't do much to substantiate your point as it stands.
- lproven 6y ago
  This is the motive, as someone cited before me: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguis... I was merely agreeing. Look at MS' history. It used this tactic to kill or maim a long list of companies: Netscape, Lotus, WordPerfect, Aldus, Novell, Sybase, STAC, Central Point Software, Quarterdeck, and dozens more. It tried it with Sun and Java -- it failed, but only just. It tried it with the WWW itself with ActiveX and IIS ASP. Again, this only just failed. It has a long long history of being the nastiest, most deceitful, dishonest, back-stabbing company in the computer industry -- and that is saying a lot. It is not a coincidence that Gates became the richest man in the world. Cory Doctorow's Twitter summary is pretty good (short thread): https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1304811968398729218 https://twitter.com/doctorow/status/1304811968398729218 The LA Times did a great investigative piece on the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation _thirteen years ago_: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2007-jan-07-na-gatesx07-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2007-jan-07-na-gates... TL;DR -- it spends just enough money that Gates & Buffett don't pay tax on the interest of their wealth; it does not do ethical investment of any kind; its objective is whitewashing the reputation of a retired criminal, in which it is very successful. I have yet to see any evidence that the company culture that Gates created and Ballmer continued has changed in any substantive way.
  - jodrellblank 6y ago
    > "Look at MS' history. It used this tactic to kill or maim a long list of companies: Netscape, Lotus, WordPerfect, Aldus, Novell, Sybase, STAC, Central Point Software, Quarterdeck, and dozens more." Netscape defunct 2003, FireFox still exists. Lotus 1-2-3 last release 2002. Sybase still existed until it was sold to SAP in 2010 and SAP killed it in 2014. WordPerfect still exists. Quarterdeck defunct 1998. Sun, Java, ActiveX, ASP. 1990s. Anything from this last decade? And, how is "this tactic" going to stop you from using Linux? > "It has a long long history of being the nastiest, most deceitful, dishonest, back-stabbing company in the computer industry -- and that is saying a lot." Cruelty, ruthlessness, and exploitation goes with success in capitalism. > "TL;DR -- it spends just enough money that Gates & Buffett don't pay tax on the interest of their wealth; it does not do ethical investment of any kind; its objective is whitewashing the reputation of a retired criminal, in which it is very successful." Character attack on a retired man, based on bad things which happened a generation ago, while giving free pass to Google who are strongarming the web with AMP and unilateral changes to Chrome, and unilateral standards which were proprietary Google internals released to the world, because they use Linux in their advertising-spyware mobile platform, and to Amazon, a much maligned company run by one of the current world's richest people, known for its mistreatment of employees and abusive attitude to the publishing industry, and for using its cloud platform to steal and reimplement popular services and put them out of business, free pass for current bad behaviour because they let people run Linux cheaply?
    - lproven 6y ago
      The reason MS didn't have to do this stuff in the last decade or 2 is because it has already killed all its opponents. Name another big desktop app vendor will hundreds of millions of seats. Name another industry-leading groupware system. The last big dominant rival MS took down was Nokia's phones operation, but it mainly succeeded there because Google and Apple accidentally helped: Evidence: MS doesn't make phones any more. It derailed the #1 smartphone vendor's own OS efforts and planted an MS exec in charge so that vendor used exclusively MS phone OSes, but it wasn't good enough. The OS failed and the vendor left the market. Apple is in a different market. Apple sells hardware. Its OSes are free. It also makes a cut on content for those devices. Character attacks? Have you bothered to read any of the links I have supplied to support my argument?