Gates told a media briefing in Sydney this morning: "You know what my toughest competitor is?
"It's pirated software.
"…if you really look around, you'll find way more pirated Windows than you'll find open-source software, way more".
Gates said he believed Microsoft's software represented a "dramatically higher, better choice than anything you'll get in the open-source realm.
"It's true the press has taken a few design wins and said, 'hey, look at that'.
"And you know, that's great, it's almost helpful to us to have a few of those where people try that out.
"[They] see that being their own systems integrator -- they say, okay, I've got this, how do I get the active directory? How do I get the software update piece? How do I get the different applications. And they see… various things about the intellectual property challenge that'll come into that."
Gates made his remarks during a whirlwind trip to Australia during which he was scheduled to meet with the Australian Prime Minister, John Howard.
According to research conducted for CNET Networks Australia at the start of 2004, corporate information technology users were forecasting a healthy future for popular open-source variant Linux on the desktop, with more than three-quarters of respondents saying it will get a little or a lot stronger. The research, which secured almost 600 responses from Australia and New Zealand, also found strong support for Linux' future as a server operating system, with 56.5 percent of respondents saying the open source software would grow stronger and 32.3 percent saying it would grow much stronger.
Windows XP (68.9 percent) and other versions of Windows (62.4 percent) were the only operating systems used at least daily, on average, by a majority of the respondent base.
For more coverage on ZDNet Australia, click here.
Talkback
How peculiar. Does Gates not realise he would never have reached the 90% or so penetration he's got without pirates?
I'm sure he realises this. However, now he GOT the 90%, he doesn't need the pirates any more. So : time to say goodbye...
His comments on being a systems integrator for ones self and realising that components are missing is dangerous ground.
I have had to install 4 Windows 2000 boxes, 1 XP box and 3 SuSE boxes in the last 2 weeks. The Windows 2000 were a real pain, XP wasn't much better, while the SuSE boxes were a breeze.
Windows 2000/XP didn't recognise most of the video cards or network cards installed in the machines, I needed the motherboard/card driver CD's to even get on the net to find the latest versions. Then I needed additional CD's for Office, anti-virus, printer drivers, multi-media devices etc. When the machines first booted, they displayed the desktop in 640x480 or 800x600.
With SuSE, it recognised the video cards and display panels and the console and YaST installer booted in 1280x1024 mode. It loaded the correct video drivers, network drivers, sound drivers, printer drivers, scanner and installed Office without me having to change discs.
Once the first install was complete, a quick trip to the net showed I needed around 60Mb of data for the SuSE installs. These installed together, and unless I installed the Kernel update, it didn't require a re-boot after patching. And that included all of the applications that were loaded (including Samba, Office, Apache, PHP and a plethora of other programs and server applications).
The Windows installs required several hundred megabytes of patches and 6 reboots before installation was complete. And many of the patches had to be loaded separately. Then the patching of Office and the anti-virus etc. could take place, another hundred megs of downloads or so.
Mr Gates should be very careful about what he says, some of his comments just aren't true anymore. Linux has caught up fast in many areas and in a couple has stolen a march on Windows.
Given a pre-configured machine, many users wouldn't find much difference between the platforms. It is only when a user has to configure Linux themselves that problems arise, and Windows isn't as easy to install and configure as Microsoft makes out.
I am still a user of Windows, but more and more of my work is switching to Linux, because it is faster, simpler and less prone to virus and worm attacks.
Having used Windows since version 2, I didn't find the switch to Linux very difficult.
He knows pirating software has been his best ally. I remember the days when even smaller companies would get all of MS offering on CDs, ready to install.
Even in those days, some companies where already selling enterprise software with licenses controlled by a locally installed license server.
Microsoft instead, was letting everyone install anything. Needed a project software ? A simple database product ? MS was the only company smart enough to make this available and come and collect revenue later.
Spot the IP threat:
MS have been busy applying for patents for everything butjustified it by saying they don't pursue them, but surely the statement contains an MS threat for the future.