Microsoft is the company everyone loves to hate. There are a number of reasons for this, but the greatest is the company's sheer dominance. Like a government, Microsoft takes flak because its presence is unavoidable.
This dominance is the product of Microsoft's influence over its partners, but Redmond is starting to lose its grip. At least three key manufacturers — of chips, PCs and handsets — in the ecosystem have wriggled free. Microsoft, used to leading others, is increasingly finding itself being led places it doesn't want to go.
The first sign came out of the 'Vista Capable' lawsuit, when previously confidential uncovered emails showed what Intel seems to have done to Microsoft just prior to the launch of Windows Vista. Intel wanted to stick its 915 chipset into new PCs and Microsoft wanted to do the same with Vista — the problem was, the 915's embedded graphics capabilities could not handle Vista's flashy Aero interface.
Nonetheless, Intel managed to convince Microsoft that 915-bearing machines should get the 'Vista Capable' sticker. Intel sold its chips, and Microsoft took a battering from users who quickly established that their new PCs could not handle Vista as promised.
Intel's low-powered Atom chipset has not helped Microsoft, either. Designed for the popular new breed of low-cost subnotebooks, the chipset is a very bad match for Vista, so — like the senior detective just days away from retirement in many a bad cop movie — Windows XP had to be called back into service for one last mission. Microsoft desperately needed to get rid of XP to boost sales of its unpopular successor, but this plan seems to have been foiled for now.
The Atom, of course, is a bet Intel made before the new subnotebook market was kicked off by Asus. When the laptop manufacturer meekly showed off its little Eee PC — originally intended to be an educational device — in early 2007, it did not expect the reaction it received: the device became instantly popular and spawned myriad competitors. Intel's bet looks like paying off in unexpected ways, while Microsoft is set to lose just as heavily. Microsoft must wish that the involuntary persistence of XP was its only problem in this market, but it's worse than that — like the first iteration of the Eee, most of these subnotebooks come with Linux-based operating systems.
Even though Microsoft has managed at least to get Windows onto many of the subnotebooks, all the devices thus far revealed come in both flavours, with the Windows flavour being either more expensive or...
Talkback
Microsoft is beginning to remind me of Harry Truman on Mount St. Helens the day before it blew: May 18, 1980. The hermit refused to leave his home on the slopes of his beloved volcano. He was too old and set in his ways to consider relocating. Twelve hours later his relocated molecules were part of a new landscape. Mount St. Helens made the decision for him. Oddly enough, Microsoft's Redmond, WA home is only 266km from Mount St. Helens. And, like Harry, their environment is beginning to suggest new directions for their survival.
Microsoft's existence depends not on directing more brain-power and resources to combat threats to their supremacy, but in one word: Change.
I think the unavoidable truth here is that we have paid for the "Operating System Layer" enough times over now. Back in the day there was a BIOS layer that came with the hardware we bought, but it didn't really help us use the device properly. It took OS vendors to create the next layer up, the front end that let us massage files and load and run the next layer up, the applications themselves. Microsoft managed to corner that market and make themselves the default, if not always the best choice. However, their business model means we would have to keep paying over and over again for the same stuff. Sure it has got prettier and more functional, but not by so much as to be revolutionary and even then, that pace has slowed to a crawl, while the cost keeps going up.
While they were doing this, a body of code was being created that could do all these things, with all the pretty and all the wizz-bang that was the final refuge for the sales folks at Bill's place. In the last few years it has finally closed that last gap between the geeky background and the user friendly foreground. The only way MS can keep their market is to actually compete despite the fact that their "Unique Selling Proposition" is now looking a bit, well frankly, un-unique.
When you boil away all the religious fervour from both "sides" it comes down to an inevitability. The Operating System has been done and is now available for zero license cost. It is mature, it looks good and runs quickly on a vast array of hardware. About the only reason left for vast swathes of the market to pay license fees for their OS is that they are unaware of the alternatives or are unwilling to try them. The longer vendors hold out against this "truth" the bigger the snap-back will be when they eventually let go.
Excellent analysis, thanks very much. I have two unrelated comments:
- I have always believed that until now, what we have primarily been paying Microsoft for is bug fixes in the guise of "new releases". It's rather cheeky, to say the least, to sell a buggy piece of software, and then turn around and charge again for the next buggy release, and the next, and the next... Until now there was generally enough new device support and such (laptops, USB, WiFi, etc) in each release to more or less paper over the fact that consumers were only getting warmed-over software, but with Vista it has become blatant. Of course part of the reason that Vista is struggling for acceptance is the bugginess, but what's new about a buggy Microsoft operating system? I think the much large reason it's struggling compared to previous releases is that it doesn't contain anything new that consumers really need.
- Based on my very recent (and ongoing) experiences with Ubuntu, I agree with Andrew, Linux has matured and improved sufficiently that it is a very viable alternative for the average PC user. Of course there are still a number of hardware and software packages which don't run on Linux, but the basics are all there now. What it needs for the next big push is for OEMs to really start offering it, and promoting it, as an alternative on a wide range of systems. Mom & Pop, the Butcher, the Baker, and the Candlestick Maker will never buy PCs and then load the operating system themselves.
- Processing power and the Atom. This might not only be a problem for Vista. Look at the minimum requirements for the newest Logitech webcams, video chat programs and the like. They are far beyond the Atom. The people who buy Atom-based systems are not going to be interested in hearing WHY such things don't work on their shiny new computers, they are simply going to expect that they will work, period.
jw
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