[svlug] Wheel Mouse Optical... Evil?

[Francis J. A. Pinteric]

On Sun, 6 Jan 2002 02:28:30 -0800
Rafael <raffi at ark.linwin.com> wrote:
> Perhaps I should say, they never invented earth shaking product or a
> method for making things. [1] Inventions few, inovations many.
> 

`Embrace and extend' is not innovation. Innovation, by definition is the
same thing as inventing, except that it referrs specifically to new
concepts and methodologies. Microsoft's E&E strategy is not to innovate
but to subsume others' innovations and then subtely `adjust' it, and force
everyone to adopt their version of it by virtue of monopolistic
domination. Monopoly does not encourage innovation from anyone. Not from
Microsoft because they don't have to, and not from anyone else because it
would be useless to compete in the face of Microsoft's E&E policy. Indeed,
the situtation was so bad that back in 1990's there were people out there
with bright ideas felt that the only way to make money was to sell their
startup business to Microsoft rather than compete directly with them.

Microsft, while claiming to be a software and technology company isn't
really either. It is a marketing company whose goal is total market
domination whose products just happen to be technology oriented. Even if
their product was something different, their goals would be the same. The
American ideal of making the better mousetrap and getting rich as a result
is lost on them. Microsoft became rich by taking someone else's better
mousetrap (86DOS was the better CP/M for the 8086) made it work on IBM's
new hardware and then claimed it as their own invention. By the time the
real inventors go around to realizing that they had been screwed and took
Microsoft to court, it was too late. Microsoft had become so rich so fast
that American Justice predictably sided with the money rather than the
merit of the case. In other words, they wore down their opponent with
legal trickery and battered them into submission by writ of legal fees.
Microsoft then threw them a bone and walked away scott free.

So, don't talk about Microsoft `innovation' since just as there are no
Microsoft inventions, it too is a contradiction in terms.

>>>--fja->

-- 
Only two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity.
But, I'm not sure about the universe.
  -- Albert Einstein.