Dear Microsoft: Answer the important question.
April 16, 2008 6:53 pm General IT, StandardizationLook not at what you see but what you don’t see. Answers may lie in missing information.
When Novell struck its now infamous deal with Microsoft, a crowd of cheerleaders tried to convince us that the deal was the second coming for Novell and for free software. An hour long chat session was even conducted where top Novell executives fended off criticism and spread the good word.
But no one asked the important question.
Later Microsoft struck a deal with ECMA and lobbied ISO to the extreme. The company is busy convincing the world that it embraces open standards and even free software. Publishing code on Sourceforge, opening up their latest document format, hiring free software developers and employing a PR army to tell us that they have turned nice. What on earth is happening? Has hell frozen over?
Some have been easily convinced. Others have been cautious; with natural skepticism and even verbal attacks on this newfound strategy. And Microsoft have defended its position, telling you to look at its actions, see how open they are, showing off their New Ethics Order.
But no one is asking the important question.
What question?
Here we go:
“Dear Microsoft, how is this good for your shareholders Return On Investments?”
A public company has an obvious commitment toward its shareholders ROI. It has a business and moral obligation toward those who has invested in the company. All strategic decisions must focus on a greater monetary return.
So, ask not how the deal is good for Novell. Ask how the deal is good for Microsoft. Ask not how OOXML as an ISO standard is good for the world. Ask how it benefits the Monopoly’s profit.
April 22nd, 2008 at 13:22
One would hope that people are turning away from MS in their droves because of their dodgy business practices. Maybe MS realises they have to change. Unfortunately they seem to be relying on the same old tricks to do it, rather than ACTUALLY getting better.