The Empire strikes back
Chapter II: Gates' second monopoly

01-30-2.000

 

Occupied Internet

Put in a nutshell, the idea is that a Win2000 internet server can support avery browser at a basic level, but it can only support it fully if the browser runs on Windows in any of the versions that will make up the DNA (Server, PC consumer, palmtop, cellular phone, TV set-top...). This would turn Linux and Mac OS X into lame OSes, regardless of stability, speed of response or ease of use. If anybody wants to give those "services" to the Windows-using masses, that anybody's going to build his sistems on Windows... since, of course, you can rely on Gates to make it unconfortable to run a Win2000 server in a non-Win2000 run environment.

So it's easy to envision a near future in which Internet's "open standards"  are definitely a thing of the past, and Microsoft proprietary technologies reinforce each other until enjoying "complete" surfing on a Mac OS machine is possible only through the use of endless plug-ins... or not at all.

The ghost "killer app"

When presented with this panorama, you've gotta shake your head and drop back to earth. What can Gates do that is so marvellous that no company wishes to miss on his Windows DNA? What can he concoct that the Linux hacker or the Apple wizards can't replicate or one-up in an evening? Is there anything? Does Gates hide an ace?

Damn it, he does. He's got Office.

He can turn Office into a range of distributed components that can be downloaded from the Internet, paying the price of the service instead of the price of the CD.

To expand a bit:

1. Gates just licenced from Apple a technology whose main virtue is to facilitate the creation of modular applications, able to integrate into one another at will to suit the client's needs. A radical precursor of OpenDoc.

2. Gates' been pouring millions in almost avery startup that showed signs of working on a new way of serving apps from the Internet. This very month it bought into Digex and Corio.

3. As we've repeatedly said, the way software's going is that: paying the developer for the rent of the modules you actually use, downloading fron the net the neccesary components and updates and being billed for actual usage.

Which leads us to conclude that Gates' ghost "killer app" could well be a distributed version of Office, available only on Windows DNA. Do you want the standard suite, up to the very latest, served warm from Microsoft's servers? Use Windows.

 
Chapter I: The nature of the beast - What Gates is working on
Chapter II: Gates' second monopoly - What he's aiming at
Chapter III: It ain't over till the fat lady sings - The not-so-bad news

 

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