Microsoft Question

Hi,

I'm a high school student doing a argumentative report on Micrsoft.

Simply,

Do you think Microsoft should be broken up? Why / Why Not?

Any other comments that relates to this are welcome.
Your name and perhaps your job/connection to community/microsoft.

I'm with Microsoft side in this case, but I like to hear from both sides.

Thanks very much and please let's not flame each other for this.
Let's not comment on anybody who respond to this, okay? It's for my report
only.

Giovanni Go
WebMaster
www.dreamnid.com





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Giovanni Go
WebMaster
www.dreamnid.com
dreamnid@dreamnid.com

I agree with Spud completely, but I also have this to add: Have you seen Microsoft's testimony or Bill Gates testimony. It really showed how bad the company is. Bill gates is involved in EVERY decision that is made, yet he sat on the stand and pretended he was ignorant. His demeanor was horrendous, and the prosecution proved he was a liar. Furthermore, have you seen their prices? What about their quality? They have excellent products, but at the expense of quality. Their OS is riddled with bugs, but it remains the only reasonable solution. They pressure companies to bundle their software...or else. However, if you are to break up Microsoft you are left with a major dillema. What about AOL? Aol accounts for 1/3 of the countries internet service and they own both Netscape and Mirabeles (ICQ). They have a monopoly just waiting to spring into action. The whole industry is one big conglomerates of monopolies and when one company falls another sleeping dragon wakes.

Look at the industry. You have Microsoft, AOL, Cisco, Oracle all as the major players. They DOMINATE the industry and can crush or absorb anything. Realize that Microsoft owns a large portion of Apple, so there is no threat there. I am sure Redhat is taken care of too.

I would like to see Microsoft broken up to some extent though. This integration crap of having to use their browser is wrong. Why not be able to integrate any browser of your choosing. Realize the WinXP will also be integrating MSN messenger. It's never going to stop with microsoft. They call inovation their taking over the market completely.

I think they have great products though. But their OS is horrendous and until they are broken up OSX isn't going to be able to compete, and that is where I think the greatest innovation lies.

<font color=red>Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.</font color=red>
Pablo Picasso

I think that breaking up Microsoft would be a bad decision and an unjustified one. I see absolutely nothing wrong with integrating several software packages into one. Every software company does this. The only difference here is that Microsoft is making Operating Systems with integrated components instead of something like a web browser or a utilities package.

But just because Window's Active Desktop and File Manager/Explorer are using an Internet Explorer Shell, doesn't mean that you can't run other web browsers such as Netscape. Microsoft lets you use other software. They just package <i>their</i> OS with <i>their</i> products.

Norton does it.
My company does it.
AOL does it.

Heck, I don't know of a company that doesn't package their own software components together to make one larger and more powerful program.

So I don't see <b>any</b> justification for breaking up Microsoft for doing the same thing. At least not without also doing so to every other company that has done it and is doing it.

<b>HOWEVER</b>, that doesn't mean that I think Microsoft hasn't done things that do deserve intervention. I think a more proper punishment for Microsoft is a judgement that Microsoft cannot release ANY new software until it either compensates people who have purchased their buggy products, or until it actually fixes at least 75% of the known bugs in each of their products, offering these patches <i>free of charge</i>.

I also think that Microsoft should at least be required to provide <b>FULL</b> documentation on <b>ALL</b> of the Windows API functions. It irks me that MS knows every last detail about them, but even today the rest of the world is still trying to piece together what some of them are and how to use some of them. How can competing software products (To compete against things like Word) be created if Microsoft is keeping pieces of their Windows API a secret? They shouldn't have to do anything drastic like make their OS open source. They should just be required to give complete documentation on every last feature in it and how they work and how they can be used.

I'm sick and tired of MS products being bug-ridden memory-leaking pieces of crap. And I'm tired of seeing countless lost man-hours of work because of these bugs. And I'm REALLY tired of seeing MS 'fix' these bugs, but instead of offering the fixes for free, they offer them as 'B', 'Second Edition', one higher version number, etc.

I would have absolutely no problems whatsoever with Microsoft holding the majority of the market IF Microsoft products actually worked as well as they should for a company of that size and with that many resources.

I mean this is what big companies do. They eat up other companies and grow bigger and bigger and soon there is little reason to go with any other product. I don't mind that. That is often times how standards get set. And standards make life easier for everyone else. And so long as the product prices are reasonable when the resources that went into them are considered, I see nothing wrong with that. Especially when you can always choose to go with those 'other' products made by smaller companies.

There is StarOffice to replace MS Office. There is Netscape and Mozilla to replace Internet Explorer. There is AOL IM, Yahoo IM, and even ICQ to replace MSN IM. There are several flavors of Linux to replace Windows. There is even Unix for those so desiring. Microsoft is NOT a monopoly. They just happen to be a very large company with the majority of the market share. This doesn't make them evil. It just means that they have little to worry from what competition does exist.

-Computers are like little kids. They don't do what you tell them to, and they act up for no reason.<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by slvr_phoenix on 03/29/01 10:24 AM.</EM></FONT></P>

Slvr, good post. Note that AOL owns both it's IM, ICQ, Netscape and Yahoo etc. Should microsoft be broken up AOL will be right behind them.

<font color=red>Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.</font color=red>
Pablo Picasso

But MS has been leading the way for so many years as well. With NT and 2000 and even xp they are real standard makers pure 32 bit very very clean code. MS has had problems with 9X because there was no real standards for it. With win 2k they are right there watching makeing sure no one makes shitty drivers, software, and hardware that is a good thing because as far as im concered the whole issue of crashes instablility is because programmer and hardware engineers are cutting corners (but windows 9x is bitchy as well). Now with the integration deal its their OS they see it fit to do what they like with it.Its just another witch hunt as it was way back when the the US went after GE and IBM.

SPUDMUFFIN


<font color=blue>Just some advice from your friendly neighborhood blue man </font color=blue>