> In short: if anything saved us from a total Windows monopoly, it was
> Sun´s software strategy to counter Microsoft and promote open
> standards, Certainly not Apple, not IBM.
This account strangely elides the open-source movement itself.
Wasn't that in fact "what saved us"? If Sun had had to depend on proprietary software developed at home or bought from somebody else -- how much of a threat would they have posed?
(Not that they posed much of a threat after all. Microsoft is still there polluting the waters, and Sun is a stuffed moose head on Oracle's -- Oracle's! -- wall.)
No doubt Sun opportunistically took advantage of the open-source movement -- they were, after all, the monopoly-to-be, not the actually-existing monopoly. So they were willing to make common cause with the open-source brigands, at least until Mordor fell.
Had they succeeded in becoming Mordor themselves, I feel pretty sure, based on my dealings with these people, that they would have out-Sauron'ed Sauron.
Apple is a parallel case, actually.
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Michael Smith mjs at smithbowen.net http://stopmebeforeivoteagain.org http://fakesprogress.blogspot.com