Bill Gates' new found indignation can do nothing but help Apple.
Daring Fireball: Lies, Damned Lies, and Bill Gates
I talked about that a bit here: SwitchBlog: Leopard and Apple's plan to take over the world, but I was mostly just saying "what if" and not analyzing the particulars of who announced what, when, and who copied who. That's an interesting angle though, and particularly because Bill Gates himself inspired it.
I'm still amazed at how flustered Bill Gates is by all of this. I don't think he would be flustered at all if Apple weren't gaining ground, this isn't just about righteous indignation, it's about a real threat. If people believe what's in the ads, to be literally true, rather than just poking fun, it is a threat. Bill knows this and is trying to defuse it, by saying the ads are untrue and trying to make it about facts rather than perceptions. It's a risky move, because this will create debates about minutia like who announced what when, but the common beliefs in the industry and perhaps even the world play into Apple's hand.
Even history is against Microsoft on this one. I know many people who think that the only product that Microsoft ever created on it's own was DOS, but even in that case, you can point out that Microsoft bought Q-DOS which was such a direct copy of CP/M it had some of the same typos in documentation.
Microsoft's well-documented business practices of stealing from weaker competitors plays against them too.
I distinctly remember seeing an interview with Andy Grove and Bill Gates about Andy Grove's Book
where they talked about being paranoid and looking over their shoulders for competitors all the time. I remember thinking that in Bill Gates' case that was probably a very good idea, not because they were touchable, or even are that touchable now, but because Bill Gates has accumulated such little Karma. Maybe this philanthropy thing is well-timed.
Yeah, you can pick apart who announced what and when, but no matter what happened, Apple has the advantage. If Bill Gates really wants to try this in the court of public opinion, I'm all for it.
This is really quite amazing.
"That seems to be their way of dealing with the fact that Apple is implementing and shipping major new features in Mac OS X far more quickly than Microsoft has been able to do with Windows. I.e., in Microsoft?s view, it?s not that Vista now offers features that appeared in Mac OS X in 2003; it?s that Mac OS X has features that Microsoft talked about in 2001. Spotlight, in this view, is a rip-off of WinFS ? even though WinFS didn?t even actually make it into Vista. "
I talked about that a bit here: SwitchBlog: Leopard and Apple's plan to take over the world, but I was mostly just saying "what if" and not analyzing the particulars of who announced what, when, and who copied who. That's an interesting angle though, and particularly because Bill Gates himself inspired it.
I'm still amazed at how flustered Bill Gates is by all of this. I don't think he would be flustered at all if Apple weren't gaining ground, this isn't just about righteous indignation, it's about a real threat. If people believe what's in the ads, to be literally true, rather than just poking fun, it is a threat. Bill knows this and is trying to defuse it, by saying the ads are untrue and trying to make it about facts rather than perceptions. It's a risky move, because this will create debates about minutia like who announced what when, but the common beliefs in the industry and perhaps even the world play into Apple's hand.
Even history is against Microsoft on this one. I know many people who think that the only product that Microsoft ever created on it's own was DOS, but even in that case, you can point out that Microsoft bought Q-DOS which was such a direct copy of CP/M it had some of the same typos in documentation.
Microsoft's well-documented business practices of stealing from weaker competitors plays against them too.
I distinctly remember seeing an interview with Andy Grove and Bill Gates about Andy Grove's Book
where they talked about being paranoid and looking over their shoulders for competitors all the time. I remember thinking that in Bill Gates' case that was probably a very good idea, not because they were touchable, or even are that touchable now, but because Bill Gates has accumulated such little Karma. Maybe this philanthropy thing is well-timed.Yeah, you can pick apart who announced what and when, but no matter what happened, Apple has the advantage. If Bill Gates really wants to try this in the court of public opinion, I'm all for it.
This is really quite amazing.
7 Comments:
Bill Gates first announced Windows months before the first debut of the Macintosh; so even the original Macintosh was a ripoff of Windows. The first Windows release came two years after the announcement - firmly establishing a trend that continues to this day.
Yea, exactly right - it's an interesting thing - if he was really dismissive of them ... he wouldn't get all defensive ... for instnace, if you asked steve Jobs if Linux is encroaching upon Mac OSX ... he might stffle a gaffaw but he would just bring it aside like 'are you kidding me?'
Bill clearly feels the heat - that he's onto a nice legacy of trying to save people but he realizes his tech legacy is a now a shamble with WIN & MS.
Anonymous said...
Bill Gates first announced Windows months before the first debut of the Macintosh; so even the original Macintosh was a ripoff of Windows. The first Windows release came two years after the announcement - firmly establishing a trend that continues to this day.
Come on er, Anonymous, you can do better than that.
Windows 1.0 was an embarrassment that launched more than a year after the Mac. Even PC users acknowledge that the first truly usable version was Windows 3.1, which came out in 1990, and that Windows 95 was the first version that began to approach what Apple had achieved in 1984. What did Microsoft do for those 11 long years? They copied the Macintosh.
Microsoft's strategy of announcing vaporware to foil competitors is not and never has been innovation. Their success was based on a strategy of ruthlessness (and some fortunate business conditions) that allowed them to crush many innovative companies, with one notable exception, Apple.
Innovation has kept Apple in the game and has positioned it very well for today's business conditions.
Bill Gate's ?! Easy on the apostrophes, he's not going to like that.
Microsoft launched their Mac version of Word at the day of Apple's launch. They've worked closely with Apple over the years and have knowledge of new OS features long before that OS version is launched. Of course Microsoft announced "Windows" before the Mac. They've been paranoid from the start and they steal and lie consistently. They settled Apple's lawsuits when Apple was dieing when Gates announced his "investment" in Apple. One of the charges in that lawsuit concerned Microsoft stealing Quicktime code. They were in such a hurry that they never even changed the variable names in the proceedures. It was a direct copy.
MSFT Windows is sloppy, "spaghetti" code, so it is harder for them to actually ship anything; and they have tp support more PC configurations because they let random 3rd parties make their hardware.
Serves 'em right.
jp said...
Bill Gate's ?! Easy on the apostrophes, he's not going to like that.
I doubt my lame typos would show up on his radar at all. Thanks for pointing it out though.
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