Einhorn Calls on Microsoft to Fire Ballmer

[shalab]

Another interesting comparison is MSFT vs Berkshire

 

Berkshire had an equity of 58 billion in 2001 and now it has 163 billion.

EPS went from 1.86/share to 5.2/share from 2002-2010

 

MSFT on the other hand went from a book value of 4.48 to 5.53 in the same period.

EPS went up from 94 cents to $2.10 cents in the same period.

 

Which is a better business and which has compounded better?

[frog03]

Nothing wrong with your idea of a comparison between the two then, do it properly on a per share basis and accounting for dividends...

 

Microsoft has a declining share count, BRK one that is rising

Microsoft has paid dividends, BRK has not

 

**************

 

Another interesting comparison is MSFT vs Berkshire

 

Berkshire had an equity of 58 billion in 2001 and now it has 163 billion.

EPS went from 1.86/share to 5.2/share from 2002-2010

 

MSFT on the other hand went from a book value of 4.48 to 5.53 in the same period.

EPS went up from 94 cents to $2.10 cents in the same period.

 

Which is a better business and which has compounded better?

 

[DCG]

Microsoft got the idea of smart phone pretty early - in the nineties. They didn't perfect the user interface. They did the tablet in the late nineties/early 2000s which also failed. They were ahead of their time for these.

 

You are correct.  They also created a product called the WebTV a long time ago.  I had one and it worked quite well actually, but way ahead of its time.  Today, everything is going the way of WebTV. 

 

 

-Microsoft did not create WebTV. They acquired the company for $425 Million, pretty much right at the time people stopped using the product. It was a pretty horrible acquisition.

 

-It hasn't been a shortage of ideas that's hurt Microsoft. It's been poor execution. And nobody executes as well as Apple.

[ERICOPOLY]

Another interesting comparison is MSFT vs Berkshire

 

Berkshire had an equity of 58 billion in 2001 and now it has 163 billion.

EPS went from 1.86/share to 5.2/share from 2002-2010

 

MSFT on the other hand went from a book value of 4.48 to 5.53 in the same period.

EPS went up from 94 cents to $2.10 cents in the same period.

 

Which is a better business and which has compounded better?

 

Based on those two metrics MSFT wins.

 

On the first point, a business growing earnings faster than equity is a good thing.  You've made it sound like under performance!  Further, do they suck more because of the 10% one-time special dividend, in addition to the ongoing dividends and buybacks?  Had they retained all that cash, your metric would reward the behavior.

 

On the second point, look-through EPS is what matters -- the shift from stocks to operating companies skews these results, and makes Berkshire look to be growing faster than reality.

 

Last, your numbers are wrong.  MSFT made .66 in FY 2001 (ends in June) and 2011 TTM right now is $2.54 which is slightly understated because 4Q FY11 will beat last year's results.  EDIT:  I think you may have meant FY 2002, but still the EPS is 0.70, nowhere near your number of 94 cents.  You need to use the current MSFT TTM numbers because of the unfairness of when the fiscal year ends (June vs December for Berkshire).

 

That is a 3.84x increase for Microsoft and it is already better than the results for Berkshire that you gave us, yet it would be more than 4x increase if they had not returned capital to shareholders but instead had bought productive assets.  The shareholders can take their cash and buy those assets themselves, then count the earnings towards their MSFT shares to level the comparison.

 

EDIT:

Better, just take the 10% MSFT special dividend and assume you used it to buy MSFT shares.  So just take the $2.54 number and multiply by 1.1x, gets you to $2.79, which is 4.23x the 2001 number of 0.66.  Then there have been other dividends that I've not yet counted, and of course $2.54 was a little bit understated because of Q4 2010.

 

[ERICOPOLY]

 

-Microsoft did not create WebTV. They acquired the company for $425 Million, pretty much right at the time people stopped using the product. It was a pretty horrible acquisition.

 

-It hasn't been a shortage of ideas that's hurt Microsoft. It's been poor execution. And nobody executes as well as Apple.

 

There was actually a Microsoft TV project several years before they bought WebTV.

 

[ERICOPOLY]

On the first point, a business growing earnings faster than equity is a good thing.  You've made it sound like under performance!  Further, do they suck more because of the 10% one-time special dividend, in addition to the ongoing dividends and buybacks?  Had they retained all that cash, your metric would reward the behavior.

 

BRK/b book value went from 25.30/share to 65.9/share from 2001-2010

MSFT results would be better if dividends are added back...

 

MSFT earned 90 cents/share in 2001 per value line.

 

 

 

Ask for your money back.

 

They earned $1.32 per Microsoft.  (before the 2:1 split)

[returnonmycapital]

Re: Microsoft earning in F2001

 

If you were to deduct the cost of issuing employee options in F2001, which I believe from F2002 on was expensed as per GAAP in the P&L, Microsoft earned only $5.084 bn in F2001, or about $0.48 per basic share outstanding. That would suggest a growth in earnings per basic share of approx. 18% per annum.

 

And owner earnings have been higher than GAAP earnings in most years between F01 & F11 (7 out of 10).

 

 

 

[returnonmycapital]

Actually, I am showing that it wasn't until F2004 that options were expensed as per GAAP.

[ERICOPOLY]

I know they lacked focus and didn't drive hard enough on phones, tablets, search, etc...  Vista took forever to deliver and then underwhelmed.  Etc..

 

There was a cultural shift that happened during this period.  I joined in 1997 and there were people 35 yrs old leaving to retire or do other things.  Regular retirement parties, the garage looked like a car show.  People worked evenings and weekends on a regular basis.

 

Then after the bust, nobody wanted to work evenings and weekends.  Once the stock came down in price, management cut benefits and generally kicked spoiled and entitled employees when they were already feeling down.  They even brought in Kevin Turner from Walmart to get costs squared away -- nobody is going to work weekends after that.

 

Today, most of us prima donnas who remember the go go years have moved on, saying it's not "Our Microsoft" anymore.  This is what has happened in the Ballmer era.  Many left for Google, where they were still throwing money around, giving stock options, etc...

 

Anyhow, I should think the current employees are more realistic and won't go through the kind of morale drain that we went through after losing so much so fast.  And the stock can likely only be a tailwind from here... many employees hold a ton of it still.

 

EDIT:

I forgot to mention... you could drink alcohol in your office.  It was normal for people to have mini-fridges loaded with beer in their offices.  People would have whiskey right up on their bookshelves!  This kind of stuff -- do you think it is tolerated at Wells Fargo?  We would not just have one or two, we would get ripped especially at the weekly "unwinder" Windows 2000 ship cycle parties (about once a week).  They've have kegs, wine, loud music, SVP (Brian Valentine) in a tutu comedy routine. Jim Allchin would play guitar.  It was really fun.  That all ended though.

[finetrader]

^{There was actually a Microsoft TV project several years before they bought WebTV}

 

These days phone companies are offering IPTV to compete against cable companies. The technology is based on Microsoft Mediaroom platform.

[Kraven]

I know they lacked focus and didn't drive hard enough on phones, tablets, search, etc...  Vista took forever to deliver and then underwhelmed.  Etc..

 

There was a cultural shift that happened during this period.  I joined in 1997 and there were people 35 yrs old leaving to retire or do other things.  Regular retirement parties, the garage looked like a car show.  People worked evenings and weekends on a regular basis.

 

Then after the bust, nobody wanted to work evenings and weekends.  Once the stock came down in price, management cut benefits and generally kicked spoiled and entitled employees when they were already feeling down.  They even brought in Kevin Turner from Walmart to get costs squared away -- nobody is going to work weekends after that.

 

Today, most of us prima donnas who remember the go go years have moved on, saying it's not "Our Microsoft" anymore.  This is what has happened in the Ballmer era.  Many left for Google, where they were still throwing money around, giving stock options, etc...

 

Anyhow, I should think the current employees are more realistic and won't go through the kind of morale drain that we went through after losing so much so fast.  And the stock can likely only be a tailwind from here... many employees hold a ton of it still.

 

EDIT:

I forgot to mention... you could drink alcohol in your office.  It was normal for people to have mini-fridges loaded with beer in their offices.  People would have whiskey right up on their bookshelves!  This kind of stuff -- do you think it is tolerated at Wells Fargo?  We would not just have one or two, we would get ripped especially at the weekly "unwinder" Windows 2000 ship cycle parties (about once a week).  They've have kegs, wine, loud music, SVP (Brian Valentine) in a tutu comedy routine. Jim Allchin would play guitar.  It was really fun.  That all ended though.

 

Good post.  Those were good years.  In many ways it was the same at some level in most businesses then.  There was a very real sense of "the sky is the limit" on things.  Everyone was going to change the world and make beaucoup bucks (as a friend of mine used to say). 

[shalab]

Ask for your money back

 

Probably I should  ;D. Again, using valueline MSFT data, adding in dividends, the book value would have been 11.11$/share. It is better than what looks like on the surface but still trails BRK from 2001-2010 period.

[ERICOPOLY]

Ask for your money back

 

Probably I should  ;D. Again, using valueline MSFT data, adding in dividends, the book value would have been 11.11$/share. It is better than what looks like on the surface but still trails BRK from 2001-2010 period.

 

However, it's optimal to be growing earnings while shrinking book value.  I'm describing a situation of ever increasing ROE.

 

Do more with less.

 

 

[tombgrt]

Funny how Mr. Market is reacting, almost up 3% because someone told them the stock is cheap.  :D

 

Maybe even funnier that Buffett basically said the same but then almost no one seemed to care about it?

[txlaw]

I think in Microsoft's case, they were so busy protecting the moat, that they missed some of the innovation that was going on around them.  They were so late when it came to search, mobile and cloud.  I think they've recognized that in the last couple of years, and have been working on the innovation side again.  But this industry moves very quickly...not like missing out on Gatorade or Frito-Lay in Coca-cola's case.   Cheers!

 

I would agree with that assessment.  

 

The businesses they were trying to protect were some of the best businesses the world has ever seen.  That blinded them to the way things were being disrupted by the ubiquitous connectivity that is only now starting to come to fruition.  

 

They also used their power to control things in a way that hurt consumers in the short run, so I'm glad they have paid for it by being late to the game.

 

 

Actually, I have to revise my statement, which was wrong.  Microsoft wasn't blinded to the disruption that ubiquitous connectivity would cause.  Bill Gates knew very well how the Internet would change things.  

 

And that's why Microsoft took actions to try to kill the web as an alternative platform that would severely reduce the value of the Wintel monopoly.  It wasn't just about bundling IE with Windows.  They actually told large Windows resellers like Compaq that they would terminate their reseller agreements if they put Netscape icons on the desktop instead of IE.  And like I said on another thread, MSFT actually tried to kill Java by creating a shitty implementation of it because they saw it as a threat to the Windows platform.  MSFT also always tries to fight against any collaborative standardization that would reduce the value of their proprietary standards which help keep their products sticky due to the network effect.

 

You guys who are dogging on Janet Reno are letting your bias towards owning MSFT determine your view on the matter.  Whether MSFT was guilty of "monopolization" is debatable, but they certainly weren't doing anything that was consumer friendly.  Microsoft was like the Comcast of today.  Fighting tooth and nail to protect their business to the detriment of society.

 

They also sucked on execution even though they did foresee how things would turn out.  WebTV is a good example, although they also had to go up against the last mile guys in that battle.  Just read Bill Gates' 1995 memo to the troops to see how forward thinking he was.

 

[ERICOPOLY]

I think in Microsoft's case, they were so busy protecting the moat, that they missed some of the innovation that was going on around them.  They were so late when it came to search, mobile and cloud.  I think they've recognized that in the last couple of years, and have been working on the innovation side again.  But this industry moves very quickly...not like missing out on Gatorade or Frito-Lay in Coca-cola's case.   Cheers!

 

I would agree with that assessment.  

 

The businesses they were trying to protect were some of the best businesses the world has ever seen.  That blinded them to the way things were being disrupted by the ubiquitous connectivity that is only now starting to come to fruition.  

 

They also used their power to control things in a way that hurt consumers in the short run, so I'm glad they have paid for it by being late to the game.

 

 

Actually, I have to revise my statement, which was wrong.  Microsoft wasn't blinded to the disruption that ubiquitous connectivity would cause.  Bill Gates knew very well how the Internet would change things.  

 

And that's why Microsoft took actions to try to kill the web as an alternative platform that would severely reduce the value of the Wintel monopoly.  It wasn't just about bundling IE with Windows.  They actually told large Windows resellers like Compaq that they would terminate their reseller agreements if they put Netscape icons on the desktop instead of IE.  And like I said on another thread, MSFT actually tried to kill Java by creating a shitty implementation of it because they saw it as a threat to the Windows platform.  MSFT also always tries to fight against any collaborative standardization that would reduce the value of their proprietary standards which help keep their products sticky due to the network effect.

 

You guys who are dogging on Janet Reno are letting your bias towards owning MSFT determine your view on the matter.  Whether MSFT was guilty of "monopolization" is debatable, but they certainly weren't doing anything that was consumer friendly.  Microsoft was like the Comcast of today.  Fighting tooth and nail to protect their business to the detriment of society.

 

They also sucked on execution even though they did foresee how things would turn out.  WebTV is a good example, although they also had to go up against the last mile guys in that battle.  Just read Bill Gates' 1995 memo to the troops to see how forward thinking he was.

 

 

Apple boots up quickly, in part because there isn't an OEM (like Compaq for example) preloading all kinds of crap services that start up and interfere.  Microsoft has a right to make the Windows experience better by shipping the product to consumers as it was originally tested (actually, the govt showed that they don't have this "right").

 

That software would commonly cause hangs and crashes, general performance slowdowns -- people would blame that shit on Microsoft.  EDIT:  I won't name names, but did you know an OEM-installed service can pop a modal dialog window on a non-interactive desktop?  Or that third-party anti-virus software installed by the OEM can ruin the performance of the machine, but that Microsoft isn't allowed to preload and pre-run it's own antivirus software that it actually has immediate control over improving and fixing bugs?  Oh yeah, it can't do that because it wouldn't be good for consumers to have antivirus bundled in by Microsoft, where it can be thoroughly stress tested and performance tested during OS product development.

 

I bought a MacBook and only Safari is preloaded.  Are they trying to kill the web?

 

EDIT:  I wonder if BestBuy installed their own software on MacBooks before sale:  would Apple allow that, or would they instead sue or threaten to not allow BestBuy to carry Apple products?

 

[txlaw]

Apple boots up quickly, in part because there isn't an OEM (like Compaq for example) preloading all kinds of crap services that start up and interfere.  Microsoft has a right to make the Windows experience better by shipping the product to consumers as it was originally tested (actually, the govt showed that they don't have this "right").

 

That software would commonly cause hangs and crashes, general performance slowdowns -- people would blame that shit on Microsoft.

 

Yeah, but was it kosher to force OEMs to prominently display IE instead of Netscape on the desktop or otherwise face the prospect of having their license to sell a necessary part of the PC revoked? 

 

Microsoft would argue that they were merely enforcing their contracts with the OEMS and that they were shipping an OS that needed to have access to the web built into it.

 

But we're not talking about a regular company here.  We're talking about a company that was the dominant monopoly in the platform business.  Antitrust law requires that monopolies are treated differently than non-dominant companies.

 

You can attack the media as being stupid or for looking for a villain.  But take a look at the the actual findings of fact by Judge Jackson before you decide that the media made a big deal out of nothing.

 

I bought a MacBook and only Safari is preloaded.  Are they trying to kill the web?

 

EDIT:  I wonder if BestBuy installed their own software on MacBooks before sale:  would Apple allow that, or would they instead sue or threaten to not allow BestBuy to carry Apple products?

 

Apple made their WebKit engine open source and is supporting the development of HTML 5.  Quite a different outlook than MSFT.

 

However, if Apple ever had dominant market share in the OS business similar to what MSFT had (which will never happen), it might be a problem tying iTunes or Safari to its various OSes, especially iOS.

 

------

 

By the way, I should probably disclose that I worked at Google pre-IPO (and left pre-IPO -- I was young and my outlook on life was a bit different back then), and that I have interviewed for various in-house counsel positions there (have been rejected each time, unfortunately).

 

So you should know that I'm biased towards Google.

[ERICOPOLY]

So you should know that I'm biased towards Google.

 

The IE team bent over backwards to allow third parties like Yahoo and Google to provide things like search toolbars directly into the IE user interface.

 

That wasn't hurting to Google was it?  And as I've mentioned AOL built their browser using IE components -- that was hurting them?

 

Look, finally they stopped their whining and just made their own shell on top of LINUX -- Chrome.  Despite the monopoly right?  Everybody wants something for free, glad they were forced to earn it in the end, just as Apple has been doing.  

 

Nothing was stopping them from making a better mousetrap.  Just like nothing is stopping them today.

 

And Netscape... please.  I used NCSA Mosaic before Netscape was even a company.  In fact, Andreeson was behind MOSAIC at NCSA.  Then he started Netscape and decided what was free before should now be sold at a price.  Microsoft merely made it free again.  Netscape was always competing against a free product, not just IE.

 

Now, IE's share has declined rapidly because Firefox has been better.  Had Netscape been that much better than IE4 and IE5, they might have made it, but surely only for a given time until open source projects would have killed it and Chrome would have come along.

 

[txlaw]

So you should know that I'm biased towards Google.

 

The IE team bent over backwards to allow third parties like Yahoo and Google to provide things like search toolbars directly into the IE user interface.

 

That wasn't hurting to Google was it?

 

Look, finally they stopped their whining and just made their own shell on top of LINUX -- Chrome.  Despite the monopoly right?  Everybody wants something for free, glad they were forced to earn it in the end, just as Apple has been doing.  

 

Nothing was stopping them from making a better mousetrap.  Just like nothing is stopping them today.

 

And Netscape... please.  I used NCSA Mosaic before Netscape was even a company.  In fact, Andreeson was behind MOSAIC at NCSA.  Then he started Netscape and decided what was free before should now be sold at a price.  Microsoft merely made it free again.  Netscape was always competing against a free product, not just IE.

 

Now, IE's share has declined rapidly because Firefox has been better.  Had Netscape been that much better than IE4 and IE5, they might have made it, but surely only for a given time until open source projects would have killed it and Chrome would have come along.

 

 

Bending over backwards?  Please!

 

That's nothing different than the way they tried to influence Netscape to use MSFT-developed Internet-related APIs in order to prevent the "commoditization" of their lucrative OS business.

 

Embrace, extend, and extinguish.  Evil.

 

Only Google is picking up the torch and going forward with developing both regular client-side and thin-client platforms that will cause margin compression to MSFT.  Much to Steve Ballmer's horror, who likes to whine about how Google is developing two platforms.  Shocking!

[ERICOPOLY]

Only Google is picking up the torch and going forward with developing both regular client-side and thin-client platforms that will cause margin compression to MSFT.  Much to Steve Ballmer's horror, who likes to whine about how Google is developing two platforms.  Shocking!

 

Google would have made their Chrome free to unseat Netscape, don't you think?  Aren't they doing that very same strategy by giving away productivity software?  Hypocrites.  Oh, and we must not suspect that they've running this strategy to protect their SEARCH MONOPOLY... no... not after the arguments you made about monopolies and how they must not be allowed to protect what they have by trying to weaken a competitor who has say, Bing!  But yes, all in the name of altruism, giving consumers a free Office suite -- just like Microsoft benefited consumers by creating a free Netscape alternative.

 

Or would it have been a platform where it doesn't ship on the OS, but then you pay for Chrome brower separately?  It would be called the "Book", not the "Chromebook".  Can I get one with Firefox pre-installed, called the "Firefoxbook"?

 

I think it's great that Google has managed to accomplish what Microsoft has, which is to ship an OS platform product of their own.  I want to buy a Chromebook actually, except so far I can only find models not yet shipped from Samsung for example, with extremely small drives.  I want at least 128GB because my online connectivity isn't so hot and I still need physical drive storage, not just cloud.

 

 

And all this time I'm using a MacBook Pro to respond on this thread.  Oh wait, that's not possible because Windows has a monopoly right?  Perhaps it's possible because Microsoft invested $150m in Apple in 1998.

 

[txlaw]

Google would have made their Chrome free to unseat Netscape, don't you think?

 

Or would it have been a platform where it doesn't ship on the OS, but then you pay for Chrome brower separately?  It would be called the "Book", not the "Chromebook".

 

I think it's great that Google has managed to accomplish what Microsoft has, which is to ship an OS platform product of their own.  I want to buy a Chromebook actually, except so far I can only find models not yet shipped from Samsung for example, with extremely small drives.  I want at least 128GB because my online connectivity isn't so hot and I still need physical drive storage, not just cloud.

 

Yeah, but MSFT had a monopoly position, and it abused it. 

 

Hey, if you're an OEM and you want to sell to consumers and especially to businesses, who virtually all require Windows due to the network effect, you better not market Netscape on the desktop.  Because otherwise, we're taking your license away and you're toast.

 

Oh, and if you're Netscape, you better use our proprietary APIs or we're going to dominate you by making sure that all businesses have to rely on IE because we know that once business start developing websites for IE, it will be more difficult for future businesses to ignore IE and all the other MSFT standards that are tied to IE.

 

Oh, and if you're Sun Microsystems, watch out because we're going to insert a Trojan into the market so that the write once, run anywhere promise of Java is destroyed.

 

Would Google do that?  Hell no!

 

And all this time I'm using a MacBook Pro to respond on this thread.  Oh wait, that's not possible because Windows has a monopoly right?  Perhaps it's possible because Microsoft invested $150m in Apple in 1998.

 

Uhh, Windows did have a monopoly, and they tried everything in their power to protect it.  Competition eventually rose, but not before MSFT raked in billions and billions of dollars of monopoly profits.

[txlaw]

I see you edited your post.

 

Google would have made their Chrome free to unseat Netscape, don't you think?  Aren't they doing that very same strategy by giving away productivity software?  Hypocrites.  Oh, and we must not suspect that they've running this strategy to protect their SEARCH MONOPOLY... no... not after the arguments you made about monopolies and how they must not be allowed to protect what they have by trying to weaken a competitor who has say, Bing!  But yes, all in the name of altruism, giving consumers a free Office suite -- just like Microsoft benefited consumers by creating a free Netscape alternative.

 

The difference is that Google is making things better for consumers, which is benefiting Google. 

 

Microsoft had no qualms about sabotaging the potential of various technologies to the detriment of consumers and to the benefit of themselves.

 

Google's interest is aligned with consumers, except one might argue on the privacy front, which is what Microsoft does argue.

 

Or would it have been a platform where it doesn't ship on the OS, but then you pay for Chrome brower separately?  It would be called the "Book", not the "Chromebook".  Can I get one with Firefox pre-installed, called the "Firefoxbook"?

 

Chrome OS is built off of Chromium, which is open source, so you could develop a competing thin-client OS or browser if you wanted to. 

 

And maybe there will be a Firefoxbook.

[ERICOPOLY]

 

Yeah, but MSFT had a monopoly position, and it abused it.  

 

I grew up with Apple, then Apple II, then Apple IIplus, then Mac.  My family never even used a Windows PC until I became the first in the summer of 1995.  It was dual-boot with LINUX!  And that came pre-installed dual boot from a retailer.

 

Fact is, Microsoft wiped the floor with Apple.  Now the reverse may be happening.

 

Neither had a true monopoly.  All Google had to do is build a Chromebook instead of whine -- nobody is going to use it until it comes to market.  All Apple had to do is build a much better product and people are all over it.  There's no monopoly to Windows that keeps competitors from succeeding, there's only a bunch of whiners in the late 1990s who tried to litigate instead of innovate.  Once litigation failed, they innovated.  Now that innovation is bearing fruit.

 

Coke has a monopoly on their recipe, and Pepsi has a monopoly on theirs.  

 

Hey, if you're an OEM and you want to sell to consumers and especially to businesses, who virtually all require Windows due to the network effect, you better not market Netscape on the desktop.  Because otherwise, we're taking your license away and you're toast.

 

It's really not that big of a deal -- Netscape actually sucked, I should know I stress tested it to see where they were at.  

 

Apple cuts the OEMs out all together!  Can you imagine what little choice there would be if Microsoft had lost the initial battle to Apple?

 

Oh, and if you're Sun Microsystems, watch out because we're going to insert a Trojan into the market so that the write once, run anywhere promise of Java is destroyed.

 

You're giving too much credit to Microsoft on that one.  Anyone could write their client side programs in Java based on the Sun VM, but they didn't want to because of performance.  I mean, I ditched my Blue Ray player because it booted so slowly (loading the Java VM).  It is a better server side technology, something Sun wouldn't concede.

 

How many apps can you name that were developed to the Microsoft VM.  Name me five.  Okay, I'll give you a long time to get back to me on that one.  I think Netscape tried to develop a Sun based Java browser but it sucked so completely that they scuttled it.

 

How about this?  Did Google develop their browser in Sun Java code?  Was it because Microsoft's VM existed?  NOPE!  Next time you're at Google, drop by the Chrome browser development lead's office and ask him why they didn't write the application in Sun's Java. 

 

A friend of mine (who left MS in 1998) was in Bellevue at a business lunch 4 or 5 years ago and Scott McNealy sat down.  There were people ribbing him for how much Java sucked.  It was not a Microsoft lunch.

[20ppy]

Today's landscape would've been the same had there not been a DOJ MSFT antitrust lawsuit. The politics around the MSFT monopoly abuse are truly just that. Nobody really can monopolize in the high-tech field for long, except LVLT I hope :)

 

That's one reason WEB keeps on saying that he does not understand high-tech, he really means he thinks high-tech is high risk over the long run. Anyway, over the long run, PCs will be eventually be taken over by new technologies. If MSFT keeps on innovate, they can still be here. Thanks to Steve Ballmer, MSFT share price is kept the way it is today, so some of us can profit from. A change of leadership will surely but slowly release some the values in MSFT business. But long term, don't go with MSFT, don't go with any high-tech for that matter.

 

 

[txlaw]

Neither had a true monopoly.  All Google had to do is build a Chromebook instead of whine -- nobody is going to use it until it comes to market.  All Apple had to do is build a much better product and people are all over it.  There's no monopoly to Windows that keeps competitors from succeeding, there's only a bunch of whiners in the late 1990s who tried to litigate instead of innovate.  Once litigation failed, they innovated.  Now that innovation is bearing fruit.

 

You're misunderstanding the nature of monopolies.  Just because a monopoly was eroded over time doesn't mean there wasn't one that was kept in place longer than it should have been due to monopolistic practices.  By your definition, AT&T was never a monopoly because they eventually got displaced by the Internet.

 

You can deny how the network effect helped MSFT become a monopoly all you want, but you're not gonna convince me that there was never any monopoly.

 

And do you know how much money MSFT spends for advertising and lobbying instead of innovating?  Do you know how much time MSFT has spent in court bringing IP suits against competitors?

 

Google and others have had to spend an inordinate amount of time developing and protecting IP so that they can continue to create open standards without having folks like MSFT trying to cram in standards where they will get a patent royalty.

 

Gimme a break on the whole "all they can do is sue" argument. 

 

Apple cuts the OEMs out all together!  Can you imagine what little choice there would be if Microsoft had lost the initial battle to Apple?

 

I won't argue there.

 

How many apps can you name that were developed to the Microsoft VM.  Name me five.  Okay, I'll give you a long time to get back to me on that one.  I think Netscape tried to develop a Sun based Java browser but it sucked so completely that they scuttled it.

 

No way I can answer that one. 

 

It was well before my time, and plus I'm not a developer.