Comments on: Meet the tech world's latest odd couple
When it comes to IBM and Microsoft, CNET News.com's Charles Cooper explains why it's a case of can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.
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As we say on the big lists, "Spy vs Spy". Limiting choice for consumers to one's own products while expanding the choices among one's own products is the soul of competition. Thus the reference to the MAD cartoon that illustrates to each generation of truth-seeking kids that the truth is, both sides have the same goals, use the same tactics and ultimately in each issue, are only known by who is on top today.
So in the end it comes down to the numbers.
Given the numbers, the Office document formats from Microsoft are on top. Microsoft can build bridges to other technologies or buy them, but they will take care of their own customers first as they should. The rest of the noise is noise generated to cover the noise coming their way. As the moderator of the panel at the Atlanta XML conference where representatives of both sides met to discuss this, I can say with first person certainty that neither side yields and both sides know that if they do, the other side steals their lunch money.
IBM makes big$$$ selling services. The day that a different technology yields better $$$ for services, they switch. The game of standards (and it is a game) is chump change in that market. Interoperability and sustainability are for them longlife cycle maintenance costs borne by the customer and paid to them. It is not in their interests to make that a seamless process; it is in their interests to make it affordable.
And so it goes. Capitalism is the never-ending passing of costs from peak to valley with an emergent frequency of transfers of capital up into every increasing sinks of wealth which the wealthy will tell you trickles down but the savvy will tell you has to be burgled to be taken back.
How did George Wallace put it? Not a dime's worth of difference.
As we say on the big lists, "Spy vs Spy". Limiting choice for consumers to one's own products while expanding the choices among one's own products is the soul of competition. Thus the reference to the MAD cartoon that illustrates to each generation of truth-seeking kids that the truth is, both sides have the same goals, use the same tactics and ultimately in each issue, are only known by who is on top today.
So in the end it comes down to the numbers.
Given the numbers, the Office document formats from Microsoft are on top. Microsoft can build bridges to other technologies or buy them, but they will take care of their own customers first as they should. The rest of the noise is noise generated to cover the noise coming their way. As the moderator of the panel at the Atlanta XML conference where representatives of both sides met to discuss this, I can say with first person certainty that neither side yields and both sides know that if they do, the other side steals their lunch money.
IBM makes big$$$ selling services. The day that a different technology yields better $$$ for services, they switch. The game of standards (and it is a game) is chump change in that market. Interoperability and sustainability are for them longlife cycle maintenance costs borne by the customer and paid to them. It is not in their interests to make that a seamless process; it is in their interests to make it affordable.
And so it goes. Capitalism is the never-ending passing of costs from peak to valley with an emergent frequency of transfers of capital up into every increasing sinks of wealth which the wealthy will tell you trickles down but the savvy will tell you has to be burgled to be taken back.
How did George Wallace put it? Not a dime's worth of difference.
I find it humourously ironic that Microsoft criticizes IBM for it's tactics. In the referenced open letter, Microsoft says "...in other words, that Open XML should not even be considered on its technical merits because a competing standard had already been adopted.".
Back in the day, Microsoft was on the other side of the fence with Win3.1 and IBM's albeit brief attempt to make OS/2 Warp's superior technology the standard.
Like with any "odd couple", it's fun to watch the bickering -- as long as you're not caught in the crossfire.
I find it humourously ironic that Microsoft criticizes IBM for it's tactics. In the referenced open letter, Microsoft says "...in other words, that Open XML should not even be considered on its technical merits because a competing standard had already been adopted.".
Back in the day, Microsoft was on the other side of the fence with Win3.1 and IBM's albeit brief attempt to make OS/2 Warp's superior technology the standard.
Like with any "odd couple", it's fun to watch the bickering -- as long as you're not caught in the crossfire.
That's just not true, MS found themselves with a run-away success in the Windows product and tried to talk IBM into making OS/2 the "grown up" version of that product but IBM wanted MS and all the programmers who developed Windows applications to recode everything for the Presentation Manager API despite the fact that the tools for Windows were a lot less expensive (thanks to Borland), a lot more complete and better documented. Not to mention the $700+ price for OS/2.
MS saw it as better to fit the OS to the code than trying to get the users to switch to a different set of tools and API.
In any case, IBM's first 32-bit release of OS/2 (OS/2 2.0) was released in the spring of 1992 just on the heels of Windows 3.l, meaning Microsoft had a little momentum going into that head-to-head contest but arguably not enough to make the race a slam-dunk.
Instead, Microsoft relied on so-called "per-CPU" licensing contracts with OEMs (effectively limiting the bundling of any other OS) and platform-limiting deals with key software developers (restricting access to key Windows APIs in exchange for a promise to develop only for Windows) in order to make it difficult for IBM's offering to compete head-to-head in the marketplace.
The expensive development kits and high pricetag for OS/2 did exist, but well before any real head-to=head competition between the two ever took place. Those things did do some damage, especially in the eyes of smaller developers, but most of the damage was done to OS/2 by MS in other ways.
Want more information? Read more about it through court documents on Groklaw's Microsoft Litigation Page:
http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.php?page=2005010107100653
That's just not true, MS found themselves with a run-away success in the Windows product and tried to talk IBM into making OS/2 the "grown up" version of that product but IBM wanted MS and all the programmers who developed Windows applications to recode everything for the Presentation Manager API despite the fact that the tools for Windows were a lot less expensive (thanks to Borland), a lot more complete and better documented. Not to mention the $700+ price for OS/2.
MS saw it as better to fit the OS to the code than trying to get the users to switch to a different set of tools and API.
In any case, IBM's first 32-bit release of OS/2 (OS/2 2.0) was released in the spring of 1992 just on the heels of Windows 3.l, meaning Microsoft had a little momentum going into that head-to-head contest but arguably not enough to make the race a slam-dunk.
Instead, Microsoft relied on so-called "per-CPU" licensing contracts with OEMs (effectively limiting the bundling of any other OS) and platform-limiting deals with key software developers (restricting access to key Windows APIs in exchange for a promise to develop only for Windows) in order to make it difficult for IBM's offering to compete head-to-head in the marketplace.
The expensive development kits and high pricetag for OS/2 did exist, but well before any real head-to=head competition between the two ever took place. Those things did do some damage, especially in the eyes of smaller developers, but most of the damage was done to OS/2 by MS in other ways.
Want more information? Read more about it through court documents on Groklaw's Microsoft Litigation Page:
http://www.groklaw.net/staticpages/index.php?page=2005010107100653
- Lotus is still good
- by irdac February 17, 2007 12:08 AM PST
- Lotus Smartsuite may have few users today but it s still much more friendly than Office. I have to use MS Office but many times I return to Wordpro to get things done without the interference of MS who believe they know better than I do what I want to achieve.
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- Lotus is still good
- by bagg44 February 17, 2007 7:36 AM PST
- I prefer SmartSuite to the Office Suite, but it's becoming more and more a quixotic preference. IBM/Lotus customer support is skewed towards a corporate customer base. It's horrible. You have to go through layers of phone menus to get to layers of people who finally set up a call back. If they want to beat Microsoft (any other software company for that matter), they need to improve customer support for a WONDERFUL office suite that they are letting flounder. It's a shame.
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