greed (was)

[Mike Meyer]

Paul Rudin <paul.rudin at ntlworld.com> writes:

> Mongryong <Mongryong at sympatico.ca> writes:
> I suspect the way Microsoft licencing is going will encourage
> this. Windows is used partly because lots of people don't actually buy
> all the licences they need. Microsoft's clamping down on this may
> actually something of an own goal. Sure they'll extract more money
> from those who are actually using their software, but they'll push
> more people to actively consider the alternatives and weaken the
> perception that windows is the only thing to have on your desktop.

But the people microsoft will push away are the ones who weren't
buying enough licenses to begin with. Basically, they'll lose the
freeloaders, which won't hurt their cash flow. At least not at first.

If they don't want to risk the OS market going from a near-monopoly to
a commodity marketplace, they can't clamp down to hard.

        <mike
-- 
Mike Meyer <mwm at mired.org>			http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/
Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information.