Firefox Founders: "We want to make money..."
John Bailo
http://www.forbes.com/business/2005/08/03/mozilla-firefox-forprofit-cx_ld_0803mozilla.html?partner=yahootix
Companies & Strategies
Firefox Goes For-Profit
Lisa DiCarlo, 08.03.05, 6:00 AM ET
NEW YORK - In less than one year, the open source Firefox Web browser
has been downloaded onto more than 76 million computers worldwide. Now,
the Mozilla Foundation, the non-profit entity that develops and
distributes Firefox, is forming a for-profit subsidiary that will
eventually capitalize on the browser's popularity.
The Mozilla Foundation will announce today that it has formed a
wholly-owned subsidiary, Mozilla Corp., that acknowledges the economic
value of the Firefox browser, and will attempt to get a return on it
without violating the fundamental tenants of the open source Mozilla
Foundation.
"We want to make money if and when it's appropriate for the goals of the
project to do so," says Mitchell Baker, president of the Mozilla
Foundation. "We don't just want to pull money out of Firefox."
lqu...@uku.co.uk
In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens
when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The
idea is to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they
get established in the marketplace.
When the China dumps textiles below cost people get all upset over it
saying it hurts US companies. Fundementally this is no different then
dumping free software "below cost" on the US market.
Tim Smith
lqu...@uku.co.uk wrote:
> In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens when
> China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The idea is
> to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they get
> established in the marketplace.
That's not very good a comparison, since textiles and steel get used, and
then you need more. E.g., if a building company buys some cheap steel, then
uses it in a building, when they need more for their next building, they
need to buy more.
With OSS, that's not the case. No matter what the OSS provider does in the
future (including switching to a commercial version that costs a lot of
money once the competition is gone), the OSS version is still there.
> When the China dumps textiles below cost people get all upset over it
> saying it hurts US companies. Fundementally this is no different then
> dumping free software "below cost" on the US market.
Well, aside from the fact that "below cost" doesn't apply to software. In a
perfectly free market, competition drives the price of things to their
*marginal* cost of production. The marginal cost of production of software
is very close to zero.
--
--Tim Smith
lqu...@uku.co.uk
If the software is distributed over the web then the 'marginal cost' is
closer to zero then anything else I can think of.
But why do you say that 'below cost doesn't apply to software'?
Developing software has a "cost" simply because it takes time to
develop software. And that's not even mentioning the other things like
the creative and intellectual aspects of writing software.
Because there is no material cost doesn't make developing software
free. Things like literature (notice I didn't say books), music, legal
help, medical examinations, psychiatric counseling don't require
materials but they are not considered to be free.
Snit
4_4Ie.2375$ns....@newsread1.news.atl.earthlink.net on 8/3/05 8:00 AM:
> In article <1123078129.1...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com>,
> lqu...@uku.co.uk wrote:
>> In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens when
>> China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The idea is
>> to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they get
>> established in the marketplace.
>
> That's not very good a comparison, since textiles and steel get used, and
> then you need more. E.g., if a building company buys some cheap steel, then
> uses it in a building, when they need more for their next building, they
> need to buy more.
>
> With OSS, that's not the case. No matter what the OSS provider does in the
> future (including switching to a commercial version that costs a lot of
> money once the competition is gone), the OSS version is still there.
True... but software often becomes dated quite quickly. How many 20 year old
buildings are there... 50 year old? 100? Quite a few.
How many users use a web browser older than a couple of years... maybe they
go back as far as Win 98's version of IE... and that is becoming quite rare.
--
God made me an atheist - who are you to question his authority?
_________________________________________
Usenet Zone Free Binaries Usenet Server
More than 120,000 groups
Unlimited download
http://www.usenetzone.com to open account
The Ghost In The Machine
<lqu...@uku.co.uk>
wrote
on 3 Aug 2005 07:08:49 -0700
<1123078129.1...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com>:
OK. So how do we stop this practice?
Obviously, Microsoft is going to have to lobby their
congresspersons -- I'd have to look to see who's
representing Washington state -- and get laws passed so
that all software is sold at fair market value, where fair
market value is determined by a governmental committee.
Yeah, that'll work.
:-P
--
#191, ewi...@earthlink.net
It's still legal to go .sigless.
Jeff_Relf
Hi John_Bailo, You cited a Forbes article that told of
FireFox's millions in gross_income and plans to make even more:
BitTorrent was ruined after it's founder, Bram Cohen, got greedy.
I no longer use it. Now it looks like FireFox is going down that same path.
A Bram_Cohen bio is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Cohen
I find it ironic that FireFox is making millions off searches
because I'm seriously considering dumping FireFox
in favor of adding web_browsing to my X.EXE .
My browser would do a much better job of searching the current page,
as it'd be an improvement on Visual_Studio's searching system.
Visual_Studio has, by miles, the best text searching system I've ever seen.
One pair of arrows on my toolbar repeatedly finds, up or down,
the word or selection under the text cursor.
Another pair of arrows repeats whatever the last search was,
ignoring the text cursor. The arrows look like this:
lqu...@uku.co.uk
Exactly what I was thinking.... where there's a problem there has to be
a government solution (not).
>From an economic 'supply and demand' perspective OSS ends up hurting
those who write the software. Presumably these OSS guys are software
engineers somewhere. (Reasonable since they know how to write
software.) So let's say that Gimp or something causes Macromedia and
Adobe to go bankrupt. (Hmmm... people complain that Msft has caused the
demise of companies.)
Anyhow, all the software engineers from Macromedia and Adobe are now
out in the job market looking for new jobs. The 'demand' for software
engineers is down (2 fewer companies) meanwhile the supply side is up
with displaced workers. In the end this tends to drive down wages so
when the "Gimp guys" go to look for their next job the job market will
be worse for them.
chrisv
>In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens
>when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The
>idea is to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they
>get established in the marketplace.
You've made multiple errors in the above statement. "Getting
established in the marketplace" is a different thing than "driving out
the competition".
1. There's nothing wrong with taking loses to get established in the
marketplace. 2. Being "established in the marketplace" does NOT
allow you to raise prices above what are fair-market.
Where problems CAN arise are when a company that has extraordinary
market power (or money) takes loses with the goal of driving-out most
of it's competition. The long-term goal in that scenario is to able
to charge higher-than-fair-market prices.
>When the China dumps textiles below cost people get all upset over it
>saying it hurts US companies. Fundementally this is no different then
>dumping free software "below cost" on the US market.
Wrong. It's completely different.
Jesse F. Hughes
> From an economic 'supply and demand' perspective OSS ends up hurting
> those who write the software. Presumably these OSS guys are software
> engineers somewhere. (Reasonable since they know how to write
> software.) So let's say that Gimp or something causes Macromedia and
> Adobe to go bankrupt. (Hmmm... people complain that Msft has caused the
> demise of companies.)
>
> Anyhow, all the software engineers from Macromedia and Adobe are now
> out in the job market looking for new jobs. The 'demand' for software
> engineers is down (2 fewer companies) meanwhile the supply side is up
> with displaced workers. In the end this tends to drive down wages so
> when the "Gimp guys" go to look for their next job the job market will
> be worse for them.
Indeed. Right thinking people *never* contribute to free software
projects.
You've convinced me.
Altruism: there's just no percentages in it.
--
"All intelligent men are cowards. The Chinese are the world's worst
fighters because they are an intelligent race[...] An average Chinese
child knows what the European gray-haired statesmen do not know, that
by fighting one gets killed or maimed." -- Lin Yutang
John Bailo
> In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens
> when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The
> idea is to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they
> get established in the marketplace.
Gee, that sounds a lot like....oooohhhh, *capitalism* -- as in, the same
thing that Microsoft does every day!
>
> When the China dumps textiles below cost people get all upset over it
> saying it hurts US companies. Fundementally this is no different then
> dumping free software "below cost" on the US market.
>
Yes, but for every person "hurt" by cheap clothes, there are 100 others
who go out and buy the clothes.
This, again, is the same strategy by which M$ remains popular. For
every company producing a product that used to sell for $100 a copy,
which is then made obsolete by a M$ plugin, there are 100 million who
will happily install the free M$ plugin.
Now, OSS is doing the same thing globally, but it's letting more people
play the game instead of the 5 or so people who own the majority of M$...
AND, it's proving that people can do business and make money even when
the 'source' is open.
lqu...@uku.co.uk
I understand what you're saying. But how do you distinguish between:
"There's nothing wrong with taking loses to get established in the
marketplace."
- and -
"...when a company that has extraordinary market power (or money) takes
loses with the goal of driving-out most of it's competition."
Seems that the difference is highly subjective. We will unlikely never
know what transpired in the boardroom when the decision was made to
"take a loss" on a product.
Or do you think this falls into the same domain as obscenity when
Justice Potter Stewart said "I don't know how to define it, but I know
it when I see it."
lqu...@uku.co.uk
Jesse F. Hughes wrote:
> lqu...@uku.co.uk writes:
>
> > From an economic 'supply and demand' perspective OSS ends up hurting
> > those who write the software. Presumably these OSS guys are software
> > engineers somewhere. (Reasonable since they know how to write
> > software.) So let's say that Gimp or something causes Macromedia and
> > Adobe to go bankrupt. (Hmmm... people complain that Msft has caused the
> > demise of companies.)
> >
> > Anyhow, all the software engineers from Macromedia and Adobe are now
> > out in the job market looking for new jobs. The 'demand' for software
> > engineers is down (2 fewer companies) meanwhile the supply side is up
> > with displaced workers. In the end this tends to drive down wages so
> > when the "Gimp guys" go to look for their next job the job market will
> > be worse for them.
>
> Indeed. Right thinking people *never* contribute to free software
> projects.
>
> You've convinced me.
>
> Altruism: there's just no percentages in it.
>
That's not what I meant. Taken too literally anything can sound
"wacked" and this is no exception. Certainly there's good to be had by
contributing work. Whether it's software, scientific research,
literature, etc. I just think there needs to be a balance somewhere. I
don't see it as economically healthy thing to be producing free work to
the extent that it hurts companies and their employees.
John Bailo
> BitTorrent was ruined after it's founder, Bram Cohen, got greedy.
In what way was it /ruined/ ?
> Visual_Studio has, by miles, the best text searching system I've ever seen.
> One pair of arrows on my toolbar repeatedly finds, up or down,
> the word or selection under the text cursor.
Couldn't you use the Google API to write a smart client that does just
the same?
lqu...@uku.co.uk
>> happens when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market
>> at below cost. The idea is to drive out the competition and
>> then raise prices once they get established in the marketplace.
> Gee, that sounds a lot like....oooohhhh, *capitalism* -- as in,
> the same thing that Microsoft does every day!
So are you now officially "on record" as supporting capitalism and
doing whatever it takes to beat the competition?
The Ghost In The Machine
<SN...@CABLE0NE.NET.INVALID>
wrote
on Wed, 03 Aug 2005 08:34:46 -0700
<BF163226.27872%SN...@CABLE0NE.NET.INVALID>:
> "Tim Smith" <reply_i...@mouse-potato.com> stated in post
> 4_4Ie.2375$ns....@newsread1.news.atl.earthlink.net on 8/3/05 8:00 AM:
>
>> In article <1123078129.1...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com>,
>> lqu...@uku.co.uk wrote:
>>> In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens when
>>> China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The idea is
>>> to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they get
>>> established in the marketplace.
>>
>> That's not very good a comparison, since textiles and steel get used, and
>> then you need more. E.g., if a building company buys some cheap steel, then
>> uses it in a building, when they need more for their next building, they
>> need to buy more.
>>
>> With OSS, that's not the case. No matter what the OSS provider does in the
>> future (including switching to a commercial version that costs a lot of
>> money once the competition is gone), the OSS version is still there.
>
> True... but software often becomes dated quite quickly. How many 20 year old
> buildings are there... 50 year old? 100? Quite a few.
>
> How many users use a web browser older than a couple of years... maybe they
> go back as far as Win 98's version of IE... and that is becoming quite rare.
>
One cannot use older browsers on secure websites as the
certificates have expired, unless the certificates are
patched therein.
billwg
<lqu...@uku.co.uk> wrote in message
news:1123090409.5...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
:
: Seems that the difference is highly subjective. We will unlikely never
: know what transpired in the boardroom when the decision was made to
: "take a loss" on a product.
Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
losses.
Microsoft does what every other software company does and that is price
things according to their perception of what they are worth to consumers in
the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield from
that market. By satisfying some consumers outside the market operations,
OSS products essentially reduce the size of the market overall rather than
taking a share of the market, since a market can only be measured in terms
of the revenues resulting from sales in that market.
Many elements of the software industry involve a fee for service aspect,
though, and these things need to be paid for or else they would disappear.
Something as simple as reporting the news about software technology needs to
be paid for by the people who advertise their commercial products using that
technology. Otherwise you will never hear about some advance or other. It
is not a simple engine.
chrisv
Not at all. It's usually quite obvious whether or not a company has
extraordinary market power. If a company has well-over half the
market, that's a pretty good sign that they do. If they have less
than half the market, that's a pretty good sign that they don't. The
vast majority of companies fall into one of the above two categories.
>We will unlikely never
>know what transpired in the boardroom when the decision was made to
>"take a loss" on a product.
Irrelevant. The market share/power is easily observable.
>Or do you think this falls into the same domain as obscenity when
>Justice Potter Stewart said "I don't know how to define it, but I know
>it when I see it."
I defined it well-enough for the vast majority of market situations.
Certainly there will be gray areas.
John Bailo
I have always been on the record for that.
I am not anti-Microsoft or anti-Gates.
I think that Bill has done everything fair and square and has followed
the rules and profited from it legally.
I just want to have more Microsofts and More Gateses. I want to see 5
year old Punjabi girls become Bill Gates and 90 year old Lapp reindeer
herders become Bill Gates.
I want to see hundreds of companies (which I can consult for at high
rates, heh, heh) each having a critical part of the technology, not just
one that can bend things to its benefit.
It's the difference between giving a man a fish, and teaching a man to
fish. That is why I created my Thousannaire Club concept. I propose
that our goal be for each person on earth to always have $5000 in a
savings account, available to them, above the basic daily cost of living.
B Gruff
> True... but software often becomes dated quite quickly. How many 20
> year old
> buildings are there... 50 year old? 100? Quite a few.
>
> How many users use a web browser older than a couple of years... maybe
> they go back as far as Win 98's version of IE... and that is becoming
> quite rare.
This is true. So really you are just saying that with an OS, you are
not making an investment (like you would in buying a building), but
rather you ought to consider the cost of that OS very carefully,
because it's going to recur very quickly, again and again?
However, look at something like CD/DVD readers/writers.
Development has continued (there is a development cost).
There is a significant manufacturing cost
There is a distribution and warranty cost.
- yet over only a few years, the cost of these devices has tumbled.
By comparison, an O/S still has a development cost, BUT:-
- almost zero manufacturing cost
- distribution cost is almost zero if pre-installed (or downloaded)
- warranty claims must be very small (you sign away your rights with MS
when you start to use it!)
In addition, the market for OS increases year on year - probably faster
than for the CD/DVD readers/writers, in fact.
BUT the price of an MS OS stays high.
I wonder why?
Could it have something to do with the good and classically American
principles of free enterprise and competition in the case of the CD/DVD
readers/writers, and the Stalinist USSR (both un-American and
anti-American) "principles" which apply to the MS monopoly, do you
think?
Bill
Jeff_Relf
Hi John_Bailo,
I was talking about searching the current page, not a Google search.
FireFox's search is making them millions but it sucks, sucks, sucks.
My X.EXE would beat the living_shit out it... if I ever decided to write it.
Similarly, Bram_Cohen has beome very greedy,
so he's really cracking down on illegal file sharing,
so BitTorrents no longer work for me.
I don't need it anyways, as ShareAza.EXE is working like a major champ.
ShareAza is my eDonkey2000 and Gnutella_2 client.
I downloaded Donnie_Darko.AVI at 4 megabits per second recently,
I kid you not ! It's obviously an ultra_popular, pro_suicide movie.
ShareAza is one hell of a way to know how popular certain MP3s/AVIs are.
chrisv
><lqu...@uku.co.uk> wrote in message
>news:1123090409.5...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
>:
>: Seems that the difference is highly subjective. We will unlikely never
>: know what transpired in the boardroom when the decision was made to
>: "take a loss" on a product.
>:
>Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
>losses.
Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free,
to drive-under the Web browser competition?
>Microsoft does what every other software company doe and that is price
>things according to their perception of what they are worth to consumers in
>the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield from
>that market.
Wrong. A monopoly prices things at a different (higher) price than
what can be done in a competitive market. This is not only basic
economics, but intuitively obvious.
>(snip nonsensical bullshit)
John Bailo
> Hi John_Bailo,
>
> I was talking about searching the current page, not a Google search.
> FireFox's search is making them millions but it sucks, sucks, sucks.
> My X.EXE would beat the living_shit out it... if I ever decided to write it.
Yes, because as I remeber you parse all the hyperlinks, so you could
easily present that as sidebar, index to the HTML.
>
> Similarly, Bram_Cohen has beome very greedy,
> so he's really cracking down on illegal file sharing,
> so BitTorrents no longer work for me.
>
> I don't need it anyways, as ShareAza.EXE is working like a major champ.
> ShareAza is my eDonkey2000 and Gnutella_2 client.
>
> I downloaded Donnie_Darko.AVI at 4 megabits per second recently,
> I kid you not ! It's obviously an ultra_popular, pro_suicide movie.
> ShareAza is one hell of a way to know how popular certain MP3s/AVIs are.
>
Yes, I saw that a few months ago -- it's a real sleeper.
lqu...@uku.co.uk
upcoming bill before Congress that will allow cable television
companies to offer telephone service. (Currently they're not allowed to
under the 1992 cable act.) Financially this will be a huge plus to
companies like Comcast (CMCSA) who is the nations largest cable
provider.
So already there are issues with how this works.
In some areas of the country Comcast is the only available cable
company. Effectively they are the local cable monopoly and have 100% of
the local marketshare. Can Comcast offer service here at below cost? In
other parts of the country Time-Warner or Adelphia is the local cable
provider. Here Comcast has 0% of the marketshare. Can Comcast offer
service here at below cost? Complicate both of these cases by throwing
in long-term and short-term service. By long-term I basically mean
continued service and short-term is "for the first 6 months" where they
try and get new subscribers.
But that's just cable service. In theory Comcast has 0% of the
telephone market share. Should they, or shouldn't they be allowed to
offer phone service "below cost" even in places where they have 100% of
the cable market share. So does the 50% market share threshold apply to
50% of any market the company competes in or just an existing market.
Mind you that if this were somehow written in law, companies would find
ways to legally give the appearance of having <50% market share. They
could either form new sub-corporations for each market/product or
define these markets so narrowly that it appears as if it's a new
market altogether. (Ex. "Microsoft announced today that it will begin
selling WinXP to users in South Dakota with Intel 4.2Ghz processors and
200-Gig SATA hard drives. "We think this 'new market' creates an
exciting opportunity for us." said a Msft spokesman...." - You get
the idea.)
nes...@wigner.berkeley.edu
after what Microsoft did to Netscape. Netscape was trying to make a
profit, selling their browser for about $30. Microsoft, after rushing
to write their own browser, gave it away for free, until Netscape was
ruined. It's not illegal to sell below cost, but it is illegal for a
monopoly to destroy competitors this way.
Switching to the present day, does anyone think Microsoft would be
making improvements to IE if it were not for the competition from
Firefox? Does anyone believe that having a monopoly is good for the
consumer?
An irony about the current Google-Microsoft competition is that
Microsoft cannot pull a Netscape on Google---Google is already free.
Jesse F. Hughes
I don't recall you crying when MS started bundling its media player.
That's hurting other companies and employees, ain't it?
In any case, I don't see many companies failing due to open source
alternatives. Can you name any company whose downfall was largely due
to a competing OSS product? (There are a few who *should* fail,
perhaps, but I don't know any that *have* failed.)
Most wintrolls claim that Linux and Open Source will never be
successful, that they can't compete with the geniuses producing fine
proprietary products like Outlook Express and XP Starter Edition. So,
since these economic scalawags are toothless anyway, hey, why worry,
big guy?
--
"If you have a really big idea, you can get a measure of how big it is
by how much people resist the obvious. From what I've seen, I have a
REALLY, REALLY, *REALLY*, BIG DISCOVERY!!!"
--James Harris, on being ignored
Tom Shelton
> I still don't think that it's as simple as you believe it is. Take the
> upcoming bill before Congress that will allow cable television
> companies to offer telephone service. (Currently they're not allowed to
> under the 1992 cable act.) Financially this will be a huge plus to
> companies like Comcast (CMCSA) who is the nations largest cable
> provider.
>
> So already there are issues with how this works.
>
> In some areas of the country Comcast is the only available cable
> company. Effectively they are the local cable monopoly and have 100% of
> the local marketshare. Can Comcast offer service here at below cost? In
> other parts of the country Time-Warner or Adelphia is the local cable
> provider. Here Comcast has 0% of the marketshare. Can Comcast offer
> service here at below cost? Complicate both of these cases by throwing
> in long-term and short-term service. By long-term I basically mean
> continued service and short-term is "for the first 6 months" where they
> try and get new subscribers.
>
Comcast is already my local phone provider - unless you mean voip over
cable, and comcast has a service for that in some areas I believe...
--
Tom Shelton
The Ghost In The Machine
<1123087394....@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
Why not? Government works perfectly here -- Microsoft
lobbies, a bill gets passed outlawing FOSS after
acrimonious debate, the President signs it, everyone's
happy -- except the consumer, of course, who now has to
deal with subquality payware, but he doesn't count here;
he doesn't have the money, except as a collective, and last
I looked there's no real "consumers union", though there
is an organization of that name that advocates for
the buyer. :-) (http://www.consumerreports.com)
Don't look too closely at the process. (I'm not sure
the product is all that good either in this case, but
there are, for example, already noises for taxing the
"free" Internet -- and I for one would gently suggest a
government registry for counties to collect therefrom.
It's a simple system: sales tax is defined area by area,
and the Fedgov tracks the areas. Merchants must consult
this database and add the correct result to the total.
Results must be tracked along with the receipts, which
must dictate buyer location, seller location, amount,
and amount of tax.
There's a provision for crosslinking as well; some states
charge unitary sales tax, some do not; there might even be
a provision for shipping destination -- an issue if the
recipient is in fact a large corporation with multiple
ship-points.
The money comes back to the states as tax grants, though
this is probably negotiable. Foreign tax authorities
might also register, given treaty obligations. The US
would also register with foreign tax authorities, and try
to collect from those who do not have such registration
areas. [I could see a mass business migration here if we
botch this. Perhaps Bolton can suggest something in the
United Nations? :-) ]
These noises are similar in principle to outlawing free
software. Like it or not, the Internet is no longer
academic -- it's commercial, and commercial enterprises
deserve some protection from fraud, abuse, and unfair
competition. How much is an interesting question, since
I'm not sure FOSS is any of these [the main problem
is inconsistency of source and documentation, which is
nothing new, but technically-minded individuals can verify
the source, an option not available to CSS solutions]; a
number of individuals here, however, may have a different
opinion.)
Once this bill is passed and upheld by the Supreme Court --
non-crypto software cannot in any way be termed "free speech"
here (crypto software is a different area altogether, mostly
because of a decision by the 9th circuit IIRC regarding such;
it gets tangled in this area) -- sourceforge.net will become
sourceforge.com, Sun will require licensing fees for Java,
and Gentoo will have to charge to downloads.
And sales tax will close the governmental deficit (there will
be a Federal processing fee, probably 0.5%, to cover
administrative costs for the new tax system; it'll be *cheaper*
to go brick-and-mortar).
As you can see, everyone wins. Sort of.
(Since you're coming in from the UK, I'm not sure how that
plugs into the British Isles and the European Union. It
is unfortunate that the EU did not pass legislation similar
to American patents; multinationals will now have to work
with a rather Byzantine system, depending on where their
product is in fact being sold. This could get ... messy.)
>
>From an economic 'supply and demand' perspective OSS ends up hurting
> those who write the software. Presumably these OSS guys are software
> engineers somewhere. (Reasonable since they know how to write
> software.) So let's say that Gimp or something causes Macromedia and
> Adobe to go bankrupt. (Hmmm... people complain that Msft has caused the
> demise of companies.)
Macromedia, Adobe, Microsoft, etc need to write to their respective
reps well before then. This is not a problem that will go away.
However, the process has in fact been damaged; you may recall that
Netscape sued for redress after IE destroyed their market.
The DoJ wasn't very effective -- even before GWB got into office.
Fortunately, Mozilla is now a corporation again. We'll see how
well that works for them.
>
> Anyhow, all the software engineers from Macromedia and Adobe are now
> out in the job market looking for new jobs. The 'demand' for software
> engineers is down (2 fewer companies) meanwhile the supply side is up
> with displaced workers. In the end this tends to drive down wages so
> when the "Gimp guys" go to look for their next job the job market will
> be worse for them.
>
Our wages could be considered already far too high, in case
you've not noticed. World GDP/cap is $8.8K. US GDP/cap
is $40.1K. A good top-notch software engineer can probably
make 2.5-3 times the US GDP/cap in raw wages, though I'd
have to look. (A consultant can make even more.)
Replace that engineer with someone from India and costs go
way down (GDP/cap = $3.1K) -- though quality might go down
as well, depending on how good that Indian engineer is
(and how well he communicates in English and copes with
the timezone shift).
If one doesn't like India, one can also mention China
(GDP/cap=$5.6K) or South Korea (GDP/cap = $19.2K).
I'd have to look regarding other "software hotspots".
B Gruff
>>> > Anyhow, all the software engineers from Macromedia and Adobe are
>>> > now out in the job market looking for new jobs. The 'demand' for
>>> > software engineers is down (2 fewer companies) meanwhile the
>>> > supply side is up with displaced workers. In the end this tends to
>>> > drive down wages so when the "Gimp guys" go to look for their next
>>> > job the job market will be worse for them.
>>>
>>> Indeed. Right thinking people never contribute to free software
>>> projects.
>>>
>>> You've convinced me.
>>>
>>> Altruism: there's just no percentages in it.
>>>
>>
>>
>> That's not what I meant. Taken too literally anything can sound
>> "wacked" and this is no exception. Certainly there's good to be had
>> by
>> contributing work. Whether it's software, scientific research,
>> literature, etc. I just think there needs to be a balance somewhere.
>> I don't see it as economically healthy thing to be producing free
>> work to the extent that it hurts companies and their employees.
>>
>
> I don't recall you crying when MS started bundling its media player.
> That's hurting other companies and employees, ain't it?
Presumably the same argument would apply to MS incorporating (free):-
A browser
E-mail client
Data compression
Photo-editing
Slide-show etc. facilities
A.V. facilities!
Bill
Rick
>
> <lqu...@uku.co.uk> wrote in message
> news:1123090409.5...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
> :
> : Seems that the difference is highly subjective. We will unlikely never
> : know what transpired in the boardroom when the decision was made to
> : "take a loss" on a product.
> :
> Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
> losses.
You might want to tell that to the accountants that see the losses on
every XBox sold.
You might want to square your statement with the fact that micro$oft GAVE
AWAY IE (after first screwing over Spyglass) and then took loses on the
re-write.
>
> Microsoft does what every other software company does and that is price
> things according to their perception of what they are worth to consumers
> in the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield
> from that market. By satisfying some consumers outside the market
> operations, OSS products essentially reduce the size of the market overall
> rather than taking a share of the market, since a market can only be
> measured in terms of the revenues resulting from sales in that market.
micro$oft wields monopoly power and has been found guilty by multiple
courts of violating anti-trust laws.
>
> Many elements of the software industry involve a fee for service aspect,
> though, and these things need to be paid for or else they would disappear.
> Something as simple as reporting the news about software technology needs
> to be paid for by the people who advertise their commercial products using
> that technology. Otherwise you will never hear about some advance or
> other. It is not a simple engine.
--
Rick
Rick
>
> http://www.forbes.com/business/2005/08/03/mozilla-firefox-forprofit-cx_ld_0803mozilla.html?partner=yahootix
>
> Companies & Strategies
> Firefox Goes For-Profit
> Lisa DiCarlo, 08.03.05, 6:00 AM ET
>
Were you trying to make a point, Bailo?
--
Rick
Rick
> lqu...@uku.co.uk wrote:
>>>>In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens
>>>>when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The
>>>>idea is to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they
>>>>get established in the marketplace.
>>
>>
>>
>>>Gee, that sounds a lot like....oooohhhh, *capitalism* -- as in, the same
>>>thing that Microsoft does every day!
>>
>>
>>
>> So are you now officially "on record" as supporting capitalism and doing
>> whatever it takes to beat the competition?
>>
>>
> I have always been on the record for that.
>
> I am not anti-Microsoft or anti-Gates.
>
> I think that Bill has done everything fair and square and has followed the
> rules and profited from it legally.
You might want tot ell the to the various courts that have decided
otherwise.
(Bailo trip snipped)
--
Rick
Tim Smith
> Where problems CAN arise are when a company that has extraordinary market
> power (or money) takes loses with the goal of driving-out most of it's
> competition. The long-term goal in that scenario is to able to charge
> higher-than-fair-market prices.
I vaguely recall reading some research that indicated that this doesn't
actually work, though, at least in most industries. The problem is when it
gets to the "charge higher" part, new companies see that, and jump into the
market.
Unless the market has large barriers of entry, this shortens the "charge
higher" phase enough that you don't make back what you lose in the "drive
out the competition" phase.
--
--Tim Smith
lqu...@uku.co.uk
Technically you would be right.
Tim Smith
> billwg wrote:
>>Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
>>losses.
>
> Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free, to
> drive-under the Web browser competition?
It was also released as a boxed product, for sale in CompUSA, Egghead, etc.,
at a price comparable to the Netscape boxed product, and it handily outsold
Netscape.
IE beat Netscape because at the time, it was simply a much better browser.
--
--Tim Smith
Tom Shelton
Finally! A voice of reason. NS was a great browser up until v3.
v4.... That was crap - pure and simple.
--
Tom Shelton
lqu...@uku.co.uk
Bingo!!! - I remember this being covered in an early economics class.
Even a monopoly doesn't enjoy completely inelastic pricing power.
Rick
> In article <cm22f154v3cq35aeb...@4ax.com>, chrisv wrote:
>> billwg wrote:
>>>Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
>>>losses.
>>
>> Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free, to
>> drive-under the Web browser competition?
>
> It was also released as a boxed product, for sale in CompUSA, Egghead,
> etc., at a price comparable to the Netscape boxed product, and it handily
> outsold Netscape.
no, it didn't.
>
> IE beat Netscape because at the time, it was simply a much better browser.
No, it didn't... and it wasn't.
--
Rick
amosf (Tim Fairchild)
I wasn't living in that alternate universe at the time tho...
--
-
I use linux. Can anyone give me a good reason to use Windows?
-
lqu...@uku.co.uk
Has it ever occurred to you that this might just happen to be my own
personal opinion on the matter? If I happen to agree with Boeing that
Air Bus shouldn't get government subsidies from the EU does that make
me a Boeing apologist?
> after what Microsoft did to Netscape.
Netscape helped kill themselves with Navigator 4. Probably the worst
browser ever released.
> Netscape was trying to make a profit
What every for-profit company ultimately tries to do. And like what
Firefox is also trying to do.
> Microsoft, after rushing to write their own browser,
> gave it away for free, until Netscape was ruined.
And they continue to give it away for free today. Seems that "free
software" is okay as long as it doesn't come from Microsoft.
> Switching to the present day, does anyone think
> Microsoft would be making improvements to IE if
> it were not for the competition from Firefox?
They would certainly continue to improve it. Based on the fact that
there have been over half-a-dozen versions of IE released before
Firefox ever came into existance. Things like Notepad and TaskManager
have been improved over the years. Why not IE?
> Does anyone believe that having a monopoly is good for the consumer?
Generally no, but in some cases yes. Phone service for example (when
adjusted for inflation) is more expensive now than it was when AT&T had
a monopoly.
> An irony about the current Google-Microsoft competition
> is that Microsoft cannot pull a Netscape on Google---
> Google is already free.
So is broadcast television, radio, Cnn.com, Yahoo and ESPN.com. Google
is a media company which makes its revenue from advertising.
Jesse F. Hughes
> Jesse F. Hughes wrote:
>
>> I don't recall you crying when MS started bundling its media player.
>> That's hurting other companies and employees, ain't it?
>
> Presumably the same argument would apply to MS incorporating (free):-
>
> A browser
> E-mail client
> Data compression
> Photo-editing
> Slide-show etc. facilities
> A.V. facilities!
Indeed. But do they include all that with the OS?
I thought everything from photo-editing on down was additional
software (depending on what you mean by A.V. facilities).
--
"Sale or rental of this disc is ILLEGAL. If you have rented or
purchased this disc, please call the MPAA at 1-800-NO-COPYS."
-- The MPAA begins a new anti-piracy program,
found on a DVD purchased in China
lqu...@uku.co.uk
Jesse F. Hughes wrote:
> B Gruff <bbg...@yahoo.co.uk> writes:
>
> > Jesse F. Hughes wrote:
> >
> >> I don't recall you crying when MS started bundling its media player.
> >> That's hurting other companies and employees, ain't it?
> >
> > Presumably the same argument would apply to MS incorporating (free):-
> >
> > A browser
> > E-mail client
> > Data compression
> > Photo-editing
> > Slide-show etc. facilities
> > A.V. facilities!
>
> Indeed. But do they include all that with the OS?
>
> I thought everything from photo-editing on down was additional
> software (depending on what you mean by A.V. facilities).
>
I read that (AV facilities) as referring to the "Movie Maker" utility
and the ability to record CDs with Media Player.
Jesse F. Hughes
"Technically"? What is the relevant difference between your concerns
regarding OSS developers and MS bundling?
The main difference I see: there is a long history of MS bundling
seriously hurting competitors. I don't see any similar history of
economic hardship due to OSS.
--
Jesse F. Hughes
"Besides, discoverers are too proud to kiss butt. Indiana Jones would
never kiss some academic's ass to get published, and neither will I."
--James Harris
Jesse F. Hughes
> On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 19:48:12 +0000, Tim Smith wrote:
>>
>> It was also released as a boxed product, for sale in CompUSA, Egghead,
>> etc., at a price comparable to the Netscape boxed product, and it handily
>> outsold Netscape.
>
> no, it didn't.
Do either of you have the numbers or evidence to back up these claims?
--
Jesse F. Hughes
"How come there's still apes running around loose and there are
humans? Why did some of them decide to evolve and some did not? Did
they choose to stay as a monkey or what?" -Kans. Board of Ed member
chrisv
>Tim Smith wrote:
>> In article <3lu1f1h1a4ikeiibb...@4ax.com>, chrisv wrote:
>> > Where problems CAN arise are when a company that has extraordinary market
>> > power (or money) takes loses with the goal of driving-out most of it's
>> > competition. The long-term goal in that scenario is to able to charge
>> > higher-than-fair-market prices.
>>
>> I vaguely recall reading some research that indicated that this doesn't
>> actually work, though, at least in most industries. The problem is when it
>> gets to the "charge higher" part, new companies see that, and jump into the
>> market.
That is true, in many markets. Untrue in others. Many markets lend
themselves a small number of large companies, and have large barriers
to entry.
Plus, if predatory-pricing was legal, many potential competitors would
shy-away from entering markets dominated by a single company, knowing
damn well that the dominant player would never let them make a fair
profit. After all, if the dominant company used predatory-pricing to
force-out it's smaller competitors, why would they treat the new
competitor any differently?
>> Unless the market has large barriers of entry, this shortens the "charge
>> higher" phase enough that you don't make back what you lose in the "drive
>> out the competition" phase.
But many markets DO have large barriers to entry. Computer operating
systems are but one example. I sure don't see a lot of companies
willing to take-on M$ in PC operating systems, despite all the money
in that market...
(True, there's Linux-based companies doing this on a small scale, but
they are greatly enabled by leveraging open-source, and thus have
quite a different cost-structure from most businesses.)
>Bingo!!! - I remember this being covered in an early economics class.
>Even a monopoly doesn't enjoy completely inelastic pricing power.
"Completely" inelastic is a straw-man. All monopolies do indeed enjoy
"greater" inelastic pricing-power, compared to companies in a
competitive market.
Tom Shelton
You actually liked 4? Common...
--
Tom Shelton
Rick
> Rick <no...@nomail.com> writes:
>
>> On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 19:48:12 +0000, Tim Smith wrote:
>>>
>>> It was also released as a boxed product, for sale in CompUSA, Egghead,
>>> etc., at a price comparable to the Netscape boxed product, and it
>>> handily outsold Netscape.
>>
>> no, it didn't.
>
> Do either of you have the numbers or evidence to back up these claims?
Well, Netscape originally sold for $99 for business and commercial use,
but was free for --personal-- use in late 1994, and it was the most
popular (widely used?) for some years after. And it was available for
window, MacOS and X Windows.
Eventually, m$ stopped charging for IE ('cut off their air supply') and
'innovated it into the OS. THAT's when IE started gaining market share.
--
Rick
Tom Shelton
> On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 19:48:12 +0000, Tim Smith wrote:
>
>> In article <cm22f154v3cq35aeb...@4ax.com>, chrisv wrote:
>>> billwg wrote:
>>>>Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
>>>>losses.
>>>
>>> Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free, to
>>> drive-under the Web browser competition?
>>
>> It was also released as a boxed product, for sale in CompUSA, Egghead,
>> etc., at a price comparable to the Netscape boxed product, and it handily
>> outsold Netscape.
>
> no, it didn't.
>
Don't know about this... I'm sure that wasn't true of ie3 vs ns3. Ns3
was a much better browser...
>>
>> IE beat Netscape because at the time, it was simply a much better browser.
>
> No, it didn't... and it wasn't.
At the time - yes it was. Communicator is what killed Netscape, IMHO.
I bought 3, and would have bought 4 if hadn't been such a flying piece
of hud.
--
Tom Shelton
lqu...@uku.co.uk
> Computer operating systems are but one example.
I don't agree with this one. If anything computer software has one of
the absolute lowest barriers to entry. All you basically need is an
idea and a computer to develop it on. Unlike say... building an
automobile factory or a semiconductor fabrication plant or an oil
refinery.
>>Bingo!!! - I remember this being covered in an early economics class.
>>Even a monopoly doesn't enjoy completely inelastic pricing power.
> "Completely" inelastic is a straw-man. All monopolies do indeed
> enjoy "greater" inelastic pricing-power, compared to companies in
> a competitive market.
Look at it this way.
Windows 3.1 was release in 1992 for $139
Win95 was released in 1995 for $159
Today WinXP (home edition) sells for $199
If you account for inflation (hey.. Bill's gotta eat too) the price has
remained fairly constant. Now if you compare what comes in the box with
XP to Win3.1 you are actually getting a lot more product for your money
today.
So even if Msft did have pricing power for the last 13 years, they
certainly didn't abuse it.
amosf (Tim Fairchild)
It's not like they could charge more. People wouldn't buy to upgrade or they
would pirate. There are limits even with a monopoly if you sell a 'want'
rather than a 'need'.
Peter Köhlmann
Well, just compare it to the price of a computer in 1992 and now.
Even when disregarding the massive difference in computing power, the price
for the machine has gone down a *lot*
When in 1992 the price for the OS was at around 5-10% of the hardware price,
it is now in the regions of 20-40% of a typical consumer machine
In other words: A total ripoff
--
99% of lawyers give the rest a bad name.
Robert Newson
...
> Presumably the same argument would apply to MS incorporating (free):-
>
> A browser
> E-mail client
> Data compression
> Photo-editing
> Slide-show etc. facilities
> A.V. facilities!
I think you've just answered your question in another post:
"However, look at something like CD/DVD readers/writers.
"...- yet over only a few years, the cost of these devices has tumbled.
"...In addition, the market for OS increases year on year - probably faster
than for the CD/DVD readers/writers, in fact.
"BUT the price of an MS OS stays high
"I wonder why?"
Obvious really: They're putting so much extra functioning (software) into
the OS, so in fact the like-for-like MS OS cost [probably] has
fallen...you're just paying for all the extras... (^_^)
Robert Newson
...
>>Switching to the present day, does anyone think
>>Microsoft would be making improvements to IE if
>>it were not for the competition from Firefox?
>
> They would certainly continue to improve it. Based on the fact that
> there have been over half-a-dozen versions of IE released before
> Firefox ever came into existance. Things like Notepad and TaskManager
> have been improved over the years. Why not IE?
When those versions of IE came out, there was NN also doing versions which
prompted MS. From what I remember, when MS had effectively stifled NN and
won, and web sites were mostly borken for W3C compliant browsers (the de
jure standard), but not the IE browser (the de facto standard), they gave up
feature[1] fixing or improving IE. It's only since FF came along that MS
has finally had to get on with doing some feature[1] fixing, and catching up
with another browser.
Does anyone have the release dates for the various browsers handy?
[1] Feature: Bug as described by the Marketing Department.[2]
[2] From an Apple ][ manual glossary.
B Gruff
>> Presumably the same argument would apply to MS incorporating (free):-
>>
>> A browser
>> E-mail client
>> Data compression
>> Photo-editing
>> Slide-show etc. facilities
>> A.V. facilities!
>
> Indeed. But do they include all that with the OS?
>
> I thought everything from photo-editing on down was additional
> software (depending on what you mean by A.V. facilities).
I think that they do, or are in the process.
- I remember "before I.E."
- ....and before O.E.
- ... and drive compression used to be 3rd party?
- photo editing = MS photo editor or something?
....or did that come with Office?
- Slide show is now part of XP?
- Anti Virus as in Microsoft Antivirus Service?
Bill
Snit
1ec7s2-...@sirius.tg00suus7038.net on 8/3/05 11:00 AM:
> In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Snit
> <SN...@CABLE0NE.NET.INVALID>
> wrote
> on Wed, 03 Aug 2005 08:34:46 -0700
> <BF163226.27872%SN...@CABLE0NE.NET.INVALID>:
>> "Tim Smith" <reply_i...@mouse-potato.com> stated in post
>> 4_4Ie.2375$ns....@newsread1.news.atl.earthlink.net on 8/3/05 8:00 AM:
>>
>>> In article <1123078129.1...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com>,
>>> lqu...@uku.co.uk wrote:
>>>> In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens when
>>>> China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The idea is
>>>> to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they get
>>>> established in the marketplace.
>>>
>>> That's not very good a comparison, since textiles and steel get used, and
>>> then you need more. E.g., if a building company buys some cheap steel, then
>>> uses it in a building, when they need more for their next building, they
>>> need to buy more.
>>>
>>> With OSS, that's not the case. No matter what the OSS provider does in the
>>> future (including switching to a commercial version that costs a lot of
>>> money once the competition is gone), the OSS version is still there.
>>
>> True... but software often becomes dated quite quickly. How many 20 year old
>> buildings are there... 50 year old? 100? Quite a few.
>>
>> How many users use a web browser older than a couple of years... maybe they
>> go back as far as Win 98's version of IE... and that is becoming quite rare.
>
> One cannot use older browsers on secure websites as the
> certificates have expired, unless the certificates are
> patched therein.
Um, OK.
--
Look, this is silly. It's not an argument, it's an armor plated walrus with
walnut paneling and an all leather interior.
_________________________________________
Usenet Zone Free Binaries Usenet Server
More than 120,000 groups
Unlimited download
http://www.usenetzone.com to open account
B Gruff
>> But many markets DO have large barriers to entry.
>> Computer operating systems are but one example.
>
> I don't agree with this one. If anything computer software has one of
> the absolute lowest barriers to entry. All you basically need is an
> idea and a computer to develop it on. Unlike say... building an
> automobile factory or a semiconductor fabrication plant or an oil
> refinery.
A few months ago, I thought that we discussed this very point, in that
there was an estimate arrived at of the cost of Linux to date.
i.e. what it would have cost from inception until now, based on number
of man years it's taken times typical U.S. salary for the people
involved.
Somebody else can perhaps remember the figure, but it sure was a large
number! It would be interesting to ask "Who, if there was no linux and
no Mac, would be prepared to put up this sort of investment to compete
with MS?"
Frankly, I doubt that anybody would.
.... which might explain the (seemingly to me) more and more frantic
attacks on linux by MS (e.g. "Get the Facts", and the money that's gone
into their huge T.V. advertising campaign)
Is this really what the MS enthusiasts who frequent this group want - an
absolute monopoly, no consumer choice, pay the asking price, with
consecutive 5-year plans.....
....just like Stalin and the USSR, in fact?
Bill
B Gruff
>>> In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what
>>> happens when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market
>>> at below cost. The idea is to drive out the competition and
>>> then raise prices once they get established in the marketplace.
>
>
>> Gee, that sounds a lot like....oooohhhh, capitalism -- as in,
>> the same thing that Microsoft does every day!
>
>
> So are you now officially "on record" as supporting capitalism and
> doing whatever it takes to beat the competition?
Capitalism in the sense of a competitive market place, such as we have
with cars, T.V.s, banking and insurance, washing machines, fridges,
etc, where many manufacturers compete, and no single manufacturer
achieves total dominance of the market?
- the "American Ideal", in fact?
.... or did you mean capitalism as in telephone monopolies, nationalised
industries, Microsoft, and Stalin's USSR?
How many industries or indeed commodities are there in the U.S. where a
single brand name has over 90% of the market?
Bill
Larry Qualig
"Peter Köhlmann" <peter.k...@t-online.de> wrote in message
news:dcrbp2$q58$05$1...@news.t-online.com...
Excellent point comparing it to the price of the hardware.
But, if you factor in the gas it takes to fill up the SUV used to drive to
BestBuy to get the hardware... The hardware costs end up about the same.<g>
Snit
dcrbp2$q58$05$1...@news.t-online.com on 8/3/05 2:08 PM:
> Well, just compare it to the price of a computer in 1992 and now.
> Even when disregarding the massive difference in computing power, the price
> for the machine has gone down a *lot*
True - and that includes the bundled software.
> When in 1992 the price for the OS was at around 5-10% of the hardware price,
> it is now in the regions of 20-40% of a typical consumer machine
> In other words: A total ripoff
One: when you buy a Dell how do you know what percent goes to the OS? The
apps? The hardware? The time? It does not show on the bill.
Two: if the price of cars came down would you claim the price of gas, being
a higher percentage, would be a ripoff? If the price of ink went down would
you whine about the price of pens? What type logic are you looking to use
here, Peter?
--
If A = B and B = C, then A = C, except where void or prohibited by law.
Roy Santoro, Psycho Proverb Zone (http://snipurl.com/BurdenOfProof)
The Ghost In The Machine
<SN...@CABLE0NE.NET.INVALID>
wrote
<BF16A5E2.279E0%SN...@CABLE0NE.NET.INVALID>:
You didn't know about certificate expirations? Try this.
Open up your fave webbrowser and find a secure webpage.
http://www.dell.com, then click on 'My Account' works.
(Accessing it directly is a little screwy. Not sure
what the problem is.)
In Firefox there's a Page Info under Tools, then one
can click on the Security tab, then View button. YMMV,
of course, for Safari (?), IE, Epiphany, Galeon, Konqueror,
or Mozilla.
Note that there's an expiration date. In the case of
membership.dell.com, it will expire in about a week!
(Presumably they'll have to fix that -- and darned soon;
school's a-coming.)
You'll also notice a chain of scripts. (In
membership.dell.com's case there's one immediate parent,
and that's it.) The browser merely has to verify the
certificate's values for hostname (an issue if the
infrastructure changes, under certain conditions) and
trust that certificate or one of its ancestors.
If the browser has old certs the trust chain will
fail, which will, under ideal circumstances, pop
up a dialog box stating something to the extent that
"I can't verify this certificate".
(At that, it's an improvement over Java's behavior, though
one can try to catch the exception.)
--
#191, ewi...@earthlink.net
It's still legal to go .sigless.
billwg
"chrisv" <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
news:cm22f154v3cq35aeb...@4ax.com...
:
: Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free,
: to drive-under the Web browser competition?
IE is a part of Windows, silly. It was added to Windows to make Windows a
one-stop shopping event for anyone using a computer. That's why the OEMs
like it so well.
: >Microsoft does what every other software company doe and that is price
: >things according to their perception of what they are worth to consumers
in
: >the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield
from
: >that market.
:
: Wrong. A monopoly prices things at a different (higher) price than
: what can be done in a competitive market. This is not only basic
: economics, but intuitively obvious.
:
Why would you want to get into a market that had competition? It is a lot
smarter to get into a market where there is no competition. Then you can
offer your products to people who see value and will pay to obtain that
value. If you think business is a lot of people selling the same thing and
beating each other up on price, you are a child.
Tim Smith
Rick <no...@nomail.com> wrote:
> > It was also released as a boxed product, for sale in CompUSA, Egghead,
> > etc., at a price comparable to the Netscape boxed product, and it handily
> > outsold Netscape.
>
> no, it didn't.
Yes, it did. You can buy reports that list the monthly sales of most of
the products at those stores, and we subscribed to those reports at the
time at work, because we had retail products at those stores we wanted
to track, and I used to look up the browser numbers each month. Retail
IE outsold retail Netscape.
> > IE beat Netscape because at the time, it was simply a much better browser.
>
> No, it didn't... and it wasn't.
IE had better support for standards than Netscape. It was faster than
Netscape. It rendered more pages correctly. It had fewer serious bugs.
Put those altogether, and you have a clearly superior browser.
--
--Tim Smith
Tim Smith
"Jesse F. Hughes" <je...@phiwumbda.org> wrote:
> >> It was also released as a boxed product, for sale in CompUSA, Egghead,
> >> etc., at a price comparable to the Netscape boxed product, and it handily
> >> outsold Netscape.
> >
> > no, it didn't.
>
> Do either of you have the numbers or evidence to back up these claims?
It's my recollection from reading sales reports that covered the major
PC retail outlets. There are companies that collect that data and sell
it for astronomical prices to interested companies. We received such
reports at work, to track how we and our competitors were doing.
--
--Tim Smith
billwg
"Rick" <no...@nomail.com> wrote in message
news:pan.2005.08.03....@nomail.com...
: On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 18:00:12 +0000, billwg wrote:
:
: >
: > <lqu...@uku.co.uk> wrote in message
: > news:1123090409.5...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
: > :
: > : Seems that the difference is highly subjective. We will unlikely never
: > : know what transpired in the boardroom when the decision was made to
: > : "take a loss" on a product.
: > :
: > Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
: > losses.
:
: You might want to tell that to the accountants that see the losses on
: every XBox sold.
:
Do you think that the XBox business is not worth the amount of money that
Microsoft has invested? I think you are wrong. They are not interested in
selling that business to recover their losses, eh? You have a limited
ability to comprehend strategies, Rick. I bet you are terrible at checkers
and probably at tic-tac-toe! LOL!!!
: You might want to square your statement with the fact that micro$oft GAVE
: AWAY IE (after first screwing over Spyglass) and then took loses on the
: re-write.
:
I believe that Microsoft contracted with Spyglass to produce the IE 1.0
version. There is a belief in the COLA camp apparently that Microsoft
somehow cheated Spyglass on the deal. What do you think IE 1.0 was worth?
I thought it was OK, myself, but I am biased in favor of Microsoft. What I
liked most about IE 1.0 was the newsreader which was ever so much more
functional than the one that came with Netscape.
: >
: > Microsoft does what every other software company does and that is price
: > things according to their perception of what they are worth to consumers
: > in the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield
: > from that market. By satisfying some consumers outside the market
: > operations, OSS products essentially reduce the size of the market
overall
: > rather than taking a share of the market, since a market can only be
: > measured in terms of the revenues resulting from sales in that market.
:
: micro$oft wields monopoly power and has been found guilty by multiple
: courts of violating anti-trust laws.
:
But not in overcharging in any sense and not "guilty" in any respect. You
never want to look at the whole picture, do you?
Linønut
> In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens
> when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The
> idea is to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they
> get established in the marketplace.
Some OSS is like that. Like Larry McVoy's "BitKeeper".
However, far and away the most significant exponent of the art of
software dumping is Microsoft.
"We'll cut off Netscape's air supply!" (for example)
> When the China dumps textiles below cost people get all upset over it
> saying it hurts US companies. Fundementally this is no different then
> dumping free software "below cost" on the US market.
The distributing of free software can hurts the competition. But it
benefits the consumer. The later jacking up of the price hurts the
consumer.
This is why the explicit support of the GPL for forking and providing
the source code is so important.
--
Tux rox!
Linønut
> Look at it this way.
>
> Windows 3.1 was release in 1992 for $139
> Win95 was released in 1995 for $159
> Today WinXP (home edition) sells for $199
>
> If you account for inflation (hey.. Bill's gotta eat too) the price has
> remained fairly constant. Now if you compare what comes in the box with
> XP to Win3.1 you are actually getting a lot more product for your money
> today.
>
> So even if Msft did have pricing power for the last 13 years, they
> certainly didn't abuse it.
Look at it this way. What were the margins on the products? Did they
increase significantly over the years? (I don't know.)
Just quoting dollar prices isn't sufficient.
Maybe the non-monopoly price for Windows would now be closer to what it
was for MS-DOS ($35-$50 IIRC).
--
Tux rox!
Linønut
>> So even if Msft did have pricing power for the last 13 years, they
>> certainly didn't abuse it.
>
> Well, just compare it to the price of a computer in 1992 and now.
> Even when disregarding the massive difference in computing power, the
> price for the machine has gone down a *lot* When in 1992 the price for
> the OS was at around 5-10% of the hardware price, it is now in the
> regions of 20-40% of a typical consumer machine In other words: A
> total ripoff
Check the profit margins. Hardware vendors have maybe a 15% margin
compared to Microsoft's 75% or more.
--
Tux rox!
John Bailo
That makes it very vulnerable to price cutting...as any hardware vendor can
reduce his costs by 100-300 by dropping XP for Linux.
--
Texeme Construct
http://www.texeme.com
Rick
>
> "Rick" <no...@nomail.com> wrote in message
> news:pan.2005.08.03....@nomail.com...
> : On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 18:00:12 +0000, billwg wrote:
> :
> :
> : > <lqu...@uku.co.uk> wrote in message
> : > news:1123090409.5...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
> : > :
> : > : Seems that the difference is highly subjective. We will unlikely
> : > : never know what transpired in the boardroom when the decision was
> : > : made to "take a loss" on a product.
> : > :
> : > Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
> : > losses.
> :
> : You might want to tell that to the accountants that see the losses on
> : every XBox sold.
> :
> Do you think that the XBox business is not worth the amount of money that
> Microsoft has invested?
YOU said:
Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
losses.
You were wromg/
> I think you are wrong.
Oh, well.
> They are not interested
> in selling that business to recover their losses, eh?
.. to cover their losses? Those would be the losses you said m$ didn't
have?
> You have a limited ability to comprehend strategies, Rick.
That's funny, coming from you/
> I bet you are terrible at
> checkers and probably at tic-tac-toe!
Do me a favor. Go to Vegas. Take out loans.
> LOL!!!
Look... a braying ass.
>
> : You might want to square your statement with the fact that micro$oft
> : GAVE AWAY IE (after first screwing over Spyglass) and then took loses on
> : the re-write.
> :
> I believe that Microsoft contracted with Spyglass to produce the IE 1.0
> version.
Wow... that took a lot of thought on your part... especially since it was
well documented.
> There is a belief in the COLA camp apparently that Microsoft
> somehow cheated Spyglass on the deal.
I guess Spyglass thought so too, since they sued micro$oft for back
royalties.
> What do you think IE 1.0 was worth?
Worth to me? $0. Worth to Spyglass? Go check the suit.
> I thought it was OK, myself, but I am biased in favor of Microsoft.
No kidding.
> What I liked most about IE 1.0 was the newsreader which was ever so much
> more functional than the one that came with Netscape.
>
>
> : > Microsoft does what every other software company does and that is
> : > price things according to their perception of what they are worth to
> : > consumers in the target market and according to what price will
> : > maximize the yield from that market. By satisfying some consumers
> : > outside the market operations, OSS products essentially reduce the
> : > size of the market overall
> : > rather than taking a share of the market, since a market can only be
> : > measured in terms of the revenues resulting from sales in that
> : > market.
> :
> : micro$oft wields monopoly power and has been found guilty by multiple
> : courts of violating anti-trust laws.
> :
> But not in overcharging in any sense and not "guilty" in any respect.
They were found to have broken anti-trust laws.
> You never want to look at the whole picture, do you?
You never want to see the truth, do you?
--
Rick
Rick
> "chrisv" <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
> news:cm22f154v3cq35aeb...@4ax.com... :
> : Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free,
> to : drive-under the Web browser competition? :
> IE is a part of Windows, silly. It was added to Windows to make Windows
> a one-stop shopping event for anyone using a computer. That's why the
> OEMs like it so well.
>
> : >Microsoft does what every other software company doe and that is
> price : >things according to their perception of what they are worth to
> : >consumers
> in
> : >the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield
> from
> : >that market.
> :
> : Wrong. A monopoly prices things at a different (higher) price than
> what : can be done in a competitive market. This is not only basic
> economics, : but intuitively obvious.
> :
> Why would you want to get into a market that had competition?
Typical dishonesty from you. Companies with monopoly power drive out
competition. It can be done legally r illegally. micro$oft has done it
illegally.
Companies with monopoly power can bar entry into a market. It can be done
legally r illegally. micro$oft has done it illegally.
> It is a lot
> smarter to get into a market where there is no competition. Then you
> can offer your products to people who see value and will pay to obtain
> that value. If you think business is a lot of people selling the same
> thing and beating each other up on price, you are a child.
You are so dishonest.
--
Rick
Rick
> In article <pan.2005.08.03....@nomail.com>,
> Rick <no...@nomail.com> wrote:
>> > It was also released as a boxed product, for sale in CompUSA, Egghead,
>> > etc., at a price comparable to the Netscape boxed product, and it
>> > handily outsold Netscape.
>>
>> no, it didn't.
>
> Yes, it did. You can buy reports that list the monthly sales of most of
> the products at those stores, and we subscribed to those reports at the
> time at work, because we had retail products at those stores we wanted to
> track, and I used to look up the browser numbers each month. Retail IE
> outsold retail Netscape.
--Retail-- IE may have outsold --retail-- NS, but most acquisition of
Navigator was through DL or directly from Netscape.
>
>> > IE beat Netscape because at the time, it was simply a much better
>> > browser.
>>
>> No, it didn't... and it wasn't.
>
> IE had better support for standards than Netscape. It was faster than
> Netscape. It rendered more pages correctly. It had fewer serious bugs.
> Put those altogether, and you have a clearly superior browser.
Then why did so many people prefer navigator when they had a real choice?
--
Rick
Jesse F. Hughes
> lqu...@uku.co.uk wrote:
>
>>> But many markets DO have large barriers to entry.
>>> Computer operating systems are but one example.
>>
>> I don't agree with this one. If anything computer software has one of
>> the absolute lowest barriers to entry. All you basically need is an
>> idea and a computer to develop it on. Unlike say... building an
>> automobile factory or a semiconductor fabrication plant or an oil
>> refinery.
>
> A few months ago, I thought that we discussed this very point, in that
> there was an estimate arrived at of the cost of Linux to date.
> i.e. what it would have cost from inception until now, based on number
> of man years it's taken times typical U.S. salary for the people
> involved.
Wikipedia's Linux article includes this:
More Than a Gigabuck: Estimating GNU/Linux's Size, a study of Red
Hat Linux 7.1, found that this particular distribution contained
30 million source lines of code (SLOC). The Linux kernel provided
contained 2.4 million lines of code or 8% of the total. Using the
Constructive Cost Model (COCOMO), the study estimated that this
distribution required about eight thousand person-years of
development time. Had all this software been developed by
conventional proprietary means, it would have cost 1.08 billion
dollars (year 2000 dollars) to develop in the United
States. Slightly over half of the code in that distribution was
licensed under the GPL.
In a later study, Counting potatoes: the size of Debian 2.2, the
same analysis was performed for Debian GNU/Linux version 2.2. This
distribution contained over fifty-five million source lines of
code, and the study estimated that it would have cost 1.9 billion
dollars (year 2000 dollars) to develop by conventional proprietary
means.
I don't have any opinion on the correctness of these estimates.
[...]
> Is this really what the MS enthusiasts who frequent this group want - an
> absolute monopoly, no consumer choice, pay the asking price, with
> consecutive 5-year plans.....
> ....just like Stalin and the USSR, in fact?
No offense intended, but do you think we can criticize Microsoft
without comparing the company to Stalin? Such hyperbole doesn't
improve an argument, in my ever-so-humble opinion.
--
Jesse F. Hughes
"Quincy, why should you not play with matches?"
"Because... [pause] Aahhh! I'm on fire!!"
Jim Richardson
Hash: SHA1
On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 22:37:30 -0500,
Linųnut <linųn...@bone.com> wrote:
> lqu...@uku.co.uk poked his little head through the XP firewall and said:
>
>> In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens
>> when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost. The
>> idea is to drive out the competition and then raise prices once they
>> get established in the marketplace.
>
> Some OSS is like that. Like Larry McVoy's "BitKeeper".
>
BitKeeper wasn't (and isn't) OSS. It was "freeware", for some uses.
> However, far and away the most significant exponent of the art of
> software dumping is Microsoft.
>
> "We'll cut off Netscape's air supply!" (for example)
>
>> When the China dumps textiles below cost people get all upset over it
>> saying it hurts US companies. Fundementally this is no different then
>> dumping free software "below cost" on the US market.
>
> The distributing of free software can hurts the competition. But it
> benefits the consumer. The later jacking up of the price hurts the
> consumer.
>
> This is why the explicit support of the GPL for forking and providing
> the source code is so important.
>
"hurting the competition" is a silly phrase unless it's involving a
boarding action with cutlasses and pistols.
"Hurting the competition" is what businesses *do*. Outsell, out produce,
cut costs, all to "hurt the competition"
It's when a company goes outside certain rules that we get upset, not
because they "hurt the competition" but because of *how* they did it.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.5 (GNU/Linux)
iD8DBQFC8cdid90bcYOAWPYRAmJlAKCsmpHE3WNqH/zNZAD2fJyHrgWpgwCbBZa/
44lWXr2kjazisNwMh4vWqWU=
=DBCw
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
--
Jim Richardson http://www.eskimo.com/~warlock
The major advances in civilization are processes that all but wreck the
societies in which they occur.
-- A.N. Whitehead
Jim Richardson
Hash: SHA1
On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 19:45:09 GMT,
Tim Smith <reply_i...@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
> In article <3lu1f1h1a4ikeiibb...@4ax.com>, chrisv wrote:
>> Where problems CAN arise are when a company that has extraordinary market
>> power (or money) takes loses with the goal of driving-out most of it's
>> competition. The long-term goal in that scenario is to able to charge
>> higher-than-fair-market prices.
>
> I vaguely recall reading some research that indicated that this doesn't
> actually work, though, at least in most industries. The problem is when it
> gets to the "charge higher" part, new companies see that, and jump into the
> market.
>
> Unless the market has large barriers of entry, this shortens the "charge
> higher" phase enough that you don't make back what you lose in the "drive
> out the competition" phase.
>
Getty tried to do this in the oil refinery business. He would buy up
competitors refineries, often at grossly inflated prices, with an eye to
getting it all back when he was the only one left standing. But when
folks saw you could make good money by building a refinery, and selling
it at far more than it cost to make, to Getty....
DeBeers tried much the same thing with the Russians after the collapse
of the wall. The Russians, hard up for cash, started selling off
diamonds, lots of them. This drove the world price of the stones down,
DeBeers started buying up all the Russian stones, in an effort to
"protect" their market, but the Russians were quite happy to sell to
DeBeers as many diamonds as DeBeers was willing to buy... DeBeers had to
call it quits after a while.
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.5 (GNU/Linux)
iD8DBQFC8cQXd90bcYOAWPYRAqanAKCRYogbSBhW+LxrVKgvT4IYPQyvXQCfUUHe
tAjGbHzqkKwVdVFG+swp8v8=
=sCkN
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
--
Jim Richardson http://www.eskimo.com/~warlock
"The dinosaurs became extinct because they didn't have a space program"
-- Larry Niven
Jim Richardson
Hash: SHA1
On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 15:27:10 -0500,
chrisv <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
> lqu...@uku.co.uk wrote:
>
>>Tim Smith wrote:
>>> In article <3lu1f1h1a4ikeiibb...@4ax.com>, chrisv wrote:
>>> > Where problems CAN arise are when a company that has extraordinary market
>>> > power (or money) takes loses with the goal of driving-out most of it's
>>> > competition. The long-term goal in that scenario is to able to charge
>>> > higher-than-fair-market prices.
>>>
>>> I vaguely recall reading some research that indicated that this doesn't
>>> actually work, though, at least in most industries. The problem is when it
>>> gets to the "charge higher" part, new companies see that, and jump into the
>>> market.
>
> That is true, in many markets. Untrue in others. Many markets lend
> themselves a small number of large companies, and have large barriers
> to entry.
>
> Plus, if predatory-pricing was legal, many potential competitors would
> shy-away from entering markets dominated by a single company, knowing
> damn well that the dominant player would never let them make a fair
> profit. After all, if the dominant company used predatory-pricing to
> force-out it's smaller competitors, why would they treat the new
> competitor any differently?
>
Because they'd go out of business, as new competitors keep popping up,
and they never get to recover their losses from the "dump" stage.
Can you give an example of such a market, where one company, undercut
everyone, then raised prices, and kept them there, *without* govt force
being involved?
>>> Unless the market has large barriers of entry, this shortens the "charge
>>> higher" phase enough that you don't make back what you lose in the "drive
>>> out the competition" phase.
>
> But many markets DO have large barriers to entry. Computer operating
> systems are but one example. I sure don't see a lot of companies
> willing to take-on M$ in PC operating systems, despite all the money
> in that market...
Because you don't look hard enough, and you artificially limit the
"market" PCs are a small segment of the computer market, dwarfed by
embedded and other computer segments, and MS doesn't do too well there.
>
> (True, there's Linux-based companies doing this on a small scale, but
> they are greatly enabled by leveraging open-source, and thus have
> quite a different cost-structure from most businesses.)
>
so what? that's business, find an advantage, and use it.
>>Bingo!!! - I remember this being covered in an early economics class.
>>Even a monopoly doesn't enjoy completely inelastic pricing power.
>
> "Completely" inelastic is a straw-man. All monopolies do indeed enjoy
> "greater" inelastic pricing-power, compared to companies in a
> competitive market.
depends on how they become a monopoly, and how they maintain it. If
force is involved, like the phone monopoly was, (the govt granted the
monopoly, and enforced it) then yes, it's pretty inelastic. Can you show
me an example of a natural monopoly like that? something that isn't
backed up by govt force?
>
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.5 (GNU/Linux)
iD8DBQFC8cVAd90bcYOAWPYRAk7ZAJsELnGTDoipcvApOrLBhs/PbfPYhACg7CwQ
Fy3pIztUb3Pwr8QXKE9ZXv4=
=njxf
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
--
Jim Richardson http://www.eskimo.com/~warlock
If you can tell the difference between good advice and bad advice,
you probably don't need advice.
Linønut
> Linųnut <linųn...@bone.com> wrote:
>>
>> Some OSS is like that. Like Larry McVoy's "BitKeeper".
>
> BitKeeper wasn't (and isn't) OSS. It was "freeware", for some uses.
Oops, you're right.
>> This is why the explicit support of the GPL for forking and providing
>> the source code is so important.
>
> "hurting the competition" is a silly phrase unless it's involving a
> boarding action with cutlasses and pistols.
As in Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life".
> "Hurting the competition" is what businesses *do*. Outsell, out produce,
> cut costs, all to "hurt the competition"
>
> It's when a company goes outside certain rules that we get upset, not
> because they "hurt the competition" but because of *how* they did it.
Such as in a predatory way.
--
Tux rox!
Linønut
> Linųnut wrote:
>
>> Check the profit margins. Hardware vendors have maybe a 15% margin
>> compared to Microsoft's 75% or more.
>
> That makes it very vulnerable to price cutting...as any hardware vendor can
> reduce his costs by 100-300 by dropping XP for Linux.
If they are prepared to take the time/effort/money to get savvy with a
different OS.
--
Tux rox!
synex
> > http://www.forbes.com/business/2005/08/03/mozilla-firefox-forprofit-cx_ld_0803mozilla.html?partner=yahootix
> >
> > Companies & Strategies
> > Firefox Goes For-Profit
> > Lisa DiCarlo, 08.03.05, 6:00 AM ET
> >
Damn sure if I wrote a piece of software that's been beamed into 76
million homes worldwide I'd want to make something from it...
DSt.
Larry Qualig
"Linønut" <"=?iso-8859-1?Q?lin=F8nut?="@bone.com> wrote in message
news:psmdnWOqrYB...@comcast.com...
Not again with these ridiculous profit margins. How many times do we have to
rehash this. Look at any SEC filing. The profit margin is CLEARLY stated.
It's currently 30.80%. Last quarter it was 29.90%.
Why do you continue to post these absurd lies that they have profit margins
of "75% or more" because it simply isn't true and it's been disproved
several times?
And yes... expensive hardware always has *lower* profit margins. Do you
expect Boeing to have 30% profit margins on a $300 million dollar jet? Of
course not. Boeing has a profit margin of only 3.2%. Duh!
Larry Qualig
"Linųnut" <"=?iso-8859-1?Q?lin=F8nut?="@bone.com> wrote in message
news:psmdnWCqrYD...@comcast.com...
> lqu...@uku.co.uk poked his little head through the XP firewall and said:
>
>
> Look at it this way. What were the margins on the products? Did they
> increase significantly over the years? (I don't know.)
>
> Just quoting dollar prices isn't sufficient.
>
Well I do know about profit margins. Have they increased? You decide.
1996 - 25.3%
1997 - 30.4%
1998 -31.0%
1999 - 39.4%
2000 - 40.9%
2001 - 30.5%
2002 - 27.6%
2003 - 31%
2004 - 22.2%
Current - 30.8%
chrisv
>"chrisv" <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
>news:cm22f154v3cq35aeb...@4ax.com...
>:
>: Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free,
>: to drive-under the Web browser competition?
>:
>IE is a part of Windows, silly. It was added to Windows to make Windows a
>one-stop shopping event for anyone using a computer.
That's the M$ spin.
>That's why the OEMs like it so well.
They don't have any choice, thanks to Evil$oft's tactics.
>: >Microsoft does what every other software company doe and that is price
>: >things according to their perception of what they are worth to consumers
>in
>: >the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield
>from
>: >that market.
>:
>: Wrong. A monopoly prices things at a different (higher) price than
>: what can be done in a competitive market. This is not only basic
>: economics, but intuitively obvious.
>:
>Why would you want to get into a market that had competition?
Idiot. Because fair profits can be made.
>It is a lot smarter to get into a market where there is no competition.
Idiot. What markets can you name that have no competition?*
>Then you can
>offer your products to people who see value and will pay to obtain that
>value.
You are a fscking moron. Are you saying you can't "offer your
products to people who see value and will pay to obtain that value" in
competitive markets?
Obviously, it's usually more profitable to be a monopoly, but
monopolizing is illegal, as it should be, because it's bad for the
consumer, and bad for the world in general.*
>If you think business is a lot of people selling the same thing and
>beating each other up on price, you are a child.
Dumbsh*t. It's not as simple as that statement, but "cut-throat
competition" is indeed extremely common in business.
*Except for natural monoplies, of course.
chrisv
>> But many markets DO have large barriers to entry.
>> Computer operating systems are but one example.
>
>I don't agree with this one. If anything computer software has one of
>the absolute lowest barriers to entry.
I said "computer operating systems", not "computer software".
chrisv
>If you account for inflation (hey.. Bill's gotta eat too) the price has
>remained fairly constant. Now if you compare what comes in the box with
>XP to Win3.1 you are actually getting a lot more product for your money
>today.
>
>So even if Msft did have pricing power for the last 13 years, they
>certainly didn't abuse it.
Define "abuse". They have monopoly pricing on their OS and Office
products, which is higher that competitive -market pricing. Multiply
the price-premium times the number of units sold, and you have
$billions of dollars being sucked-out the pockets of the world's
consumers, so that M$ stock-holders can buy bigger yachts.
Larry Qualig
"Jim Richardson" <war...@eskimo.com> wrote in message
news:nps8s2-...@fimbul.myth...
Excellent point. I posted something about DeBeers a couple of days ago. It's
very interesting to know what goes on with them and the diamond market. It's
just one of these things where the "perception" you get from all the adds,
commercials and public obsession with diamonds is grossly different from the
reality.
If any COLA reader/poster is bored and has a little free time it's certainly
worth checking out the story on DeBeers and diamonds. Oddly enough, diamonds
are still considered "very rare precious stones" when in fact this is only
because DeBeers wants it them to be rare.
Again... it's a really interesting situation.
chrisv
It would be much lower, certainly.
And then there's the issues of quality and innovation, which can
suffer when there is no viable competition (e.g. M$ crapware 8)
billwg
: On Thu, 04 Aug 2005 01:29:07 +0000, billwg wrote:
:
:
: > "chrisv" <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
: > news:cm22f154v3cq35aeb...@4ax.com... :
: > : Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free,
: > to : drive-under the Web browser competition? :
: > IE is a part of Windows, silly. It was added to Windows to make Windows
: > a one-stop shopping event for anyone using a computer. That's why the
: > OEMs like it so well.
: >
: > : >Microsoft does what every other software company doe and that is
: > price : >things according to their perception of what they are worth to
: > : >consumers
: > in
: > : >the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield
: > from
: > : >that market.
: > :
: > : Wrong. A monopoly prices things at a different (higher) price than
: > what : can be done in a competitive market. This is not only basic
: > economics, : but intuitively obvious.
: > :
: > Why would you want to get into a market that had competition?
:
: Typical dishonesty from you. Companies with monopoly power drive out
: competition. It can be done legally r illegally. micro$oft has done it
: illegally.
How can a question be dishonest, Rick? You seem to be sputtering! You seem
to ignore the thought that a company that is not in a market cannot have a
monopoly in that market to begin with. I think your attitude is
overpowering your ability to think clearly. Further, the courts said that
Microsoft acquired their monopoly, limited to operating system software on
Intel compatible desktop computers, legally.
: Companies with monopoly power can bar entry into a market. It can be done
: legally r illegally. micro$oft has done it illegally.
:
: > It is a lot
: > smarter to get into a market where there is no competition. Then you
: > can offer your products to people who see value and will pay to obtain
: > that value. If you think business is a lot of people selling the same
: > thing and beating each other up on price, you are a child.
:
: You are so dishonest.
:
You are far too biased to be of any use to anyone, Rick. It is affecting
your ability to even understand the concepts involved.
billwg
"chrisv" <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
: billwg wrote:
:
: >"chrisv" <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
: >news:cm22f154v3cq35aeb...@4ax.com...
: >:
: >: Oh? Not even on Internet Explorer, released on the market for free,
: >: to drive-under the Web browser competition?
: >:
: >IE is a part of Windows, silly. It was added to Windows to make Windows
a
: >one-stop shopping event for anyone using a computer.
:
: That's the M$ spin.
:
: >That's why the OEMs like it so well.
:
: They don't have any choice, thanks to Evil$oft's tactics.
Did any OEM company officer or senior manager offer to testify to any such
dislike, Rick? The answer is no. Prior to the DOJ trial, however, 20 or so
CEOs from various interested companies such as Dell and Compaq and HP signed
an endorsement of Microsoft, though. The facts of the matter are that the
OEMs do not want the OSS stuff, Rick. They want to keep things the way they
are.
:
: >: >Microsoft does what every other software company doe and that is price
: >: >things according to their perception of what they are worth to
consumers
: >in
: >: >the target market and according to what price will maximize the yield
: >from
: >: >that market.
: >:
: >: Wrong. A monopoly prices things at a different (higher) price than
: >: what can be done in a competitive market. This is not only basic
: >: economics, but intuitively obvious.
: >:
: >Why would you want to get into a market that had competition?
:
: Idiot. Because fair profits can be made.
Tell that to Delta, United, American! LOL!!!
:
: >It is a lot smarter to get into a market where there is no competition.
:
: Idiot. What markets can you name that have no competition?*
Well, start with desktop OS platform software, Rick! How about image
manipulation software on Apple computers? How about personal financial
software on PCs? How about Corvettes?
What you miss is the concepts of marketing, Rick. You are not very well
educated in these things, obviously, else you wouldn't have such silly
ideas.
:
: >Then you can
: >offer your products to people who see value and will pay to obtain that
: >value.
:
: You are a fscking moron. Are you saying you can't "offer your
: products to people who see value and will pay to obtain that value" in
: competitive markets?
It is hard to explain things to those who have no basic understanding of
underlying concepts, Rick. Surely you must know that if you can claim to be
a teacher. There is actually no such thing as a competitive market in the
sense that you seem to be defining. There are groups of consumers whom you
have educated to believe that your product is their best choice for the need
that they have. That is your niche and that is your market.
Your niche may be small or large and your niche may be growing or shrinking,
but you are the only supplier in that niche. Want you obviously want to do
is grow your market by finding more prospective consumers that you can
convince to buy your product and join your niche. That may be a case of
taking some other company's customer who is not so well informed about your
more suitable product and educating them as to its benefits or it may be
finding someone who previously had not purchased anything because it was not
affordable and demonstrating how they can afford to purchase your product.
It is a consumer education process, pure and simple, Rick.
:
: Obviously, it's usually more profitable to be a monopoly, but
: monopolizing is illegal, as it should be, because it's bad for the
: consumer, and bad for the world in general.*
Monopolies are not illegal, Rick.
:
: >If you think business is a lot of people selling the same thing and
: >beating each other up on price, you are a child.
:
: Dumbsh*t. It's not as simple as that statement, but "cut-throat
: competition" is indeed extremely common in business.
:
Any examples?
: *Except for natural monoplies, of course.
:
billwg
: On Thu, 04 Aug 2005 01:38:02 +0000, billwg wrote:
:
: >
: > "Rick" <no...@nomail.com> wrote in message
: > news:pan.2005.08.03....@nomail.com...
: > : On Wed, 03 Aug 2005 18:00:12 +0000, billwg wrote:
: > :
: > :
: > : > <lqu...@uku.co.uk> wrote in message
: > : > news:1123090409.5...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com...
: > : > :
: > : > : Seems that the difference is highly subjective. We will unlikely
: > : > : never know what transpired in the boardroom when the decision was
: > : > : made to "take a loss" on a product.
: > : > :
: > : > Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen
any
: > : > losses.
: > :
: > : You might want to tell that to the accountants that see the losses on
: > : every XBox sold.
: > :
: > Do you think that the XBox business is not worth the amount of money
that
: > Microsoft has invested?
:
: YOU said:
: Well you cannot accuse Microsoft of doing that. They haven't seen any
: losses.
:
: You were wromg/
:
the front end of any business setup. If you open a pizza restaurant, you
have to pay the rent in advance and buy an oven and a cash register and all
the other things that you are going to be selling. Is that a loss? No.
: > They are not interested
: > in selling that business to recover their losses, eh?
:
: .. to cover their losses? Those would be the losses you said m$ didn't
: have?
For a teacher, you have a poor sense of context and reading comprehension,
Rick. You called them losses.
:
: > You have a limited ability to comprehend strategies, Rick.
:
: That's funny, coming from you/
:
: > I bet you are terrible at
: > checkers and probably at tic-tac-toe!
:
: Do me a favor. Go to Vegas. Take out loans.
I try to get there once a year. I like the Bellagio the best. What's your
favorite?
We go to Biloxi once or twice, too, the Beau Rivage is like a miniature
Bellagio. I don't need any loans, though.
:: >
: > : You might want to square your statement with the fact that micro$oft
: > : GAVE AWAY IE (after first screwing over Spyglass) and then took loses
on
: > : the re-write.
: > :
: > I believe that Microsoft contracted with Spyglass to produce the IE 1.0
: > version.
:
: Wow... that took a lot of thought on your part... especially since it was
: well documented.
:
: > There is a belief in the COLA camp apparently that Microsoft
: > somehow cheated Spyglass on the deal.
:
: I guess Spyglass thought so too, since they sued micro$oft for back
: royalties.
:
No they didn't. Where do you get your knowledge? You should go to primary
sources rather than COLA for your info, Rick. You are getting a biased
view.
: > What do you think IE 1.0 was worth?
:
: Worth to me? $0. Worth to Spyglass? Go check the suit.
Cannot check something that doesn't exist, Rick. But you say it was
worthless and so did a lot of people in that era. Microsoft made it better
over time, though, and today it is the premier browser in use with by 80% to
90% of the people who use them. A remarkable achievement, IMO.
However, if the Spyglass contribution was so substandard as was claimed,
however can you say that they were "screwed over"? That would imply that
they had some merit and you plainly do not think so. Microsoft did pay them
some $8M for their code contributions, though. That was a lot of money for
such a poor job, don't you agree?
:
: > I thought it was OK, myself, but I am biased in favor of Microsoft.
:
: No kidding.
:
: > What I liked most about IE 1.0 was the newsreader which was ever so much
: > more functional than the one that came with Netscape.
: >
: >
: > : > Microsoft does what every other software company does and that is
: > : > price things according to their perception of what they are worth to
: > : > consumers in the target market and according to what price will
: > : > maximize the yield from that market. By satisfying some consumers
: > : > outside the market operations, OSS products essentially reduce the
: > : > size of the market overall
: > : > rather than taking a share of the market, since a market can only be
: > : > measured in terms of the revenues resulting from sales in that
: > : > market.
: > :
: > : micro$oft wields monopoly power and has been found guilty by multiple
: > : courts of violating anti-trust laws.
: > :
: > But not in overcharging in any sense and not "guilty" in any respect.
:
: They were found to have broken anti-trust laws.
:
Not true in any precise sense, Rick. They were found to have done things
that were considered violations of the antitrust laws when performed by a
company holding monopoly power in the same market. And they were found to
currently have monopoly power in the "Intel compatible desktop computer
operating system software" market, so these activities were not permitted.
However, there was no determination that the practices were actually
performed at a point in time that Microsoft had the monopoly. Thus they
were enjoined not to do anything like that in the future, but past practices
were only used as evidence that such things were going on.
For example, take the IBM testimony. At the time that Microsoft was trying
to get IBM to promote Windows, IBM was still selling OS/2 and the two
products were comparably priced and available to PC buyers. There was no
Windows monopoly at that time, certainly, and IBM had full access to OS/2.
IBM wanted to offer Windows, however, because it was more popular with PC
buyers and so IBM could sell more PCs with Windows than with their own
product. The evidence was that Microsoft paid fees to OEMs to deal
exclusively, but the offer to IBM was not an antitrust violation at that
point in time. No penalties were ever assessed, as would be the case if
there was a provable law violation.
: > You never want to look at the whole picture, do you?
:
: You never want to see the truth, do you?
:
I think that the truth is obvious, but it is you who are blind to it.
lqu...@uku.co.uk
What price premium? If anything their profit margins are currently
below their average and certainly in-line with industry averages.
Somehow you've managed to convince yourself that it's wrong, immoral or
illegal for a company to make a profit.
chrisv
>"chrisv" wrote :
>:
>: billwg wrote:
>:
>: >That's why the OEMs like it so well.
>:
>: They don't have any choice, thanks to Evil$oft's tactics.
>
>Did any OEM company officer or senior manager offer to testify to any such
>dislike, Rick? The answer is no.
Would you testify against a company that could put you out of business
if they wanted to?
>The facts of the matter are that the
>OEMs do not want the OSS stuff, Rick. They want to keep things the way they
>are.
Liar. M$ uses their monopoly power to enforce obedience.
>: >Why would you want to get into a market that had competition?
>:
>: Idiot. Because fair profits can be made.
>
>Tell that to Delta, United, American! LOL!!!
Dumbsh*t. "Can be made" does not equal "will be made". Obviously bad
management or bad luck can cause losses. DUH.
The point stands, that you are a fscking idiot for your ridiculous
"Why would you want to get into a market that had competition?"
question. There is generally NO CHOICE but to do EXACTLY that,
OBVIOUSLY.
>: >It is a lot smarter to get into a market where there is no competition.
>:
>: Idiot. What markets can you name that have no competition?*
>
>Well, start with desktop OS platform software, Rick!
Then why don't you start a desktop OS business, since there is no
competition? LOL!!!
>How about image
>manipulation software on Apple computers? How about personal financial
>software on PCs?
No "monopolies" in those markets, that I am aware of.
>How about Corvettes?
God damn, are are a stupid fscker.
>What you miss is the concepts of marketing, Rick. You are not very well
>educated in these things, obviously, else you wouldn't have such silly
>ideas.
My name isn't Rick, and since I'm kicking your stupid ass all around
the block on these issues, what does that say about your education?
>: >Then you can
>: >offer your products to people who see value and will pay to obtain that
>: >value.
>:
>: You are a fscking moron. Are you saying you can't "offer your
>: products to people who see value and will pay to obtain that value" in
>: competitive markets?
>
>(snip verbose nonsense claptrap)
None of that answers my question, which pointed-out how stupid your
above statement was.
>: Obviously, it's usually more profitable to be a monopoly, but
>: monopolizing is illegal, as it should be, because it's bad for the
>: consumer, and bad for the world in general.*
>
>Monopolies are not illegal, Rick.
Did you check the * comment, troll?
>: >If you think business is a lot of people selling the same thing and
>: >beating each other up on price, you are a child.
>:
>: Dumbsh*t. It's not as simple as that statement, but "cut-throat
>: competition" is indeed extremely common in business.
>:
>Any examples?
Only about a million. Everything from toothpaste to staples to cars.
It's the rule, not the exception.
TuxSux
Novell would then be forced to lower Suse 9.3 Pro from the current $99.95USD
to $.03.
lqu...@uku.co.uk
chrisv wrote:
> lqu...@uku.co.uk wrote:
>
> >If you account for inflation (hey.. Bill's gotta eat too) the price has
> >remained fairly constant. Now if you compare what comes in the box with
> >XP to Win3.1 you are actually getting a lot more product for your money
> >today.
> >
> >So even if Msft did have pricing power for the last 13 years, they
> >certainly didn't abuse it.
>
> Define "abuse". They have monopoly pricing on their OS and Office
> products, which is higher that competitive -market pricing.
Not even close to abusing anything. I spent the last 3 minutes looking
at random "profit margins" since you claim that Msft is somehow abusing
the poor consumer with their monopoly. Let's see how they compare.
Company....Proft Margin
Microsoft 30.8%
Novell 34.0%
Adobe 28.8%
Oracle 25.5%
Pixar 51.7%
Checkpoint 52.2%
Cedera Software 28.3%
Microstrategy 71.5%
Cogent Software 41.2%
Yahoo 35.9%
InfoSpace 44.9%
Sorry... but I don't see anything that appears "abusive" in their
pricing.
chrisv
> chrisv <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>>
>> That is true, in many markets. Untrue in others. Many markets lend
>> themselves a small number of large companies, and have large barriers
>> to entry.
>>
>> Plus, if predatory-pricing was legal, many potential competitors would
>> shy-away from entering markets dominated by a single company, knowing
>> damn well that the dominant player would never let them make a fair
>> profit. After all, if the dominant company used predatory-pricing to
>> force-out it's smaller competitors, why would they treat the new
>> competitor any differently?
>
>Because they'd go out of business, as new competitors keep popping up,
>and they never get to recover their losses from the "dump" stage.
True for many markets that have lower barriers to entry, yes.
>Can you give an example of such a market, where one company, undercut
>everyone, then raised prices, and kept them there, *without* govt force
>being involved?
I seem to recall that Standard Oil was able to do something like
this... M$ is holding a pretty impressive share of the desktop OS
market...
>>>> Unless the market has large barriers of entry, this shortens the "charge
>>>> higher" phase enough that you don't make back what you lose in the "drive
>>>> out the competition" phase.
>>
>> But many markets DO have large barriers to entry. Computer operating
>> systems are but one example. I sure don't see a lot of companies
>> willing to take-on M$ in PC operating systems, despite all the money
>> in that market...
>
>Because you don't look hard enough, and you artificially limit the
>"market" PCs are a small segment of the computer market, dwarfed by
>embedded and other computer segments, and MS doesn't do too well there.
My "artificial limit" is still a market, large-enough to support what
one of the most successful companies in the history of the world.
>> (True, there's Linux-based companies doing this on a small scale, but
>> they are greatly enabled by leveraging open-source, and thus have
>> quite a different cost-structure from most businesses.)
>
>so what? that's business, find an advantage, and use it.
Point taken. I should also note, though, that Linux is still just a
niche, not enough to cause M$ any significant loss of income (at least
at the present).
>>>Bingo!!! - I remember this being covered in an early economics class.
>>>Even a monopoly doesn't enjoy completely inelastic pricing power.
>>
>> "Completely" inelastic is a straw-man. All monopolies do indeed enjoy
>> "greater" inelastic pricing-power, compared to companies in a
>> competitive market.
>
>depends on how they become a monopoly, and how they maintain it. If
>force is involved, like the phone monopoly was, (the govt granted the
>monopoly, and enforced it) then yes, it's pretty inelastic. Can you show
>me an example of a natural monopoly like that? something that isn't
>backed up by govt force?
I don't think we are in disagreement regarding elasticity of pricing.
Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz
08/03/2005
at 07:08 AM, lqu...@uku.co.uk said:
>In a way I view a lot of this OSS stuff the same way as what happens
>when China dumps steel or textiles on the US market at below cost.
>The idea is to drive out the competition and then raise prices once
>they get established in the marketplace.
No, because the GPL makes that impossible.
--
Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz, SysProg and JOAT <http://patriot.net/~shmuel>
Unsolicited bulk E-mail subject to legal action. I reserve the
right to publicly post or ridicule any abusive E-mail. Reply to
domain Patriot dot net user shmuel+news to contact me. Do not
reply to spam...@library.lspace.org
Tom Shelton
They didn't once 4 came out. Communicator was crap Rick, face the
facts.
--
Tom Shelton
B Gruff
Could you just run through the maths of that for me?
Bill
John Bailo
> Novell would then be forced to lower Suse 9.3 Pro from the current
> $99.95USD to $.03.
The price will soon be $0.00 as they launch their OpenSuse campaign they are
talking about renaming Suse Professional Linux to just Suse Linux and
putting the distro on DVDs that will go into magazines, the
mail...everywhere.
--
Texeme
http://texeme.com
TuxSux
Just like AOL has done for years.
Millions of wooden tabletops will thank Suse.
billwg
"chrisv" <chr...@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
::
: My name isn't Rick, and since I'm kicking your stupid ass all around
: the block on these issues, what does that say about your education?
:
As to the rest, it says nothing about my education, but says al lot about
your faulty perception! Lame!
:
: >: Obviously, it's usually more profitable to be a monopoly, but
: >: monopolizing is illegal, as it should be, because it's bad for the
: >: consumer, and bad for the world in general.*
: >
: >Monopolies are not illegal, Rick.
:
: Did you check the * comment, troll?
:
What part of "monopolizing is illegal" are you trying to quibble with?
: >: >If you think business is a lot of people selling the same thing and
: >: >beating each other up on price, you are a child.
: >:
: >: Dumbsh*t. It's not as simple as that statement, but "cut-throat
: >: competition" is indeed extremely common in business.
: >:
: >Any examples?
:
: Only about a million. Everything from toothpaste to staples to cars.
: It's the rule, not the exception.
:
None that you can think of then?
chrisv
>: >: >If you think business is a lot of people selling the same thing and
>: >: >beating each other up on price, you are a child.
>: >:
>: >: Dumbsh*t. It's not as simple as that statement, but "cut-throat
>: >: competition" is indeed extremely common in business.
>: >:
>: >Any examples?
>:
>: Only about a million. Everything from toothpaste to staples to cars.
>: It's the rule, not the exception.
>:
>None that you can think of then?
Idiot troll. Aren't you embarrassed to make such an ass of yourself
all the time?