Robert Pogson

For years I have had visitors to this site repeating how M$ is No. 1 and will never be unseated but it keeps happening…
The latest:

Gmail’s growth has skyrocketed since its public introduction in 2007, but this year in particular, Google has been successful in attracting millions of new users. In January, Google mentioned in its earnings call that it had about 350 million monthly active users on Gmail; six months later, about 75 million more users had flocked to Gmail, growing the total number to 425 million monthly active users. By this measure, Gmail has dethroned Hotmail.

Other battles M$ has lost: HPC, small cheap computers (including mobile), web servers, SCOG v World, …

Other battle soon to be lost: desktop/notebook OS, browsers, cloud,…

So, M$, in fair competition, keeps failing. Why is that? They have more money than most and should be able to do better. What keeps them from excelling? It’s the burden of having to remember every lie they have ever told, the backwards-compatibility with really stupid software-design decisions made decades ago, and the insistence on abusing monopoly power. Those dogs don’t hunt… not in the long run. Life and IT are long distance races. Bullies, criminals and those who take advantage of others may temporarily gain some advantage but they cannot keep it. In spite of lax governmental enforcement of anti-competition laws and sell-outs by OEMs, retailers, journalist, analysts and consultants, superior IT comes through in the end. Even M$ is using GNU/Linux in its operations now but there’s no monopoly-generated pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, just working for a living.

see Gmail Becomes World's Largest Email Service; Google Continues To Unseat Microsoft – International Business Times.

What will the innovators at M$ think of next? Having trouble convincing people to try Skype? No problem! Just install it at 3am while they sleep…

“Microsoft’s Windows Server Update Services (WSUS) last night deployed a Skype update to Windows clients that had never had the telephony and messaging software installed. This resulted in Skype being installed on these computers.”

I have used WSUS. It helps keep a bunch of PCs updated. I never could get it to work perfectly and now it’s acting like a trojan, bypassing IT policies to avoid time/bandwdith-wasters. How many $millions will be wasted removing the junk from PCs in schools and offices and homes?

See Microsoft installs Skype without consent – The H Security: News and Features.

The Competition Bureau is supposed to defend the Canadian economy from anti-competitive acts like exclusive dealing, bundling, price-fixing and the like. Despite some good work, the departing chief did nothing about M$ and its “partners” excluding GNU/Linux from retail shelves all across Canada. She did nothing about bundling that other OS with nearly every PC sold in Canada for decades. Clearly that prevents competition for operating systems and prevents competition on price/performance. Shame…

Competition Bureau chief Melanie Aitken stepping down – The Globe and Mail.

Pronouncements about future growth of Ubuntu GNU/Linux are not based on wishful thinking or tea leaves. Jane Silber has feedback from downloads, updates and OEM shipments to back up huge growth in India as well as China.

“We have chosen India for our biggest retail expansion after China because we see tremendous opportunity and growth in this country. India is one of the countries where Ubuntu is most successful and well received. We see significant growth in Ubuntu adoption in India. Over the last year we saw 160 per cent growth. So, we believe that there is real potential and demand here. I would like to make special mention of our partners because this is done with them. So we can go to the market through our OEMs. Canonical is not building computers and Canonical does not have stores. Our OEM partners know very well and have much more data than we do about the many machines that ship in India with Ubuntu pre-installed. Our OEM partners believe that we can grow with proper marketing and education.”

GNU/Linux does very well in a competitive environment. Ordinary people are getting to know about GNU/Linux at school, from associates and OEMs and retailers. They are not locked into Wintel and affordable IT using GNU/Linux makes sense to everyone. In these circumstances it is reasonable to believe this growth will continue until GNU/Linux has huge share of installed OS in India. With India’s huge population and rapid growth, the sky is the limit.

see EFYtimes – Diksha P Gupta “Ubuntu Adoption Grew 160 Per Cent In India Last Year”.

A video documenting a simple problem has gone viral on Youtube. One step from a subway station is a tiny bit higher than others and people following the rhythm of the stairway often trip on it. Bad things Happen.
Good things happen, too, when ordinary folks, users, tell service providers what they think of the service. Sometimes one picture is worth a thousand words. Other times thousands of responses get the attention of people in a position to make the world a better place.

In software, the same principle applies. The people who make software are not perfect. They make mistakes. They misunderstand things. They get priorities wrong sometimes. They don’t know every situation in which software will be used.

In FLOSS there are often well-defined means of giving developers feedback. Sometimes e-mail works. Other times a bug-tracking system works. FLOSS also has a backup system for when feedback fails to get a better result, the fork. Since the code is open for examination and modification, it is feasible for a user or group of users to fix the problem or to improve the software. It is even possible to make informed decisions about starting from scratch to replace software. Choice is good.

FLOSS beats closed source software in many ways thanks to the openness of the source-code. Often there is no way to ensure feedback gets to the people in charge with non-free software. There are just too many layers involved. I remember the time I was working in a school and several times reported on paper a problem with the configuration for printing. My students, using GNU/Linux could print but no one else in the building who was a student could print. At first, I was told I used the wrong form. On the right form, nothing happened. Finally, I physically assaulted an IT person and demanded to know why the problem had not been fixed. “What problem?” was the reply. It turned out that my boss had rewritten my report. The secretary in the IT department also rewrote it. By the time the IT guys got it, the report was watered down to “Hello, World!” or something so generic no action need be taken. It took the IT guy seconds to allow students to print…

So, if you want your feedback to count, if you want to use software that increasingly works for you and not someone else, use FLOSS, the right way to do IT. I recommend Debian GNU/Linux because it works for you. Debian has a very effective bug-tracking system. Of course, there is a package for that and you can add it to any computer running Debian GNU/Linux. How’s that for openness? You are not restricted to using that package for reporting software bug either. You could use it to report on stairs, building maintenance, gardening chores, “Honey, Do” lists and so on.

“Everything used to be desktops, now 60 per cent of PCs sold are laptops. Next year, tablets will outsell desktops," forecast Microsoft’s Antoine Leblond, head of its web services operation.”

Of course, they see “8″ running those tablets, but that is wishful thinking. The ideas that PCs last only a few years, that PCs slow down with use and that every PC must have a licence from M$ are extinct species of thought in IT. Today, people want small cheap computers and Wintel cannot give them that. Wintel is all about charging excessively for technology which they got away with when they were a monopoly but that is ending. M$ can no longer dictate the paths of IT. There are many valid choices that people have been exercising in increasing millions over the last few years. People love Android/Linux, GNU/Linux, tablets, smart phones and thinclients and above all, ARM. In 2013, the important difference will not be “8″ on ARM but */Linux on x86/amd64. The reality will be that the technology that people love on tablets will begin to replace the technology they hate on desktops and notebooks.

see Microsoft says tablets will trump PCs in 2013 • Reg Hardware.