Re: Embrace, Extend Extinguish

[amicus_curious]

"Rjack" <user@example.net> wrote in message 
tMudndbsxJpDqJbWnZ2dnUVZ_jKdnZ2d@giganews.com">news:tMudndbsxJpDqJbWnZ2dnUVZ_jKdnZ2d@giganews.com...

> Due to legal antitrust concerns, Microsoft is always going to
> allow about 20% of the total market to competitors...

As romantic as that may sound, it is the wrong view of the situation. 
Microsoft's continued dominance of the PC OS market is due to tried and true 
notions of market dynamics, nothing more and nothing less.  The PC market, 
as orchestrated by Microsoft, is mature as such things go and already they 
are branching out into other fields in order to find new worlds to conquer. 
The PC OS market is very mature and consumer expectations, attitudes, and 
tastes are firmly set.  There is no way on earth to unseat Microsoft here 
and there is little reason to do so.  The FOSS fellas are miffed at the 
market success and vast wealth of the MSFT founders, but they are fated to 
be miffed for all time.

New things come up all the time, for example Google and Facebook and such. 
They are the star performers today and will likely pale in the future to be 
replaced by something else.  It is nature's way and read of "Product Life 
Cycles" in the marketing lore for the details.