Why Microsoft Shouldn't Worry About Cannibalizing Their Userbases 180
New submitter coyote_oww writes "A ComputerWorld analysis article suggests that Microsoft should stop worrying about one product cutting into another product's sales, and concentrate on putting their best foot foward regardless of the impact on product lines. The big impact would be the price of Windows: '... Microsoft must, at least in the main, sell devices based on lower prices. And the only significant component of a Windows-powered device that can be cut further — hardware margins are at or very near the bone, and have been for years — is the Windows license.' It's still possible they could sell Windows versions at different rates for different devices, but that could get hard to justify to consumers over the long haul."
Re:Different versions of Windows (Score:4, Interesting)
What would happen is the "gamer" version would be one of the (fragmented) premium versions, so you'd end up paying more for less. Plus, who wants a computer that you can't connect to a printer in a pinch if need be, just because you don't have the right windoze license?
"You have to kill your own babies" (Score:5, Interesting)
Microsoft's decline is directly correlated with (Score:5, Interesting)
the introduction of Windows Genuine Advantage.
Before WGA was introduced, most people thought windows came free when they purchased a new computer. The rather high price for the OS was completely obfuscated. The cost was hidden because there was no impediment to installing a copy onto any machine so they thought it was free. All you needed was a copy. Well, MS decided they wanted to get paid for all of those installs. So, they introduced WGA. So, what happened... Well, people still bought new machines... But, when they went to use the new OS version on their old machines it didn't work because it could only be validated on one machine... Now, people still wanted the new OS so they went to see how much it cost and they were horrified by how much a copy of windows cost.
This left people with four choices:
1. Don't upgrade... (Look at how long it has taken to get people to stop using Win XP.)
2. Pay the high price. (Probably not)
3. Bootleg a copy. (Bit-torrent has lots of copies)
4. Look someplace else. (Have you noticed how well Apple has been doing lately)
Notice, in all but one unlikely scenario, MS doesn't make anymore money than they did before the introduction of WGA. But what they have done is enlighten people to the true cost of MS windows. Additionally, when someone doesn't upgrade or goes with an alternative to Windows, then third party applications suffer because the installed base of the current windows is diminished...
MS quite simply destroyed their own monopoly by trying to get people to pay for something they would never pay for.
Every time MS releases a new OS I keep thinking they would figure this out and drop WGA but they keep on striving for a smaller and smaller market share.
Simply put, having a solid monopoly is MUCH more valuable than the few sales they have made as a result of WGA...
Oh and lets not forget, WGA just pisses people off so as a paying customer... You get punished... Great business model if you want to shrink your market share.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:New license model: Free! (Score:5, Interesting)
I routinely use both Linux and Win7, depending on the client I'm dealing with.
A well set up Linux is easily the more responsive environment, and has less annoyances and inconsistent behaviors than the Windows equivalent. Simple stuff like using USB drives or wireless networking just works better. Switching back to W7 feels like wading through glue after a day or two on Linux.
If both OSs were priced the same, had identical OEM and software vendor support, I have no doubt people would largely choose Linux.
Re:Different versions of Windows (Score:2, Interesting)
It's easy to use, but try installing a new driver without reinstalling the entire operating system to a new version. Oh right, let's try random ppas. I'm about to try updating ALSA, kernel and Wine at the same time to get rid of consistent garbled sound in Wine (hoping it fixes zsnes too) but that will be terminal and /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ time, not double-clicking foosetup.exe as in Windows.