WI:Microsoft was broken up

What would the state of PC be had Microsoft been broken up back in the late '90's/early 2000's? Would there be more competition in the OS arena? I want to know if OS's like the BSD's and Linux could have a bigger share of the market.
 

Ian_W

Banned
What would the state of PC be had Microsoft been broken up back in the late '90's/early 2000's? Would there be more competition in the OS arena? I want to know if OS's like the BSD's and Linux could have a bigger share of the market.

Bigger than they have in OTL ? No. Every Mac runs BSD, and every Android phone runs Linux.
 
Bigger than they have in OTL ? No. Every Mac runs BSD, and every Android phone runs Linux.

Yes, bigger than OTL. Could Red Hat (either before or after spinning off Fedora), SUSE, or the Debian community make some in-roads, and could there be a Mark Shuttleworth-type to spin off an *Ubuntu for PC's.
 
What would the state of PC be had Microsoft been broken up back in the late '90's/early 2000's? Would there be more competition in the OS arena? I want to know if OS's like the BSD's and Linux could have a bigger share of the market.
Bigger than they have in OTL ? No. Every Mac runs BSD, and every Android phone runs Linux.
Yes, bigger than OTL. Could Red Hat (either before or after spinning off Fedora), SUSE, or the Debian community make some in-roads, and could there be a Mark Shuttleworth-type to spin off an *Ubuntu for PC's.
You guys are overreaching the implication, the whole monopoly suit was because MS was not a mere OS developers, but so much software ended up putting rivals in bad place, what happened other spreadsheet besides excel? and so on.

At worst if the FTC say is a monopoly, we're going to see new companies, one working the OS, another the office suit, another the Explorer/Edge and so on..the big butterfly? No Xbox.
 

GeographyDude

Gone Fishin'
. . . the whole monopoly suit was because MS was not a mere OS developers, but so much software ended up putting rivals in bad place, what happened other spreadsheet besides excel? and so on. . .
1) a healthier programming industry across the board,
2) but because of the distraction and frustration, Bill Gates is slower to get involved in global public health?
 
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1) a healthier programming industry across the board,
2) because of the distraction and frustration, Bill Gates is slower to get involved in global public health?
1)Ummm Depend, now office and Explorer/Edge will have the nightmare of optimize for windows after the OS is released, that might make the OS company to improve that one, Office could adapt easy...Explorer...ummm.
2)Yeah specially as MS founder will have to divide the pie who ends with who now.
 

hammo1j

Donor
There would be a lot more innovation.

MS 1990 to 2003 was super hot and innovative in the Office arena until it had destroyed the competition.

The latest Excel for instance is no real advance on 2003.
 

Puzzle

Donor
There would be a lot more innovation.

MS 1990 to 2003 was super hot and innovative in the Office arena until it had destroyed the competition.

The latest Excel for instance is no real advance on 2003.
Try using 2003 for a bit and I think you’ll change your mind. My job has some legacy systems and it’s pretty painful to use XP era office in comparison.
 
wouldn't it depend a lot on just how much these different systems can interact? While it's not really an issue today, back in the 90s? If you have different businesses/government agencies that all use different systems that are incompatible, that's a problem...
 
wouldn't it depend a lot on just how much these different systems can interact? While it's not really an issue today, back in the 90s? If you have different businesses/government agencies that all use different systems that are incompatible, that's a problem...
At the point MS is broke up(and if apple die as requirement), some might adopt or stay with windows by inertia but private ones will benefit of a bidding war for 'software services'
 
At the point MS is broke up(and if apple die as requirement), some might adopt or stay with windows by inertia but private ones will benefit of a bidding war for 'software services'
which is fine for innovation, but can these competing services interact with each other? If not, then problem...
 
which is fine for innovation, but can these competing services interact with each other? If not, then problem...
They will, as say before, the thing is now Office have to compete in open market with other third parties when come to program to windows(rather just using the internal memo and barely optimize till 2 year later anyway), you now need make it good day one, ditto explore and ditto having Windows OS compatible with other software, both former MS and Third party.

I think that help a lot as companies will hire and nurture more engineers and programmer, who knews, one might fund the next tech giant too...
 

hammo1j

Donor
Try using 2003 for a bit and I think you’ll change your mind. My job has some legacy systems and it’s pretty painful to use XP era office in comparison

Thanks for your reply.

I do have Excel 2003 on my home computer and it's sufficient for Invoicing, vba etc. Whereas if you compare the mobile phone of 2003 with today's phone then that is proper innovation, not regrouping the features into a ribbon...

Would be interested to know what are the new features you are missing when you use 2003...
 

Puzzle

Donor
Would be interested to know what are the new features you are missing when you use 2003...
The graphs are much much nicer, I'm a huge fan of being able to have more than 65k rows, and everything is more polished. Sure the basic needs of a spreadsheet were accomplished back in the 1990s, or perhaps earlier with Visicalc or whatever, but the whole experience is dramatically better. A 2000 pickup truck might do all the same tasks as a 2019 one, but overall quality is improved to the same degree as Excel.
 
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