Intel just cut the price of some processors in two because AMD was out there undercutting prices. Competition is good for us. When consumers can choose their OS on retail shelves like they can choose their processor (since excluding AMD was made a no-no) consumers will benefit with lower prices. Wake up retailers! You can sell more units at the same margins with GNU/Linux. Demand GNU/Linux from OEMs to increase sales!
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Well, you have to take what is available to you, Robert. Intel is sometimes unable to get full price realization and the same has happened to Microsoft. For example, the normal license charges for Windows were apparently too high to provide a fertile environment for netbooks and there was a real danger that OEMs might be forced to adapt Linux or some other platform, such as freeBSD as did Apple, for their purposes. So Microsoft had to create a product niche to meet those market requirements. It was not as lucrative as they might wish it to be, but that was all that there was available.
@amicus_curious
But it was still more lucrative than not being on netbooks at all. OEMs always do the “hard” work of pre installing the system so the only thing left for M$ to do was to wait for money pouring in on their accounts
Yes, that is what I call M$ tricking the world into working for M$: re-re-reinstalling, re-re-rebooting, fighting malware, and exclusive dealing one way or another. This monopoly is their greatest achievement and it is a crime against humanity just as slavery was.
“This monopoly is their greatest achievement and it is a crime against humanity just as slavery was”
LOL, Robert! I bet you would get a far different opinion from the slaves! I chuckle when I see you kooks compare Microsoft to various evils, suggesting that having the most popular OS in town and trying to collect money for it from people who want it is worse than anything else evil in the world.
I remember that, when the DOJ took a lot of reversals from the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals in the USA and States vs Microsoft case, the anti-MS bunch attributed the loss to the DOJ going into the tank for MS due to the election of the Bush administration that was alleged to be in Bill Gates’ pocket. If you think about it, they felt that MS having the dominant OS was worse than the President of the USA being on the take! Incredible.
What choice is there for consumers going into Walmart? They have no choice except to do without and that is not on.
Elections in the Soviet Union used to have one candidate on the ballot. I would not say it was a determination of the most popular candidate.
The fundamental choice that they have is to go somewhere else to a merchant who is willing to cater to their wants. If there is no such merchant, then the consumer has to realize that they are looking for a specialty item and it may be hard to find. It is unnatural to insist that someone cater to your whims at their expense.
The Soviet Union’s Communist Parth had guns and armies to enforce its dictates, Rober. Microsoft only has its abiilty to appeal to the mass market consumer. You have the wrong analogy. You have to face the fact that Linux has no real appeal to the consumer beyond saving a few bucks and the great majority of computer users in the world are not as miserly as you.
Well, some of those points are matters of opinion but I live in a wealthy country, have a huge house, much larger than I need, and I drive a car much more expensive than I need. Most of the world that can afford to buy a netbook cannot own either of those luxury items. Look at Africa, Asia and South/central America. There are billions of people a lot worse off than I who can barely afford necessities of life. Spending more than a basic amount for information technology is out of the question for them. For me it is just a preference. I can throw money at lots of other things. I would gladly throw $1000 at flowers/shrubs/trees/gravel/servers while I doubt I will ever spend that kind of money on a client PC. For $100 I can get a decent thin client box and for about $250 I can get a very decent thick client. I want extras in servers because it is useful there. That is not being miserly, just wise. A fool and his money are soon parted.