Microsoft "may have to lower prices"

Inquirer ^ | 04 February 2003 | Inquirer staff

[JameRetief]

And the pendulum begins its reverse swing ping!

[per loin]

Microsoft has become the Alfred E. Newman of the Linux world.

[Rain-maker]

As Garret Morris would say, "Competition has been very very good to prices!"

Do I hear Windows XP for $19.95?

[Caipirabob]

Microsoft "may have to lower prices"

Maybe if they hadn't outsourced all those decent paying American jobs, more people could afford to pay the higher price.

Payback's a b*tch, isn't it, Bill?

[RLK]

When Microsoft began it was a decent company with integrity. With the passage of time it has become an arrogant abomination.

[Norman Arbuthnot]

Gee, what a surprise!?! I always though MS Office was a real bargain at $450. < /sarcasm>

[doosee]

With the new subscription activation policy, MS is making more by selling less, so as a smart move they now lower prices to constrain other market competition. They have so much cash they are embarrassed about it.

[tm22721]

The problem with this industry isn't Micorsoft but small third party software houses who crank out crappy software drivers/installation packages for hardware add-ons.

That's why Microsoft instituted a program to certify third party software having been tested with XP.

By the way most third party software is still not XP certified which is evidenced by a warning when it is installed on your computer.

BUMP

[Straight Vermonter]

When Microsoft began it was a decent company with integrity.

You mean when they sold IBM an operating system they didn't have?

[visualops]

definitely.
This is just another marketing strategery

[Wonder Warthog]

"When Microsoft began it was a decent company with integrity. With the passage of time it has become an arrogant abomination."

Hey, it happens to virtually ALL companies as they get bigger and the suits take over. Concern for customers and employees goes out the window as the bean-counters start looking for a "magic fix" to drastically increase profits--while the truly GOOD companies just keep on succeeding.

[RWG]

Why would you pay $20 for junk? I gave my copy away.

[College Repub]

Haha. Or when they then bought up some independent programmers code right after that and gave it to IBM.

[anobjectivist]

This is why antitrust lawsuits are a bunch of crap.

Eventually, "monopolies" take care of themselves.

The two biggest ones in the country, microsoft, timewarner/aol are taking it in right now, just proving the point.

Who will be next? Should be the real question.

[Wonder Warthog]

"With the new subscription activation policy, MS is making more by selling less, so as a smart move they now lower prices to constrain other market competition. They have so much cash they are embarrassed about it."

I think not. A lot of folks (myself included) simply WILL NOT put up with the "subscription application" bullbleep. I will continue to run Windows 98 for the foreseeable future, and then make the jump to Linux. I was a satisified user of Microsoft software for MANY years (I first used Windows before it was available as a separate product, as a "run-time" accessory to Micrografx "In-A-Vision" drawing software (later succeeded by Micrografx Designer).

The day my CAD package runs under Linux (via Codeweavers), or I find an acceptable native Linux substitute, Microsoft will have seen its last dollar from me.

[for-q-clinton]

Competition? But a US Court ruled MS had no competitors. This must be a farce because most of the linux heads I spoke to said MS must be broken up to fairly compete with them.

[Behind Liberal Lines]

Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww....... ;-)

[Happy2BMe]

"Do I hear Windows XP for $19.95?"

Make that $19.95 for XP Pro and $12.95 for the home edition.

Let them split off SQL server if they want, I don't grudge them the R&D cost recovery that will be necessary with the advent of a new dawn in cyber crime - especially cyber-terror crime aimed at the U.S.

But they'd better hurry - all Linux needs to go mainstream is a driver set on par with Windoze to better support gaming hardware and digital image editing.

Let the poor, poor employees of M$ and it's shareholders come back down to earth - the days of price goudging the world for an OS that is no longer the safest or most reliable are history.

Capitalism *does* have it's blessings . . .

H2BeMe

[Happy2BMe]

"Why would you pay $20 for junk? I gave my copy away."

Which version of Linux is on your box?