Microsoft hits new ethical low point?

[sethg at ropine.com (Seth Gordon)]

Well, you gotta feel sorry for Allchin & Co. (although not sorry
enough to spend money on their products, mind you :-).  The market
where they have their undisputed-except-by-themselves monopoly power
-- desktop operating systems -- is also the market where, thanks to
declining hardware prices and saturation of the easiest-to-sell-to
demographics, profit margins are getting squeezed the most.

In the server market, once upon a time, Everybody Knew that Unix was
doomed, because all the commercial Unix venders were squabbling with
each other while Windows NT was poised to steamroll over them.  Now,
in its most recent advertising campaign, Microsoft has to tout the
benefits of Windows 2000 as compared with ... previous versions of
Windows.  And in smaller-than-desktop platforms (e.g., embedded
systems), Windows CE (or whatever they call it this week) has to
compete not just with Linux, but PalmOS, QNX, etc., etc., etc.

Allchin, remember, was one of the Microsoft witnesses that Boies
eviscerated on the stand, by showing that a video that Microsoft had
submitted into evidence had been doctored.  Telling ridiculous
whoppers for the greater good of The Company is hardly new for him.

--sethg
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