On Mon, Jan 23, 2012 at 7:20 PM, Steven Peck <sep...@gmail.com> wrote: >> It's an effective business strategy. Although it tends to piss >> people off ... > > Yes, but it's not like Microsoft doesn't do this for no reason. They > acquire technologies and often incorporate them into existing or expanded > versions of product lines to customer benefit.
And they often don't. Case in point, I believe they have discontinued the Mac Virtual PC product. Or, I had a client who was heavily invested into Great Plains on NetWare. Microsoft bought GP and overnight announced they were dropping non-Windows support. Client was not pleased. Or, they used to offer IE for non-Windows platforms, for free, until they achieved browser dominance and then lost interest in competition. And so on. I don't find GOOG's record to be any better than MSFT's, but it's not like MSFT is everyone's best friend either. > Google does this too but their marketing feel is currently one of 'free > offerings forever' which doesn't actually match their published words. That strikes me as a rather vague and supposing accusation. It's certainly the case that GOOG buys products and companies and integrates and axes as they see fit for their business strategy. Some things are free, some aren't; they change their prices as they see fit for themselves. GOOG hasn't proven much different than any other major company in this regard. "Don't be evil" is a rather elastic motto, it would appear. -- Ben ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin
