>I dare say that Oracle is (at long last) at that point or approaching it ra...

berntb · on July 4, 2012

What was innovative? Copying other's stuff and integrating a browser into the OS?

dredmorbius · on July 5, 2012

Microsoft's business model was innovative, even where their software wasn't.

Per-unit licensing, bundling, including the browser for free (which, BTW, screwed Spyglass out of any browser-related royalties).

berntb · on July 5, 2012

Doesn't the illegal use of monopoly powers seem new here, because it was in a newer field?

(Thanks for reminding me of Spyglass, shudder.)

dredmorbius · on July 5, 2012

Even that's arguable. IBM, Xerox, and AT&T all certainly exploited monopolies for some time in tech.

I suspect the real complaint was that Microsoft wasn't terribly innovative. Few things in tech are. The key is to steal from the best, and implement well. While it's arguable that Microsoft's technical implementations weren't all they could have been, the combined reach of their tech + business model worked very well, from the PoV of business success and spreading their "ecosystem" to borrow a more recent term, for most of 2-3 decades.