I don't believe that "Microsoft’s seemingly permanent “monopoly” has faded" at all. They still control 90+ percent of operating systems, and probably have a similar share of productivity applications. The tech market has grown beyond the desktop to the Internet, and certainly Microsoft's share of the new market areas isn't dominant. But nobody has chipped away at Microsoft's share of the traditional business.
Google's Firefox browser has signficant user share, but as it's a free product competing with another free product, that's probably not important.
As to Google's wickedness, I'll grant they haven't abused their power in any signficant way so far, but they have the ability to do some fairly heinous things with all that personal data should the mood strike. All it takes is one product manager trying to make a name for himself in a down quarter for that to happen, and I'll lay odds it will.
That being said, there's certainly a good argument for sitting back and doing nothing while we wait for the shoe to drop, especially compelling because we don't know exactly when and how Google will undermine our precious freedoms.
Frank
· 1 year ago
Yep, those many competitors to Google's products are really threatening it. After the Yahoo joint venture, Google will have a mere 90% of the search advertising market. Watch out, Sergey, Larry, and Eric! Any inventor in a garage can get together the tens of millions of dollars necessary to amass the digital infrastructure necessary to challenge you.
czhakis
· 8 months ago
Google is in the same position Microsoft was against IBM, and with a gazillion more resources, so most probably in the future, Google will be where Microsoft is today and Microsoft will be where IBM is today.
All Comments
Google's Firefox browser has signficant user share, but as it's a free product competing with another free product, that's probably not important.
As to Google's wickedness, I'll grant they haven't abused their power in any signficant way so far, but they have the ability to do some fairly heinous things with all that personal data should the mood strike. All it takes is one product manager trying to make a name for himself in a down quarter for that to happen, and I'll lay odds it will.
That being said, there's certainly a good argument for sitting back and doing nothing while we wait for the shoe to drop, especially compelling because we don't know exactly when and how Google will undermine our precious freedoms.