master@virtualnex.us 505-859-3559
It’s a Trap: Microsoft Embrace, Extend, Extinguish Part Deux
March 31, 2016
0

It’s a Trap!

MSFT: Embrace, Extend, Extinguish

For almost twenty years I have consulted for the top firms in many industries.  These include the largest web hosting provider in the first Internet, the world’s largest software company and the world’s largest firm and retailer.  These positions include Enterprise Security, Cloud, Hosting, Configuration Management, you name it.  I have watched a world go from Apple Macintoshes to Windows 95 and the Windows monoculture, to iOS dominance and the mobile revolution.  Finally I have gone through each of these transitions going from an Apple kid with Basic and line numbers to Windows Active Dire
ctory and Exchange Enterprise, and then Objective-C OOP on iOS 4x-9x.  Finally my servers have all switched to only Open Source.

MSFT-ubuntulogo-virtualnexusRichard Stallman, the Commander of the Rebel Fleet enabled Linus Torvalds, Han Solo, to kernel us to freedom.

But the war is never over.  Microsoft is integrating bash into Windows 10 this year and I  hear the praises of the choirs of angels, “Microsoft loves Linux” cries Satya Nadella, the face of a kinder gentler Microsoft.  (Prakash, 2016)  There is no kinder gentler Microsoft.  I worked for MSFT in the 90’s and later in the 2000’s.  We were the largest firm in the world, and larger than Apple in adjusted dollars until only very recently.  Apple returns to apogee, watch it ebb.  This is the 1990s all over again.  We have Cryptowars over encryption, and MSFT is again using Embrace, Extend and Extinguish.  A young whipper-snapper who has never read Eric Raymond came at me today in a forum and I had to trim back my eyebrows and ear brow hair and then shave my beard to serve up some secret fire of anor.  [Gandalf fights the Balrog 0:55 ]  The battle between liberty and tyranny never ends, it only develops new fronts.  You shall not pass MSFT!

The poster claims screenshot from G+ below:

Regardless of the direct attack in the Google Plus, read more Eric Raymond befBA-GPlus-MSFT-virtualneusore Foruming into a flame war young man, Microsoft did not lose the mobile computing war.  As Bane explains to Batman in The Dark Knight Rises, “Peace has Defeated You.  Victory’s cost you your strength.” [Bane Defeats Batman 0:45]  Microsoft ran Windows Tablet / XP for years when Ballmer mocked the iPhone and iPad.  Little did he know that timing is everything.  And without Bill, or Steve as great iron-fisted executives nothing could be forged.  Like the Hoover Dam and Panama Canal, all great endeavors of import are forged by some guy who is willing to be an asshole.  The question my friends always wonder about me?  “Is Karadi THAT asshole, or just a plain asshole.”  Only time will tell.  Please read my somewhat edited response to the kid who is about to discover what wolf we are again welcoming into our homes.

Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish Part Deux.  

“I have watched this strategy countless times before and it is important for me to educate this cohort on what Embrace, Extend, Extinguish means.

Embrace:

Microsoft embraces an open independent product as great tool by integrating Windows / Microsoft software with its functionality.

Extend:

Microsoft then Extends the software’s functionality with new proprietary MSFT extensions that everyone loves and becomes the de facto standard due to MSFT near monopoly market dominance.

Extinguish:

Finally it Extinguishes support for the open standard once it has attained dominance through misuse of market power.  Think Internet Explorer over Netscape and other extinct party jokes.

How this works with Ubuntu, is that Microsoft adds bash functionality that all the kids get for free with their Windows, easy, deceptive, simple.  Then this is their ONLY understanding of Linux.  Apple has done this too to a lesser degree with features it shamelessly steals such as from WebOS or even Xerox PARC for the first Macintosh.

Why would Microsoft do this?  You may not remember this. but Microsoft owned the desktop marketplace at 98% plus for decades.  This produced a stagnation that few remember today but also helped us get to where we are in the present.   The most important thing is for people to use Open Source whenever available.  This model gave us the innovation of Continous Integration (CI), Continuous Deployment (CD) and True DevOPS Infrastructure-as-Code.

Finally remember three things about MSFT employees.  Ballmer wielded MSFT’s market position like a bludgeon, called Linux cancer and used patents to crush and hobble Linux viz. Novell.  Next, any employee who spent twenty years at MSFT would be completely owned by these ideas.  This firm has the most mercenary culture I have ever seen.  Finally, Mr. Nadella is a product of this culture.”

Keep your friends close Ubuntu; keep your enemies closer.

References:

Prakash, Abhuishek. (2016). With the Help of Ubuntu, Linux Command Line Comes to Windows.  Retrieved March 31, 2016 from It’s F.O.S.S website: http://itsfoss.com/bash-on-windows/

Eric Raymond Wikipedia. (n.d.). Retrieved March 31, 2016 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar

Secret Fire of Anor. (n.d.) Retrieved March 31, 2016 from http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Flame_of_Anor

Gandalf Fights the Balrog. (n.d.) Retrieved March 31, 2016 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJZZNHekEQw

Bane Breaks the Bat (n.d.) Retrieved March 31, 2016 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkHIglq9TM8

Ballmer Mocks iPhone (n.d.) Retrieved March 31, 2016 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eywi0h_Y5_U

Hoover Dam and Panama Canal (n.d.) Retrieved March 31, 2016 from pastparallelpaths.com/2013/04/13/the-panama-canal-and-hoover-dam/

Embrace, Extend, Extinguish Wiki (n.d.) Retrieved March 31, 2016 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish

Nadella, Satya. (2015). “Microsoft Loves Linux.”  Retrieved March 31, 2016 from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54hHr8ye2kE

Paul, Ryan. (2007). “A Visual Timeline of the Microsoft-Novell Controversy.” Retrieved March 31, 2016 from http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2007/01/linux-20070128/