BOARDROOM TAILS
ANN CROTTY: The irony of Bill’s messiah complex
Conventional thinking absolves Microsoft from blame
How ironic it was for Bill Gates to be swanning about, mouthing off about bringing medicine to the poor of Africa, while in the UK thousands of sick people were struggling to get the service expected of a run-down national health system that was overly reliant on Microsoft’s operating system. The two situations are not unrelated. Gates has the money to fund his philanthropic ambitions because his company, Microsoft, made obscene amounts from the near-monopoly it enjoyed in the market for computer operating systems. Judging by last weekend’s Ransomware attack (and the threat of more) it now looks as though much of Microsoft’s operating systems weren’t fit for purpose.Despite the flaw, because Microsoft could be run on ultra-cheap personal computers, it came to dominate the market. It also harnessed the power of marketing and became the largest software company in the world.All the way back in 2000, a US judge ordered Microsoft to be broken up, as punishment for abusing its market dom...
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