MIcrosoft’s plan for World Domination
No it doesn,t involve weapons of mass destruction, only a complete idiot would trust Micro$oft with a mission critical operating system, but this short interview does confirm a some rather obvious intentions as Billy Gates’ empire moves beyond the office. Towards the end, Allard reportedly makes some general observations about how they will offer media companies such as ESPN a platform solution. They have already had some success with the BBC iPlayer despite plenty of well founded criticism, so I think its a fair bet that the borg might be on to something. Will “Our ABC” be another feather in the Micro$oft cap? Internally there are plenty who think the sun shines out of the Bill’s arse and the ABC is up to its neck in terms of MS systems, so its distinctly possible that despite any valid objections or alternatives, management is likely to be seduced by skinheads like Allard.
It probably shouldn’t matter, except for a couple of things. One is the question of locking the viewing public into a proprietary system (with the issue of equity in mind), and the other is the threat posed to an organisation’s independence. If a media organisation adopts a specific locked up platform such as the iPlayer, regardless of the technical merit of the solution, they do several things. First and foremost they exclude a potential chunk of their audience which has couple of reactions, people go elsewhere and or people adopt the new system, discarding their old. In the case of iPlayer, linking the BBC brand with Micro$oft is a great public relations coup for Ballmer and Co. A few more such successes will rob competing platform solutions of air, and makes it easier for one system to dominate in much the same way that Micro$oft dominated computer operating systems. Without competition, media outlets could find themselves hostages to the platform in the future. The only insurance against such a scenario is to foster self sufficiency and encourage open standards based solutions, or buy a lot of shares in the company that will end up having you by the balls in years to come.
David Howe
http://www.qednet.biz