“Dot Net,” as it is called, is Microsoft’s vision of the future.
It’s 50% inspiration and 50% manipulation. … I don’t have to
tell you how Microsoft manipulated you in the past. They did it
with DOS. They did it with Windows. They’ll do it again with
Microsoft.Net. Here’s how.”
“Microsoft always promises that their platform will be ready
Real Soon Now. In fact, it’s always months, sometimes years late.
By that time, many developers are too invested to bail out. Gates
said previews of Microsoft.Net will show up in 2001, but full
services will not be available until at least 2002. Why
pre-announce? To stake a claim and to freeze the competition, of
course.”
“Here’s another warning. Microsoft says it will embrace
standards. Sure, Microsoft will play the open-source game at the
beginning. But only long enough to create their own proprietary
flavors. I guarantee you when Dot Net arrives, it will run only on
Microsoft clients and servers. Once you’re locked in. They’ll
increase the toll. And start extracting monopoly profits
again.”