“…one of the things I have to do on a regular basis
is what-if analysis. In this kind of analysis, you make the
assumption that something that is possible actually happens, you
describe the future world that results, and then you develop a
strategy to deal with that outcome. It’s actually quite a bit of
fun.“Recently, I had the chance to do this with the assumption that
Microsoft had failed and the world had embraced open-source
software.“In that world, which I profiled around the 2010 timeframe,
revenues and jobs had long ago left North America and much of
Western Europe. Software jobs and positions largely had moved to
the Third World because of lower labor rates in emerging
nations…”