You got most of the facts right Suzanne. Of course Gates would
probably still be working on his degree in poker, it Paul Allen hadn't called
him up and talked him into moving to New Mexico. They wrote a basic
interpreter for the Altair 8800 (anyone remember??).
They guy's name was Gary Kincaid (last name not sure) and he was the
one who wrote CP/M. And he just wouldn't play the IBM rules of the
time...He came down to see them, but he was getting ready to go surfing
and didn't have time for them (they didn't have an appointment). Bill
Gates groveled and yes purchased DOS from Seattle Computer for
$50,000.
He also stole the concept for windows from Apple...but then Apple stole it
from Xerox, so in this day and age I guess 2 wrongs make a right.
Essentially, there is only been innovation at Microsoft if you use a rubber
band.<s >
On 1 Jul 98, at 20:25, Suzanne wrote:
> >>
> >> What I don't understand is if so many people are against what Microsoft
> >> is doing, then why don't the computer manufacturers choose another
> >> operating system to ship with their systems? Microsoft doesn't own the
> >> computers. They own the software.
> >
>
> I'm a little vague on my geek history, but didn't Gate's original contract
> to provide the DOS operating system for IBM's first personal computers
> specify that all PCs from then til the end of time run Microsoft DOS
> (which Windows runs on top of)? Isn't that, and the fact that Apple
> Computer thought it could get away with charging more for a superior
> computer, the main reason PCs with Microsoft's operating system became the
> industry standard?
>
> Perhaps somebody could fill us in on how that early '80s contract
> stipulating DOS (which Gates didn't even write but bought from somebody
> else) somehow continues in force after all these years?
>
> BTW, the "Revenge of the Nerds' video which I've seen a couple of times on
> public tv, is an absolutely fascinating portrayal of the early years of
> PCs and Macs. The saddest part of the story was learning that another
> developer was approached by IBM and his wife, who handled the meeting in
> his absence, refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement. The IBM dudes
> walked, went back to Gates, who seized the opportunity, spent $50,000 to
> buy DOS from someone else and sold it to IBM. The first guy committed
> suicide years later. If my memory of the story is correct, DOS was a
> back-engineered version of the dead guy's operation system (somebody
> correct me if I'm wrong on the details).
>
> The fact that Gates didn't even write the original DOS program is part of
> the reason for resentment against Microsoft: it established his pattern of
> buying up and marketing other people's ideas and his reputation for never
> having done anything creative besides cutting that immensely lucrative
> deal with IBM way back in the dark ages.
>
> The IBM alliance was a particulary sharp one. In the mid-80s I bought my
> first PC for my ad agency. I wasn't too impressed by the Apple Lisa I'd
> looked at. All I wanted to do was word processing, and I couldn't
> understand the significance of the little icons onscreen. Our company's
> first PC and dot matrix printer cost around $5000. That was big bucks for
> us, and I felt much more secure buying a machine with the International
> Business Machines logo on it. Our salesman talked us into buying a clone
> next time around, and it and its printer were "only" $3500 (2 mb ram and a
> 40 mb hard drive). It was a couple of years before Apple changed the face
> of graphic design with the laser printer and Adobe Postscript technology.
> Until then, we, and the rest of the world were perfectly happy with our
> PCs. The only reason I changed was that my brother convinced me in '92
> that it would cost a fortune to make my PC "act like a Mac and it still
> wouldn't be a real Mac." Now that I've had Macs, I'd certainly never
> switch back, but nonetheless it's easy to understand how PCs became so
> well entrenched.
>
> Suz
>
>
> ____________________________________________________________________
> --------------------------------------------------------------------
> Join The Web Consultants Association : Register on our web site Now Web
> Consultants Web Site : http://just4u.com/webconsultants If you lose the
> instructions All subscription/unsubscribing can be done directly from our
> website for all our lists.
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
--Lee
Nurses' Call Administrator http://www.nurses-call.org
Design West http://www.designwest.com
Web Weaving Wizard http://www.wizards.net
____________________________________________________________________
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Join The Web Consultants Association : Register on our web site Now
Web Consultants Web Site : http://just4u.com/webconsultants
If you lose the instructions All subscription/unsubscribing can be done
directly from our website for all our lists.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
