(Mercury article)
> The philosophy underlying AOL's $4.3 billion acquisition of Netscape
> Communications Corp., which was confirmed Tuesday morning pending
> shareholder approval, is what AOL's chief executive calls ``AOL anywhere.''
...
> At the same time, however, Case restated AOL's intention to continue
> offering its existing subscribers the browser made by Netscape archrival
> Microsoft. AOL plans to exercise a Jan. 1 option to continue repackaging
> Microsoft's Internet Explorer inside its own software. Case said this
> arrangement is good for two to three more years.
BINGO! I suspect that MS is fronting AwOL to buy and destroy
Netscape. And with that, Linux!
> Case pledged Tuesday to bring this same approach to Netscape's browser.
> ``We do believe that the next generation of portals is really going to
> involve high integration with client software,'' he said.
>
> What this means for consumers is that AOL essentially will be trying to keep
> them from straying outside the folds of its Web sites. This concept is known
> as being ``sticky,'' and AOL hopes to deploy an array of tools to encourage
> consumers to stick around.
Care to speculate who is going to be the DOJ's next target in five
years, when we can't buy anything on the web except through AwOL?
> ``We're not going to support our competitors,'' said Kirsten Kappos,
> spokeswoman for Earthlink, one of the nation's largest Internet service
> providers. ``I don't think anyone would do it.''
And by cutting off Netscape, MS-AwOL cuts off Linux! Brilliant
strategy!!! Who will use Linux, when there is no decent web browser? Who
will oppose MS, when Netscape is gone???
Marc Andreeson's strategy becomes clear now. By ejecting Mozilla
into the Open Source arena, he wanted to be sure that even indirectly, MS
can not easily win.
Our only hope, is to oppose the patenting of algorithms and
applications of algorithms, All MS has to do, is copyright a lot of
look-and-feel stuff, and Open Source (tm) software is dead, at least to
the extent that MS can sure individual programmers and users. But let us
face it, after suing a few Open Source programmers for tens of millions of
dollars re use of patented algorithms and copyrighted interface standards,
Open Source will be as dead as build it yourself from scratch automobiles.
> AOL's browser plans could even force other major content sites to find a
> browser partner or introduce their own software. Yahoo's chief operating
> officer, Jeff Mallett, said his company continues to weigh this as a
> possibility, although the benefits have never appeared to make this
MS's proprietary standards, probably some patents, look and feel
copyrights and service marks, etc. and Bang! If you want the web, you have
to run Windows! Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.
All AOL has to do to finish this, is to produce a web browsing credit
card terminal that displays the card holder's picture whenever a credit
card holder runs his card through a card swipe machine. With that, they
will soon own electronic commerce, because unlike an image on a credit
card, that can not be faked with anything short of a technologically savvy
crook. With that, MS-AwOL gets a strangle hold on electronic commerce
that no one can break.
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