11.30.09

Microsoft Partner Starts Harassing GNU/Linux+ARM Product Vendors

Posted in FUD, GNU/Linux, Hardware, Microsoft at 6:33 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Summary: Microsoft’s “Slog” against ARM-powered devices began some months ago, but is the latest debacle in any way related to Microsoft?

SEVERAL months ago when the word “Netbook” was manipulated by Microsoft we finally complained about the name “Smartbook” [1, 2, 3, 4]. It was almost as though this name was made up by Microsoft in order to separate between a class of computers capable of running Windows and those that cannot.

According to this, a Microsoft partner suddenly says that the word “Smartbook” is no longer permitted. “I wonder,” writes Pamela Jones, “if it’s a coincidence that Qualcomm is being harassed over the name smartbook by a Microsoft partner, just as it gets ready to launch?”

As an important reminder from the news:

Helping to reduce cost will be Smartbook manufacturers’ relief from paying for a Microsoft licence because Microsoft has refused to port Windows XP/Vista/7 to ARM.

A reader has just sent us what he titled “Eye on Microsoft Slog,” referring to what Microsoft calls it when it attacks major rivals like a bulldozer. Sub-notebooks are among the victims (see links at the bottom of this post) and the illegal steps taken by Microsoft had been documented here before Microsoft started to whitewash and have people forget the truth, then believe that GNU/Linux lost, based on lies.

Windows ARMageddon Proceeds Smoothly

Microsoft has some fundamental market problems and is trying to substitute FUD for product. The market for smart phones and netbooks is hot. The market for desktops and Windows is not. Windows Mobile is a mess and the Vista family is never going to fit into your pocket. How do you spin that on its head? Easy, recycle previous lies and project doom onto the latest commercially successful threat, Chrome OS.

Current Microsoft talking points are that Google Android and Chrome OS will fail in the market just like GNU/Linux netbooks failed. Well disproved lies, such as higher rates of returns for GNU/Linux than Windows on netbooks and bogus market share numbers, are trotted out as supporting evidence. Damage control also extends to disparaging new wireless technologies that Google is pioneering. The Microsoft story is plastered all over Google Sci/Tech News through the usual suspects and analysts. The Microsoft party line is so backward that it would be funny if it did not mask prior criminal actions and were not a part of their current slog against Google.

Reality, of course, looks nothing like the Microsoft story and GNU/Linux netbook sales are surging. The illegal squeeze on GNU/Linux netbooks was short lived and much resented by retailers and OEMs that took a bath instead of making lots of money in a white hot market. New market data from ABI now shows that GNU/Linux is shipped on about a third of netbooks and they predict a majority share in 2013. Their numbers do not include “fast boot” GNU/Linux or home installs, just what shipped on 30 million netbooks. Predictions of dominance come from the rise of ARM systems. ABI’s predictions are too optimistic for Microsoft because they think Microsoft might do something with ARM and that Vista and Windows 7 might run on netbooks.

Boycott Novell should congratulate itself for conclusively documenting Microsoft’s attack on the Asus EEE PC and OLPC projects. Informed
predictions can only be made from correct history and correct technical knowledge.

References

• Linux owns 32 percent of netbook market, says study
• ABI’s Jeffrey Orr on rising Linux netbook sales
• Linux’s share of netbooks surging, not sagging, says analyst