Summary: Microsoft Response Point reaches the end of the line

THE LAST death of a Microsoft product that we mentioned (just one among many) was here, but this continues at the usual pace of about one dead product every 1.5 weeks. Latest casualty:

After weeks of speculation, Microsoft has essentially killed Response Point — the company’s former VoIP system for small businesses. According to a Microsoft Town Hall meeting today with VARs, the product is in maintenance mode with no future releases planned. Sorry for the following comparison, but Response Point has become Microsoft’s modern day OS/2. Here’s why.

Alas, Response Point is a product with an eager, niche following that didn’t officially die. Instead, Response Point will fade away (quickly, The VAR Guy predicts) through maintenance mode support. IBM used the same strategy to walk away from OS/2 a decade ago.

Now that Microsoft puts VoIP on the back burners, Cisco enters more such areas with GNU/Linux, and Microsoft's Communication Server partner Nortel goes out of business, what might happen to Exchange (Microsoft's ripoff of others) in the long run? GNU/Linux is competing well against Exchange and here is a good new comic on the subject. ⬆

Related posts:

• Why Microsoft Doomed Exchange... and E-mail Too
• Microsoft Kills Novell's Exchange 'Killer'?
• What (In)Compatibility Games is Microsoft up to With Exchange 2007?