Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft Implicitly Declares Vista 8 Dead, Refocuses on Vapourware Instead and Bribes Dell to Play Along

On to imaginary products

"In the face of strong competition, Evangelism's focus may shift immediately to the next version of the same technology, however. Indeed, Phase 1 (Evangelism Starts) for version x+1 may start as soon as this Final Release of version X."

--Microsoft, internal document [PDF]



Windows Blue



Summary: The sale of Dell turns out to have been initiated by Microsoft, whose leading product (common carrier) is already having obituaries written about it due to the messages which come out from Microsoft

The manager behind the product which we dubbed Vista 8 has already been fired. It is easy to see why now that we have preliminary market statistics, just over half a year after the official release. Vista 8 greatly harmed OEMs such as Dell (Dell too has complained) and this new report says that Microsoft is paying Dell [1, 2, 3] to encumber PCs with Vista 8, leaving the customers out of the loop.



The terms of Microsoft's $2 billion loan into the war chest of Denali Holdings, the Dell private buyout entity led by Michael Dell and Silver Lake Partners, are now public record. Microsoft's money was key in raising the $24.4 billion required to finalize the offer for Dell, but it's possible Dell will benefit even beyond the loan; the loan documents make clear that after the acquisition is complete, Dell will re-negotiate its payment terms for Microsoft software licenses.


So no longer is it mere speculation that Microsoft was behind Dell going private and selling out. "Windows Blues," as iophk calls it, is what we are seeing here. "Vista 8 is failing so they are already doing the N+1 thing," he adds. Here is a report about it. Talk about rush; this is motivated by panic. The Guardian says "PC sales plummet", but what it means to actually say is "Windows preinstalls plummet" (because of failure to evolve). "Biggest expectation is that update will revive start button familiar to users for 17 years before removal from Windows 8," writes Charles Arthur. But that's not really an apt summary. The real news is that Windows is plummeting to minority market share and Microsoft has no clue what to do about it. Here is CNET claiming "'Wintel' on the wane: Intel goes Google". The summary is as follows: "Intel has been synonymous with Windows PCs seemingly forever. But it's trying to change that in a hurry. Enter Google."

I recently had lunch with an Intel engineer who acknowledged this trend. Moblin and Tizen were not good enough as comeback attempts. Here is a criticism of what Microsoft is essentially doing right now. The author alleges that Windows 8 marketing fiasco deemed even worse than ‘New Coke’ and he starts with the obvious pitfall: "With the Windows Blue update on the way, analysts have already started writing obituaries for Windows 8, the operating system that proved to be immensely polarizing among PC users. While history will likely look upon Windows 8 more kindly than the widely despised Vista, Envisioneering analyst Richard Doherty tells The Financial Times that it will be remembered as the biggest marketing fiasco since Coca Cola decided to rework the formula for its famous soft drink back in the ’80s."

Here is IDG with some numbers:

Microsoft's own numbers show Windows 8 sales falling rapidly



Microsoft says it's sold more than 100 million Windows 8 licenses to date, but its officially reported monthly sales are falling off precipitously


Based on some numbers from IDC (part of IDG), despite a lot of money spent on marketing, Windows is a non-starter outside the desktop.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Happy 20th Birthday to OpenDocument Format (ODF)
nowadays many companies use "online" "webapps" to collaborate on various things
Passkeys Are Vendor Lock-in and Imperialism, Not Security, So Escape Them Before They Latch Onto Your Workflows
This is their 'grand vision' of computing. You merely 'rent' what you assumed you truly bought to own.
Let's Put Slop In the Casket Once and for All (Call Out the Sites and People Who Produce and Spread Slop)
Together, through a movement of integrity and solidarity, we can marginalise the spread of slop in all its forms, including code
Windows Down in the Largest Countries, Microsoft Cannot Dodge This Reality Forever
Talking about "clown" and "hey hi" (AI) - sometimes "Quantum" - is like telling bedtime stories to infantile investors who don't understand those buzzwords
 
Microsoft's Debt Grew 2.1 Billion Dollars in the Past 3 Months Alone or 8.2 Billion in the Past Half a Year
That's very different from what the mainstream press tells the public, including shareholders
Links 03/05/2025: Amazon and Apple Problems (the A's in GAFAM), Hard to Hide Any Longer; Australia’s Election
Links for the day
Why Law Firms and Courts in Particular Should Dump Microsoft
Giving a notoriously corrupt and chronically law-breaking company control over one's systems and data is a recipe for disaster
Gemini Links 03/05/2025: Showerhead Mod and Micro Dosing on LSD
Links for the day
Links 03/05/2025: Bribery in Dutch Microsoft DC Probe, Zuckerberg Conflates Slop With 'Friends'
Links for the day
Today is World Press Freedom Day, 3rd of May
2025 World Press Freedom Day
Gemini Protocol's Momentum Ahead of Its 6th Anniversary (Next Month)
The more capsules go online, the more people participate in writing, not just reading
Corporate Media, a Cheerleader of Wall Street Facade, Spent Days Saying "META" and "MSFT" Lifted "the Market", But Their Debt Soared
Facebook's debt has never been higher
Microsoft Windows Falls to a Meager 9% "Market Share" in South Africa While GNU/Linux Rises Above 5% in Desktops/Laptops
South Africa is where the founder of Ubuntu (or Canonical) comes from
Links 03/05/2025: Australian Election and manpage for Gemini Considered
Links for the day
Links 03/05/2025: UK Arrests for Bribery Connected to Microsoft Datacentres
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, May 02, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, May 02, 2025
Not Just an OSU Open Source Lab Issue
Prominent and very prolific news sites about Linux ask for help
GNU/Linux Has Risen to All-Time High in South America, Windows Has Fallen a Lot Due to Android
What will the rest of the year bring?
Richard Stallman (RMS) Says US "Magats" Have Destroyed Press Freedom in the US
Now they're exporting their attacks on the media to the UK
In Africa, GNU/Linux Rose From 3% to 4% in Just Two Months
So says statCounter anyway... What will it be like by the end of this year?
Gemini Links 02/05/2025: Bandcamp and Spying "Smart Glasses"
Links for the day
Microsoft Says Demand/Budget for "AI" is Decreasing, Bing is Also Moving Down and Down This Year ("Bing Chat" Was an Utter Failure, People Want Sites, Not Slop)
Skype is about to shut down, XBox will likely die soon
Asia is Running Away From USA-ware (Trump or 'Tariff Regime'), Including Microsoft Windows
The nationalism harms Microsoft
Data Shows Largest EU Economies Shifting to GNU/linux
all-time highs
Microsoft President Panics Over Europe's Abandonment of Microsoft/GAFAM/Trump's USA, These Figures Show Us Why
Microsoft is bluffing
Microsoft Windows Falls Below Quarter in "Market Share" (While Microsoft Fakes Rising Dominance... in Buzzwords and Fake Accounting)
Cooking the books while Windows gets 'cooked'
Links 02/05/2025: Expedia Group Undergoes Layoffs, Twitter Exodus in Europe
Links for the day
Techrights Statement: The Solution is Not More Censorship or Moving to Another Mastodon Instance, the Core Problem is Social Control Media Including Mastodon
Censorship typically leads to additional (new) issues
Good News, Bad News: Groklaw is Back Online, SoylentNews Apparently Loses Editor
Jan ought to change the resignation into a mere pause
Manchester Computing Centre (MCC) Made the First GNU/Linux Distro, But You Probably Never Heard of It
People like Owen are barely remembered, not because they didn't do valuable work but because they didn't suck up to "The Establishment"
Online Mobs and Crabs: Doing to Fabrice Bellard What They Did to Richard Stallman and Linus Torvalds
They just don't want skilled people to be productive
E-mail is Not HTML, Web Pages Aren't a Form of E-mail
as an associate remains us, always use "plain text, it was good enough for Shakespeare"
Slopwatch: Stigma-Baiting by the Serial Sloppers and Latest Garbage From the Slopfarm LinuxSecurity.com (Also Slopping Away at "OpenBSD" With SEO SPAM Made by LLMs)
Microsoft et al are trying to profit from blurring away information
Links 02/05/2025: Mineral Selloff and Chinese Sanctions
Links for the day
Gemini Links 02/05/2025: Hens and Tmux
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, May 01, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, May 01, 2025
Gopher/Gemini Links 01/05/2025: Slop/LLM Bot Troubles and Driving Angry
Links for the day
Links 01/05/2025: Apple Lies to Courts, European Patents Thrown Out by British Courts Again
Links for the day
Microsoft's CEO is Hyping Up 'AI' (Plagiarism) to Distract From Falling Interest in It and Missed Expectations (Investors Run Out of Patience as Reality Does Not Meet or Match Early False Promises)
Microsoft clearly needs 1) a distraction and 2) hype about "AI"
No, Microsoft, Plagiarism is Not "AI"
"Satya Nadella says as much as 30% of Microsoft code is written by AI"
Microsoft Has Become Almost Extinct in Web Servers, Netcraft Now Ranks It in Only One Category (Microsoft Down Sharply), Deranked/Outranked in All the Rest
Microsoft used to be in all categories, now it's in just one
Gemini Links 01/05/2025: Small Web and Going Offline
Links for the day
Microsoft Has Hundred of Layoffs Again, Same Week as the Company's Fake Results
those people were in effect Microsoft employees, just classified as contractors
Sirius Open Source in Court
I personally was a witness and an alibi
What GNU/Linux Means to Us
Linux without freedom is like becoming a vegetarian "except on special occasions"
Links 01/05/2025: Slop Blowback, Social Control Media as Vehicle of "Sextortion"
Links for the day
Disinformation and Marketing Spam From and For OIN (GAFAM's and IBM's Weapon Against Free Software Activists and Reformists Against Software Patents)
All in all, this anniversary is just a PR stunt with revisionism
Some of the Evidence We'll Be Relying Upon in the Lawsuits Against Matthew J. Garrett
Finally facing the consequences for his actions
Symptom or Hallmark of Ponzi Schemes: Microsoft Says It Gains Over 100 Million Dollars in "Goodwill" and Its Speculative "Value" Nearly Doubled to $119,329,000,000 in the Past Year Alone
Total liabilities are now over $240,000,000,000
Gemini Links 01/05/2025: Trying OpenBSD and Usenet Reborn Released
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, April 30, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, April 30, 2025