Many have predicted the demise of Microsoft several times over the decades. The last big assessment being during Netscape’s glory years of the early 90’s and MS’s being caught flat footed by the Internet. But Bill pulled it out. But now? –

Even disregarding Microsoft’s bubble valuation when Mr. Ballmer took over in 2000, the stock has been the proverbial dead money for a decade … At bottom, this is a corporate governance problem. Manifestly, the solution is not to let management keep stepping up to the plate with shareholder money and promising home runs that never materialize…

What the company should … do now is sharply lift its regular dividend and then promise to keep lifting it, so management will have to strain and push to reinvest in its core business while still meeting its dividend commitment to shareholders. Mr. Ballmer or whoever succeeds him needs to be placed under relentless daily pressure to distinguish between necessary spending on the business and pursuit of me-too products that don’t serve shareholder interests.

And…

One big bet Microsoft should make is on open source, the tool of the underdog, a label that is coming to fit the Redmond giant.

Yes, Microsoft is increasingly dabbling in open source, but the company needs to get more than its feet wet. It needs to dive into open source head first.

Open source would pave the way for Microsoft to be more relevant on the web, as Mitch Kapor has argued. If Microsoft wants to compete with Google - and it must - then it’s going to have to significantly sharpen its web arsenal.

Forget loose distribution agreements for Drupal and better interoperability with PHP. Microsoft should consider acquiring Acquia and thereby bringing Drupal (and Acquia) founder Dries Buytaert into the fold. It should be looking for ways to aggressively woo the Linux, Apache, MySQL and Perl/PHP/Python crowd to Windows plus AMP and, frankly, to embrace LAMP developers for everything but Windows.

But let’s not stop there. Microsoft also needs to go deep on Linux. Yes, this is anathema to the Microsoft faithful. But I’m not talking about porting its applications to run on Linux, nor am I suggesting that Microsoft replace Windows with Linux as its desktop and server operating system. That would be madness.

Source

In the former observation, this maybe true under Ballmer. Ballmer is less of a risk taker than Gates ever was. The Internet adaption being a case in point. Bill bet the farm with little realization if the switch would pay off. It did.

But this time around its a little different as the latter quote points out. This time in order to make a switch, Microsoft will be the underdog in any move to intelligent consumer devices. The high ground right now is held by Apple of all people. To get there Microsoft will have to leave Windows in all its flavors behind. That poses a huge undertaking and I doubt Ballmer has the insight to pull it off.

As to a switch to Linux? Heh. We suggested that two years ago. From a technical standpoint it makes sense. Tie in with all the IP work that has been done on the kernel and concentrate your uniqueness in coming up with a X11 based desktop that is for all the world a Microsoft product. The savings would be huge.

But there is a problem. In going there MS would most likely have to cut costs. I mean, anybody with any IT experience will tell their TAM that MSLinux is not worth the current going price if all it is a desktop layer. I can free from 20 other distros. So MS would have to figure out how to survive on 50% of its current income stream while porting all their apps to the platform.

Question is will they, can they?

The Russian Federation is moving to a Linux based platform choice for most government office uses –

The government is hoping to launch the first version of a “national operating system” for its computers as early as next year, a senior Communications and Press Ministry official said Thursday.

The operating system, for use on the computer systems of government agencies and state-run companies, will be 90 percent based on the open-source Linux operating system, Deputy Communications and Press Minister Ilya Massukh said.

He said use of the operating system would be optional for all agencies.

The operating system is part of the Information Society program, which the government is planning to implement from September. The program will receive 10 billion rubles ($330 million) in funding per year and includes other technology-related projects such as the creation of an “electronic government.”

The national operating system “may be one of the first targeted programs from the new raft that the government is going to approve,” Massukh said.

143m Russians using Linux? Maybe.

Linky.

Have you read about using utility computing and how it offers scalable flexibility over traditional server architecture? IT conversations recently interviewed Scalr’s Sebastian Stadil who demystifies the cloud and talks up his open source cloud resource manager.

 

 ITC.TM-SebastianStadil-2010.06.14 [40:45m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Yawn? Surely you jest. Oh I know that multihead conferencing has been around. Most of it corporate using dedicated circuits and equipment. Or public services like WebEx. But what makes VuRoom is that is does not require a lot of specific gear. If your PC can run the latest version of Skype it can run VuRoom.

SUNNYVALE, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–ViVu, Inc. (www.vivu.tv), an emerging leader in creating innovative and easy-to-use solutions for live video participation, today released VuRoom – a ViVu-powered plug-in for Skype, the popular software that enables the world’s conversations. VuRoom is built on the Skype platform to provide customers with instant multi-user video conferencing – an exciting new breakthrough previously unavailable to Skype users. Along with its presentation and desktop sharing functionalities, VuRoom is designed to help remote business users collaborate in real-time, while also saving valuable time and money.

“Having experienced the technology, I believe that ViVu is well positioned to deliver on the video collaboration needs of SMB and enterprise customers. In particular, I see strong potential for ViVu’s new Skype plug-in.”

“Our recent research studies predict a big year for global growth in the web conferencing market,” said Krithi Rao, an analyst in the Information & Communication Technologies Practice at Frost & Sullivan. “Now more than ever, enterprises are looking for cost-effective communication and collaboration solutions to help them succeed.”

Demo here.

Now why the tither Dog? The price. The problem with most of the other services is they run $30-40/month. That can run into some serious coin on a 10 person team every month. This is running $10/seat. A fourth the price. At that price point if using the software for the entire team replaced but one airline ticket a month it paid for itself and then some.

The fact that it is on Skype provides for a very ubiquitous platform. One could add external input sources as needed into the video conversations with little cost or set up charges. The real question is does it last in its current biz plan form. Skype with there latest release now provide P2P video on the three major OS platforms. That is probably 60% of all the Skype usage out there. Couple that with some geek will pull this off as a freebie somewhere as well. Time will tell.

But while it lasts VuRoom lowers the bar on multihead video.

Linky.

A New Zealand high school running entirely on open source software has slashed its server requirements by a factor of almost 50, despite a government deal mandating the use of Microsoft software in all schools.

Albany Senior High School in the northern suburbs of Auckland has been running an entirely open source infrastructure since it opened in 2009. The 230-pupil school was set up to follow open learning principles, offering large “learning commons” areas where multiple classes interact rather than conventional classrooms and setting aside one day each week for pupils to work on self-driven research projects.

Albany SHS’ unorthodox approach is also reflected in its IT infrastructure. Deputy principal Mark Osborne was determined to use open source software throughout the school, even though planning for that process began less than two months before the school opened.

Totally open. Further in the article, it is revealed that a student can bring in other foreign platforms like a Mac and use them on the network as well. A good thing for the school? Sounds like it. Little early to tell. The school only started in 2009. Give it a year or so and lets hope there is a follow up article.

Linky.

… In Hungary? Yeah I know, Ole Tux is just an OS. That is what I thought too. Still do by the way. But in Hungary a political party — Jobbik — has sprung up.:

We are going to implement open standards in the public sector and will promote the spread of open source solutions among the general public and among businesses. Under these directives, government and public sector documents can be stored only, in open document formats, on systems running open standards applications.

We are going to develop open standard interfaces, in order to encourage municipalities, the tax department, the banking sector and public offices to use open source solutions.

We are going to supply government funded and developed applications for municipalities, nation wide, to eliminate parallel and wasteful developments.

When both proprietary and open source software will be available with the equal functionality to accomplish a particular task, we will make the use of open source solutions, mandatory.

We are going to implement open standards in the school system and will introduce open source computing as a subject in schools, under the discipline of computer sciences.

That ladies and gentlemen is the Jobbik party platform. Sound wild? Well I will just direct you to Sweden where the Pirate Party has a foothold in Parliment after raising petitions and funds on the Pirate Bay file sharing suit. They now have over a dozen affiliated Pirate parties in the world. So it would not be far fetched at all.

Linky.

Yes Dear Reader a little TCO analysis can save you money. We have been saying for years that the shell game of free phone, payback is a b!@#$ thru the contract is a bear. It also hurts your wallet. –

He’s considering buying a data-only plan from T-Mobile and relying primarily on SkypeOut purchases, with a backup of free Gizmo5 calls through Google Voice, although new Gizmo5 sign-ups are currently suspended. That means little to no mobile calling (unless you used the free Guava app). Then again, Ben sees some significant savings by the end of what would be a two-year contract, and considers himself a “near-total” dependent on Google services. Could you imagine making the data-only jump?

Just go over to the lifehacker article and see for yourself. Keep in mind that the author is considering only going with a data only plan, 2yr contact. There are other considerations one can also employ. For instance, does your spouse have a phone with a carrier who does a Friend and Family deal? Why not punch the Google voice into the loop? Then the calls to her are free. And if perchance one has a small VoIP server then a VoIP app on the Nexus might avoid all the Gizmodo fiddling as well.

While we are on the subject. The Nexus Launch. A captured live blog feed is here with pics. Initial take — very iPhonish. But that seems to be where the jive is at the moment. The wise move being made? You can buy the phone separate and go with any vendor you wish. That’s a damn smart move, especially for the consumer.

I just hope the carriers are prepared for the bandwidth assault. This phone screams — Songbird App. But your data store staying on the home server and streamed to the Nexus as an audio terminal. Oh and anybody out there developing a multiparty audio remix app for the Nexus. It would sell.

We have projected for 2 years that it was time for unbundling the phone. We would have expected it to happen before the smartphones took hold. But I guess it takes the extra functionality of the smartphone to force the issue on the carriers. Hope I am right but wrong.

Nexus one analysis.

My apologies to Ed Berridge its not our practice to just lift articles bodily from a publisher. But this is just too sweet not to —

LINUX VENDOR Red Hat hit a milestone yesterday when its share price rose above Microsoft’s.

True, Microsoft has a hell of a lot more shares out there in the marketplace and its own share price has not been that healthy over the past year, but this is being seen by analysts as a great day for the free software outfit.

Since 2001 Red Hat has experienced more than 600 per cent growth, while during the same period Microsoft has experienced negative growth in its share price.

Actually 2001 was a darn good time to invest in Red Hat. In those days its stock was worth a piddling $3 per share. Now Red Hat stock is priced at over $28 per share.

Analysts say that while Red Hat’s share price has been higher than today what is important is that actually it is worth the figure.

Red Hat’s profits come from server support subscriptions and it is a stable maker of earnings.

The only thing that could go wrong for Red Hat is if other Linux suppliers come along and offer lower subscription fees.

However to balance that, Red Hat is making a killing with virtualisation and its Java application server business in Jboss.

According to CIO Today, Red Hat could make out like a bandit on the craze for Cloud computing. µ

Ed, if you or your publisher have heartburn, please just send us a note. We will take this down. But this is just too sweet not to savor. Go Red Hat!

Linky.

Ever wanted to be a movie mogul? See your name up there in the credits. Wield power. Manage the casting couch. Well you can, well except for the last part —

Get your credit!

If you purchase and pay the DVD by september 15th latest, you can get your name mentioned on the official movie credit scroll! To make sure the crediting works fine, we will remind everyone via email a month before the movie goes to premiere.

As you can notice on the campaign “money meter”, we target at a pre-sale of 2000 this time. Very ambitious, but the targets for this project are ambitious too. Order now!

General donations are welcome too, check the Sponsor Prospectus for offerings, or use the Donate button there.

Thanks for the support!

The Durian Team

Yep its an Open Source project. Only this time it is going for Open Funding too. So all it takes is for you to preorder Durian by September 15th and your name will be added to the list of credits as a ‘producer’ I guess. Ego? Hey you bet. But where else can the average schmo like me get a crack at this? My point exactly.

Linky.

For those that are of a geeky sort and want to play with the code that is the base for the Palm it is now available. –

To comply with the GPL, Palm has released the source code packages for its Linux-based WebOS used by the new Palm Pre, which has been on sale in the US since the beginning of June. The company has also set up its own open source site.

For its WebOS, Palm uses version 2.6.24 of the Linux kernel with nearly 1,000 patches, most of which relate either to the Pre’s ARM processor architecture or to platform-specific drivers. Some Palm developed new drivers are also included in the source code, such as a driver for the acceleration sensor in the Pre.

The Pre is already in the stores and seems to have developed a decent following. With but a few exceptions (eg no X11) any linux developer would feel right at home with the Pre.

Linky.