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IDG, Gartner, InfoWorld, and ZiffDavis announce "Dark Day for Windows"

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hm_murdock:
November 20, 2004

REDMOND, WA, Today, Microsoft founder and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates announced today that he was heading to the Seattle Apple Store to buy a Power Mac 970. He cited deficiences in Microsoft's operating system software, Windows, and decided that Apple's UNIX-derived Mac OS XI on new IBM-designed PowerPC 970 hardware was clearly superior.

This is only one in a rash of dramatic "switcher" stories away from Windows. Operating systems like Linux, FreeBSD, Mac OS XI and OS/2 Warp 4.5 are gaining tens of market share points per day based on current trends. ZiffDavis' ZDLabs tested the newest release of Red Hat Linux, 9.0 and announced Windows Longhorn "dead before its time" based on their findings with Red Hat 9.0. Red Hat's newest release is able to run Windows games, as well as a new rash of Linux native games on a new graphics subsystem called "Crystal"... an Open Source X11-compatible version of Apple's Quartz 2.0 framework.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiled Quartz 2 as part of Mac OS XI (Eleven) at MacWorld Expo recently. Of Mac OS XI Jobs says, "Mac OS XI will empower users in ways they never thought imaginable. They can truly break free the shackles of Windows when they try a new Mac."

After years of floundering in the market, Apple struck back last year with sweeping product changes based on new processors and hardware with lower than their normal prices which caught the eyes of PC buyers. Lower prices with comparable and higher speeds boosted Apple's market share to nearly 20% by the first quarter of 2004.

Dell, Apple's biggest competitor has been looking to embrace the PowerPC Open Platform with a new line of computers running Linux. The new Dell Generation line use either a low-cost IBM PowerPC 750fxe running at 1.8 to 2.5GHz, or a big iron PowerPC 970e at 3.5 to 5GHz. Dell will ship YellowDog Linux on the machines with KDE4.5 and Apple iWorks Pro for Linux in time for Christmas.

How is Linux creator Linus Torvalds handling the news? In a recent interview, he told Maximum PC magazine, "I think it's wonderful that people are finally waking up to the joy of real, reliable computing. Apple, Dell, and all the 'UNIX guys' are finally winning the victory they deserve!"

In conclusion, analysts are saying this will be the first Christmas in over two decades that will have a technology company other than Microsoft win big. Apple and Red Hat seem to be the heroes of the day, and it seems that at long last, a computing world without doors, Windows, or Gates might be possible.

[ November 21, 2002: Message edited by: Jimmy James: Mac Commando ]

[ November 21, 2002: Message edited by: Jimmy James: Mac Commando ]

TB:
.......Now we just have to sit back and watch it happen. Two years seems just a bit optimistic to me though

psyjax:
Wow Jimmy, you should forward that article to steve Jobs  :D

Say, "it could be like this Steve, if only..."

heh... maybe he'll get his fuckin act together and deliver like he used to.

pkd_lives:
Very good 10 points for cheering my day up.

Although I don't think Linus would ever truly talk up Apple or Dell.

Calum:
i don't think linus torvalds would say that, but i don't know him. i don't know steve jobs any better really but i have a hard time believing he will allow apple to really pull its finger out to this extent.

[ November 21, 2002: Message edited by: Calum: Linux Commando ]

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