What will the Microsoft trial mean to those whose livelihoods depend on Microsoft products?
Trial by Ordeal
What will the Microsoft trial mean to those whose livelihoods depend on Microsoft products?
If you could survive being smothered in steak sauce and
then being cast into a pit with six starving wolverines,
you must not have stolen that loaf of bread after all.
Nifty concept, eh? Trial by ordeal is centuries old, yet
it seems to have survived to this day, with a twist: The
spectators are the ones enduring the ordeal.
Yet we’re stuck with that ordeal if we want some
sort of legal system that works. You, or supermodel Em,
or the person on the corner, or the Lions Club may know
that Reagan funneled Iranian arms money to the Contras,
or that O.J. was/was not guilty, or that Clinton perjured
himself, or that Microsoft execs held secret meetings
where they stomped on Jim Barksdale blowup dolls and threw
SPARCstations over the railing. But, if you or Auntie
or the person on the corner or the Lions Club were to
become judge, jury, and executioner, well, we might as
well just pack it all in, surround our homes with barbed
wire, and stock up on whatever gear hasn’t been snatched
up by my brother, the Y2K survivalist.
In our business, we have to somehow make it through the
ordeal of the Microsoft antitrust trial, where it seems
the Feds will do and say anything short of accusing Redmond
of surreptitiously manufacturing nuclear weapons for a
preemptive strike down Netscape way, and in which Microsoft
will do and say anything rather than admit that some of
the ways it does business are specifically intended to
crush, maim, and mutilate any company that dares become
more than a minor competitor.
Is that illegal? How illegal? Does it warrant fines,
breakups, mass beheadings, trips to the wolverine pit?
The protagonists in the trial duke it out in Armani suits
and careful it’s-not-quite-a-blatant-lie terminology,
holding spin-dispersal conferences after every day in
court.
It’s you, me, the person on the corner, the coders,
the sys admins, and the architects who have to suffer
through the ordeal because, in the end, we’re the
ones who still have to make a living in a marketplace
created by Microsoft. We display Microsoft certifications
to show some competency with its products. We count on
Microsoft development tools, on TechNet, and on MSDN.
Our ordeal is that we don’t know what the outcome
of the trial will be for us. I couldn’t care less
whether Redmond’s top 20 moneymakers make only tens
of millions rather than hundreds of millions. But those
of us whose billables are based on Bill are more than
a bit nervous following the proceedings. It’s no
great leap of faith to imagine a scenario in which Microsoft
is either convicted of or admits to violations of antitrust
regulations, is it?
What would a Microsoft breakup mean to the thousands
of us whose livelihoods depend on Microsoft products?
I doubt any of the players in this game particularly care,
beyond lip service. We need to maintain a sense of perspective
about how Microsoft views us. The certification process
and its costs are marketing expenses for Redmond; our
being out there and doing what we do generates income
for Microsoft in the form of product licenses. As for
the Feds, they’re trying to figure out where Microsoft’s
practices fall under the law; third-party vendors and
service providers aren’t part of that fact set unless
some practice concerning them can provide ammo for the
Justice Department.
Face it, our fate hangs in the air, and it’s going
to be determined by forces we can’t control one bit.
This gal would be surprised if, in the end, Microsoft
is dismantled; but remedies that result in a less lopsided
playing field will have an impact that goes beyond just
affecting Redmond’s annual financial statements.
That’s not an admonition of the government—let
‘em do what’s right under the law. It’s
more of a wakeup call to you, dear readers, to not discount
this case or prejudge it. Weather the ordeal by keeping
your skills current and staying flexible.
About the Author
Em C. Pea, MCP, is a technology consultant, writer and now budding nanotechnologist who you can expect to turn up somewhere writing about technology once again.