Tag Archives: Linux Ubuntu

Bye-Bye Microsoft. Hello Linux. [Rev 2]

Leave a reply

Microsoft (MS) has gotten too big for its britches. Over time its wildly popular series of Windows upgrades has won over much of the world. For many years they successfully operated under a business model that said If you build it, they will come. The latest upgrade presents improved features that require some customers to get over their thrifty-hump and pay to upgrade their computers to Windows 11. This business model kept sales growth high and led everyone to believe that it would go on forever. After all, founder Bill Gates is a likeable folk hero whose appeal across the business and computing worlds seemed inexhaustible. But he is a tech guy, not a finance or marketing specialist. At some point most tech companies transition from tech driven to finance driven as they are taken over by the finance guys.

Numerous examples exist where a tech company goes from engineering focused to finance focused. Boeing is a recent example of an aerospace engineering culture transitioning to overriding concern for shareholder value in the form of quarterly stock prices. In the unceasing desire of the C-Suite to improve profits by cost cutting, Boeing apparently drifted a bit to far into the MBA’s fever dream of operating a finance engine. The 737 Max fiasco and their botching of the Artemis program is widely regarded as being due to drift of the company culture. Luckily, nobody has been killed in the Artemis program due to Boeing engineering failures … yet.

Another example of this is what Jack Welch did to General Electric Company (GE). His transformation of GE includes implementing a cut-throat culture. I’ll let readers visit the Wikipedia page for more details. Guys like Welch become demigods attracting hungry young business school graduates flocking to their pedestals hoping to glean savvy insights and secrets to become the next generation of masters of the universe. I can’t blame anyone for their enthusiasms and the desire to succeed, but bastardizing technology companies by conversion to finance companies is beyond the pale. When those who inhabit the rarefied air of the C-Suite are more concerned about their golden parachutes than the furtherance of their manufacturing ingenuity and quality, they should move on. When Jack Welch left GE, his severance package was $417 million.

I’m partway through switching to Linux Ubuntu from the home version of Windows 11. I just purchased an Asus laptop preloaded with Linux. Like most people I have a giant collection of pdf files as well as MS Word and Excel files. My understanding is that pdf files are easier to transfer to Linux and one of the better ways to deal with Word documents is to convert them to pdf.

MS Windows and MS Office were loaded with advanced features wildly beyond what any single user would need to use. These features were neatly organized in pull-down menus and manipulated with the click and drag of a mouse. This would allow users from casual to super-users to use a single package across a wide range of applications. No need to offer different versions across business, personal and scientific applications.

MS has been selling excess capacity from early on. It was part of the ballyhoo and razzle dazzle. Think about all of the objects you own that are packed with unneeded applications you’ll never use. I wonder how much of the US economy is spent on tools and widgets that have wasted utility.

The Windows operating system (OS) and MS’s package of office applications have provided a widely adopted template for business activity, games and home computing. The friendly and perhaps even inviting graphic user interface (GUI), facilitated by the mouse, put a buffer between the user and the stark command line input with no visual clues of what to do next. Windows applications were user friendly and forgiving of mistakenly used features.

Many feel that Windows 7 was the high point in this important series of products. It seems Microsoft is a victim of its own success. Once market penetration reached a certain level, the question becomes how to sustain sales, EBITDA and growth. Auto manufacturers solved this problem long ago by offering physically appealing cars that were new and improved each year. They often used successful models as a guide to improved design and performance. While not foolproof, this approach can work very well.

Switching from the Windows OS to the Linux OS is what I’m doing presently. I’ve been saving MS Word and Excel documents since the late 1990’s. The version, or “distro’, of Linux I’m using is Ubuntu. It has a Windows-like GUI except that there is a command-line feature that needs to be dealt with. Windows does too, but I’ve only seen IT folks dip into it to work their dark arts.

My impression is that Linux applications are not initially as feature rich as Windows but realize that the succession of Windows upgrades have been subject to creeping featurism from the beginning. Windows 11 has builtin spyware in addition to increased bloatware running in the background, bogging down computational speed. Allegedly the goal of MS is to apply Co-Pilot to use captured user data for the user’s search purposes. As of this writing Windows 11 market share at 31 %.

The Linux mentality is quite different. Generally, technology tends to improve in succeeding versions in order to stay competitive in the market. That evolution plus a new business model have led to the current Windows 11 fiasco. Older Computers that operated well on Windows 10 are suddenly inadequate for a drop-in replacement to Windows 11. People, businesses and governments are outraged by equipment upgrades needed to do what they did yesterday and consequently are dropping out of MS Windows all together. So alarmed is MS that it has even caused Bill Gates to be recalled from retirement to help brainstorm the sudden migration away from Windows.

MS has implemented artificial intelligence (AI) elements that are unwelcome to many users. MS blurts out that AI promises to improve efficiency for users. Every dog and cat out there is doing the same. AI is an economic bubble that many are trying tap into. Early adopters do the best in these bubbles.

MS has tumbled over the edge of If you build it, they will come. Furthermore, the annual subscription now in play is new to most individuals using Windows. Even worse, the sacrosanct space on your hard drive is not even safe from the MS mothership hovering overhead beaming up your information or plowing it into the cloud that you may consider confidential. Should some documents under Windows 11 be air gapped onto a thumb or disconnected external drive? Seems that way.

Crossing the OS Rubicon- From MS Windows 11 Across to Linux Ubuntu

Leave a reply

After viewing an alarming report on YouTube concerning the shady situation with Microsoft’s business strategy in general and Microsoft Windows 11 in particular, I’ve decided to cross the Rubicon to Linux Ubuntu. It’s not just about what I’ve learned about Microsoft’s intrusion into my personal computer’s files. My latest update of MS Outlook ab.so.lute.ly stinks. My relearning and expectations of Windows 11 Outlook is contaminated by my prior familiarity with the previous rev. The blurred familiarity of the new version is twisted with years of habit and expectations. I’ve had enough.

I’ve been using Microsoft products since the Jurassic age of home computing, ca 1986. I refer to both “IBM” machines of that age and Apple’s McIntosh. As a result, both my entire professional and personal computer lives are deeply invested in Microsoft products, MS Word especially. I’ve heard that transfer compatibility going from Word documents to whatever Linux app is problematic, except for pdf files.

My plan is to experiment with an inexpensive laptop from Amazon with Linux Ubuntu already installed. The goal is to make a parallel assessment of Ubuntu with my personal and consulting work on MS Windows.

Remember the scene from Saving Private Ryan where a German soldier is killing an American soldier by struggling to push his bayonet into his chest on the upper floor of a building? While the German soldier is pushing the blade closer and closer, all the while he is attempting to quell the American’s panic with soft words, shushing and a pleading for him to stop resisting. It’s very disturbing and reminds me of the banality of evil.

Many companies, including Microsoft, are constructing business models that remind me of this disturbing scene. They are encouraging customers to switch from Windows 10 to Windows 11 by aging out Windows 10 updates. In doing so, Windows has become a subscription service rather than your personal property in the privacy of your hard drive. Instead of buying MS windows once, you are now paying for a subscription and allowing MS to examine your files. What do they do with what they may find? Overall, they want to turn your proclivities and interests into cash through selective advertising and sales of marketing data to third parties.

They are trying to force users to use their cloud storage where they will have access to all of our data. Worse yet, their AI “helper” encourages users to ask for help that reveals what the user is thinking. That help can be in the form of rewriting your text or actually producing content for the user. The AI system resides in one of their data centers and who knows what kind of analysis and business planning that results in.

Why is it that many people seem to believe that government is inherently bad and businesses are inherently good, or at least preferable? Why distrust government yet throw your faith into free market capitalism? At the very least, the US government as it has been operated up to now is often regulated to afford at least some transparency and accountability. Does business have such transparency? Politicians can, in theory, be voted out for corruption and malfeasance. But what about the shitheads who control a great many large corporations? Other than the limp-d**k approach of refusing to buy their products and services, what other leverage is there? For example, recent history is full of examples of corporations badly polluting the environment, but even with proof in hand, citizens must fight for years at high personal cost to force accountability on the polluters. Or, recall the trouble with Purdue Pharmaceuticals and their potent and addictive OxyContin. They knowingly profited from their product for years fully knowing it’s addictive potential. Even widespread addiction and death weren’t trouble enough to cause a prompt regulatory response from the gov’t. Here both Purdue and government officials were painfully reluctant to respond. Finally, there was the battle between Erin Brockovich and Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) over hexavalent chromium groundwater contamination in Hinkley, CA. Detection of hexavalent chromium isn’t difficult, but nailing down accountability is, especially when it is a citizen vs a large corporation.

This approach is really about shooting fish in a barrel and is increasingly appearing on social media with advertisers pushing subscriptions rather than outright purchases. Amazon does it as well with certain food stuffs. I understand the business motivation to exchange a single larger sale for monthly payments of smaller dollar amounts over time. This works best when charges are hidden in your credit card statements disguised as lengthy character strings rather than intelligible names. Also, that particular human frailty of losing track of what you are paying for by credit card is a real issue for people. Do we actually think that the C-Suite knobs who oversee their sales operations haven’t thought of this? They know exactly what they are doing.

Ostensibly, the “genius” of the free market is to maximize the efficient use of capital. Obviously, history bears (or bares?) out that there is much evidence for this assertion. The downside of this is that decisions contrary to your personal choice are made by others who decide what efficiencies that you will pay for while they retain their margins.

Economics isn’t a type of physics resting on the space-time continuum. It is a social science that uses some math for persuasion.

Do you want to produce a product that results in a few single-item sales of a dollar each or a product that produces a larger number of nickels over time? Obviously, it depends on the product.

Like hundreds of millions of others, I have helped to keep Microsoft afloat and remain a great investment for their stockholders. We’ve done our part. But now it is time to say “so long and thanks for all of the fish.”