Competition surely results in lower prices, which should be better for consumers.
In technology, new competition is causing many people to predict a fundemental change in the current business model. Microsoft has been dominant in the regards to their Office products and operating systems. They have had competition from Apple, who is essentially a niche player. They both operate on the same business model. Develop proprietary software, and sell that product for a mark-up, profiting on the difference. Apparently, many people see this business model as unsustainable and believe that they can turn computers into the next radio or television.
Radios are broadcast for free and supported by advertising. Following that analogy, users will purchase a unit, a computer, then purchase a subscription to the internet. However, once on the internet the user will be able to go online to use an office suite or product for free, which will show advertisements to the user. Furthermore, many believe the same could be done for an operating system.
Call me old fashioned, but I am just not getting it. If I am writing a paper for school, or working on a project for work, advertising would be an unwelcome distraction and both counter-productive and inneffective. Second, I don't quite understand how a company would advertise on an operating system, but I do recognize the value of an open source operating system such as Linux.
Someone should explain some of this to me, because I am still not seeing it.
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There are already online operating systems you can use. The cool thing about them, any computer your on is essentially your own computer because your files are stored on a server somewhere.
ReplyDeleteI like the current model because I have a computer that is 4 years old and still running. If I had to pay a subscription to run it, I wouldn't. Because I don't have to, I have connected it to my tv, and watch hulu on it.
One of the reasons for the possible shift to the client server model, is our current technology, silicon, is quickly running out of space for expansion. It's upper limit is based on how much heat it can take before it melts. So, our current laptops, or future netbooks can stay right about where they are, and just run a web browser, and a giant server somewhere can worry about heat.
I understand and believe that the cloud computing shift will occur, but I don't understand a business model where Google will give you the OS for free and make revenues through advertising.
ReplyDeleteRemember, we don't understand very much of anything google does, like make chrome?
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