The Beeb and Bill

The BBC takes apart the Microsoft myth: "Microsoft has always been seen as a laggard when it comes to online life... In 1995 Mr Gates co-wrote a book entitled The Road Ahead which gave little mention to the rising tide of interest in the net and its looming influence... In early 2004, speaking at the World Economic Forum, Bill Gates predicted that within two years the problem of spam would be solved... In January 2002 Bill Gates sent out one of his regular memos that defined the priorities for Microsoft over the coming months and years. That memo was entitled 'Trustworthy Computing' and declared an intent to put the security and integrity of user's data at the heart of everything Microsoft did... Despite Microsoft's efforts, hi-tech crime is booming and Windows PCs are at the heart of it. Some anti-virus companies now report that there are more than one million items of malware in existence and Windows PCs are the target of choice for the bad guys... It is something of a myth that Microsoft is a hive of innovation that regularly pumps out products that take on the world. In reality, it is a good populariser of ideas but few can be said to have originated on Microsoft's campus or at the research labs it has set up around the world. The innovations that it has ridden to success on - the graphical user interface, the mouse, spreadsheets, the web, the web browser - all started life elsewhere. Even now the company regularly pays huge sums to snap up companies, such as Hotmail, that are experts in areas where it is lacking. Even so given its research budget - billions every year - Microsoft rarely wows the world with its new products. It's clear that there is a profound philosophical difference between Microsoft, for which read Bill Gates' approach to business, and the world of open source that has sprung up on and prospered alongside the net. This philosophical difference was sealed in 1976 when Mr Gates sent a letter to San Francisco's legendary Homebrew Computer Club in which he decried their rampant sharing of Microsoft's Basic for the Altair. Many of those who attended the Homebrew Meetings went on to be the leading lights that created the internet and defined its open source ethic of sharing for the greater good. By contrast Microsoft has jealously guarded the inner workings of its products."