Do you want to hear a lovely bedtime story?
It involves Microsoft (the big bad monopoly), Internet server worms,
and a New Internet Order. Are you comfy yet? Good.
I'm going to take a page out of the sensationalist journalism
started by Robert X.
Cringely. Mr. Cringely suggests that Microsoft could be
intentionally making their products insecure because (a) their market
share wouldn't go up if their products were made secure and (b)
Microsoft wants to own the Internet. We already know that (b) is pretty
much true - Microsoft tends to want to own anything it sets its beady
little eyes on. And I wouldn't put it past them to try to accomplish
(a). After all, there are good enough programmers working in the halls
at Redmond to create a new protocol. (My bet is that it's not really
all that hard to do.)
So let's say that Microsoft does get around to implementing TCP/MS,
and they unleash it on the worm-filled, buggy Internet currently
running TCP/IP. (Let's further suggest that all those worms only work
on Microsoft server operating systems, like they largely do now.) "Come
use our protocol," they'd say, "and you won't have to worry
about Internet worms ever again!" There would be a quick switch to the
new protocol, headed up mainly by the people who don't really know any
better - clueless client users and PHBs (to use the technical term) who
don't really know what they're talking about, technology-wise. Boom,
you've got a rather large chunk of the Internet now running TCP/MS.
Of course, MS would have been pressuring router companies to release
patches that'll make their routers route this new protocol so that
everyone can use TCP/MS. Eventually, TCP/IP wouldn't be usable anymore.
This is about the time you'd say "Microsoft owns the Internet." A New
Internet Order (like I said above) free of server worms and with data
tracking - all backed by Microsoft, just like they want.
But what happens to everyone who runs non-Microsoft operating
systems? Some of them will get MS-sanctioned patches allowing them to
run TCP/MS. (I'm talking about the Mac OS here.)
The rest, well, that's more interesting. Remember, there are a lot
of Internet servers out there that aren't running Microsoft server
products. A good number of those servers are running free operating
systems - Linux, FreeBSD, Darwin, etc. Those operating systems will
probably not be helped by Microsoft. But, then again, the Open Source
community can often match or
beat Microsoft products at their
own game.
Should MS actually succeed at doing TCP/MS, how much do you want to
bet there will be a free (as in beer and speech, most likely)
implementation of it? I personally would be willing to bet the
farm.
But some people (like those PHBs) will replace some or all of their
stable non-MS servers with brand new Windows machines. No doubt some of
them will be a lot more crash prone. They might learn to live with the
new Windows server, but I'll bet a lot of them will just scream, "This
is bull! I'm going back to Novell!" Or someone who knows what's what in
the IT department will secretly install a Linux server to cope with the
Windows one that doesn't work.
Microsoft won't own the Internet after all.
Would MS be able to pull off a switch to TCP/MS? Probably. Will they
succeed? Not likely, mainly because of the Open Source community, which
has a good long history of taking previously
closed or semi-closed protocols and turning them into Open Source ones.
If TCP/MS does end up being the dominant protocol on the client
computers of the Internet, the Open Source movement will likely make a
free version (shall we call it TCP/GNU or TCP/RMS?) available to
everyone else.
It's a good thing Apple decided to participate in the Open Source
movement, isn't it?
Share your perspective on the Mac by emailing with "My Turn" as your subject.
