C|Net is carrying an interview with Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, about Linux, FOSS, piracy, sales, and marketing, among other topics.
This guy cracks me up everytime he says something. He's so completely full of crap that I'm surprised he's even allowed to be in the IT field, let alone CEO of the most dominate software company in the market.
Some highlights:
I would argue that our customers have seen a lot more innovation from us than they have seen from [the open-source] community.
I'm sorry, what? What exactly did you innovate? What in your entire product line was not acquired or stolen from someone else?
Linux itself is a clone ... of a 20-year-old system.
Actually, is a 30-year-old system, and it's an evoultion of it, not a clone. And by the way, do you remember something called MS-DOS? Windows for Workgroups? Window NT? How exactly is this version so revolutionary?
A Linux PC in most countries is a PC in which somebody is being encouraged to pirate Windows.
Riiiiiiiiight.
And I also don't think hardware prices have come down, at least at the client. Hardware prices have not come down significantly in a number of years...The capability goes up, as the capability goes up in our software.
C|NET: "Average selling prices are pretty far down."
No, no, no. Not in the home. It hasn't come down in the last several years at all. Remember when sub-$1,000 PCs were all the rage. The percentage of sub-$1,000 or $500 PCs is not significantly different today than it was several years ago. There is more capability every year for the price, but the same could be said for Microsoft Office 2003.
Wow. Anyone else have a headache after reading that?
There are numerous more choice quotes, so please, grab yourself a Dew, pop some popcorn, sit back and prepare to be entertained.
Here's the full interview:
http://news.com.com/2008-1082-998297.html