] Exciting new networked applications are being written.
] Time is not standing still. Microsoft must survive and
] prosper by learning from the open source software
] movement and by borrowing from and improving its
] techniques. Open source software is as large and powerful
] a wave as the Internet was, and is rapidly accreting into
] a legitimate alternative to Windows. It can and should be
] harnessed. To avoid dire consequences, Microsoft should
] favor an approach that tolerates and embraces the
] diversity of the open source approach, especially when
] network-based integration is involved. There are many
] clever and motivated people out there, who have many
] different reasons to avoid buying directly into a
] Microsoft proprietary stack. Microsoft must employ
] diplomacy to woo these accounts; stubborn insistence will
] be both counterproductive and ineffective. Microsoft
] cannot prosper during the open source wave as an island,
] with a defenses built out of litigation and proprietary
] protocols.

Microsoft and the Commoditization of Software