I think Cringely under estimates the degree to which open source software will get in MS's way. I agree that it won't overthrow MS, but I believe that open source software is going to be the tar pit that slows MS down. MS is going to have great difficulty fighting Linux and open source software in general, and they money they spend trying to do so will be money they can't throw at other companies.

The other side of that coin is that I think Cringely is too optimistic about MS missing the boat any time in the next decade. If open source doesn't slow MS down enough to make them vunrable, I'm not sure they will anytime in our life times. Bill totally missed the boat on the internet, but they got around that because they could afford to simply buy their way back in. As long as MS can do that, they won't be unseated.

Jay