Firefox market share bounces back 668 plus 15

Actually, Judge Jackson did agree that Microsoft had engaged in illegal product tying. You do recall that Microsoft was found guilty, right?

As for IE being a loss leader vs. an integral part of Windows... I can see that this is a matter of perspective that we will probably not agree on. You see an operating system as a monolithic offering with many apps bundled. I see it as a platform for running applications (of which a browser is just one). Both are potentially correct, but whether you define IE as a loss leader depends heavily on which definition you accept.

UW Oshkosh, clbutt of 1990. Comp sci with a MIS emphasis. I could have converted it to a business degree with a comp sci minor with very little change in my course list. Actually, I could have added a couple of courses and picked up a math minor as well... but I decided to not hang out for the extra semester that would have required. And this is exactly what I described earlier, selling one thing at a loss to enable profits on something else. How is your example substantially different? Replace floor traffic with web traffic and you've captured most of the reason why Microsoft wants IE to be the dominant browser. Control the browser, and you can exert influence on the server side infrastructure (a potentially lucrative market).

What you describe as a 'sales gimmick' others call a 'marketing strategy'. The clbuttic example brought up in business school is the Gillette (give away the razor, sell the blades) approach, which is certainly called a marketing strategy when they discuss it.

Well, I would not say ALL, or Microsoft would include MS Office for free as well. Some even theorize that Microsoft might eventually give away Windows as a loss leader to preserve their Office profits. That's not going to happen any time soon, but who knows, only time will tell.

Because a measure of units tells me how many potential customers I might be able to sell to. Here is an example: Company Alpha sells an operating system with $1000 per unit profit. Company Beta sells an operating system with $1 per unit profit. Company Alpha made 10 million dollars last year. Company Beta made only 1 million. If I have an application that I can sell for $100 dollars per copy regardless of platform, which operating system system is the most attractive to me.

Obviously it makes more sense to sell to the Beta platform despite its smaller monetary market share, because 1 million potential customers is far better than only 10 thousand potential customers. This should be an easy concept for you to grasp, as this exact argument has benefited Microsoft for years. Unix used to account for far more profit in the server market than Windows, but Windows sold far more units. This attracted more software developers, which accounts for a large part of Microsoft's success.

That same dynamic is now working in Linux's favor. The cost savings of Linux is driving huge growth in deployed units. This in turn is attracting an increased number of developers, including big players like SAP, Peoplesoft, IBM, etc. The low hanging fruit is existing Unix market share, but Windows is not immune to Linux encroachment, and they say as much in their SEC filings.

The branded product I sold was the first web server software to run on Novel NetWare servers. We distributed a low cost (eventually free) version as a loss leader for our high-end server that supported SSL encryption and ecommerce capabilities. It was an admittedly niche application but very profitable until Novel woke up to the market and saw the need to bundle their own web server. I saw the writing on the wall and sold the rights before then, even had some direct conversation with Ransome Love before he left Novell to run Caldera. The low-end and high-end products went by the name GLACI-HTTPD and GLACI-SecureServ, respectively. You can still find some traces of it around the web.

I have since then used free training seminars and products to sell follow on consulting services. This now falls under my new SkillTrek trademark. This is a relatively new venture with much less presence on the web. We have mainly been running trials with local chamber of commerce members, with good results so far.

True, but that does not mean consulting revenue is not worth pursuing, particularly if I build a consulting brand and then just manage the work of others. It certainly has a better chance of success than trying to sell a direct compebreastor to Windows, would you not agree?

I would be very interested in learning more about your business ventures. I mean this very honestly. As a small business person, I believe in the power of networking with other business people.

Thad