Microsoft & IBM settle
Microsoft is giving IBM about 775 million dollars in cash and 75 million in software to settle the dispute between the two companies over unfair business actions by Microsoft against IBM. - Full story at The Register here - in the end the most telling part of the story can be found in this line though - Now the two vendors can go back to less amicably competing over Java, Unix, and Linux while partnering to sell millions in Windows and Office licenses
At the end of the day we are just happy to see Microsoft paying someone for acting like a bully and a jerk, weather it is to IBM, SUN, AOL, DELL, or the EU (all companies or groups that have recieved checks from MS in the past). We will continue to support NON Microsoft solutions for all users, though XP is a step in the right direction for a OS, though it still has major security issues, and Outlook is probably the best email solution out there at the moment. Hopefully this settlement will make IBM more competitive in the future and that will push Microsoft to go in new and better directions. Our hope is that competition will make Microsoft innovate instead of manipulate, or buy and shelve, and/or copy.
