How Microsoft Beats GNU/Linux In Schools

twitter writes "Ever wonder why schools still use Windows? Boycott Novell has extracted the details from 2002 Microsoft email presented in the Comes vrs Microsoft case and other leaks. What emerges is Microsoft's desperate battle to 'never lose to Linux.' At stake for Microsoft is more than a billion dollars of annual revenue, vital user conditioning and governmental lock in that excludes competition, and software freedom for the rest of us. Education and Government Incentives [EDGI] and "Microsoft Unlimited Potential" are programs that allows vendors to sell Windows at zero cost. Microsoft's nightmare scenario has already been realized in Indiana and other places. Windows is not really competitive and schools that switch save tens of millions of dollars. Because software is about as expensive as the hardware in these deals, the world could save up to $500 million each year by dumping Microsoft. Now that the cat is out of the bag, it's hard to see what Microsoft can do other than what they did to Peter Quinn."

Product dumping

Microsoft has already been ruled a monopoly... isn't dumping [wikipedia.org] an illegal tactic for monopolies?

Re:Product dumping

It's not dumping if the competition (Linux) is free. They are not going to put Linux out of bussiness by undercutting linux's profit margin. It might be possible they are however dumping with regard to software support (red hat, IBM, Novell, ...) But I think this would be hard to argue succesfully.

Even the memos from MS state MS cannot and will not compete soley on the basis of price.

The thing is their products are agile in price since they have high fixed costs and low marginal costs. Airlines are classic example of this. Airlines try to create price structures (e.g. saturday stays, advance purchase, limited kinds of seats, luggage limits,... ) so that they integrate the area under the demand curve.

Far from being unfair this is actually socially ideal. In the ideal limit people pay for something exactly what it is worth. depsite the fact that some folks pay more than others, over all nearly everyone, including the people paying the higher price, are paying LESS than they would have to pay if it was sold for a fixed price, because of the increased demand lowers the per capitia fixed costs.

I also question broad statements like " Windows is not really competitive and schools that switch save tens of millions of dollars.". Anecdotally maybe this is has happened. But it's not really clear that this is true in general. School systems are one of the most budget limited govt run orgs. They try everything to shave dollars, like fees for art supplies, to hot lunches paid for by PTO fund raisers. I find it hard to believe the schools would somehow be so blind as to over look an easy "tens of millions" if the case was clear cut.

" Windows is not really competitive and schools that switch save tens of millions of dollars. "

Re:Product dumping

It's not the operating system that pays, it's the sum of platform applications and infrastructure where Microsoft makes money, coupled to the students that know nothing else but Windows. The tip of the iceberg is Windows. The cash cows are Office, SQL Server, Exchange, and the add-ons, upgrades, and other platform products.

You don't 'lose' to Linux, you lose revenue that represents lots of infrastructure, server licenses, CALs, and so on.

There are few professional organizations that can do an end-to-end Linux infrastructure for educational needs (including school administration software costs) but the list is growing, if by populism alone.

Part of Microsoft's loss is the horrible security problems of 1998-2007, as they're less than before. That damage hurt Microsoft-- coupled to support costs for the products. Macs have always been a fractional part of the educational market, and Apple's done a lot to damage their own relationships with schools-- but students love them.

Microsoft has a lot to learn about love, rather than feigning leadership.

Re:Product dumping

Indeed, and consider how MUCH money on training Microsoft gets for free when public schools teach with Microsoft products.

It's not just the license. It's all the taxes you pay to train your own childs for the benefit of a private company.

Re:Product dumping

It's not dumping if the competition (Linux) is free.

Last I saw, Linux wasn't free, RedHat, Novell and Canonical all sell it (plus assorted support and licensing offerings) for quite a sum. Therefore, this dumping is illegal. surely?

plus, Macs certainly aren't free, and they're also part Microsoft's of the competition.

Re:Product dumping

Macs are the main competition to Windows, not Linux.

I do not think that is true. Plenty of people and organizations use Linux on the desktop/laptop.

With Linux (or say FreeBSD) you can deliver a functional platform with *all* of the applications a typical (and not so typical user) needs for *no* acquisition cost.

Definitely an attractive value proposition which continues to attract attention.

Re:Product dumping

The main competition to Windows Is Windows N-1.

Re:Dumping.

Who says they Microsoft has the edge? Where I work we hire a number of kids out of college, *all* of them have higher degree of comfort implementing various solutions on a Linux/BSD platform then Windows. That tells me they are getting a tremendous amount of exposure to these platforms during their college years.

Quite frankly I manage to do my own job quite effectively without having to rely on Microsoft products at all, this includes technical aspects as well communicating, documenting, etc.

So by all means use the tools you are comfortable with, but do not imply that they are the only choice for the *real world* when that is not even close to being the case.

Re:Product dumping

Adding the word objective to your argument does not make it any more objective.

You need to show WHY it is objectively more or less of a monopoly than the Law says and ALSO show why we should consider your definition of monopoly rather than the legal one.

Objectively strangling an infant or elderly person should be less of a crime than strangling a young adult because the young adult is harder to replace than the infant and has more to provide to society in terms of man-hours work.

While objectivity can help justice; justice is not necessarily objective

Apps!

One of my customers is a K-12 school. They have 10K students, and 390 different windows applications.

Most educational software simply isn't written for Linux. Most educational software is poorly written for Windows. Running as a non-admin user is always a hangup. I can't imagine trying to get all these apps to run under Wine. The chorus of "why don't we have windows" would be deafening.

The reason Windows beats Linux in schools is because the apps they need, work under windows. When the superintendent wants an application, he gets it. No matter how poorly written or insecure it is, we always end up installing it. If linux is somehow responsible for it not working, linux gets tossed, 100% of the time.

Re:Apps!

This is something of a chicken and egg problem isn't there? I don't recall Windows having any sort of natural advantage when I was in school. It was all Apple ][s, except in the business department where they had some PS/2s running MS-DOS. A couple people thought Windows was interesting, but nobody was in a hurry to switch.

All of this Windows software has developed through the traditional "network effect," and that was nurtured through programs such as Microsoft's that put Windows on many desktops throughout the 90s. That doesn't mean it can't be brought to Linux someday, though. There has to be some demand before it happens. Either that, or some open source efforts to replace the poorly-written software that you mention.

Re:Apps!

When Bob fail at math, Bob is bad at math. When Alice fails at math, girls are bad at math.
When an application crashes under Windows, the application failed. When an application crashes under Linux, Linux fails.

I may sound pompous, but the first bias is being fought by using techniques that could be used in the second as well. The most simple method that yields results is incredibly cheap : show people they have a bias. Most people don't like to feel that they are being sexist and try to correct their bias if they perceive it. Most people (especially teacher, where I live) don't like to feel they are doing the job of a corporate lackey, or helping a monopoly. Microsoft does have a bad rep, not only among geeks. People also don't like to feel that they are being cheated in paying too much for so few.

That, and I was really impressed by wine progresses (under the standard Ubuntu install) these years. Most of your old Windows applications will work better under Ubuntu than under Vista. Even file sharing through netbios/samba worked more easily.

Re:Apps!

During college, I worked as IT support for an association of special education preschools. While I did get them to adopt OpenOffice, I immediately realized that I couldn't even recommend switching to Linux, because essential programs weren't supported.

One program that comes to mind is Boardmaker, by Mayer-Johnson. It's an extremely popular tool for helping autistic children, and not a complex program at all. It wouldn't be hard for open-source devs to replicate, but there is just no interest among developers. Unfortunately, without it, few special ed teachers will ever consider using Linux.

There is certainly demand for a free alternative as well - in part because of Boardmaker's $400/license price tag. Searching for "Boardmaker linux" or something of the sort reveals that people have asked for it, but gone unanswered. Perhaps the saddest request is this:

"My 11 year old son has autism and his a communication therapist has recommended Boardmaker by Nova logistics to help him communicate. He has had a great affinity for computers since he was 4 years old. He has a Pentium III 1Ghz powered Intel D815eea computer which I built for him.

Boardmaker sells for over $500 and we live on low, fixed income. I have been told that there may be an equivalent, Linux based program. If so, can you tell me what it is and where I can get it? Thanks for your help."

There were no responses.

Key applications

At the High School I volunteer at there are key applications that teachers feel they can not do without. One such example is Microsoft Publisher. This is a loathsome application that does not export to any other known publishing application, but is used to teach publishing in the school. :-(
We are making progress though. The school switched to Open Office this year for all but the business lab. I am working with the business lab teachers to get them familiar with Open Office so they can make an informed decision about what software to use in the future.

office suite

Maybe its because office suite is simple, easy to use and works very well with graphics embedded within documents.

Treat Microsoft like the Cable company then.

When your contract with Microsoft is about to run out, just tell them you're switching to Linux. Then you can get more Microsoft products for free.

When Microsoft stops offering freebies, then switch to Linux.

Problem solved.

and OLPC/Negroponte will still think MSFT is good

it shows that nothing has changed at Microsoft in the past 20 years. There is no "new Microsoft", there is no "kinder, gentler Microsoft", and there is no "Microsoft is a friend to open source".

It's all a lie for the purpose of furthering their goal of making sure Windows is the only OS for the vast majority of the populations.

surprise!

LoB

rambling comments from a labtech...

I made the switch to Linux with Ubuntu because, for most things, it works just plain better than Windows. But, getting this point across to the people I work with is, well, proving rather difficult.

Why is that? Because:

1) People are gullible. The people that make decisions about purchasing first look at a glossy sales brochure or pick what they saw advertised on TV. Then they then ask "Is this okay?" Linux doesn't have any shiny brochures, we never get asked if it's okay.

2) People are terrified of change, any change. They won't admit it, but they are. It's not that Linux is still harder to use than Windows (honestly, it's the other way around now, and I've proved it to people); it's that people don't want to change, even for the better.

3) People are lazy. I had instructors DEMANDING that I dual-boot to Linux (so I used a VMware image instead) and then they went off to teach MS Office instead of Open-Office... because there's a course-pack/textbook that includes online testing and grading (so they don't have to do any work).

In short, the problem is inertia. Unfortunately, Linux is going to have to get way better than Windows before the Educational "ship" can start to make some course corrections. Dumb, fearful, lazy people have to be beaten over the head with the obvious before they will change direction.

Now, the appropriate tool to beat said people over the head with is a turn-key Linux distribution that integrates into an Active Directory domain, right out of the box. One that includes an image-casting process that allows 100s of computers to be managed (deployed, updated, etc.) from a central console (PXE boot, the works). If I had that (turn-key), I might make some progress around here... though it would still take a while.

FOSS will eventually dominate education. It is inevitable. The Linux distributions out there are making phenomenal strides towards ease-of-use and overall functionality. In most aspects, they have already bested Windows. But, it will take time to overcome the inertia in Education. Honestly, I expect the business world will actually turn first. Education, despite its best efforts, is surprisingly conservative.

        David...

Re:Or

And why is that? Because Microsoft has a monopoly over the market.

Re:Or

I think you're suggesting that Microsoft "gained" their monopoly fair and square. As if "apparently people liked [Windows]."

Unfortunately, that's not very apparent at all. Apple had a viable, easy-to-use operating system at the same time. It eventually became outdated, yet it had a lot going for it including some nice killer apps (desktop publishing for one). You can't simply shrug that off as 'people just liked Windows better' unless you know what you're talking about.

In actuality, Microsoft gained its monopoly using questionably dubious, but well documented, business tactics, and now they use that OS monopoly in yet more questionable and dubious ways. This is generally known and accepted, but maybe your "apparently people liked [Windows]" comment isn't so well supported.

Re:Or

"Schools prefer to use Windows because it's what the vast majority of their faculty and staff know, it's what the vast majority of their software runs on, and it's what students will encounter on the vast majority of computers they will use in the real world."

I can accept points one and two but point three, "it's what students will encounter on the vast majority of computers they will use in the real world" is and always has been total utter bullshit. Whatever the students are using now will have only minor correlation to whatever they'll found in "the real world" few years from now. When I were in school it were the days of Microsoft DOS. How much does it resembles Windows Vista to Microsoft DOS except that there's "Microsoft" in the name? Is it really so much similar Windows 98 to Windows Vista than it is to current versions of Gnome or KDE upon Linux?

In fact, the reverse is truer: whatever I learnt about DOS on my school days serves me nothing on current versions of Microsoft OS and apps. On the other hand, what I learnt on my university days about NFS, X Window, DNS, SMTP, Vi... is still serving me now almost word by word about fifteen years later. And this is not per chance: Microsoft, being the principal actor and living out of selling licenses is *forced* to add new features and change the way of doing things just "to stay the same" while others, specially if not competing on selling usage licenses, can maintain whatever is already working just the same for ages.

Re:Or

In my experience (I worked in a school for 7 years and went to the same one for 5 years; and worked in a primary school for about 18 months), the only reason they use Microsoft is out of habit. That's what they're used to, what the staff are used to, and what the IT Technicians are used to. If anything breaks, there's Microsoft to blame.

Fact is, most of the time, all they use is a Word Processor and a Web Browser. Occasionally using presentation software, and maybe some spreadsheeting and database software. Have a guess what most of the staff are used to; and how much trouble they have with MS Access for teaching GCSE. Serious problems come up with the less experienced staff just with Microsoft's software. Now imagine trying to suggest using something new.

There's no reason they couldn't use Linux aside from the installation and support; switching from OpenOffice to Microsoft Office really isn't much different than going from Windows to Mac. I finally managed to convince them to have a couple of Ubuntu machines that the students had no problems with using, I wanted the students to have an experience of all operating systems; surely that's the idea of being at a school? Experiencing as much as possible? Most of the staff wouldn't even try. Some would, but most wouldn't. Some even wanted Windows 95 back.

Microsoft configuration just isn't cut out to be used in schools, it's hard to tie down the operating system as much as the staff really want it, Linux would be a god-send, but I can't see it happening any time soon. It'd save a lot of money and effort overall, and a lot of time if the staff were able, and the governors were willing. Most IT Techs aren't even trained and get the job because they know someone on the inside; or like me; proved themselves when they worked there. Not for the will of trying to change, but getting a school to do anything is damn near impossible.

Oh, the reason I left? The pay and conditions were terrible; most things just weren't working right, security was a joke, almost daily re-installs in some of the rooms, and no-one was interested in doing anything about it.

Re:Can anyone explain the link?

A couple of years back, Massachusetts attempted to mandate open formats in state government. ODF was to be the office piece of this and MS pulled every dirty trick in the book to reverse or subvert that up to and including pulling strings to get the people pushing for this pressured to leave.

I suggest "massachusetts odf" as better set of search terms for Google.

Re:Teachers

Um, I think one of the perhaps very good reasons they don't use Linux is because the teachers are clueless as to how to use it.

Um, I think that the teachers are pretty clueless as to how to use Windows, too. I'd almost go as far as saying they're pretty clueless on how to run any hardware more advanced than hamster cages, but they generally can get students to do that for them.

Not to denigrate teachers - they are fine at what they're actually trained to do (i.e., teach), but most of them are the "typical computer user" (read clueless).

Re:let's do lunch

because MS have more experience of wining and dining (and bribing) than generally less dishonest Linux companies?

I wouldn't impute any dishonesty to these sales people. Generally speaking, it's not necessary to be dishonest in order to win.

I suspect that most people's conception of the way things work in government (and education in particular) is altogether too jaded. Many people working in education policy do so out of interest and generally show a degree of commitment to the principles of learning and development.

That doesn't mean they're necessarily brilliant, insightful or even competent. Some are, some aren't. But the vast majority of them make decisions in what they consider to be the best interests of the young people under their care.

The folks at Microsoft are smart, organised and effective. The links in the summary documents show that they've got a clear game plan, and the tables attached indicate that they were executing well on it.

Compare that to the work done by FOSS organisations. With the exception of IBM, there's hardly anyone who has established contacts in Education. FOSS is typically touted by mid-level technical folks who have expertise in their field but little political experience. They almost certainly don't have the resources, the planning or the operational intelligence to keep pace with Microsoft.

Add to this the fact that Microsoft is the incumbent, and you'll see that they've got the advantage in almost every respect: resources, position, momentum and intelligence.

Microsoft's played dirty in the past, and they likely will again in the future. I'm only suggesting that it's not necessary to play that way every time.

The corrupt practice in this particular case is dumping, and that decision is being made at the corporate level. While corruption taints everyone who participates in it, that doesn't mean they are suddenly guilty of every manifestation of it all at once.