Tapsearch Com EditorBack to Future Economic Crisis - IBM/Microsoft
December 20th 2009 00:33
Bizarre Politics Reports:
This is part of a series we call back to the future economic crisis. We retrace the steps of how we got into the the economic mess we suffer today. We keep repeating the errors of the past and do not take time to answer some basic questions.
Ray Tapajna Chronicles forecasted the economic crisis years ago based on experts who predicted the coming of the "Bewildered New World."
In a back to the future mode, we will provide articles from more than ten years ago that tell us the economic crisis is not something new. The only thing new about it is the financial communities took the big hit this time and were bailed out while the millions who lost their jobs forever during the most massive dislocation of jobs in history. Many others have stepped down into the working poor class or are missing in action from any kind of reporting.
Let's go back to 1998-99 and see how the Microsoft anti-trust case was in a back to the future mode related to our times in 2009-10. The same old story continues- the lack of a level playing field knocks out workers and small businesses with governments acting as brokers and dealers in the process locking hands with massive transnational corporations. The stock market flourished by workers getting fired instead of hired.
Here is a question that needs to be answered for the sake of the future. In the beginning of the micro computer era, Microsoft was gifted the operating system for the IBM compatible. It was called DOS which is now the grandfather of all current Microsoft systems. This is the question: Why did IBM award Microsoft the operating system for the IBM compatible PC computer on an exclusive basis and then gave their hardware production awau to the whole world.
Here is part of the answer but not the whole answer that eventually impacted our economy severely. IBM itself was coming out of the 1980s confronted by several anti-trust suits and they chose to defend their older mainframe business and came out with a micro computer thinking they would throw a money wrench into the growth of the micro computer systems. They had already given multi-million dollar divisions away as a way of settling several anti-trust suits. They came into the 1980s as a wounded giant and wanted to find a way to stop the hemorrhaging. In my opinion they made a big mistake and the person who started the micro computer division was frozen in rank for his failure to forecast the impact the IBM compatible computer would have on all computers. IBM did something strange. They farmed out the production of the components for the PC computers. This was an exception for they always liked to do everything in house to protect their patents and copywrites. Never did they expect the PC compatible micro to take off like it did. And it is equally odd that they gave the operating system away to another company when they could have done it themselves.
There was a vast micro computer market already with each manufacturing having their own versions of operating systems. IBM never thought they would knock them all out with the one exception of MAC computers. They had just wanted to test the waters before they produced their own micro computer in house. In the end Bill Gates locked in the DOS operating system as his own while IBM had to make the computer a compatible since most of the components came from other manufacturers including foreign ones. They had to open the production to all of these companies and hoped to ride the wave by banking on their banded name IBM. It did not work.
In the end, the mainframe and mini computer markets were crushed and the wide open architecture of the IBM PC compatible open the door to all the wage slave labor markets in the world. As a result, millions of workers in the computer industry lost their jobs in the USA . In 1992-93 alone, IBM and AT&T/NCR computers fired more than 300,000 workers between them. The mainframes were suddenly put on automatic with system support people fired across the board. This caused the Y2k crisis. The winners were those who used the impoverished workers in the world who the parts for the computers. Techinical publications reported that one third of all computers going into China had to smuggled in. There was no level playing field left. In addition, Microsoft itself fired full time workers and went with contract and temporary workers.
The main part of the question still remains of why things went this way. It is obvious that government failed to insure a level playing field and now we are paying for this terrible loss during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. President Obama talks about creating new high tech jobs and ignores how the U.S. gave away the technology that took decades to achieve. In essence the U.S. gave away the value of about ten Marshall Plans. The Marshall Plan helped restore Europe and some of Asia economies for a fraction of this value. The Marshall Plan was based on duplicating success and creating local value added economies in balanced geopolitical settings. All this was tossed to the winds. Now we have what is called free trade which is not really trade or free ( President Bush's and President Obama bail outs are now actually tariffs on future generations) and nor free trade "green" as the worst kind of "dirty manufacturing" and long haul shipping has taken over.
It did not have to happen this way and plenty of experts were on hand back then telling us how thing should work. Government and the Bill Gates of the world ignored it all.
In a back to the future mode, we will provide articles from more than ten years ago that tell us the economic crisis is not something new. The only thing new about it is the financial communities took the big hit this time and were bailed out while the millions who lost their jobs forever during the most massive dislocation of jobs in history. Many others have stepped down into the working poor class or are missing in action from any kind of reporting.
Let's go back to 1998-99 and see how the Microsoft anti-trust case was in a back to the future mode related to our times in 2009-10. The same old story continues- the lack of a level playing field knocks out workers and small businesses with governments acting as brokers and dealers in the process locking hands with massive transnational corporations. The stock market flourished by workers getting fired instead of hired.
Here is a question that needs to be answered for the sake of the future. In the beginning of the micro computer era, Microsoft was gifted the operating system for the IBM compatible. It was called DOS which is now the grandfather of all current Microsoft systems. This is the question: Why did IBM award Microsoft the operating system for the IBM compatible PC computer on an exclusive basis and then gave their hardware production awau to the whole world.
Here is part of the answer but not the whole answer that eventually impacted our economy severely. IBM itself was coming out of the 1980s confronted by several anti-trust suits and they chose to defend their older mainframe business and came out with a micro computer thinking they would throw a money wrench into the growth of the micro computer systems. They had already given multi-million dollar divisions away as a way of settling several anti-trust suits. They came into the 1980s as a wounded giant and wanted to find a way to stop the hemorrhaging. In my opinion they made a big mistake and the person who started the micro computer division was frozen in rank for his failure to forecast the impact the IBM compatible computer would have on all computers. IBM did something strange. They farmed out the production of the components for the PC computers. This was an exception for they always liked to do everything in house to protect their patents and copywrites. Never did they expect the PC compatible micro to take off like it did. And it is equally odd that they gave the operating system away to another company when they could have done it themselves.
There was a vast micro computer market already with each manufacturing having their own versions of operating systems. IBM never thought they would knock them all out with the one exception of MAC computers. They had just wanted to test the waters before they produced their own micro computer in house. In the end Bill Gates locked in the DOS operating system as his own while IBM had to make the computer a compatible since most of the components came from other manufacturers including foreign ones. They had to open the production to all of these companies and hoped to ride the wave by banking on their banded name IBM. It did not work.
In the end, the mainframe and mini computer markets were crushed and the wide open architecture of the IBM PC compatible open the door to all the wage slave labor markets in the world. As a result, millions of workers in the computer industry lost their jobs in the USA . In 1992-93 alone, IBM and AT&T/NCR computers fired more than 300,000 workers between them. The mainframes were suddenly put on automatic with system support people fired across the board. This caused the Y2k crisis. The winners were those who used the impoverished workers in the world who the parts for the computers. Techinical publications reported that one third of all computers going into China had to smuggled in. There was no level playing field left. In addition, Microsoft itself fired full time workers and went with contract and temporary workers.
The main part of the question still remains of why things went this way. It is obvious that government failed to insure a level playing field and now we are paying for this terrible loss during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. President Obama talks about creating new high tech jobs and ignores how the U.S. gave away the technology that took decades to achieve. In essence the U.S. gave away the value of about ten Marshall Plans. The Marshall Plan helped restore Europe and some of Asia economies for a fraction of this value. The Marshall Plan was based on duplicating success and creating local value added economies in balanced geopolitical settings. All this was tossed to the winds. Now we have what is called free trade which is not really trade or free ( President Bush's and President Obama bail outs are now actually tariffs on future generations) and nor free trade "green" as the worst kind of "dirty manufacturing" and long haul shipping has taken over.
It did not have to happen this way and plenty of experts were on hand back then telling us how thing should work. Government and the Bill Gates of the world ignored it all.
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