[bennysonething]

"world's most reviled software"

Right, yeah, people hated Microsoft's software so much that they bought it by the bucket load.

Also that comment about midway being problematic. Why is it problematic!? Did WW2 not happen? Who'd actually be offended?

[pydry]

It's the only software in the world I've tried to actively avoid buying and failed. At least 7 times now.

It's the shopping channel of software. Whether or not you wanted it it comes bundled.

I'm pretty sure it'd be a lot less popular if every OEM had a check box that said Ubuntu that deducted the license fee. MS frowns upon that sort of thing, though.

[hahajk]

I found an article that says that OEMs pay around $10 for a Windows license, at least for tablets. If I was buying a new computer I’d probably keep Windows installed for $10 just in case I needed to dual boot some time in the future.

[Inhibit]

At some point they weren't paying anything for licenses on sub 9" devices. Although I swear it was 11" or 14" on Win10 at some point I can't find a reference.

https://www.onmsft.com/news/windows-10-9-remains-free-oems-a...

[gnud]

> Also that comment about midway being problematic.

It compares the "battle" between Sony and Microsoft to an actual war in which a lot of people died. It also sets up the XBox as some sort of patriotic push to defeat the agressors that attacked us without warning.

I'd be offended if I was working for the PS2 division at Sony at the time, I think. I also think I'd be offended if I was working on games for the XBox - it's entertainment, not war!

[wccrawford]

I wouldn't be offended, but I would be horrified. It's an awful comparison and one that I'd never make. I'd think poorly of anyone who discounts lives that easily.

[kortilla]

> I'd be offended if I was working for the PS2 division at Sony at the time

These are companies that trivialize violence with games in the first place. I doubt you would be working for them if a war analogy offended you.

[mattnewton]

Huge difference between art and war.

See also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25570038

[fulafel]

The secret to MS success was that they realised their main customers weren't the end users, but corporate IT and ISVs.

[irrational]

Do they? I thought people just got windows with their PC and didn’t buy it. Lots of people use office at work, but I don’t know anyone that bought it personally. Google docs works fine for 99.9% of what people need office software for.

[bennysonething]

Office was and is so popular because it's better than the competition. Microsoft originally had hoped someone else would provide decent office type software. But it was crap so they wrote their own.

[irrational]

Would MS have written their own if Google docs had been around back then (assuming we also had broadband Internet back then)?

[nikanj]

The usual suspects: Some white person from California who wasn’t even alive when the war happened

[foldr]

The early 2000s were peak Micro$oft hate time. You had to at least pretend to hate Microsoft if you wanted to have any technical credibility.

[pjmlp]

Ironically I know plenty of M$ haters that nowadays are MS certified consultants and partner shops.

[Scapeghost]

Boy Microsoft's software is the most pirated in the world.

In my corner of the 3rd world and the countries around it many people have computers but almost nobody pays for software.