6.5 Billion People: 3 OSs???

[freebooter]

There are over 6 billion people on planet Earth and we, essentially, have only 3 operating systems for personal computers: MS, OSX and Linux.

Doesn't it strike anyone else besides me as rather odd?

I'm wondering if some computing giant like, say, Google could develop something that could compete in this highly lucrative market.

 

[P-Worm]

OS's aren't exactly easy to make and with the choices we have now, the benefits from making a new OS don't even come close to outweighing the tremendous time and effort needed to create a better one.

P-Worm

 

[robbieduncan]

There are a lot more than 3 OSs. You are only looking at major, well known ones.

 

[0098386]

That numbers right. It's better to have fewer OS's so we're not all fighting for compatibility and such. I like it that we have XP and OSX for major systems, and Linux for hobbyist/hacker/server use.

 

[iShater]

1) You are assuming all 6 billion people have even seen a computer. Some can barely survive

2) If you count all the versions of Windows and Linux and MacOS, there is quite a few different ones out there.

 

[7on]

What about BeOS? AmigaOS? BSD? OS/2? Unix? BIOS?

 

[bartelby]

Would you really want to go back to the era where every manufacturer had their own OS?

 

[freebooter]

There are only 2 or 3 choices for a regular user.
Hardly any choice at all, really.
How would you feel about having only the choice between 2 or 3 cars in the whole world?
Wake up and smell the burnt toast. There is no 'free market'.

 

[Eric5h5]

Back in the '80s there were dozens of consumer OSs. However, programs are vastly more complex these days; trying to port something like Photoshop to 20 different fragmented systems would be completely unfeasible.

How would you feel about having only the choice between 2 or 3 cars in the whole world?

That's not a good analogy. Think of an OS as more like fuel...you've got a choice of gas and diesel, pretty much. How would things work if every car manufacturer required their own fuel?

--Eric

 

[0098386]

How would you feel about having only the choice between 2 or 3 cars in the whole world?
Wake up and smell the burnt toast. There is no 'free market'.

It doesn't work like that though.

Imagine if cars were offices and trying to work with different companies and individuals only to find that your cars were incompatible with each other.
As I said before. It works well now. We have 2 major home OS's, a few major server OS's and many discontinued/hobbyist ones. It's like how I won't use my Amiga 600 for work anymore since I can't connect it to my home network (wireless), I can't get documents from there to other computers etc. Computers need standards. Hell even with our 2 major home OS's neither can write to the others native file system. Imagine how bad it would be with hundreds of home OS's running around?

 

[robbieduncan]

There are only 2 or 3 choices for a regular user.
Hardly any choice at all, really.
How would you feel about having only the choice between 2 or 3 cars in the whole world?
Wake up and smell the burnt toast. There is no 'free market'.

I drive one of those non-existent minority cars. I used to use a minority OS (RISC OS). There is a free market. It has spoken: Windows or perhaps Mac OS.

 

[pseudobrit]

The world becomes more interconnected everyday. If spoken language were invented today, there would probably be only a very small handful to flourish.

Continued diversity in things like language and culture are positive aspects, but too much diversity in areas of interconnectedness are a drag on the free flow of economic and technological advances.

 

[Evangelion]

I drive one of those non-existent minority cars. I used to use a minority OS (RISC OS). There is a free market. It has spoken: Windows or perhaps Mac OS.

there isn't, really. The history is full of dirty tricks Microsoft used to kill their competitors. Like how Microsoft forced OEM's to buy Windows-licenses for each computer they sold, regardless of what OS that computer was running. Or how Microsoft increased licensing-costs for companies that shipped competing software. Or how DR-DOS was sabotaged from threatening MS-DOS. Or how they "cut off Netscape's air-supply".

There is no free market. There is an abusive monopoly. think about it: The competing OS needs to be order of magnitude better (OS X), or about as good, but 100% free in order for them to gain any new market-share. Does that sound like "free market" to you? In a truly free market, Microsoft would be dying as we speak.

 

[doubleohseven]

You are assuming all 6 billion people have even seen a computer. Some can barely survive

That's true. I read somewhere that 1 billion people in the world have a computer and use the internet. The other 5 billion are either living in poverty or don't know what a computer is, most likely.

 

[Loge]

Or how DR-DOS was sabotaged from threatening MS-DOS.

Ah yes, I used to have DR DOS, and having problems getting Windows 3.1 to play nice with it. In the end it was easier to just give up and go back to MS DOS.

I also remember hearing a lot about O/S2 at the time and how that was going to be the next big thing for PCs.

 

[7on]

Microsoft would be dying as we speak.

MS is dying. Vista was a disaster. Our IT is still going to roll us all back to XP before 09 (they lost the CS3 disks )

When Windows 7 comes out and it's just like Vista, everyone will stay with XP again. Eventually MS will lose it's edge after a few cycles. They aren't doing their anti-competitive practices anymore, but it takes a while for it to be reflective in the market. The fact that I can go to Dell's site and buy a computer with Linux is a big boon (and of Amazon's top ten laptops, a few come with Linux).

I predict in 10 years or so OSX will be up to 30%, Linux 10%, and Windows 60%. And these are probably modest estimates (and taking into account if MS doesn't get their act together by then, who knows? maybe Windows 8 will blow us away?)