[Am-info] Microsoft, Verizon link for fast Net

[Paul Rickard]

========== On 2002.06.21 09:23 AM, Erick Andrews typed: ============

>Ballmer said Microsoft will spend about $500 million to develop 
>its MSN internet service this year. It has about 7.7 million subscribers.
>
>"The reason this will work is that each of us has an incentive to keep 
>doing what we're doing," said Ivan Siedenberg, Verizon's president 
>and chief executive. Verizon has about 1.4 million DSL customers.

     MSN is a brand and marketing tool, not an actual ISP. All the 
company's high-speed Internet is now a branded version of some other 
company's service (Qwest, Verizon, Gilat / Gilat-To-Home), and in some 
areas the dialup service is as well. Microsoft is doing with its Internet 
service what it does with Windows - they handle the brand names, the 
marketing, and the bits, and let somebody else make the big investments 
of buying and maintaining hardware. Microsoft doesn't even host all of 
its Web sites anymore - some of the non-core sites are now done by a 
server farm partner. Before long Ms won't even need a physical "campus" 
anymore, they can just all telecommute to Bill's castle and think up new 
brands to stick on products and services produced by others.


======== Paul Rickard, Editor of The Microsoft Boycott Campaign =======
--------------------------------[ Http://www.msboycott.com ]-----------

  "Instead of worrying about whether or not the government will stop
   Microsoft from innovating in the future, the head honchos in Redmond
   ought to spend some energy trying to figure out what force has
   prevented them from innovating over the past decade."
       -InfoWorld Editor Nicholas Petreley - December 20, 1999