Hi there
The Markets don't seem to agree with the sentiment of the article -- in any case in order to develop something for the FUTURE you have to lay the groundwork somewhere and this does cost money.
I'd rather trust the Markets than from some possibly "Linux Centric" magazine -- not that there's any complaint with Linux it's just that it isn't nor ever likely to be a big player for your typical Home users-- and for those corporations who have switched to Linux and using Open Office -- well it might be OK for simple documents but I doubt if any SERIOUS POWER user of EXCEL say would agree that Open Office is a satisfactory replacement.
People particularly in the US work on incredibly Short Term ideas --if it hasn't worked by tomorrow --forget it. Ms although late to the party realizes the future is AWAY from the traditional desktop and even though late and maybe the first throw of the dice wasn't to a lot of people's liking the future IS in mobile / portable devices and the desktop will represent a DIMINISHING value in Ms's portfolio.
I know some say there's stuff that you'll always need a desktop for -- true -- but this isn't in the future where Ms expects most of its revenue to come from and by recognizing this early enough and while they are still rich enough allows them to try out stuff and make some mistakes along the way.
I'd still rather be in Ms's shoes than Apple's -- especially now that even the once mighty iTunes is being hampered as subscription based music services such as Spotify eat into iTunes, music torrents still abound in spite of all attempts to close these sites down, and people such as Netflix, Hula, SKY and even the staid old B.T in the UK start rolling out "On Demand" TV / Films etc which will also kill APPLE TV stone dead -- new TV's are often Smart TV's which can connect to the Internet or a LAN directly so who needs an Apple TV type of box.
The I.T magazines should stick to doing what they do best -- stick to essentially I.T stuff -- for instance in the same magazine there's a great little article of a lot more relevance to anybody doing system administration whether at home or work.
13 killer open source admin tools - InfoWorld
I'd leave business to the Markets and let Ms get on with it.
Yesterday 08 Mar at market close (and Fridays are often "Carnage on Wall St Days")
AAPL close 430.58 USD 52 wk range 419.00 - 705.07
MSFT close 28.00 USD 52 wk range 26.26 - 32.95 .
Apple has a lot to do in order to convince the market. Ms seems to have the confidence of the market at the moment to recover anything like its previous position.
Cheers
jimbo