MICROSOFT

History of Microsoft

History of Microsoft

Introduction

Since the decades, Microsoft (MS) has been called as the leading industry. Microsoft has also been sued by individuals, other companies, and a number of states (Lewis 1999, 5-12). There are two schools of thought on Microsoft's legal problems. One school argues that the government and MS competitors are out to get Bill Gates and his company because Microsoft has been so successful. The other school of thought insists that Gates and Microsoft have consistently engaged in cutthroat competition designed to shut out all competition through any means available.

Specifically, Microsoft has been charged with violating the Sherman Antitrust Act by forcing computer vendors and manufacturers to load new computers with Microsoft Windows as an operating system. Secondly, the company has been charged with forcing out browser competition by requiring vendors and manufacturers to include Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) as the browser of choice for Windows and by removing icons for other browsers, such as Netscape, from computer desktops. Consumer advocate Ralph Nader called Microsoft “the most dangerous company in America today.”

There is little doubt that Microsoft has dominated the computer software industry since its introduction of Windows 95 operating system in August 1995. Microsoft had been working for years to provide an operating system for the PC that would be as user friendly as that of Apple Macintosh computers. In 1988, in a landmark case, MS convinced the courts to uphold its right to copy the Graphical User Interface (GUI) used in Apple computers. Microsoft then introduced Windows 3.0, a weak and bug-filled imitation of the Mac. While its operating system was being fine-tuned, MS worked on innovations for its basic Windows programs, which would extend the market for Microsoft products.

In the process of building the Microsoft empire, Bill Gates has become one of the richest men in the world, and is considered by many to be a living symbol of the best and worst aspects of U.S. capitalism. Gates has written two books explaining his vision of the future of technology, and his views have helped to shape the computer industry in the United States.

In 1973, Gates entered Harvard University. While there, he and Paul Allen developed the first BASIC interpreter for the Intel 8080 microprocessor, as well as a version of the programming language BASIC for Altair, the first microcomputer from Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (M.I.T.S.). MBASIC was later used by M.I.T.S. to accompany its Altair 8800 kit; by 1977, 10,000 Altairs had been sold. His success in software programming led Gates to leave Harvard in his junior year and turn his focus to Micro-Soft, a company he had co-founded with Allen in 1975 (the hyphen was later dropped).

Microsoft established its leadership in microcomputer programming languages, first by fitting IBM PCs with its Disk Operating System (DOS) in 1981, and later by equipping non-IBM PCs with MS-DOS. In 1987, Microsoft introduced its first version of the Windows operating system (OS). By 1993, Microsoft was selling a million copies of Windows a ...