____/ nessuno@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx on Thursday 03 January 2008 22:22 : \____
> On Jan 3, 9:26 am, Roy Schestowitz <newsgro...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> ____/ ness...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx on Thursday 03 January 2008 15:55 : \____
>>
>>
>>
>> > On Jan 2, 4:56 pm, Roy Schestowitz <newsgro...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> >> ____/ ness...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx on Wednesday 02 January 2008 23:22 :
>> >> \____
>>
>> >> > Microsoft up 15%
>> >> > Google up 50%
>> >> > Apple up 133%
>>
>> >> > I think if you look over the last 5 years the comparison is even more
>> >> > dramatic.
>>
>> >> It means very little. Microsoft is pumping cash into the stock. In
>> >> general, stock price does not indicate much because it doesn't just gauge
>> >> actual wealth. IBM and Dell, IIRC, are in heavy buyback mode as well.
>> >> Novell will inevitably end up this way as well.
>>
>> > Yes, I've read how many large corporations in the US are buying back
>> > stock. But to the extent that is true of Microsoft, it means that
>> > their 15% gain means less than it seems. I don't know if Apple has
>> > been buying back stock, but surely their 133% gain is related to the
>> > success of iPod, iPhone and OS/X.
>>
>> I don't watch Apple to be honest (I closely track RHT/RHAT, NOVL, INTC, AMD,
>> IBM, MSFT, ^FTSE and SCOX in the finance feeds), but all that I know based
>> on bankers' word is that Novell is *advised* to buy back stock (many layoffs
>> coming next year and jobs continue to move east-wards). It's not looking
>> great for the US economy in general and I suppose you've heard about the
>> price of oil (a Benjamin per barrel).
>
> The Sibold troll is posting an item on how great Apple has been doing,
> and taunting Linux advocates. I think he's a Wintroll not an Apple
> troll, which is odd since the news is mostly bad for Microsoft, not
> Linux. Also, even according to NetApplications, Linux is up from
> about 0.35% in Jan 07 to 0.66% now. I don't know what their
> methodology is, I couldn't find out, for example, these are OS
> statistics as reported by browser hits? In the US only?
You can't get absolute numbers, but you can spot trends. Surveys indicate that,
given the samples at hand, Linux usage on the desktop (not necessarily
connected to the Web), has doubled in the past year. Think of this as a
subsample of a sample. Sites like Groklaw and other popular 'congregation'
areas for Linux users (there are characteristic attached) honour privacy, so
their logs are not included in these Web stat-based surveys. It's a shame in
a sense because by compromising privacy they could help the image of Linux,
namely by showing its popularity.
> I'm guessing
> that this represents desktop usage in the US. But the point is that
> both Apple and Linux are up in the last year, Windows is down, getting
> nibbled from both directions. At this point Apple and Linux are not
> competing much with each other. But the report on Apple in the last
> few days really is impressive. Looks like half the universe got a Mac
> and an iPhone for Christmas. My father-in-law was one (Mac last fall,
> iPhone for xmas). I hadn't seen an iPhone before. It's really
> beautiful, I've got to say. My father-in-law is deaf, so he doesn't
> use the phone part, but he does do a lot of internet from hand-held
> devices (his main way of communicating), and he's a technology nut.
> He also loves his new Mac and vows never to go back to Windows, which
> he used for 10 years. Anyway, I'd love to see Ballmer's face when he
> sees these statistics. I won't feed the Sibold troll, but this is
> an interesting story. All the curves I've seen on Apple are aiming
> for the stars, so it's got to give Billy and company bad dreams.
>
> 2007 has been a bad year for Microsoft. I can't wait to see what 2008
> will bring.
Apple's growth is definitely symbiotic as far as Linux goes. It's UNIX, it uses
Samba, it runs open source apps without performance penalties, and so forth.
Some Apple Mac users move to Linux or mix the two (desktop and server or
desktop and desktop).
--
~~ Best of wishes
Roy S. Schestowitz | Useless fact: Florida is bigger than England
http://Schestowitz.com | Free as in Free Beer | PGP-Key: 0x74572E8E
Cpu(s): 24.7%us, 4.0%sy, 1.0%ni, 66.2%id, 3.7%wa, 0.3%hi, 0.1%si, 0.0%st
http://iuron.com - semantic engine to gather information
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