The WING Blog

The Web and Internetworking Group at BU/CS

May

17

Microsoft and CentOS: strange bedfellows

By Mark Crovella

This is an interesting analysis of MSFT vs REL vs CentOS.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/05/17/microsoft_and_centos/

I’m continually intrigued by how the location of ‘value’ shifts in the IT industry.  It seems that software has this constant potential for being re-architected, and as a result, where the problem lies, shifts.    This article suggests that the real money-making opportunity in cloud computing right now is in management (ie, as opposed to in OSes or CPUs).   This makes sense to me and jibes with what I saw when I worked in industry.

It reminds me of how IBM, which once made oodles of money selling OSes and CPUs, eventually moved ‘up’ the value chain to selling managed ‘solutions’.   I think this was a remarkable reinvention.   I wonder if Microsoft can and will eventually do something similar.

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