It has been a hot summer in the
world of computing. First,
Microsoft, the industry giant in computer operating systems and
office productivity software, launched its new search engine, Bing. Bing finally
won Microsoft some positive acclaim in its long-running effort to challenge
Google's dominant role in search advertising. Soon after that, Microsoft found
success in another long-running effort, signing a 10-year alliance with Yahoo! which
gave it substantial property rights on Yahoo!'s search advertising
technologies. Google, the search engine
titan and the company most impacted by these initiatives, wasn't sitting idle
either. Google lobbed another shell into the world of operating systems, with
the new version of its Chrome web browser, first introduced in
2008. The Chrome browser is actually a
mini-operating system, which can motivate software developers to write applications
that run inside Chrome (rather than on Windows). This can eventually
convince end-users to buy network computers or low-cost netbooks that have no need
either for the Windows operating system or for Microsoft Office.
This ongoing battle between Microsoft and Google will
determine how our society makes use of technology, computing, and information,
and which company reaps big rewards in the IT industry.
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