"Microsoft Gets On the Next Billion Bandwagon" is the headline
– but is this announcement
something to get excited about, or is it a half-assed attempt by Microsoft to
prevent itself from sliding into irrelevance in the developing world?
First, it must be said that Bill Gates individually has a
genuine commitment to global poverty reduction, which is entirely selfless and
admirable. It is also quite right and proper that his commmitment to the developing
world is expressed through his personal foundation, rather than through the
company he founded. Microsoft’s purpose is to make money for its shareholders;
development activities belong to the Gates Foundation.
Here’s what Orlando Ayala, Microsoft’s point man on this project, told Reuters:
"This is not a philanthropic effort, this is a business." He’s quite
right about that. Because if it was a philanthropic effort, it would look very,
very different:
- The software would be free, rather than costing $3. What’s the point of
the nominal price? It does nothing for Microsoft’s bottom line, and at the
margin discourages people from using Windows rather than open-source software,
which is free.
- In fact, the software would be open-source, rather than buggy old
Windows software which is not well supported, which has whopping great security
holes, and which won’t improve over time.
- And actually the attempt to use "information communications technology"
to help the world’s poorest, in the words
of Asian Development Bank vice president Larry Greenwood, would concentrate
not on computers but rather on phones.
With any luck, all of these things will happen. Which would be good for the
base of the pyramid, less good for Microsoft.