Apple Inc (AAPL)

[M Paquette]

Or not...

MSFT's marketshare will continue to erode as security issues continue unabetted through 2005.

Security issues have had no significant effect on marketshare so far. I see no reason for that to change in 2005.

MSFT just won a 560 million dollar 6 year contract to supply software and maintenance to the US Air Force. It covers 525,000 Microsoft desktop Windows systems as well as servers. The USAF hopes to save money and improve security by standardising desktop configurations across the organisation. Nothing like making a nice easy target of yourselves.

MSFT was chosen in 2003 as an exclusive contractor for the Homeland Security department, including 140,000 desktop computers, for a 5 year contract. Mmmm.... monoculture.

MSFT also won a 3.6 million contract to supply Beijing's municipal government. This may not hold, as some of their government officials are questioning the wisdom of the move.


MSFT market share will change only should something else catch the eye of IS drones and managers, or the buying public suddenly starts making educated buying decisions. Don't hold your breath.

Security isn't even on the radar. The average user thinks all those advertising popups, and constant Internet traffic from their worm infested spambot loaded Wintel boxes are perfectly normal. I've run across a couple of folks this weekend who bought new machines for Christmas because their old (1 and 2 years old!) were "too slow", and tbe new machines didn't pop up all the windows and alerts their old machines did.