Gates not frightened of the big bad Linux

THE GRAND NABOB of the world's software giant, Microsoft, Bill Gates, has told technologists that he is not afraid of Linux.

Speaking at a shindig at the Computer History Museum, Gates said that he had seen other threats to Vole's dominance come and go and Linux will eventually go the way of OS/2.

He pointed out that everyone said that OS/2 was going to kill Microsoft and it didn't, despite Big Blue having twice the number of staff of the Vole. Other giant killers such as Novell or Borland had failed to dent Microsoft's global supremacy.

When asked how he could be so confident when more than half servers being purchased today are running Linux, Gates disputed the figure. He said well over 50 per cent of servers that are sold run Windows Server and Linux was killing Unix not Windows.

He said that Windows does compete with Linux, but the shift of Unix share to Linux has been dramatic. He predicted that Linux will kill a lot of the Unix stuff that's been out there down to very small numbers and eventually Windows and Linux will dominate market share. µ