Comment by chii
16 hours ago
i think they meant the hardware becomes more fungible. This is what made IBM lose their competitive advantage when it came to PCs, because others were able to make IBM-compatible ones that are cheaper and still able to use the same old software.
Right. But viewed differently, that made everyone have to compete at actually making good PCs, instead of relying on customers unable to escape to another vendor due to lock-in.
We want this. Software and other modern tech desperately need this! How many companies are stuck with an absolutely terrible suite of MS products because you can't easily rip out and replace just the IM or videoconferencing part, for example?
Its good for the buyers, and good for broader society and the economy.
Its bad for vendors.
Why would vendors do something that is bad for them? HN is full for people talking about how to create a "moat" for their products. Why do you expect hardware vendors not to want to do the same?
> Why do you expect hardware vendors not to want to do the same?
of course they want the moat - the point is that society as a whole should force them not to have a moat. Ala, they should not be allowed monopolies.
Unfortunately, this sort of legislation has been lacking recently, and in fact, has been failing even enforcing existing ones from yester-century.
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