OpenIPv6

Looks like Microsoft is going to save the world, yet again.

Yes, I’m cynical about anything Microsoft does that supposedly benefits anyone else. They didn’t get where they are through altruism.

But a closer look shows that that cynicism might not be justified here. It is a real improvement to their product, and a valid reason for people to upgrade their copies of Windows (earlier versions of Windows being the biggest competitors to Vista and Windows 7). The fact that it helps the rest of the world too is just an accidental side effect.

Even the “covenant not to sue” on it benefits Microsoft directly, because without that, the world would probably ignore them and adopt a different solution.

All in all, it’s a rare and masterful example of turning a potential technical disaster into both a commercial gold mine (driving consumer upgrades) and an untarnished PR win at the same time.

A tip of my hat to you, Microsoft.

3 Comments

  1. Hopefully the spec will be both specified in a reasonable fashion and implemented correctly by Microsoft, the article ironically gave the example of the Microsoft Word OpenXML format as a prior instance of this policy which in both cases was not and was another form of lock-in. I’ll believe that OpenIPv6 is truly an open standard when I see it, pardon me for being cynical.

    (Of course, the real solution for all consumers to use Macintoshes running OS X with Apple routers, and thus have real IPv6 available by default… I jest. 🙂 )

  2. It looks to me like it’s a good design. We’ll see if they manage to screw it up somehow, but frankly, I can’t see any way that they could, short of turning it into a subscription service (which would simply kill it, as even they would know).

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