Today, Don Box of Microsoft appeals for love (well, at least polygamy), inviting us all to snuggle up with their .NET stuff and pointing out that it works with Open Source technology. Scoble takes a Redmond job and also wants to start dating. I have this problem with loving Microsoft, it's just that I fear them so much.
Not that (I think) I'm paranoid, but I look back over the last decade, and the experience people have had with Microsoft partnerships, and the things that came out in that litigation, and the cutting-off of air supplies, and the abusive one-on-one behavior (only that which I experienced personally), and well, I'm chicken.
So, I think that Don and Bob are smart, decent human beings, and I think .NET has some way-cool innovations, and I think (perhaps most important of all) Microsoft is admitting that the bits-on-the-wire worldview has a right to exist. Having said that, in things like this I see exactly the API lock-in hell that I've spent my career dodging.
At Antarctica, we use plenty of Microsoft products, even some highly proprietary stuff like VML, and we try not to tolerate Operating System religion. But, speaking as a businessman, Microsoft still scares the crap out of me. Which is going to keep me from feeling the love. And right now the platform I develop for is the Web, and I'm not looking for another.
