Gates, AOL and some morning coffee thoughts

OK, since days the headlines about Micro$oft and AOL working together from now on are flying through the channels. Here are my sunday morning coffee thoughts about this, just noted between croissant and bagel:

• Who thought that AOL/TimeWarner could have been the counterpart of a unstoppable rise of Microsoft to total market reign, totally misunderstood both companies targets. AOL wants an AOL-account on every computer (and a pile of AOL-CD’s in the postbox, dustbin, cupboard and everywhere around the computer on the desk), Microsoft wants Windows running on all that machines. These are not contrary targets, you can do both: Windows on every machine and AOL as serviceprovider as well. »You’re nothing but dreamer…«
• Microsoft stated that there won’t be a downloadable version of IE higher than Version 6SP1 (which is the latest actual version indeed). This means, that if you like IE and want to upgrade you will have to upgrade your windows not your IExplorer. Which means that you will have to take the merrits of »Palladium« if you want a better IE. Maybe for some people a better IE is a heavy argument for upgrading to newer Windows but also »Palladium« is a argument against doing so. The questioning for a non-IE-webbrowser will rise if many people decide against upgrading the whole system.
• A rise of questioning for other browsers like IE cannot be wanted by Micro$oft so the deal with AOL will cover this point. What will they do? The death of Netscape, which belongs to AOL/TimeWarner, is the logical consequence. How will this affect Mozilla. Will it die also if there is no netscape-related work at AOL anymore?
• Is this the end of a usable AOL Instant Messenger Service?
• Is this merger the ultimate strike for Micro$oft on the way to total market reign? Will AOL stop spitting millions and billions of AOL-CDs? Will all TimeWarner movies be shown first in Bill Gates private cinema?
• How far will they go?

Further thoughts @ hebig.org.