Everything is Connected

Without noticing, time passed by very fast. I still have vivid memories of Microsoft releasing Windows XP, and It being the best OS system, even arguably better than Windows Vista. Today I read an article that says that Microsoft XP only has one year left of support. With that in mind, many small and medium-sized companies still operate in Windows XP, as it’s very stable. According to statistics from Analytics Company Net Applications, 39% of all personal computers, and 42% of all Windows PCs, ran XP last month.

To keep their OS users, Microsoft kicked off a new promotion aimed at Windows XP customers, trying to move them to Windows 8. But Microsoft will face a tough job as it tries to push customers off Windows XP. The current business companies which uses Windows can get a 15% discount, Microsoft said on a promotional website. On its Open License website, Microsoft quoted $188 for each Windows 8 Pro license, and $373 for each Office 2013 Standard license, for a
total of $561. The 15% discount would lower each Windows-Office combo by $84 to $477.

This is a great idea from Microsoft, by giving a discount for upgrading the operating system; people will have more incentive to purchase Windows 8. But what needs to be considered is that Windows 8 requires a lot more hardware specifications that the old computers don’t support. So the companies will probably need to purchase new computers that can possibly support the OS. And what can be good is that a combination discounts for bulk purchasing Windows 8 and new computers, and that could bring a lot of more purchasing for Microsoft and the hardware company.

When I was reading through Ma Xin’s blogs, I thought that his ethical post about the Vitamin Water was interesting. I agreed to his point and also found it unethical to state a product healthy while it being as bad as other sugary product, in your case, Coke. It makes sense to me for companies trying to cover their product’s weakness, but have they considered their consumers’ feelings? They use the term “Vitamin Water” to make people think that it’s only a bottle of water that contains vitamins while tasting really good. But in the real case, each serving contains 125g of calories and 32.5g of sugar in total, which is equivalent to a half slice of cheese pizza. I was actually surprised about this.

This asymmetric information brings benefits to the company, but harms the people who purchase this product, as they expected it to be a healthy product. But the asymmetric information may not necessarily be caused by hidden information from the company, but is more likely from the lack of professional knowledge of customers (which in this case: consumers don’t read the nutrition facts).

I think that the government should take more responsibility and make more strict legislation. A possible way for government to do is to require all food companies write down the significant weakness of their products in the obvious place. It’s hard to implement, but it has applied to some products such as cigarettes.

Monthly Archives: March 2013

Windows XP’s new future- Windows 8

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