Financial identity is *dangerous*? (was re: Fake companies, real money)

[Ian Grigg]

http://www.financialcryptography.com/mt/archives/000219.html

dan at geer.org wrote:

> ... to break the conundrum Ballmer finds himself
> in where the road forks towards (1) fix the security
> problem but lose backward compatibility, or (2) keep
> the backward compatibility but never fix the problem.

I think the recent decision by Microsoft to not upgrade
browsers indicates that they are plumbing for your choice
(1).  Backwards compatibility takes a back seat.  I wrote
more about it here:

http://www.financialcryptography.com/mt/archives/000219.html

> His Board would prefer (2), the annuity of locked-in
> users, but it forces a bet that software liability
> never happens.  Fixing the problem, for which the
> calls grow more strident daily, puts the desktop
> platform into play even more than it is now as
> it asks the users (who, having lost compatibility,
> thus have nothing to lose) to marry Redmond a
> second time.  A VM-cures-all strategy is then
> an attempt to avoid having to choose between (1)
> and (2) by breaking backward compatibility for
> new things but bridging the old things with a
> magic box that both preserves the annuity revenue
> stream from locked-in users while it keeps the
> liability bar at bay.

I have two questions:  Does he have a board?  I
never heard of anyone but Bill Gates telling Ballmer
what to do.  Just curious!

Secondly, is a VM strategy likely to work?  Assuming
that Microsoft can make it work nicely, it also opens
the door for other OSs to be added into the mix, something
that Microsoft wouldn't be that keen to promote.

(I don't disagree with your comments, though!)

iang

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