Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#251

Post by shmerl » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:33 PM UTC

tomnipotent wrote: post #220

severino wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, you know, this wasn't just an "insane" guy at the top who now left the company and everything's cool. Companies have culture, and while we can agree today Microsoft's not the same Microsoft from 10 years ago, we shouldn't forget their history so soon.

> this wasn't just an "insane" guy at the top who now left the company and everything's cool Satya Nadella has completely re-organized MS inside-and-out since taking the helm in 2014. It is a VERY different company than it was even 5 years ago. In March [1], Microsoft even went so far as to officially disband the Windows department and merge it into something called "Experiences & Devices". [1] https://www.theverge.c…

It's different, but not very different. They still have a lot of lock-in like Outlook (ActiveSync), DirectX, exFAT and so on and so forth. They show no sign of dropping lock-in, except in markets where they are way weaker than competition.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#252

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:33 PM UTC

lev99 wrote: post #193

gsich wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Telemetry is bad, forced updates is not.

Forced updates are bad. 1. Updates can introduce breaking changes. 2. Windows will restart the computer to update, potentially interrupting processes. 3. Users should have freedom to use software in the way that they choose, and not have actions forced on them by the software. I understand that many windows users are far from power users and the forced updates provide security updates. My point of view is anyone will…

> I understand that many windows users are far from power users and the forced updates provide security updates

I think this largely was only true of the period between the internet becoming a thing and the smartphone becoming a thing. Nowadays there's phones, tablets, and chromebooks that serve the needs of those people better and in a more convenient form factor. Desktops are for people who do work, create stuff, or are hobbiests.

I think a lot of the reasons computers suck today is because of this idea that they need to cater to some strawman drooling moron of a user.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#253

Post by vira28 » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:37 PM UTC

I understand most of the concern about Microsofty way.

However, basically I see two different era for MS. Before Satya and After Satya. So, I don't have any concern/worries in this acquisition.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#254

Post by sker » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:37 PM UTC

scjr wrote: post #245

sker wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus I'm sure under Microsoft they will have some sort of free private repos like GitLab, Bitbucket and Visual Studio Team Services already do. Lack of free private repos is the main (only) reason why I don't use GitHub.

What do you base this on?

1. They already have such offering (VS Team Services).

2. Their competitors (GitLab, Bitbucket) already have that offering.

3. I don't think they're interested in GitHub for its revenue, but for its strategic value. GitHub has to protect its revenue model by disallowing free private repos, Microsoft can afford to be more flexible.

4. They've already made similar moves. They acquired Xamarin, which was expensive, and made it free.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#255

Post by meiraleal » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:41 PM UTC

zmmmmm wrote: post #207

It's getting depressing to see that mid tier companies are all now reliably getting swallowed up by larger ones. It is starting to feel like the golden age of technology - where brand new small companies emerge and become giant ones - is waning. Were Google, Amazon and Facebook actually the last of the tech giants to emerge and from now on, it's just a procession of watching every other company merge into the existin…

I think it is a cycle. When the middle tier companies vanish, the small ones start to rise again.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#256

Post by morganvachon » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:42 PM UTC

gsich wrote: post #150

philipov wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows 10's forced updates and telemetry say otherwise.

Telemetry is bad, forced updates is not.

Forced updates can be bad, for example I narrowly missed having a bricked workstation when the April update was released and it borked machines using Intel 600p SSDs. I hadn't used that machine for a few weeks and it had been powered off; by the time I finally started using it again Microsoft had blocked the update for machines with that hardware.

Anyway, I can manage the limited telemetry via hosts and I can defer updates (which I will do from now on), but my biggest gripe is forced installation/reinstallation of previously removed apps and games. I run Windows 10 Pro and I end up with a few variations of Candy Crush games, Minecraft, Autodesk drawing apps, and others after initial OS installation and after every major update so far. This is while using an offline account, and even if I used my Microsoft account on this workstation I've never purchased/downloaded any of those apps in the past.

I get that "Pro" at this point means home power user, and companies should be using Enterprise, but Microsoft shouldn't be pushing any software back onto the machine once the user has uninstalled it. That's user-hostile and takes control out of the hands of the one person who should be in complete control of the system.

Once full, non-buggy support for Ryzen APUs arrives in Linux, I'm switching Windows 10 to a VM and going back to Linux on this machine as the daily driver OS.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#257

Post by gmueckl » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:43 PM UTC

Someone1234 wrote: post #154

api_or_ipa wrote: post #35

I can't help but be insanely sceptical. Microsoft has a massive legacy of Embrace, Extend, Extinguish and I don't want the GitHub ecosystem to suffer from the same reoccurring pattern. Call me jaded by Microsoft's past behaviour, but I just cannot forget the numerous times Microsoft has absolutely ruined thriving ecosystems by using the same tricks.

Microsoft wouldn't benefit from killing GitHub. Heck Microsoft killed their own competitor TFS and pushed people to migrate to Git, and uses GitHub themselves for hosting several products. Microsoft also has full Git support in Visual Studio Online (their enterprise competitor to GitHub), Visual Studio, and VS Code. Microsoft would likely use GitHub to advertise their development products, tools, and services like Az…

They extinguished Skype. They will manage to do the same with Github eventually. They are the biggest user already and would therefore be forced to cater to their own needs first over those of the rest if the community. This would drive the service squarely into the ground by doing everything right.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#258

Post by Chaebixi » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:45 PM UTC

giancarlostoro wrote: post #185

AgentK20 wrote: post #6

Really hope these talks fall through and nothing comes of it. Too many bad experiences with Microsoft buying something out, mismanaging it, and it goes down the drain. As much as I love GitHub, I won't be using a Microsoft-owned GitHub for any of my company's work.

To be fair they haven't screwed up LinkedIn. I think they will let GitHub grow with their resources.

> To be fair they haven't screwed up LinkedIn. I think they will let GitHub grow with their resources.

I'm not sure if LinkedIn could be any less "screwed up" than it was when Microsoft bought it.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#259

Post by bborud » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:49 PM UTC

As a long time GitHub user I really do hope these talks do not result in an acquisition. I would really like GitHub to be independent from OS vendors, or vendors of platforms, ecosystems, compilers, IDEs etc.

I want GitHub's goal to be a good GitHub. Not a good part of the Microsoft ecosystem. Those may initially be the same, but it takes very little for them to not be the same.

Re: Microsoft and GitHub have held acquisition talks

#260

Post by gerdesj » Fri, Jun 01, 2018, 10:50 PM UTC

tomtheelder wrote: post #215

giancarlostoro wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair they haven't screwed up LinkedIn. I think they will let GitHub grow with their resources.

IMO that's because LinkedIn wasn't a great product to begin with. It's just the stickiest app of all time. Something something network effects.

It's just the stickiest app of all time To me it barely exists. I'm a hirer in the UK.

Before anyone touts how much wider our reach might be for potential hires, can I point out that my little firm has hired people from the other end of Europe directly ("real" friend of friend etc). Oh and just in case you are wondering - we pay and treat everyone equally and equitably.