Microsoft has no immediate response to sharply-declining margins, so it hastily points to products that do not exist yet

Let the conspiracy theories begin! Seriously, I want to consider how Microsoft will respond if Linux begins to heavily impact their profitability. Consider these possible actions

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer recently gave a presentation in which he said that GNU/Linux has more market share and poses a greater threat to Microsoft's profitability than does Apple.

How GNU/Linux toppled Microsoft through its margins

Microsoft pressured by pessimistic analysts, profitability online remains a struggle

We’ve been having a discussion on the meaning and impact of Microsoft’s TomTom suit, and there seems to be quite a bit of suspicion and angst over Microsoft’s patent and licensing tactics. However, I believe if one wants to see the Microsoft of old, the better place to find it is in the netbook market.

With people's conflicting interests and reappointments, it seems almost evident that Microsoft stuck its fingers in as many pies as needed

Novell makes more evident what was obvious from the very start - that it puts Microsoft's interests ahead of anything else

BOTH MICROSOFT and Novell will have a role or at least some impact at a formal, national level. Mundie's involvement is a subject that we covered yesterday [1, 2], but we wrote not as much about Schmidt's impact. Sun, Google, and Novell are all places where he worked, so his affinity towards particular companies cannot be ignored.