A tale of two brands
MS-Watch | at | by Mike
Sun's move to consolidate around the Java brand comes at a time when Microsoft is distancing itself from the .NET one. Microsoft and Sun Microsystems have spent a lot of time and energy one-upping one another over the years. Typically, Microsoft sets a course, and shortly thereafter, Sun mimics it while publicly deriding Microsoft's direction. (as was the case with Microsoft's announcement of .Net and Sun's subsequent launch of SunONE). Given that relationship, Sun's move to try to consolidate all its Java wood behind one arrow comes at a curious time.
Microsoft already has disappeared .Net from its Windows line, as well as from its enterprise server and MapPoint products. Folks are expecting that Microsoft will be phasing out .Net from the Visual Studio developer-tool family in the coming year, too.