| | Encyclopedia :: encyclopedia : Microsoft Windows (Site not responding. Last check: 2007-10-19) |
 | | Microsoft's operating system has also benefited from the fact that they are one of the few companies that are willing to license their OSes to hardware manufacturers (for example, Apple does not license Mac OS X and Sun did not license Solaris to anyone before it was open-sourced). |
 | | Before, companies who wanted to be in the computer business had to create their own operating system (such as the Amiga) or use an OS without a GUI (like MS-DOS or CP/M); even an exclusive license was significantly cheaper than developing a new operating system and creating a software base. |
 | | A study conducted by Kevin Mitnick and marketing communications firm, Avantgarde, found that an unprotected and unpatched Windows XP system only lasted 4 minutes on the Internet before it was compromised. |
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