American History 1988
Chapter 380 - 369: Intensity Rises

Chapter 380: Chapter 369: Intensity Rises

$18.7 billion net worth valuation, surpassing Gates by almost $4 billion.

This gap is bigger than any other between rankings on the list, with Buffett in third at $11.8 billion.

It could be said that Dean’s fortune far exceeds theirs, yet he is ranked second in the latest issue of Forbes.

Because of such dramatic effect, many reporters now want to interview Dean, asking how he feels about missing out on the title of the world’s richest person.

Even Forbes officials had to explain that their calculations are delayed, hence the list does not promptly reflect the net worth of the candidates.

Forbes is working to improve this mechanism and plans to update candidates’ wealth tracking on the internet in real-time in the future.

Of course, Dean doesn’t care about these things, and even Gates himself doesn’t like Forbes’s various reports.

It seems that the founders of the internet technology industry do not wish to see their names on the list.

However, reporters don’t care about that; they need news with a punch.

Dean’s ranking incident on Forbes perfectly fits their reporting needs.

And then there’s the scene today, even if he fled to Tennessee, he was still found, by The Wall Street Journal no less.

"Mind talking about your wealth? How did you achieve all of this today?" Emma asked while scribbling on a piece of paper.

Dean sighed, "It’s a much-discussed topic. If I have to attribute it to anything, it might be that I have more faith in the internet."

"Do you think the internet will create even bigger miracles in the future?" Emma continued taking notes without stopping.

"Of course, in my view, the innovation brought by the internet is just beginning," Dean said, handing the riding crop to little Roy and then constantly teasing him.

"Interesting viewpoint," Emma raised her eyebrows slightly. The internet’s current popularity has already exceeded many people’s expectations, but Dean believes it’s far from the endpoint.

"OK, would you mind sharing your plans for after becoming one of the richest people in the world?" This topic might interest many people.

"Um..." Dean rested his hands on his hips and looked off into the distance, "As you can see, I might do some things that help me relax and that I’m interested in."

"Running a farm?" Emma’s gaze was teasing.

"Yeah," Dean nodded with a smile, "I feel relaxed here, and my family enjoys it all as well."

"Besides these, will there be other investments or plans? Including any changes in your lifestyle?"

"It’s hard to say, but I might focus more on investments in traditional industries.

As for life... I don’t think there will be much change. I’ve always been like this."

"But I heard you placed an order with Boeing for an ultra-large private jet?" Emma was well-informed.

"It has not been finalized just yet; I am gathering information about it," Dean said, seemingly unfazed by the fact that his lie had been exposed.

"It’s said that such a custom jet costs over $300 million, an unimaginable figure," Emma was very keen on Dean discussing his recent big spending.

"You know, due to work, I need to fly at any time and place.

Considering the size of the team, perhaps buying a jet directly is the better choice."

Dean had no intention of flaunting his wealthy lifestyle, so he found a casual excuse.

Emma nodded without dwelling too much on this topic. "Did you hear about the recent press conference from Microsoft?"

"What?" Dean was taken aback by this unexpected news.

"Microsoft is planning to hold a press conference in early December about their internet strategy."

"Oh~" A gleam appeared in Dean’s eyes, "Look, just like I was saying, the internet is just starting."

...

Throughout the fall of ’95, Gates was studying the strategic competition with Netscape.

After several meetings with senior management, Microsoft concluded two strategic decisions.

First, to rely on the programming capabilities of their in-house team to develop a browser quickly and to keep up with Netscape Navigator’s new features.

Second, Gates decided to give the development team ample funding to ensure the execution of this decision.

He wanted to turn the browser development into a race, hoping to drag Netscape down with it.

In short, in the short term, Microsoft’s investment in coding time and manpower far exceeded what it could profit in the same period.

This was a development race regardless of cost, a tactic commonly used by Microsoft.

They had used this strategy before to wear down text software processing companies like Micropro and WordPerfect.

The former was acquired by Bit, and the latter by Nevoll Company.

Even the already sizeable Lotus couldn’t withstand this kind of pressure and was forcibly taken over by IBM in the stock market this year.

Yes, Lotus is now part of IBM’s business.

And Microsoft managed to take care of these companies swiftly not just because of the financial gap, but also because it had the advantage of owning the operating system.

As the competitors to Office, Microsoft delayed delivering the system development kits to these companies until just before the release of Windows 95.

This meant that while Microsoft’s new versions of Word and Excel were ready, these competitors were just starting their development work.

It’s no exaggeration to say, the war was over before it even began.

This is Microsoft, sparing no effort in competitive tactics.

Even Gates now regrets that he shouldn’t have let Netscape get the Windows95 development kit so easily.

But it’s already too late, and their only option now is to use a development race to wear down Netscape.

So, with the nonstop development of a team of thousands, Microsoft launched a beta version of Navigator 2.0 in October.

This was just two months after it had released version 1.0 in August.

According to the normal cycle for software companies in Silicon Valley, a major version update takes at least half a year to a year.

But with Microsoft’s cost-disregarding investment, it was shortened by 3 to 6 times.

Alright, Netscape was also scared by the rapid pace of Microsoft’s updates.

They realized that this opponent was no longer as weak as Mosaic.

Although Microsoft had a poor start, with such an investment, the outcome was uncertain.

Clark and Anderson tried out the beta version of Microsoft’s Navigator 2.0.

Then after just a few minutes, they started cursing, as Microsoft had almost entirely copied the functionalities of Netscape’s browser.

In version 2.0, Navigator also began to support various video playback and web-mail features.

This was pretty much step for step the same route as the Explorer 2.0, which Microsoft had copied to a tee.

What unexpectedly and indignantly surprised Clark and his team the most was that Microsoft’s Navigator browser also began to support the JavaScript language.

Yes, the shameless Microsoft used the technology of Netscape to write browser functionalities and then turned around to compete with Netscape.

What happened to developing their own programming language, as they’d publicly stated they would?

This is the result?

In fact, Microsoft did indeed initially plan to do so internally, but they quickly realized that they couldn’t catch up with Netscape’s progress at the current rate.

So, the development of their own language was put aside. Netscape’s JavaScript was already mature and had passed the preliminary review of the European Computer Manufacturers Association.

Of course, the most important factor was the app store model, which truly targeted Microsoft’s vulnerability; they just couldn’t worry about that at the moment.

If they waited until their own programming language was developed and then developed Microsoft’s app store, maybe it would’ve been too late.

To seize the discourse for developers, Microsoft directly applied the JavaScript template and began trying to develop their own application plugins.

Like a password manager similar to Netscape’s app store, and an ad-blocking plugin.

After analysis, Seattle unanimously agreed that these two kinds of plugins were essential functions for users.

But their actions angered Netscape, and Barksdale had already instructed his lawyers to send a warning letter to Microsoft.

Such blatant plagiarism was an outright slap in the face.

However, upon Dean’s suggestion, Netscape was just collecting evidence and had not immediately initiated a lawsuit.

As for Microsoft, they showed no reaction, as if they hadn’t received the notice at all.

Perhaps in their view, such a lawsuit would take years to resolve and posed no threat to Microsoft.

Microsoft’s current focus was on promoting Navigator 2.0, which had shown significant improvement over the first version.

Objectively, version 2.0 could indeed meet some of the internet needs, but with Netscape’s prior contributions.

Even though Microsoft made significant efforts to promote it, Navigator 2.0’s market share was still only about 3%.

By November, when the official version went online, the situation still hadn’t improved.

Then Wall Street responded, and analysts from Merrill lowered Microsoft’s stock from "buy" to "hold".

Everyone was watching this competition, and from the current outcomes, Netscape’s model seemed to represent the future of the Internet.

But Microsoft was still harvesting profits from every operating system, which undoubtedly went against the spirit of openness upheld by the current Internet surge.

So in just one day, Microsoft’s market value evaporated by tens of billions, with the company maintaining at around 50 billion US Dollars now.

The stock market was volatile, not just Microsoft’s shareholders, even Gates became unsettled.

He had not expected the outside world to place such importance on the concept of the Internet, which even affected Microsoft’s stronghold.

On December 7th, Gates chose this date for Microsoft’s press conference.

He compared Microsoft to the American fleet attacked at Pearl Harbor 54 years ago, gearing up for battle.

On this day, the Seattle headquarters conference center officially announced Microsoft’s move into the internet.

If Gates compared his company to the American fleet then, who, in Gates’ eyes, was the attacker?

A small company that had only been founded a little over two years ago, Netscape!

Regardless of the reasonableness of Gates’ shameless statements, this press conference garnered intense national media attention.

Every word of the content released in this event was thoroughly interpreted, after all, this was the first time Microsoft had publicly declared its entrance into the Internet.

Also, it was a signal: Microsoft was declaring war.

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