A World Without Competition

Try to imagine what things would be like today had there not been fierce competition in certain key parts of our world.  I’ll give you some examples:

Had VMware not come about, cheap and accessible virtualization might not have happened at all.  Even if it had found its way into data centers, it would have likely been priced out of reach.  Free versions would likely never have happened.  Not because VMware did all this.  But because their emergence pushed others to step up and compete.  We got Virtual Server, GSX, VMware Player, Virtual PC, Parallels, Virtual Box, Xen and others.  Then came the hypervisor products and all that.

Had Google not pushed into web search services, free web applications and web advertising, there wouldn’t even be things like Bing, iAds, Virtual Earth, Bing Maps, Office 365, or even half the search features found in products like Sharepoint.  Again, this is not all Google’s doing.  It’s just that once they stepped onto that boat and it began to move fast, everyone else dove into the water to see what they could do.

Without Apple, where would portable music and multimedia devices be?  Where would tablets be?  Sure, Microsoft and others tried tablets many times, and they all failed horribly.  HORRIBLY.  But now they’re back in the game.  What about ultra-thin notebooks?  What about touch-screen phones?

Without Amazon, where would ebooks be today?  Where would the Nook be?  Sony Reader?  iBooks?

Without Netflix where would all the online movie services be today?

Without Toyota, where would hybrid vehicles be?

Without FedEx where would all the other overnight carriers be today?

COMPETITION IS GOOD.

PERPETUAL COMPETITION IS BETTER.