Chapter 171 The Rising Sun
"Then why are we ignoring IBM?" Yang Yiwen continued to ask.
Su Yuanshan smiled. "It's not something that can be explained in just a few words. But think about it carefully—what's your impression of IBM? Or rather, when you hear that IBM is launching a browser, does it feel natural to you?"
The three of them thought for a moment and simultaneously shook their heads.
Carly laughed. "IBM always acts like an aristocratic lord. It doesn't have the spirit of the Internet."
"Bingo!" Su Yuanshan snapped his fingers in praise. "Exactly. IBM has always been aloof… even when they released personal computers, there was still this sense of arrogance and awkwardness. That's why today, in the PC field, they're being crushed by Dell, Compaq, and HP—despite the fact that IBM was the pioneer of personal computers!"
"Such aristocrats might do well dealing with enterprise clients, but if they want to dive into a consumer-focused market like browsers, they should just give up."
"As for Sun Microsystems…" (he corrected himself here, because earlier he had mistakenly said Oracle)
The three immediately turned their eyes to him.
Because just earlier, Su Yuanshan had said they needed to go all out against Sun. Naturally, they were curious—why Sun specifically? And why was he so confident?
Sun Microsystems was a true old-school IT company, founded in the 1980s by Stanford elites. It's widely known that Silicon Valley's success cannot be separated from Stanford University, and Sun was a product of that elite environment.
The name "SUN" was actually an acronym: Stanford University Network.
The name alone exuded prestige and arrogance.
Over the past decade, Sun had always pursued an integrated hardware-software strategy—similar to Apple. But while Apple focused on consumers, Sun focused on enterprise markets.
Sun owned its own processor line—the RISC-based SPARC processors—and its own semi-open-source operating system based on BSD Unix, called SunOS (later rebranded as Solaris, with SunOS being defined as its kernel—essentially still Unix).
Left hand: operating system. Right hand: processor.
Very Apple-like.
When you're armed with powerful weapons, it's hard not to get the urge to conquer.
Relying on these two strengths, Sun fought fiercely in the enterprise market against companies like DEC (Digital Equipment Corporation), HP, and SGI (Silicon Graphics).
In the previous timeline, after the success of Java, Sun crushed its "weaker" competitors and rose rapidly—until it met IBM and Microsoft.
After Java's breakthrough, Sun established the Java Community Process (JCP) to standardize Java. Many companies flocked to Java, making Sun extremely confident—so confident that they didn't realize: for a programming language (a tool), tools were everything.
When they finally realized this and began acquiring companies like NetBeans and Forte Software to build a developer ecosystem, it was already too late—IBM had struck first.
IBM launched Eclipse, an open-source Java development environment.
The result was that countless third-party tools started using Eclipse as their platform, sharing files and workflows.
(Of course… given IBM's famously "unique" way of doing things, Eclipse would eventually be overtaken by IDEA—IntelliJ IDEA—the rightful successor to Java's spirit.)
Against Microsoft, Sun fared even worse.
By the late '90s, Microsoft was crushing Sun like a child. The Wintel alliance (Windows + Intel) was a force no small company could resist.
Thus, when the dot-com crash came, Sun—once worth over $200 billion, once the second-largest tech company by market cap—collapsed almost overnight and was eventually sold to Oracle for less than $7.5 billion.
That was Sun's fate in the original timeline. (You can look it up if you're curious—no need to pad this chapter with more history.)
…
But at this point in time, none of that had happened yet.
Java hadn't even reached infancy.
There was no Spring Framework. No Apache dominance. No Java-powered open-source revolution yet.
Right now, Sun was still just a low-powered Apple—without a Steve Jobs.
Or perhaps, a rising sun on the horizon.
Which made it the perfect opponent for Yuanxin—something they could and should suppress now, before it grew too strong.
In the long run, Su Yuanshan believed that browser monetization would eventually have to be abandoned.
Database technology could be shifted toward open-source.
Website building tools could transition into online site creation platforms—offering modular systems for users to build personal websites.
All these things could be given up.
The only thing that must not be abandoned was the CC language.
Because it wasn't just another programming language—it was the fundamental descriptive language for the oceans of content that would flood the Internet. It was the foundation, the carrier. It would be the new era's "Java."
As Su Yuanshan peeled back the layers, carefully analyzing the future of each major software tool and narrating the likely course of the Internet's development, Carly's eyes gradually lit up—just like Yang Yiwen's had earlier.
She stared at Su Yuanshan's sharp and handsome face, feeling a wave of awe rise in her heart.
Was this man truly blessed by God?
No... he didn't even believe in God.
But how was it that he had such god-like foresight, able to see the Internet's future so clearly?
In her heart, Carly didn't even use the word "prediction."
Because although Su Yuanshan's analysis was technically a prediction, his logic was so rigorous, so airtight, that it felt almost as if he had personally witnessed the future.
What he said made people unconsciously believe: he was right.
Carly thought back to Su Yuanshan's oft-repeated term: Internet thinking.
Perhaps this was Internet thinking?
Like a science fiction author, immersing oneself in that future world—standing there and observing it first-hand.
...
Su Yuanshan, of course, had no idea just how deeply he had shaken Carly.
After a short pause, he continued his briefing.
"Yuanxin is not a small company, nor a small enterprise.
We don't need to fight over every bowl of rice on the table.
We must keep our eyes on the big picture: on the pot, on the cutting board, even on the farmland itself!"
"If a giant company obsesses over the gains and losses of a single piece of software—provided it's not their core business—then they can be a giant, but they can never be great."
Saying this, Su Yuanshan thought of Microsoft.
In the previous timeline, Microsoft's takedown of Netscape was largely Netscape's own fault.
From 1993 to 1995, Netscape had dominated the browser market.
Microsoft didn't even bother to compete at first.
But when Netscape became too ambitious and started trying to create web-based operating systems, they finally poked the bear.
In response, Microsoft scrambled to purchase a license from Spyglass Entertainment and used it to develop Internet Explorer.
To Microsoft, a browser was just one of many applications layered atop its operating system.
If the operating system was a shopping mall, then Microsoft was the landlord.
All other software vendors were tenants, and their software products were the goods on sale.
Microsoft, as the mall owner, didn't need to run a competing store inside its own mall unless it was absolutely necessary.
That was probably why Microsoft didn't initially prioritize browsers, but rather focused on website development tools.
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