> Sun is the loose cannon of the computer industry. Unable to see past their raging fear and loathing of Microsoft, they adopt strategies based on anger rather than self-interest. Sun’s two strategies are (a) make software a commodity by promoting and developing free software (Star Office, Linux, Apache, Gnome, etc), and (b) make hardware a commodity by promoting Java, with its bytecode architecture and WORA. OK, Sun, pop quiz: when the music stops, where are you going to sit down? Without proprietary advantages in hardware or software, you’re going to have to take the commodity price, which barely covers the cost of cheap factories in Guadalajara, not your cushy offices in Silicon Valley.
Indeed Sun got eaten alive by commodity hardware while not having any viable strategy to make money on software.
Many of these posts seem timeless and often very prescient.
In fact, at the bottom of this one, he points out the strategic dead-end Sun was heading down with commoditizing software while also making/promoting Java that commoditized their hardware...
https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/06/12/strategy-letter-v/