I love the way Cringely writes. He is compelling, controversial, and pithy. He is technically savvy and has a fair amount of business acumen.

But in this case, he is incorrect:

Microsoft can’t compete. Yahoo probably can’t compete. Sun and IBM are like remora, along for the ride. And what does it all cost, maybe $1 billion? That’s less than Microsoft spends on legal settlements each year.

Game over.

He underestimates Microsoft – but he does it on purpose. As Gates points out:

‘The number of times people have written our death warrant – every four or five years. Now they have a new person’s name on it: it was Netscape, it was Novell, it was IBM, it was Ashton Tate, it was Lotus. There have been many names. The old saying is – tell me where I am going to die, so I will be sure not to go there,’

You know what, though? Cringleys’s not trying to be Nostradamus. Rather, he understands the economics of attention. Cringley achieves his goal in writing this article:

1. to be entertaining and controversial,
2. to say things that his readers want him to say,
3. to get others writing about what HE writes.

He does such a good job getting others to write about him that I would feel amiss not tipping my (black) hat to him with a story and a link.

Just Look at the way he ends his article – the way he ends so many of his articles:

“And yet next week I’ll take it one more step.”

That’s Cliff Hanger Brilliance.

And if you’re still reading SEO Black Hat next week, I promise to get back to some good search engine spamming techniques!