While I was at the first SouthEastLinuxFest in June 2009, Beth Lynn Eicher made some bold claims.

“Microsoft will no longer have the majority market share in 24 months” she said.

Even though she was among free and open source neighbors, she was greeted with “Sorry. Not going to happen!” each time except when she said it to Nicholas A. Schembri. Nick decided to hold me to this claim by making a wager.

If Microsoft has majority market share on June 30 2011, Beth Lynn will owe Nick twenty US dollars.

This blog will serve as a way to keep track of the progress over the next two years.  During this time I will seek nothing but the truth. Bad things will be said about Microsoft, Apple, Linux, Open Source, and Free Software if it is a fact. I will also site evidence that Microsoft’s current business practices are unsustainable and evidence that people are favouring the ideals of the alternatives.

The debate is basically bug one’s resolution date.

As of July 2009, there are only 3 places within technology that Microsoft has majority market share.

1. Desktop/Laptop Operating System

2. Browser

3. Office suites

Thanks to w3counter, we can track worldwide status and the status of the viewers of this page for points 1 and 2. According to the marketing blog of Open Office, bug one in the office suite area should be resolved sometime in 2010. If that isn’t apparent in December 2010, we will cross that bridge when we come to it.