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[Chris Brault]

Funny you should mention Beta,

>> Linux is a superior technology same as Beta was to
>> VHS.  Those who needed the superior technology in
>> the broadcast industry stayed with Beta and paid the
>> premium, the uninformed masses bought the marketing
>> misinformation and went with VHS.
> 
> I think this is actually a bad analogy. Both Beta and VHS were
> proprietary, so the difference is on off features vs price. In which
> case VHS won because it came to the market earlier and was able to be
> cheaper because of mass production. Beta:VHS::Windows::Mac is probably a
> better analogy.

Beta was owned outright by Sony.  Sony refused to license the 
technology. Clone manufacturers (read: competition) were unable to build 
cheap alternative Beta tapes or machines.  The kept the price of Beta 
tapes and equipment monopolistically high.  This is what almost cost 
Apple their life in the early 1990's; they destroyed their competition 
and, as the sole manufacturer, was forced, by the law of supply and 
demand, to keep prices sky high.

JVC, on the other hand, freely sold licenses to build VHS machines and 
manufacture tapes, treating it as a commodity.  As a result, VHS, which 
wasn't the first to market became the dominant technology through better 
availability and cheaper pricing.  It's the American way: If it's 
cheaper, we buy it.