Gates essentially bought QDOS from a corporation, and as far as I understood it he only had to port it. And then, once MSDOS has marketshare, he made sure every IBM clone had to run Microsoft OS via all kind of dirty tactics, see for example AARD code.

Had IBM not opted to partner with Microsoft at this point, there would've been more competition on technical grounds. Because if there is one thing Microsoft hates to do is compete on that ground.

So Microsoft became big in the PC consumer market thanks to IBM, and then Microsoft used lies and deceit to make sure IBM would not get their cut (including control) in the desktop and server market. That is the OS/2 & wnt/w9x debacle.

Some call the above "brilliant businessman" and all that. Fine, I find it shortsighted (dumb & selfish).

While it was not only due to Microsoft that IBM lost its dominant position, IBM left the consumer market when OS/2 didn't prevail in the consumer market (because Microsoft went with Windows NT and Windows 9x behind their back), and never came back. From that point there was no IBM and "home computer markets", and the Thinkpad never aimed for consumers. The fact laptops became a commodity instead of a business product with high margins made IBM leave that market. They knew they could not compete with trends in market a-la gadgets, they suck at that kind of stuff, its not where they do business, so they sold something not part of their core-business.

And yeah, Microsoft ****ed their partner. Its not only the situation which matters. It is also about the choices made by the parties involved.

Here's what happened with SGI when they were in trouble late 90s. From Wikipedia:

The guy who managed to make these decisions (Rick Belluzzo) got himself a job at Microsoft afterwards as COO. Here a brief history of how he screwed SGI. One of the things he did was going for Windows NT workstations which undermined the faith customers had in the IRIX/MIPS product line. We see the very same here! I thought Qt was going to be the bridge between Nokia's products but now its all vague. See e.g. this post + comments.

Speaking of which. It is the ****ing same for the games industry. Instead of writing for OpenGL et al, they write for DirectX and therefore cannot port to platforms on which DirectX does not run (every non-Microsoft platform). Studios are screwed with this lack of portability.

I don't get how people keep falling with their big fat feet in this **** puddle of Microsoft!