There is a natural tendency to hate big business in North America. We have our corporate favourites but they can easily fall to overexposure and advertisers know this and are careful with the brands they try to sell us. Both Microsoft and Sony are heavyweights in big business and the word Evil is admittedly loaded. We hate success on a primal level, it's a trait embedded in our character mythology it makes us who we are to want to associate a philosophical trait like evil to something as indifferent as a corporation. But here goes my indulgence.
Microsoft is well hated in software circles. Linux-heads hate Gates and are actually doing something about it, composing their own OS. Mac users hate Windows because it copied them and became more successful. The old-school reason for hating Microsoft was that it was Gates who introduced the concept of paying for software. Many newbie kids still have this original hate of Gates and Microsoft but don't realize it, they just know the 1337 hate so it must be cool.
Microsoft made no secret they’ve wanted to be a TV set top box for well over a decade. Philips created CDi back in the 80s which introduced some clever standards but I think we can safely say it failed. Philips tried again but collaborated with Sony this time on the more successful WebTV. This didn’t go unnoticed by Microsoft who bought webTV. Ironically neither party (Sony nor Microsoft) knew it at the time but they were destined to wage a fierce battle over the TV/Computer paradigm. The same product WebTV was both Microsoft and Sony's first step into this hopelessly immature space.
Sony devastated the console market with the PlayStation, single-handedly sinking Sega who never make another console after its failed Dreamcast and sticking to Nintendo.
As we all probably know Microsoft dusted off their sleeves and prepared for a costly war with the current video game champs. Microsoft had a unique vision of a gaming machine that would also be a media device, introduce a community and then an online shopping method. This trinity through the gaming shows rare vision and has hastened the advancement of possibilities in internet technologies. We enjoy unprecedented access to new and unique experiences from these creations by Microsoft.
At the end of the day, the Microsoft hating Sony-suck ups, Linux-brats and Apple-snobs can have your disposition against Microsoft. I’ve always HATED SONY (well, hate's a strong word, lets say I've avoided most of their products) for the exact reasons most people hate Microsoft. Sony really is an evil empire.
Sony is a consumer electronics giant and with the exception of TVs the Sony name is either garbage or just a mediocre (but often reliable) example of what that technology can offer. Sony speakers? Forget about it! Far better speakers from dedicated speaker companies exist for less money. Sony hi-fi ES line, way too expensive for what you get. Try brands like NAD, Rotel or Outlaw if you want better quality for less money. Sony’s cheap hi-fi gear (IE $200 5.1 receivers) are garbage, but you knew that. They don’t hold a candle to comparably priced Onkyo, Yamaha, Kenwood or just about any other. To be fair to Sony their digital cameras/camcorders are generally great products if you’re not shooting professionally. They often make unremarkable but reliable performers. Of course Sony TVs rock the house!
Why is Sony the evil empire?
Close your eyes and think of a song… got it? Okay, there is a base 50% chance that song is owned by Sony. Yes, Sony about half the music the world listens to and a hell of a lot of movies. This is what gives Sony the balls to put hi-fi, visual and optical storage advancements back years by releasing proprietary standards that compete with the accepted standards. This leads to poor sales of either competing standard, expensive media and general delays of the technologies maturity. Sony went to war with the rest of the video tape industry with their own standard called Beta that gave considerable competition to VHS. Years later when high resolution audio started with DVD-Audio Sony created SACD to compete and throw the whole hi-res audio into a spin. Now we see Sony releasing Blu-Ray just when HD DVD should have been the accepted standard (and if you like computers and plan on using Windows Vista HD DVD is the clearly superior standard). A new format war is brewing between Sony and everybody else because Sony wants to control the next gen optical storage medium.
Everybody uses a DRM nowadays. They suck but they’re something we’ll just have to get used to if we value digital consumables. DRMs like Apple’s FairPlay and Microsoft’s PlaysForSure are harmless and if you’re tricky you can crack it and remove it or just live with it and play by their annoying rules. But Sony’s version of the DRM called RootKit (you must install this when you use a Sony/BGM CD) is a Trojan horse. Yes, Sony knowingly released CDs with a harmful component secretly included. Sony’s own brand of DRM demonstrates their contempt for their customers. If Sony is the real evil Empire then Microsoft is the antidote. Jason Garms, program manager of Anti-Malware Technology Team on Microsoft and has said they’ll include detection and removal of Sony’s Rootkit in Window’s Anti-Spyware beta.
Today Sony seems content to give us a gaming only machine the multi-media powerhouse PS3 will be released next year. Microsoft has stuck to the deep vision they've had since the early 90s, seeing the livingroom media come to fruition with Xbox Live. XBL is not only a gaming community but it's becoming the first real remote control e-commerce marketplace. There is nowhere else for it to go but start integrating more MSN features like music and eventually movies or TV shows, all to be played through Xbox 360 (or future iterations of the Microsoft STB).