I found this article fascinating. I’m no expert but it does make a certain amount of sense. For me, however, the key point would be whether or the type of partnership advocated in this article would have the same level of privacy commitment that Apple has and is demonstrating.
Also, this article also makes me consider using Microsoft products perhaps a little more, e.g., Word whereas my current default is Pages. Any thoughts on this article and the prospect of making greater use of Microsoft Office Suite on my Apple devices?
I think that the level of animosity between the two companies (if not their more… enthusiastic users) has dropped to nearly zero already. They cooperate well and compete where they have overlapping interests, but do both in ways that are beneficial to the industry as a whole and their users in particular.
As for a closer relationship, or strategic partnership? The two companies have extremely different corporate cultures. They would not work well together in such an arrangement anymore than Gates and Jobs would have been able to share an office for any length of time.
Microsoft today is a very different company than it was during the Gates and Ballmer years. That became clear to me when Satya Nadella demonstrated, and later sold, Microsoft Office on IOS before it was available on Windows tablets.
If Microsoft Office has features that you need then use it. MSO, especially the Windows version, has capabilities that are hard to find in other products. But I’ve found the number of people who absolutely must use MSO to be a very small percentage of users.
However, I will always recommend you pick the tool that works best for you.
I’ll admit that I was a reluctant user of Microsoft products on iOS and Mac after my company shut down integration with our enterprise Office 365 accounts with Apple Mail, Calendar due to security reasons. However, I’ve found many of the apps to be great alternatives to Apple’s apps and other third-party apps. I won’t repeat here, but I shared some thoughts on this thread. Really worth a try if you have a toe already in the MS and Apple ecosystems. Microsoft To-Do
I am liking Office 365 for the most part. One drive is usable. It is handy. However, I am going to take all my work files and copy them to an external drive. I have trust issues. It is nice being able to work on work stuff on my Mac instead of the work issued laptop/tablet Panasonic Toughpad.