Bloggerzombies: A dream of a security nightmare foretold

If we accept that Google is turning into the new Microsoft as Microsoft turns into the new IBM then its worth watching for patterns and pathologies that might repeat themselves. In Blogger, I can’t help seeing glimpses of a Microsoft-like future, where, just as many older Windows machines are now part of zombie armies managed by spammers, Blogger plays the same role. It took Microsoft a long time before it accepted that it needed to do a better job of securing the entire environment, and now it bemoans users keeping older Windows versions at work. A huge amount of engineering work in Vista has been focused on security issues. Of course a blog is not an operating system, in the traditional sense, but it is a gateway between the network and the back end (see this example of WordPress as library management middleware). I see many people leaving Blogger now for WordPress, and I wonder what will be left behind: a zombie army, slowing down the Net?

Last night it struck me that Google should really just can Blogger development in favour of WordPress, but I can’t see that happening. My advice to Google though: fix the zombie problem now, even if there doesn’t seem to be any money in it. Security problems won’t go away and you really don’t want to be in a position in the five to ten year time-frame where everyone blames you for every network security breach, even if its nothing to do with you. Just ask Microsoft.

disclosure: parts of Microsoft are RedMonk clients.