Warning: Microsoft 'Monoculture'

Dan Geer lost his job, but gained his audience. The very idea that got the computer security expert fired has sparked serious debate in information technology. The idea, borrowed from biology, is that Microsoft has nurtured a software "monoculture" that threatens global computer security.

After he argued in a paper published last fall that the monoculture amplifies online threats, Geer was fired by security firm @stake, which has had Microsoft as a major client.

In biology, species with little genetic variation -- or "monocultures" -- are the most vulnerable to catastrophic epidemics. Species that share a single fatal flaw could be wiped out by a virus that can exploit that flaw. Genetic diversity increases the chances that at least some of the species will survive every attack.