Funny thing that people tend to prefer Gates' version of Microsoft ( which is full of popular but sub-quality products) rather than Ballmer's version ( with unpopular but more stable products)
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
211–220 of 784 posts
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#212Earlier quoted context omitted.
People may scoff at this - but why not? His experience from Apple and NeXT should transcend into an organization like Microsoft. He will be an extremely useful asset, although perhaps a bit dictatorial from what I've heard.
and bring skeuomorphic user interface to Windows 9? That will totally brainfuck the whole UX industry.
That'd be the day that I introduce my fist to the monitor.
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#213Huge news! Let's see what happens to the stock today. It edged up a little at the end of the day, suggesting that perhaps news was getting out. It's up 8% in premarket trading. [1] One interesting thing to note from that chart is their Beta (a measure of link to market volatility) is less than 1, which is very low for a high tech stock. It basically means that the market views them as less volatile to market conditio…
Who really cares what this does to the stock market today? It's about the long-term success of the company and the products that will lead it into the next generation (or not), and not the short-term fluctuation of stock.
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#214Good news, bad news, who knows? I don't know if current Microsoft issues are in their DNA or not. Personally I was bullish (yes I put my money where my mouth is) of MSFT but I mainly found the following obstacles to be more optimistic: - The relationship with developers was deteriorating: I am a MSDN customer and tried to upgrade but they don't give me any discount in the first year of upgrade while keeping with my s…
Microsoft's licensing schemes are riddles, wrapped in enigma's and covered with shit. I'm actually surprised that Windows doesn't have In App Purchases. You want to search? It's only 2.99! You want the desktop? It's only .99! I've never encountered the issues you have with MSDN. I believe you only because the team that dreams up their licensing/key schemes, should be forced to use them. The jury is still out on Windo…
Licensing being complex is a feature. It gives Microsoft something easy to wheel and deal on; it also gives OEM salespeople something to hide profit in ("gosh, sorry your enterprise desktops came out $40/seat high, but Microsoft gets all of that" while $35 of that is pure profit for the OEM)
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#215He'll be remembered as a terrible CEO. Ballmer took over as CEO in 2000. In the 13 years since then, Apple has experienced an unprecedented resurgence. Google and Facebook have gone from being obscure startups to giants. The tech industry went through the bubble, recovered, and today is stronger than ever. What happened to Microsoft? While the rest of the tech sector exploded and prospered, it stayed still. A MSFT sh…
why is stock price the only measure of a company and its CEO? Unless of course you're a share holder.
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#216Earlier quoted context omitted.
As a side note, I really have a hard time figuring out what was it that Gerstner did at IBM. When he started, IBM was the mainframe company. What is it doing today? They say it's services, but what are services? When I did an internship there, everyone I asked just shrugged their shoulders.
IIRC, IBM are still reasonably big on R&D, aren't they? Also, investor-wise people were happy with what he did. A thriving company doing i-have-no-idea-what is a better investment than a sinking mainframe company.
IBM is big on R&D in India...and squeezing money out of customers for projects they can't build anymore. I work for Microsoft, I don't want to work for IBM.
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#217Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree that he will probably not be remembered for having more than doubled revenue and almost tripled profits. He will not be remembered for transforming Microsoft into one of the most important enterprise software companies. Not for introducing .NET, C# or Kinect either. All of that will be forgotten. He will be remembered for missing mobile. He will also be remembered for caring a lot about developers and about d…
And for missing search. And for missing social. And for insulting OEMs. And for his failed Windows Vista launch, and Windows 7, and Windows 8. For one man, he sure has a lot of failures on his plate.
How exactly Windows 7 was failure?
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#218He'll be remembered as a terrible CEO. Ballmer took over as CEO in 2000. In the 13 years since then, Apple has experienced an unprecedented resurgence. Google and Facebook have gone from being obscure startups to giants. The tech industry went through the bubble, recovered, and today is stronger than ever. What happened to Microsoft? While the rest of the tech sector exploded and prospered, it stayed still. A MSFT sh…
I agree that he will probably not be remembered for having more than doubled revenue and almost tripled profits. He will not be remembered for transforming Microsoft into one of the most important enterprise software companies. Not for introducing .NET, C# or Kinect either. All of that will be forgotten. He will be remembered for missing mobile. He will also be remembered for caring a lot about developers and about d…
I think that .NET was being developed some time before Ballmer ascended to the CEO throne. Gates probably had more to do with it than him.
Ballmer is/was probably a good CEO for a conservative, old school company, which can derive profits from a stable and well used product line.
But that's not what MS is/was advertised as being about. In that circumstance, Ballmer is the wrong type of CEO.
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#219Earlier quoted context omitted.
But what could be the future of MS look like a strategic perspective? I am pondering a bit about that. They are somewhat squeezed in between closed system and open source. How can they position themselves for a solid path for the future in that middle-ground.
I'd second rdl's enterprise mobile option. MS have the right foothold there, and neither iOS nor Android are what big, slow business users expect.
Given the number of business users using iPhones, I'm going to say it's exactly what they expect now.
Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months
#220Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ballmer has always lacked the ability to see the future. Be it about him calling Zune the iPhone killer, or much prior to that claiming it in the media that no one would ever wan tto buy an iPhone. Also, really below par products.
To be fair, one of the greatest "see the future" CEOs has said similar things. Just off the top of my head, I know that Steve Jobs said that no one would want a larger screen than the original iPhone had, and he said that 7" tablets didn't make any sense. Now Apple has a larger iPhone screen and 7" tablet. That's not to say that Steve Jobs was wrong about the future, but he had to sell devices in the present which me…
Exactly. Jobs said nobody wants X,Y,Z but then when it turned out they did, Apple was right there with an X,Y,Z product perfectly timed to capture the market.
When Ballmer said nobody wants a phone with a keyboard, or that Zune would kill iPod he acted on that until reality was exhausted from beating him mercilessly over the head with proof he was wrong.