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Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

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Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#561

Post by robert-wallis »

hrvbr wrote: post #300
DonnyV wrote: post #52

Scott Guthrie for CEO!!!! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Guthrie

He's more of a CTO. "CEO of Microsoft" is a prestigious title. They could use it as an opportunity to pull a coup. Like offering to merge with Facebook and giving the title to Zuckerberg. It doesn't have to be with FB, any big guy that would bring a missing market to Microsoft's empire would be a coup. But the reasonable thing to do is to hire from inside.

I always believed leaders should do the main thing the company does. Microsoft's new CEO should write software and make hardware. It's hard for me to respect a manager that doesn't understand what I do.

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#562

Post by sytelus »

Delmania wrote: post #63

I think Ballmer is an interesting case study in perception versus results. He's commonly portrayed as a poor CEO that has led Microsoft in the direction of irrelevance. And yet, to quote oft critic Gruber, "he knows how to make money" ( http://daringfireball.net/linked/2013/04/19/msft-q3 ) I'd love to sit down and talk to him, and see if his vision is a bit more long range than your average industry analyst, similar…

Do you know of any specific actions that Ballmer took to "make money"? My understanding/perception is that all the increase is in part result of inflation over last 13 years and in part of enterprise contract strategy that was already in place since Gates era. I don't understand when people say Ballmer helped Microsoft produce .net/C#/XBox. These products were envisioned, created and delivered by few smart people in Microsoft and I personally don't know of any specific contribution from Ballmer in to these products either technical or otherwise.

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#563

Post by fhd2 »

BrandonM wrote: post #530
kjhughes wrote: post #61

What were the key Ballmer era highlights? == Negatives == * Clashes with Gates during CEO transition of power: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121261241035146237.html * Developer relations / motivational speaking (thanks mathattack): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvsboPUjrGc * Employee retention (thanks JonnieCache, Ziomislaw): http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/microsoft-ceo-im-going... * Windows Phone: http://…

What about Microsoft developing some of the best enterprise programming tools in the world? I don't use any of the following, but I have to admit that they are (or at one time were) best-in-class is basically all of them: * C#, F#, and all of .NET * Visual Studio * SQL Server * DirectX * ActiveX[1] [1] ActiveX is not the best technology, but it paved the way for the AJAX programming that everyone does today.

> ActiveX is not the best technology, but it paved the way for the AJAX programming that everyone does today.

You can safely add AJAX to the list, XMLHttpRequest is from Microsoft as well.

I never had much symphathy for Microsoft, but I can't help but respect some of the things they've done, both in the Gates and Ballmer eras. They used to really care about developers.

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#564

Post by mindcrime »

nl wrote: post #328
fauigerzigerk wrote: post #94

Earlier 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…

It's hard to disagree with sarcasm on the internet. But in this case you are absolutely correct. Microsoft used to control the future of computing. Now they are yet another enterprise software company with no apparent mission except to make money. The lay somewhere on a continuum with IBM, Oracle, SAP all the way through to companies like CA. At one end of that spectrum they do research and produce software that peop…

I am missing something in what you are saying there, OR you are saying something that I find absurd, and I can't figure out which.

Are you meaning to say that an enterprise software company can't be looking toward the future, and/or that only consumer facing technology companies are innovating and creating new stuff that will affect the future?

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#565

Post by mindcrime »

yogo wrote: post #441
sheri wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a tendency to believe that the companies which are doing well right now have 'won' in some sense. We need to understand that this is the state of affairs right now. There is a non-trivial possibility that Facebook/Google etc become lumbering giants just like MSFT.

> There is a non-trivial possibility that Facebook/Google etc become lumbering giants just like MSFT If history serves as an indicator, I would say the chances of that happening are relatively high.

I would say that it's actually inevitable.

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#566

Post by marshray »

lotso wrote: post #442
corresation wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OEMs like Dell were shitting all over the Windows brand with plasticky (and still expensive!), heavy, unreliable, loud-as-shit laptops with terrible screens. This is utter nonsense. There simply is no other way to put it. There have always been premium Windows machines (Sony was doing the extremely-thin, fits in an envelope, made-with-unobtanium laptop thing years before Apple did), and discount machines. Focus-on-ae…

So why would Intel dump hundreds of millions pushing the ultrabook, if the OEMs were creating the right devices already?

Without wanting to agree or disagree with the parent discussion, one very plausible answer is simply that they had hundreds of millions and felt an obligation to invest it in support of their market ecosystem.

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#567

Post by Nelson69 »

alttag wrote: post #307
fauigerzigerk wrote: post #94

Earlier 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…

Given his newly announced re-org [1], the timing is a bit weird. Don't get me wrong, I think MSFT will be better served with a different CEO, but I wonder whether the two are connected. Certainly, the re-org will struggle without strong leadership to hold it together. 1: https://http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/Press/2013/Jul13...

I've been pondering that too.

You know what makes sense to me? MS is only broken according to engineers inside and people in the SV echochamber. They've got piles of cash, they generate piles of cash, they pay a dividend... Other than equity prices, they look pretty good. They were late to search but bing has carved out a niche, late to mobile but they've got a niche, late to games but they look like they are doing just fine there. Vista, Windows 8, RT and Surface seem to be missteps but they are still shipping numbers that most companies would be envious of.

If they were or are bothered by the flat equity prices, why did it take so long? And to be very honest, the engineers I've spoke to that have mentioned "problems" within the company generally have options that have been underwater, FWIW.

I think Ballmer and upper management think they are doing just fine, they think there is a competitive landscape but they are still making tons of money and leading a few sectors. He reorged them for what he sees as the next 10 years or something and he's going to find a replacement that sees his vision. They won't pull an outsider and probably don't see the need as there isn't anything "broken" that needs to be "changed." I predict no big changes.

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#568

Post by thisisdog »

excitom wrote: post #507
gregd wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not entirely sure any of these can be attributed to Ballmer but Microsoft has been entirely successful in the enterprise. Active Directory (copied, but marketed better than Novell), Group Policies, Visual Studio (arguably the best IDE available today), Sql Server, .NET, Azure. And trust me, I am no fan of Ballmer. I think this announcement is the best thing to happen to Microsoft in a LONG time.

Small point, but SQL Server was developed by Sybase.

They rewrote the whole thing without the licensed code from Sybase since version 4 or whatever the edition.

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#569

Post by corresation »

calbear81 wrote: post #558
corresation wrote: post #545

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple pushed IPS screens when PC OEMs were happy with the lowest quality TFT panels available. For years Apple insisted on having a proper GPU in their machines, until Intel finally was able to offer a competitive IGP. And finally Apple also moved forward with SSDs early on. There have always been a diversity of options available in the PC market, and those who wanted to pay the premium for an IPS screen (you know, A…

Apple's willingness to invest in making higher resolution panels and better screens the standard helped bring down prices for everyone else to be able to get the same level of quality. On the phone side, for several years, the iPhone had the BEST possible screen available on any phone because they invested in the panel and locked up the supply (since they paid for it) while other phone makers were content with lower…

"Content with lower resolution" screens, when almost all of them dramatically led Apple at the time of their retina unveiling. Add that companies like LG, Sony, and Samsung actually make the screen (and rest assured, Apple is not stopping any of those companies from doing what they want with their own lines).

This is the mythology of Apple that is so bizarre. Apple overshot competitors not because Apple has such a dedication to technology excellence (I mean, at the time their offerings were dramatically behind all competitors), but because the simplicity of the SDK meant that they had to simply double existing resolutions.

It's going to be interesting to see what Apple does with the market-lagging iPad Mini on the refresh -- double each dimension resolution, yielding a hilariously excessive pixel density purely to maintain the wrong-headed SDK?

Re: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to retire within 12 months

#570

Post by wehadfun »

astrodust wrote: post #232
sker wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've mentioned Windows 7 twice in this thread. By what measure do you consider it a failure? If anything, Windows 7 is the best thing released under Ballmer.

Windows 7 is not a success. It's just a non-failure. The only reason people use it at all isn't because it's fantastic, but because it's incrementally better than Windows XP without all the garbage Vista foisted on the user. After having used it for an extended period of time, the only real improvements I've seen are in the explorer shell, which are minor at best, and the theme.

Windows 7 had "nepitutal" benefit from windows 95 and Microsoft Office. Ballmer could release a OS with no start menu, with a bunch of weird squares and it would sell
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