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Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

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Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#81

Post by mkramlich »

kenjackson wrote: post #28
rbanffy wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's complicated. Apple's products were always highly regarded. Their problem was pricing - they charged too much for boxes Dell sold for much less.

Apple's products weren't highly regarded through most of the 90s. The survived on a niche market at the time, but weren't highly regarded during this phase either for their design or technical architecture. Pricing wasn't their problem -- their products were the problem. It wasn't until 2000 or so when they got their mojo back.

Yes they didn't really get their mojo back until Austin Powers returned, man. Yeah, baby, yeah! (cut to shot of Steve Jobs in black turtleneck)

Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#82

Post by kenjackson »

philwelch wrote: post #77
kenjackson wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You see no evidence that an operating system for a mobile device is not their core competency? Clearly, determining core competencies is not one of yours. :-)

I think you snuck in an extra negation that I didn't and turned my sentence around, so now I don't know if either of us knows what the other meant! Me: "I see no evidence mobile phones are in any way even close to Microsoft's core competency" "in any way" and "even close to" are non-negating modifiers we can remove, so: Me: "I see no evidence mobile phones are Microsoft's core competency" You: "You see no evidence th…

My bad. Trying to be cute. Let me actually attempt to give a little evidence, since you claim to have none.

First, if you think MS has no core competency or that software is not one of them, then we could end the discussion right here.

But otherwise, it seems clear to me that mobile OS software is among their core competencies.

I start with the premise that operating systems are one of their core competencies. They have sold more units of OSes than any other company (or among the top 3). They employ probably the most renowned set of OS experts (David Cutler, of Vax VMS and NT fame. Rick Rashid, who did mach, the kernel that OS X is built on, Butler Lampson and Chuck Thacker, Turing Award winner for their work in operating system. Leslie Lamport, etc...).

Now you may say, "but they have no experience with mobile OSes". Except they were one of the first companies to do a mobile phone operating system. They also do operating systems for kiosks, embedded systems, and of course desktops and servers.

And while Windows Mobile is not a popular OS, the reason is not the OS itself. It's the shell that is problematic. The underlying OS is solid, and is being used in Windows Phone 7. They need a new shell and app deployment model, but they aren't going in and ripping out the kernel. And from people who have used it, they say the OS in WP7 is snappy.

IMO the company has 3 core competencies: OSes, Dev Tools, and Business Productivity sw. They have some secondary ones: Online Services and Video Gaming.

In summary, I think for them to give up in a space where they've actually produced a solid code base over the past decade, just when the space is now showing it can generate profit seems absurd.

Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#83

Post by jsz0 »

robryan wrote: post #13

You'd have to think they would be better off giving up on owning the mobile platform, given that they are up against Android and iOS/iPhone I don't think they could possibly come up with something compelling enough to get mobile companies to pay for a license over the free Android OS which iterate much faster. Possibly they could form a partnership with the aim of bringing other products to a platform. They could sup…

I think they still have a shot in mobile simply because there isn't as big of a barrier in switching platforms. Moving from iPhone to Android to WM7 might end up costing the average person $50 in apps over a period of years. One really good WM7 handset could totally change the market.

Personally I see the Android market is on track for much less diversity in the future. HTC and Motorola seem to be the only companies doing a really good job with Android. The big problem with Android is your handset maker can cut corners and give you a terrible product. Google doesn't do a whole lot to support OEMs besides a link to the source code and words of encouragement. Microsoft has lots of experience as an OEM software partner. The license fee may end up being a reasonable price for handset makers to pay to avoid some of the difficulty of developing an Android device.

Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#84

Post by whatusername »

btilly wrote: post #74
nostrademons wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it both saved and killed the company. It saved the company in that it stopped the hemorrhaging of cash and gave them an actually profitable business model. Without this, they would've gone out of business entirely sometime in the early-mid 90s. It killed them as a center of innovation. IBM hasn't invented anything worthwhile since the IBM PC in 1981. (No, I don't count Eclipse: IntelliJ idea came out first an…

Without this, they would've gone out of business entirely sometime in the early-mid 90s. There is a problem with your timeline. My memory says that IBM only openly embraced open source in 1998, which means that it saved them later than you indicate. Lemme look. (Searches, finds http://www.salon.com/technology/fsp/2000/09/12/chapter_7_par... , reads.) I was right. They joined the Apache Project in June. They released…

SVC is pretty impressive. http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/storage/software/virtualizatio...

And the Power7 chips look impressive..

IBM's "problem" is that they don't do consumer stuff.. So they can get slagged off as inventing nothing worthwhile since 1981 - because they don't make shiny toys like the iphone..

Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#85

Post by whatusername »

todayiamme wrote: post #71
nostrademons wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a lot of Microsoft's problem is that they succeeded in their mission statement. "A computer on every desk, all running Microsoft software" was incredible hubris in 1974. It's reality now. What can Microsoft do to top that? It makes me wonder about what the world will look like in 15 years. Google's mission statement is "Organize the world's information, and make it universally accessible and useful." Right no…

I agree with what you say, but a part of having a vision also means looking beyond your own accomplishments. I have noticed something in how I think/do things everything feeds to the next thing. Unrelated things become connected somehow and just continue some undefinable chain. 'What's next?' is really the question they can't seem to answer. Maybe, the problem over here is that the dreamers have stopped dreaming and…

Or the key dreamer decided that "what's next" was to cure the world of malaria.

Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#86

Post by evilduck »

kenjackson wrote: post #75
philwelch wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see no evidence mobile phones are in any way even close to Microsoft's core competency. It would be a lot more dignified and profitable if Microsoft acted like a mature business rather than unsuccessfully chasing the latest trends.

You see no evidence that an operating system for a mobile device is not their core competency? Clearly, determining core competencies is not one of yours. :-)

I would also agree that it's not their core competency. Four to five years is a terrible product response time from a company with an existing codebase and the financial means to improve it. Apple/RIM/Google ate their lunch because they sucked at mobile products.

Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#87

Post by rao »

city41 wrote: post #23
Tichy wrote: post #17

It's all a symptom of too much money and too many resources, I think. Focus get's completely lost. Isn't there a way to run a big company? Is anything known on how Apple does it? How big are their development teams, even? Would it make sense to manage internal teams a bit like startups, that is they would have to succeed on their own and pitch for investments?

According to Wikipedia, Apple has 34k employees. Microsoft has over 100k. Maybe at that scale, 34k and 100k aren't very different, or maybe that's like night and day.

The range of products offered by Microsoft is huge. Multiple versions of OS, Office, VS and various websites.

Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#88

Post by kevbin »

tmsh wrote: post #4

Can you think of a project, a product or a company that succeeded with a somewhat negative-sounding name (even if meant somewhat ironically or as sort of a renegade mentality)? I'm drawing a blank.... It's odd that I can't think of a single one though. Even among game studios, etc.

Company: Humble Oil http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humble_Oil, Micro Soft, Borland, SMEG

Product: * For dummies, dilbert, crack, SCSI

Project: Butt-head astronomer, operation enduring freedom (when emphasis on 2nd instead of 3rd word), unix, lisp

Re: Amid layoffs, Microsofties reveal further turmoil in Redmond

#90

Post by signa11 »

Anechoic wrote: post #3

Before succumbing to schadenfreude just remember that this will eventually happen to your favorite tech company in the future, be it HP, Dell, Apple, Google, Yahoo, Fog Creek, Amazon, Y Combinator, etc. Companies have ups and down. Hopefully MS will see this as a learning experience, become a better competitor and then we as consumers will benefit.

> Hopefully MS will see this as a learning experience...

if the london-stock-exchange fiasco didn't change anything at microsoft, i doubt that this will have any impact at all.

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