Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

paulgraham.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 237 posts

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#91

Post by breck »

RIMR wrote: post #46
buran77 wrote: post #14

> Their [n.b Apple's] victory is so complete that I'm now surprised when I come across a computer running Windows. Nearly all the people we fund at Y Combinator use Apple laptops So nearly all of the (relatively) very few people that are funded by YC have Apple and that's proof of Apple's complete victory over a dead MS. In a year when MS was still on an upward trend, growing by 20% market cap to become double that o…

It is an common theme with PG to write confidently about technology while also demonstrating that he has absolutely no understanding of what he's talking about. I've been commenting about this here for YEARS with constant pushback and excuses for him from the community. "He's a billionaire so he must be smart", "He personally wrote the entire HN codebase", "Nobody really needs a valid SSL cert on their website in 202…

[dead]

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#92

Post by foul »

simion314 wrote: post #40

Just a rant about MS , people here claim how good they are with backwards compatibility. Bullshit, we were using an MS Azure TTS API, MS also had anew similar API but in alpha so we could not use that one back then. The old API has still more then 1 year of support but the MS "very nice guys" /sarcasm started breaking it, like one day one end point returns a different response structure, I fix it and next weak other…

MS in fact is good with backwards compatibility only under windows/related software and maybe xbox, those bragging about MS' love of legacy aren't wrong, they are just focused on their almost historical product, what made Microsoft.

We can't say "no big deal" tbf, because for example Office files had fairly good longevity across updates (not perfect, a lot of file broke).

BUT anything else (embedded, cloud, AI, when they poisoned web standards, etc) isn't really under that much lauded backwards compatibility AFAIK.

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#93

Post by wobfan »

wink wrote: post #69
ethbr1 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with "all use Macs" is that Apple has always been a great hardware company with an underfunded software side. MacOS has so many problems or unsupported features it isn't funny, while Windows was fine. >> I never used Microsoft software, so it only affected me indirectly Hmm. The lesson here is probably don't assume you understand a competitor's strengths and weaknesses via secondhand experience. And the t…

> have been evened with PowerShell/.NET, WSL2, and HyperV. I'm gonna need a source for that quote because no, no one besides a couple of Windows admins ever acknowledged parity, just "meh, if I have to".

While I consider myself of being part of a Linux-y bubble, I can definitely see people around me, who are, or where, in the same bubble, using PowerShell more and more and more. And, this is the interesting part, every single one of them has been saying that PowerShell is way better than e.g. Bash, or whatever you wanna compare it to. This is also because of the much more modern architectural design of Windows NT, which is and has been miles ahead of Linux, because it could learn from it's failures when it was developed. Same for PowerShell. It could learn from the mistakes that Bash made, and still has to live with.

Still, obviously, this is anecdotal evidence at best.

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#94

Post by carlosjobim »

buran77 wrote: post #14

> Their [n.b Apple's] victory is so complete that I'm now surprised when I come across a computer running Windows. Nearly all the people we fund at Y Combinator use Apple laptops So nearly all of the (relatively) very few people that are funded by YC have Apple and that's proof of Apple's complete victory over a dead MS. In a year when MS was still on an upward trend, growing by 20% market cap to become double that o…

It's not about being rich or not. People who can choose what kind of computer they have will choose Apple over PC. People who cannot choose will use work computers in their office with Windows installed, that corporate chose for them.

People who do not want a computer at all will have neither PC or Mac. The majority of people do not want to have a computer – they see enough of them at work, and they are happy with their smart phones.

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#95

Post by josefrichter »

buran77 wrote: post #14

> Their [n.b Apple's] victory is so complete that I'm now surprised when I come across a computer running Windows. Nearly all the people we fund at Y Combinator use Apple laptops So nearly all of the (relatively) very few people that are funded by YC have Apple and that's proof of Apple's complete victory over a dead MS. In a year when MS was still on an upward trend, growing by 20% market cap to become double that o…

This also reminds me of "garage startups". In fact, probably only a fraction of people around the world own a garage. If your family has a garage, it means you are probably among the top ~1% richest people on Earth.

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#96

Post by behnamoh »

matwood wrote: post #83
behnamoh wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Reading rich people's blogs reminds me every time that there's a reason wealth is also called "fortune". Because it's more about luck than anything else. At some point they lose touch with reality. I've found their "advice" often doesn't work for young people who wanna become successful like them. Another example is Jensen: "Nvidia doesn't have a long-term strategy, we just think about what to do next. I don't wear…

> At some point they lose touch with reality. See every rich person telling young people to follow their passion.

Yes, it's so frustrating to hear them talk. Everyone knows a great deal of their success was luck (as discussed in the book Outlier), but they still find it amusing to lecture the "lesser folks" about ways to get rich.

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#97

Post by dijit »

jvanderbot wrote: post #63
dijit wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think of it in the inverse. If you're a person who is at one end of a funnel (in this case; new tech companies) and you see a 100% adoption which is contrary to the mainstream: you would think you have good insight. You might forget that you're looking at: A) A cargo culture B) a homogeneous cohort. This is the same way that people knew ahead of time that Microsoft Office would kill off Lotus notes. Since all school'…

So you're saying that new AAA game companies use macs or linux? I can't resolve the cognitive dissonance of that making a ton of sense or none.

There are more non-windows PC's in AAA game companies than there were in 2008 by a wide margin. Though usually not directly for gamedev.

In 2008, the IT department couldn't even handle Macs at all, now it's a standard deployment among managers, designers, brand and even some programmers who only work with backend code. (though usually they'll have a gaming PC too for testing the game).

That was literally unthinkable back then.

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#98

Post by dijit »

JohnHaugeland wrote: post #48
buran77 wrote: post #14

> Their [n.b Apple's] victory is so complete that I'm now surprised when I come across a computer running Windows. Nearly all the people we fund at Y Combinator use Apple laptops So nearly all of the (relatively) very few people that are funded by YC have Apple and that's proof of Apple's complete victory over a dead MS. In a year when MS was still on an upward trend, growing by 20% market cap to become double that o…

I’ve been hearing people say this since this incorrect essay was written almost 20 years ago Microsoft had 74% of the desktop then and has 72% today Microsoft had 0% of hosting then and has the world’s second largest share, 23%, today Microsoft had, in 2007, 18% presence share in console gaming. Today they have 65% They were one of the four tech orgs present at the presidential inauguration They have grown enormously…

> Microsoft had 74% of the desktop then and has 72% today

Microsoft had 90%+ of desktop penetration in 2008; in fact, it made news that it had slipped to below that at the end of 2008.[0][1]

Now it's around 70%, but seems to be improving?[2]

[0]: https://www.osnews.com/story/20605/windows-market-share-slip...

[1]: https://www.computerworld.com/article/1367310/windows-market...

[2]: https://www.statista.com/statistics/218089/global-market-sha...

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#99

Post by dist-epoch »

buran77 wrote: post #14

> Their [n.b Apple's] victory is so complete that I'm now surprised when I come across a computer running Windows. Nearly all the people we fund at Y Combinator use Apple laptops So nearly all of the (relatively) very few people that are funded by YC have Apple and that's proof of Apple's complete victory over a dead MS. In a year when MS was still on an upward trend, growing by 20% market cap to become double that o…

Almost everybody I know drives a Lamborghini. Toyota is so dead...

Re: Microsoft Is Dead (2007)

#100

Post by dist-epoch »

behnamoh wrote: post #38
buran77 wrote: post #14

> Their [n.b Apple's] victory is so complete that I'm now surprised when I come across a computer running Windows. Nearly all the people we fund at Y Combinator use Apple laptops So nearly all of the (relatively) very few people that are funded by YC have Apple and that's proof of Apple's complete victory over a dead MS. In a year when MS was still on an upward trend, growing by 20% market cap to become double that o…

> Reading rich people's blogs reminds me every time that there's a reason wealth is also called "fortune". Because it's more about luck than anything else. At some point they lose touch with reality. I've found their "advice" often doesn't work for young people who wanna become successful like them. Another example is Jensen: "Nvidia doesn't have a long-term strategy, we just think about what to do next. I don't wear…

> I don't wear a watch, because NOW is important

That doesn't imply that Jensen thinks he's successful because he doesn't wear a watch. He's not that delusional.

Post reply on HN