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Is Microsoft Money Crushing Microsoft?
JoshuaDFranklin writes "The latest Seattle Weekly has an article by a former Microsoft project manager titled Microsoft's Sacred Cash Cow. It argues that Microsoft, addicted to its Windows and Office revenue, is stifling innovation within the company: 'new, better ideas that would take business away from Windows or Office don't really have a chance at Microsoft.' Apple, in contrast, has embraced Open Source and is delivering a better consumer experience." Update: 06/06 21:24 GMT by T : Sorry, it's a dupe.
Can I get paid to be a Slashdot editor? I'll only dupe half as much as the others and I come cheap!
Microsoft never innovated BEFORE they had money. They don't innovate NOW. They just don't innovate. It's not part of their corporate culture. They wait for other people to (1) invent things and (2) prove them to be profitable, and then they move in and sell them. Sometimes they look for people who might potentially be a threat later (Netscape) and they throw money at putting them out of business. But this is all they have ever done. Talking about their Windows/Office revenue streams "stifling" innovation is silly; there's nothing there to stifle.
... and a pretty badly written, incoherent, biased, and decidedly uninformed story too, to be honest.
The guy may well have worked at MS once, but it didn't take long for him to become a Born Again Mac User.
Coming soon - pyrogyra
Yes, but will you be smart enough to dupe only the articles that make Microsoft look bad?
It's the bias that pays.
Yes, Darwin as a UNIX platform is open-sourced. But honestly, can you really say that Apple has "embraced open-source" anything without cracking a smile?
Last I checked, they were the one of the largest proponents of proprietary software/hardware. Granted, they have let up a little bit in releasing development tools for packages like iTunes. But all the same, that's a long ways from embracing free and open source code.
Also, Apple tends to lean HARD on Microsoft for office tools. In that vein, can you really say Apple has diverged from the path Microsoft set? I'd argue no.
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Microsoft was not the first to either invent or implement the start menu, the integrated file system / net browser, or the safety-checked bytecode-based API. In fact with all of these they were literally years and years behind other commercially successful implementations.
Now that you mention it, Microsoft may well have been the first to use the task bar window switching concept. Well, bravo Microsoft! Too bad it isn't a terribly good concept. And come to think of it, it isn't one that many linux/unix GUIs actually use.
The fact that KDE was even later with some concepts than Microsoft does not make Microsoft creative. Last I checked KDE was a very small-scale project struggling just to stay alive. I don't see anyone promoting them as harbringers of innovation, making your attack on them really something of a straw man.
Apple, in contrast, has embraced Open Source and is delivering a better consumer experience."
What is up with you people and Apple?!!
My God! Give it a rest.... Please. You're killing us here!
I can't get away from the Apple worship even if I block apple stories. It's everyway.
Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against Apple. But Apple is just another Corporation who's goal, as with all other corporations is to, *gasp*, maximize profits for its shareholders.
Ironically Sun ( http://sunsource.net ) and IBM has done orders of magnitude more for Open source than Apple. And at least Sun gets beaten up everyday here. Apple though is worshipped to the point that it is frickin' nauseating to the rest of us.
Come on guys, fanboys just aint cool.
Based on upvotes, Ageism is the only "-ism" Slashdotters care about and think isn't SJW
This makes a lot of sense. Microsoft hasn't innovated anything for years, if at all. After crushing its competitors (Netscape, WordPerfect, etc.), Microsoft hasn't really made any viable updates to its software. Take Windows for example. The first few versions of Windows were bad and it didn't take until Windows 3.0 until Microsoft finally made it usable enough for developers to develop on it. Windows 95 was probably at Windows's peak. It's interface was very usable, didn't really get in the way, and had a lot of developers.
But then, Windows's quality deteriorated beginning with Windows 98, when Microsoft integrated Internet Explorer as a means to kill Netscape (and when Windows now had a 95% market share). However, as many people on this board know, integrating a browser to an operating system causes all sorts of problems, and Windows has gone downhill ever since. Windows XP, for example, is more stable than Windows 95/98, but it suffers from more worms than those operating systems, it's "eye candy" (if that's what you call it) is really an eye sore, and the interface gets in the way (compare the Find dialog in Windows 95/98 to the Find command in Windows XP, you'll see a difference). Ditto for Office, last time I checked, Clippy is still there. Microsoft Word has a lot of other annoyances (ever tried outlining there? It's a pain).
Now, look at Apple. Apple has made a lot of innovations within its whole lifetime. It was the first to bring the graphical user interface to the secretary's desk (Apple Lisa and Apple Macintosh). Apple has made a lot of innovations that make many processes very easy (for example, in the old days, all you needed to do to network two Macs together was to connect a printer cable to each other, and then use Chooser to share files. No network configuration or anything. Try that on an old PC.). Finally, Apple took UNIX and fused the Mac OS with UNIX to make, after a long process that includes NeXT and Rhapsody, to create Mac OS X. Mac OS X is the only UNIX-based operating system where it is so easy for a non-geek to use without much difficulty, yet the UNIX pro could access the core using a few mouse clicks.
Apple could be considered one of the masters of usability. The operating system never gets in the way of your work, you control the computer. This is different from the Microsoft approach, which is the computer controls what you do. This is exactly why Apple hasn't came out with something annoying like Clippy or that dog in the Find box in Windows XP.
Microsoft needs to do something drastic with Windows and Office. Microsoft needs to start innovating, make Windows and Office user-friendly again, and finally make a stable version of Windows. Windows doesn't need a UNIX core (Microsoft spent tons of money on NT; besides, Microsoft adopting a UNIX core wouldn't be innovation), but Windows should be stable enough to use on a regular basis without any problems. Microsoft should also fix many of its other applications, such as the rapidly deteriorating and antiquated Internet Explorer, and not integrate the browser with the operating system. Isn't it about time that Microsoft should learn that integrating a browser with an operating system causes instability within the operating system? It's like, whenever Microsoft finally takes control of something, they sit on their couches, raise the prices, and the quality of their applications deteriorate with each and every new release. Microsoft needs to innovate fast here, and improve its products.
"KDE with a taskbar, start menu, integrated filesystem/net browser, Mono"
.net (Mono in gnome world) is MS response to Java, nothing new/innovative.
those are not MS innovations. There were number of different docks, launchpads, root menus etc. in X, OS/2, MacOS, taskbar and start menu are nothing new (i.e. not significantly different from the others). You could do cd ftp://ftp.uu.net in midnight commander since before MS new Netscape would be a threat.
erik
...all excited, don't know why...
Microsoft was not the first to either invent or implement the start menu, the integrated file system / net browser, or the safety-checked bytecode-based API. In fact with all of these they were literally years and years behind other commercially successful implementations.
That might be true, but lately I'm actually starting to see some signs of innovation and creative thinking coming from MS. The new "pop-up blocking" technology in Internet Explorer is a very good example.