Strategy Shift In The Air For Microsoft

mrdaveb writes "In the face of a declining market for MS Windows and MS Office, Microsoft's recent statements and acquisitions point to a future in which .NET is a key driver behind a strategy which will see Windows CE devices taking the limelight. This article explores the problems which Microsoft face in maintaining their stranglehold, and their likely route to keeping Windows on top."

Comments

Wear & Tear

[fembots]

What Microsoft really needs is some way of ensuring that software wears out at a similar speed to hardware

It gets me wondering why consumer is willing to pay $4999 for a Plasma TV that has a specific (say 20,000 hours) lifespan, but can't stand paying a $49 software that has an expiry date.

Hardware used to last for 10-20 years (like old radios), but hardly live past 3 years nowadays, yet consumers are rushing out buying and replacing gadgets every day.

I guess the main influence is Open Source and freeware, which sort of prevent major software makers to gang up on consumers.

Wear & Tear on hardware is by nature, Wear & Tear on software is by design, and people can choose against that design, but not many people can break nature's monopoly.

Re:Wear & Tear

[Valdrax]

There's a difference between the physical limits of hardware and designed-in product failure. People simply don't like it when a company deliberately breaks their product to soak more money out of them when they could've given people a better product that they wanted in the first place. $49 software with an expiry date is software that could've lasted you for life for $49. People resent being treated that way.

Re:Wear & Tear

[jxyama]

>I guess the main influence is Open Source and freeware, which sort of prevent major software makers to gang up on consumers.

yeah, right, wishful thinking. "consumers" buying plasma TVs and other "gadgets" you are talking about hardly know about open source software.

i think it's mostly because it's not "physical." unlike TV, software feels so... not real. it's just something that runs on the computer - why is it "worth" so much money?

Re:Wear & Tear

[Anne Thwacks]

My local PC dealer says MS Windows wears out and has to be reinstalled every few months.

He says this has been true since windows 1.0, and who an I to query a professional?

Re:Wear & Tear

[WesG]

In the face of a declining market for MS Windows...

Declining market for MS Windows??? Show me some facts that says the market is declining for MS Windows! Microsoft just posted record profits for the quarter. How is MS Windows declining???

Re:Wear & Tear

[Anne Thwacks]

Actually some consumers are richer and more stupid than others.

In the real world, many people are still running Win95 because that is what they are used to, and they don't want to run something new.

Many others are not connected to the internet, and live hundreds of miles from a phone socket.

Some parts of the world are not even American (yet).

Re:Wear & Tear

[ecalkin]

Because so far the consumer entertainment industry has made products that were better *enough* (and *cheaper*) that 3-5 years later, people are motivated to replace rather than repair

a lot of people can see an 3 year improvement on tvs stereos, pvrs, etc. a lot of people couldn't tell you what got better in office xp over office 2000.

Re:Wear & Tear

[PedanticSpellingTrol]

Find a bunch of the old fogies from Western Electric to help you out with that, please. God, those old monopoly phones were immortal.

Re:Wear & Tear

[PMJ2kx]

a lot of people couldn't tell you what got better in office xp over office 2000.

They got rid of that damn paperclip!

Re:Wear & Tear

[ultranova]

God, those old monopoly phones were immortal.

It self-contradicting to talk about immortal things in the past tense ;).

Re:Wear & Tear

[Shalda]

Nice troll, but I'll bite.

The consumer is wiling to pay for the Plasma TV that has a specific lifespan because the technology doesn't exist to make a plasma TV that lasts longer. Also, hardware (whether TV, Radio, computer, whatever) often is obsolete before it wears out.

There is no reason to buy software with an expiration date. You mention Open Source and Freeware as influences that prevent major software makers from ganging up, but that's bogus. Other than Office and Windows, there's sufficient competition in most products that keep the market open. And Office and Windows are stymied mostly by corporate buyers willing to sit on older versions rather than give in to a subsription model of liscencing.

Frankly, I think the linked article is rather bogus. Microsoft has a way of ensuring that software wears out. They simply release new versions and slowly quit fixing older versions. Combine that with added features such that older versions of Office can't open documents created with current versions and new features for Windows forcing consumers to buy current versions to run the latest software. Microsoft isn't hurting by any stretch of the imagination. There is no "declining market for Windows and Office."

Mod parent and article down as Flamebait -1.

Re:Wear & Tear

[tonyr60]

Only a relatively small number of consumers are prepared to pay $4999 for a Plasma TV. Microsoft's market would be 1000's times larger. Also, a plasma TV has some "excitement" attached to it, it can be shown off to the neighbors etc. Software has long ago lost that "excitement", at least amongst your average consumers.

Which is Microsoft's big problem. Can you imagine asking your neighbours over to look at an update to an OS, or word processor?

There are only so many /.'s around....

Re:Wear & Tear

[ZorinLynx]

They were rented from the phone company. When they broke, the phone company had to SPEND money to send a guy out to repair them. Hence, they had the ultimate push to create reliable products.

The old Western Electric phones are a great example of what manufacturers are capable of, if they put quality and durability first. Since making people buy a new X every couple of years is profitable, they design X to fail after a couple of years; preferably after the warranty.

-Z

Re:Wear & Tear

[spectre_240sx]

"Changing" might have been a better term to describe the current Windows market. The fact that the nature of personal computing is changing is hard to disagree with. Apple is definately making new inroads now that OS X is seen as a stable operating system. Internet Explorer is losing marketshare for the first time in... 5 years? People seem to be waking up and realizing that there are options out there that don't include having their comptuters full of spyware. Although the number of people buying windows and other microsoft products is still growing, the number of people looking at alternative products is growing as well.

Re:Wear & Tear

[NanoGator]

"$49 software with an expiry date is software that could've lasted you for life for $49. People resent being treated that way."

*Cough*Valve*Cough*.

Re:Wear & Tear

[RealAlaskan]

It gets me wondering why consumer is willing to pay $4999 for a Plasma TV that has a specific (say 20,000 hours) lifespan, ...

If you watch TV 8 hours a day, five days a week, that translates to a 10 year lifespan. I realize that you probably picked that figure out of the air, but here's a site that says 30,000 hours.

Hardware used to last for 10-20 years (like old radios), but hardly live past 3 years nowadays, ...

A 10 to 15 year lifespan isn't too terrible for hardware, which naturally wears out. Plasma TVs seem to be about as long-lasting as cars.

... but can't stand paying a $49 software that has an expiry date.

As another post mentioned, most folks are willing to accept the idea that hardware naturally wears out, even if well made. In contrast, the idea of paying for something that is made to die before it wears out, just to make you pay for it again, rubs most of us the wrong way.

Re:Wear & Tear

[StikyPad]

People resent being treated that way.

Well, sure, but they only resent it if they know about it. Obviously if software had started out as a subscription, it would be easier for people to accept that business model (although it's hard to imagine other companies wouldn't compete by coming up with the idea of buying the software once and -- dare I say it? -- owning it). But I don't think you can really compare software and a TV. A computer and a TV would be a little more analogous, and it's obvious that people spend $3000 for a top of the line computer that they won't be using in 3 years.

However, for the sake of argument, I think the biggest difference here is that software is not a status symbol, whereas something like a plasma TV is, and status symbols are all about being impractical. If and when plasma TVs are sold at a price where everyone can afford them, people will be paying 5 grand for something else (note I didn't say something better, just something else).

Re:Wear & Tear

[Valthonis]

Who knows? Last time I checked, MS was sitting on a cubic blortload of cash, and it's already been documented (try Google) that they regularly shuttle their money around to ventures that are losing money so that they ALWAYS turn a profit in their quarterly reports. Don't take them at face value.

Re:Wear & Tear

[Profane MuthaFucka]

OK, about the fridge:

I've got a Kenmore that I paid about $1400 for, in the year 2001. It's warmed up to room temperature requiring an after-hours service call exactly three times, and it also used to inexplicably dump water all over the floor. What a piece of shit it is.

One failure was a circuit board that controlled a flapper thingy that opened between the freezer and the cooler to let air in. It senses temperature and opens when it's too warm. Old fashioned fridges used to use a mechanical device to prop it open at varying angles, letting more or less cold air into the cooler compartment from the freezer compartment. That system never broke. My new electronic one did break, and needed a $300 part to fix.

The coils on the fridge are on the bottom, which means that a fan is needed to blow air over them. Well, the fucking fan broke, and fried a bunch of shit down there. That was the reason for *one* of the times the fridge dumped water on the floor. The fucking water lines are plastic not copper, and when the coils got too hot because the fan broke, the fucking water line broke too. Fucking $500, and it was an after-hours service call, on Thanksgiving day 11 PM. Goddamn nearly lost the turkey leftovers goddamn it to hell. Old fashioned fridges had the coils on the back, and they didn't need a fan. And the water lines were fucking copper.

Oh for fucks sake, I could go on and on and on with this, and it's just my fridge. Don't even get me started on all the times that my garbage disposal and the dish washer have filled my kitchen with water. Fuck me, if it happens again I'm going to, ummmmm, actually, nothing because nobody makes good shit any more. Maybe I'll just bitch about it. Yea, that's it.

Re:Wear & Tear

[Kashif Shaikh]

My father used to work for Inglis - an appliance maker. One of the problems Inglis saw was that people weren't buying new appliances as the old "versions" were working perfectly fine for the past 10-20 years. Why buy a new one if the old one ain't broke? Now Inglis manufactures things like washing machines such as one part inside is _designed_ to fail _after_ the warranty period and the whole product is only designed to last for at most 5 years. Also the whole cost cutting approach(trying to use plastic, cheaper parts, etc) is making appliances crappier day by day. What I'm trying to say, hardware makers design their machines to fail after x amount of time.

New product line

[nizo]

Strategy Shift In The Air For Microsoft

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Strategy?

[Ahkorishaan]

Microsoft will never change their strategy.... It's always going to be keep the markets cornered, and allow as little interoperability as possible.

Re:Strategy?

[chris09876]

I disagree. They're a big corporation, and although they've done bad (and even some stupid) things, their goal is still to make money for their shareholders. If that goal requires that they be 'clever' and try and change their business model/strategy, I'm guessing they're going to do something. It might take them some time (more time than others), but I'm sure that Microsoft is not going to disappear. They're going to adapt to whatever market conditions present.

Re:Strategy?

[temojen]

s/shareholders/board members & institutional investors/ . They're publicly traded; individual shareholders have little to no power or share of the profits.

Re:Strategy?

[ackthpt]

Microsoft will never change their strategy.... It's always going to be keep the markets cornered, and allow as little interoperability as possible.

Most of Microsoft's success can be chalked up to two failures by one other company...

IBM allows Bill Gates to own and sell MS-DOS under his own company's name, as IBM doesn't take the PC seriously.

IBM fails to protect their PC design, not taking PC's seriously, and clones flourish providing a ready market for MS-DOS

Most of everything else Microsoft has profited wildly from is centered around these two items. Microsoft has demonstrated that they are not a very inventive company by buying up lots of technology companies and immitating others. Where they have attempted to innovate in new markets they have usually fallen flat on their face and lost hundreds of millions of $. If it weren't for the O/S, Office and Server divisions Microsoft wouldn't be able to sputter so frequently.

Re:Strategy?

[Anonymous Coward]

If Microsoft is capable of adapting to changing market conditions, they may adapt.

But they may not be capable. The book "The Innovator's Dilemma" explores cases where corporations were not capable of adapting to changes in the market space caused by "low-end" competitors moving upward into the formerly plush (well-controlled) market.

Open source has the potential for doing this to Microsoft, IMHO.

Re:Strategy?

[brian.glanz]

I agree, who wouldn't, that MS' historic stance was against inter-op in so far as inter-op harmed their business model. I see this as the primary reason they got Googled and that they are getting out-Fire Foxed. They tried to have it both ways with their approach to the Internet, but could not bend it sufficiently to the anti-inter-op will which worked for them so well, for so long.

Not only the natural trends in technology driven by human behavior and the Net's architecture, but also the courts have certainly weighed in, and they have demonstrably changed MS. I disagree that MS would continue in the same vein, against inter-op. They are out to earn, and earn big. No one can deny smaller devices already supplanting PCs, call them "phones" if you must, and the near-future trend toward ever more hardware integration with previously offline environs (LCD paint, anyone?). MS will change their strategy to be more pro-inter-op, because that is the only way in which they can continue to earn, and maybe the only way in which they can continue to (legally) exist as MS.

BG

Microsoft Strategy

[ackthpt]

See what everyone else is doing.

Copy it, tying it to your own IP, proprietary architecture and co-opting it to erode better strategies and make it your own.

Bundle it.

???

Fail to Profit!!!

Re:Microsoft Strategy

[ackthpt]

Fail to profit? Since when has Microsoft failed to profit? Individual organizations within MS maybe, but not as a whole.

If it weren't for the OS, Office and Server divisions, they'd be dead.

Many companies would have spun divisions like those off and retained some large chunk of stock to profit from as the new entity fought on even ground to survive. That Microsoft has kept each of these divisions under one roof has a lot to say about the shoddy security, bloat and often annoying 'features' in each package.

Re:Microsoft Strategy

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, that's like saying GM would be dead if it wasn't for the automobile division. Microsoft is an OS (Desktop & Server), and Office software company!

Re:Microsoft Strategy

[ackthpt]

Dude, that's like saying GM would be dead if it wasn't for the automobile division.

General Motors and Ford have, for the past couple years, only shown a profit in the finance divisions. Automotive operations have broken even at best, but usually are racking up losses.

Microsoft is an OS (Desktop & Server), and Office software company!

Microsoft should be a technology company. They're still very profitable, thanks to all the locked in customers and upgrade paths, but for how much longer? We gripe a lot about their products for good reason, they don't have adequate competition to keep them on the rivet, making their products the best they can be, rather than the slop they release.

It doesn't matter

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

I think we can all safely say that no matter how successful, or not, microsoft will be in the years ahead, the millions of users trained from birth to believe that windows id the worlds only operating system are unlikely to move en masse to the alternatives.

Natural and unnatural monopolies

[MBraynard]

MS's is natural. They are having to innovate to keep their market lead. Just like US Oil having to do everything they could to cut the price of oil. You may not like the method (making things more propriatory to raise transition costs) - and these methods may backfire (seems like they may be already), but they are one way or another trying to make their product more attractive than the next guys.

Now enter the US postal service. You try setting up a small time mail service in your city and go to jail. You try using FedEx for what the Postal Inspectors deem regular mail, and you go to jail. Similarly, if you try to stop paying into the government retirement system and start your own with higher returns.... guess what happens? Or what if you try to open your own liquir store in Virginia or Pennsylvania across from a state run ABC. Jail.

We throw this monopoly term around way to much without acknowledging the difference between a natural, earned monopoly and a violent, coercive one.

Re:Natural and unnatural monopolies

[kfg]

And yet, Microsoft was not found guilty of being a monopoly, but of employing that natural monopoly power in a criminally coercive manner in an attempt to leverage into an unnatural one.

In effect they behave as does orginized crime.

What was it that Argentinian minister said? Oh yes, that they do business like a drug dealer.

KFG

Re:Natural and unnatural monopolies

[Macadamizer]

"Other than not having access to USPS mail boxes (which are USPS private property), what is there to prevent you from creating a mail server or using FedEx to mail whatever you want?"

If you want to carry standard, first-class mail, then the "what is there to prevent you" is the U.S. Constitution, Article 1, Section 8, Clause 7: [The congress shall have the power] To establish Post Offices and post Roads;

This has been repeatedly interpreted to give the U.S. authority to create and maintain a monopoly on delivery of mail in the U.S.

But yeah, you could start your own FedEx service if you wanted to -- but they are not delivering mail, they are delivering "parcels." I guess if you wanted to send all of you first-class mail by FedEx, you could...

Re:Natural and unnatural monopolies

[TRACK-YOUR-POSITION]

"Natural monopoly" is an economics term that, while it probably describes Microsoft and any other dominant software maker, doesn't really have anything to do with what you're talking about.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_monopoly

Also, if Microsoft carries out their software patent threats, that will make Microsoft a coercive monopoly as well. Hell, I guess breaking your competitor's legs is just another way of trying to make their product more attractive than the next guys.

Nohing new...

[PincheGab]

Is it just me or does this article state nothing new?

- Microsoft has had the Office no-upgrade problem for a long time...

- .NET was specifically developed to (appear to) run multi-platform (or was this an accident on the part of microsoft?)

- The first full release of .NET was in 2002... The beta period was long before that...

- Of course MS wants development for WinCE/PocketPC to be as easy as developing for the deskptop... Perhaps that's why you can write a PocketPC/WinCE program right on MS Developer Studio?

- Yes, Microsoft would want everyone to rent out Office instead of buy a perpetual license. Every app developer wants that. Remember ASPs (Application Service Providers)?

This article sounds like its written by someone who just got into computers and is just finding out what's gone on for the last 5 years...

Do something well.

[paithuk]

Personally I would just like to see Microsoft do something really well for the first time. They seem to take the approach I use at University: Do it as quickly as possible and put effort in where it can be seen. This is not what I would expect when it comes to a commercial product, and only works for proof on concepts. Now 21 years later, it's pretty clear Windows isn't a POC, so buck up and give us something we can really love. (For more information, visit www.apple.com)

Re:Do something well.

[Stick_Fig]

It's not a POC (proof of concept), but it is a POC (piece of crap). That's what you get when you keep building layers upon layers like an onion -- except, instead, the onion's rotting from the inside.

umm.....

[djfray]

What makes the article's author think that alternative Operating Systems are putting a stranglehold on Microsoft? Seriously, could someone give a link to these numbers, because I didn't see any in the article, and without it I have a bit of trouble believing the assertion.

Strategic retreat...

[the_skywise]

I've been wondering about this for awhile. Microsoft's overall strategy has always been to be the mediator between your computer/data and you. At the beginning this was DOS, then it became Windows on top of DOS. Then Office to get to your business data, etc; Netscape was a major threat because they could usurp that position and allow you to get to your data through the web browser on a PC without needing a MS product. .NET is the ultimate implementation of this strategy. If they can really make it run anywhere: PCs running Windows, OSX or Linux on various hardware flavors AND on palms, consumer electronics devices, etc; Then they'll have succeeded in making a standardized "glue" layer between you and the hardware.

Next port Office to .NET and you have practically the same scenario as you have today except now Windows(.NET) runs anywhere.

Linux? OSX? Windows? Bah, who cares, so long as you're running a .NET license...

Windows CE Strategy? Right . . .

[sunspot42]

Win CE devices are going to continue dropping in price as they become more common. There's no way Microsoft is going to be able to earn anywhere near the margins they make in the PC business on a $100 cell phone, and there's no reason why hardware makers in the competitive electronics marketplace won't switch to open source (i.e. free) alternatives in the not too distant future in order to make their products more competitive. It's not like there's a huge inventory of Win CE software out there that absolutely must be run on these portable devices.

If MS is betting the future on CE devices, dump your MS stock right now while it's still worth something. MS remains a one trick pony, and their one trick is their OS monopoly in the PC marketplace. In spite of their billions, they've never been able to dominate any other industry and they never will because they're incapable of innovation. Their entire culture involves around theft, acquisition and intimidation. Expecting Microsoft to compete in a more open marketplace and win would be like expecting the Mafia to get into the automobile manufacturing business and compete with Toyota. They aren't structured for that kind of business, have no aptitude for it, and their strong-arm techniques only alienate customers and potential partners.

FUD

[X43B]

"Microsoft's profit is currently focussed on two major products - MS Windows and MS Office. Both of these are in decline."

Only on /. can one of the most profitable companies in the world with record profit and revenue for this past quarter be considered in decline. I'm not saying I approve of how they do it, but it is funny how FUD can go both ways.

Re:FUD

[duplicate-nickname]

From Microsoft 2004 annual report:

11% growth in Windows XP/2000 revenue
19% growth in server revenue (2003/SQL/Exchange)
17% growth in Office/Project/Visio revenue

Yea, I don't think the guy writing this article has a clue what he's talking about.

Re:FUD

[ultranova]

Only on /. can one of the most profitable companies in the world with record profit and revenue for this past quarter be considered in decline. I'm not saying I approve of how they do it, but it is funny how FUD can go both ways.

Being the most profitable company in the world and being in decline are two separate statements that in no way contradict each other. Neither do record profits contradict decline, due to the rather ambigious nature of the word "decline".

Consider a corporation that is steadily losing markets to other corporations (and yes, this is happening to Microsoft - Linux market share is growing, and since all market shares must add up to exactly 100%, someone else must be declining). If the total market is growing, that corporation could easily be making record profits (by growing its absolute sales) while still losing market share (declining).

What makes it worse in Microsoft's case is that their business model is based on being the best known alternative. Windows and Office are so widely used that they are de facto standards. If Microsoft loses market share, this position is threatened, which will lead to further losses - applications will get ported to other operating systems and other file formats will be used for document exchange (and secretaries will learn to use other office programs), making Microsoft's programs seem worse and worse in comparison. So any decline in market share is very bad news for Microsoft. This might also tempt Microsoft to try and make it look like it was having record revenue, to imply that it had record sales and is therefore not going anywhere and therefore still the wise choice.

Disclaimer: I haven't read the article, nor have I examined either market shares of various products or Microsoft Corporation in any detail. I'm just speculating how these seemingly contradictory claims could be true simultaneously.

Millions trained in MS Windows? Where?

[ulatekh]

Perhaps millions of Americans, but it's a big world, and a lot of third-world countries are modernizing on open-source software. I think Microsoft is destined to be an America-only thing, like football.

Don't think that's what consumers are doing

[SuperKendall]

When a consumer is buying a plasma at Best Buy (for example), I don't think in fact they are buying a TV with a life of 20,000 hours. I think they have no idea that is the case, and as far as they are concerned that TV should last for years and years.

I do not think that yet people are fully bought into the notion of device failure in a year rather than ten. After all, people are used to the TV's they had before which did last perhaps ten years or so (that was the case for my last TV, even really a bit longer than ten years).

People still get refrigerators that last for a while, and other appliances they probably plan to keep as long as the house.

I think also there's a function of money where people expect for hosuehold electronics/appliances to last longer as the cost increases. Certainly a lot of people expect this of cars, preferring to keep a car ten years or longer and assuming it will hold up.

Bill's pet project

[EmbeddedJanitor]

You can bet that MS corporate strategy will follow Bill's pet projects. Bill is seriously into the handheld device, so you can be sure that MS effort will be put into that.

MS has screwed up so many times in the handheld arena, but now the technology is getting to the point where maybe they can get their bloatware to work: i. mobile devices are getting powerful enough and cheap enough; ii. 3G and effective wireless netweorking are getting to the stage where they are reasonable as mobile data carriers.

MS has been losing money in mobile for many years. This might give them an edge in the future.

Re:Bill's pet project

[caluml]

Bill is seriously into the handheld device

That sounds like the sort of spam I get.

Cell not a general purpose CPU

[Valdrax]

It's a nice conjecture, but I don't really see MS getting all that hyped about Cell when it's more likely that they see it as a competitor. After all, you don't have to be using WinCE to take advantage of the distributed architecture.

Furthermore, Cell isn't a general purpose CPU. In fact, it may be slower for general purpose computing than today's CPUs. According to the Ars Technica article posted earlier today, they trimmed a lot of the out-of-order execution logic out of the main PowerPC component to make room for the SPEs and to let it be clocked faster. It also seems to only have a single FPU on it -- a logical move since the SPEs are vector FPUs primarily. Code not optimized for Cell (which is going to be a limited subset of multimedia applications) will run slower. The .NET VM isn't going to auto-parallelize code after all.

Overall, I don't see MS trying to abandon x86 for Cell any time soon since x86 multimedia processing power is more than enough for most consumer applications. While Cell may take off for games, it's not going to make Office or Explorer run any faster.

The writing is on the wall.

[mrbcs]

Not many people need the latest and greatest computers. I still have 98 running on an AMD 64 bit 3000+. (I like fast but I don't really NEED it) I still use office 97. I can't see this computer industry ever reaching previous heights.

We don't NEED a new bug ridden Microsoft OS or Office suite. Microsoft is starting to see what the rest of the computing world has been dealing with for the last couple years.

The industry is stagnant and there are now tons of 1 ghz machines out there that will run any old os and suit most people just fine. Business is starting to smarten up. I pity those guys that bought into the Microsoft subscription service. How much longer for Longhorn? I don't think they're getting their monies worth and I doubt they would continue the subcription the next time.

The sooner Microsoft dies a horrible death, the happier I'll be!

Perhaps they'll make things a little easier then

[strider3700]

I'm in the middle of learning to create a program on a windows CE device. Since it's going to be used to aquire data I figured it would be nice to install some form of DB on it. Sure enough there is SQL 200 CE for the ce .net devices. So Here I am thinking this is great I'll install that and away we go. 1 day later I'm still working on that install.

First I already have visual studio .Net installed and I really can't complain about it. Best IDE I've ever used hands down.

Second I know that I need SQL server to replicate the DB's with so I head off to MSDN and grab it.
500 or so meg later and I burn it to a CD(my media versions of the subscription haven't arrived yet) and start the install. Installation doesn't appear to do anything. After messing with it for a bit I remove it. Remove the desktop edition, and remove the old sql client tools. run the install again and it works. Fine I can live with that.
So I install sql 2000 CE It tells me that I need sql 2000 SP1 installed. I assumed that the newest version on MSDN would have the service pack installed already but I would be wrong.

So 430 meg later I have downloaded SP2 (sp1 is rolled into it) and another 120 or so meg and I have SP3. Install those. Reinstall sql CE. I get further but I now need to install IIS so that the two can comunicate. It didn't come preinstalled on this XP pro SP2 PC so I get to track the program down, set it up then get the database installed then I can get back to the 20 minute tutorial I was following. .Net on CE devices may work nicely but the hours of hoops to jump through just to get started is a real pain in the ass. By far the best part of this exercise has been visual studio. I added the necessary parts as a reference and away it goes.

Deploying programs to the device is trivial. If all the rest of the software was at the same level as visual studio I wouldn't be using linux as my desktop at home.

Why MS bought VirtualPC _and_ What .NET is about!!

[javaxman]

I've heard this explaination as to why Microsoft bought Connectix ( and thus Virtual PC ) before, but never quite so successfully explained.

Basically, they bought VirtualPC so their future customers, running on some non-x86 processor, can run legacy x86 Windows programs along side their .NET-based programs. The detail being that of course, the .NET-based apps are running in a ( licensed ) Microsoft operating system environment. As an added bonus, the OS used in VPC is yet another licensed MS operating system! Even _more_ software sales for M$!!

It's just the M$ way of _not_ betting the farm on x86... which is the true point of .NET, at least according to this guy.

Hey, they're not stupid at M$, they just like *MONEY*!!!

Consumer mindset

[fembots]

The fact that this post is modded informative shows there are people out there who will buy anything a company sells.

...or the next front

[BeerCat]

.NET has been around for a while, but it finally might be beginning to pick up. The w3schools stats for February* have included .NET as an OS platform, with a small, but rising share. Perhaps MS are looking for the same (initially slow) take up of IE6 or XP.



Of course, the real news is that Firefox has hit 20%, with other non-IE taking the total to over 25%. Yeah, I know, "lies, damn lies and statistics, and all that", but it should mean the end of IE only sites, when it can be shown that they are turning away 1 out every 4 site visitors.

I think the author missed something important

[ShatteredDream]

About Longhorn. It was supposed to be the Great Leap Forward for Microsoft and yet most of the cool features have either been pulled for future releases or being backported to XP. This will probably be the first version of Windows where there is very little incentive to upgrade from the previous version for most of Microsoft's users.

The absolute worst thing that could happen to Microsoft would be for Windows to lag in sales. So much of their company rides on the success of Windows and Office that if one of those gets badly damaged it would have very damaging results for the entire company.

Google!

[LesPaul75]

I (still) say that Microsoft is being forced into changing their application delivery model by Google. What choice do they have? What happens when Google rolls out a word processor, spreadsheet, and a dozen other "Office-like" apps all of which run right in your web browser, and they offer it all at a really, really competitive price per user (especially to businesses), and Microsoft is still selling clunky old CDs?

Look at it this way... Which would you rather have: this or this? One of them comes on a CD, and becomes outdated very quickly unless you continously patch and upgrade it. The other is just a URL that you type into a browser, and you can let them (Google) worry about keeping it up to date.

Re:Google!

[mottie]

One of them works in your laptop as you are driving down an unknown road in the middle of no where, and one works when you are sitting at your desk. You are comparing apples to oranges.

.Net == .Not

[JPyObjC Dude]

If I had two identically priced and featured products and one was running on .Net and the other JME, I would not even think twice about selecting latter.

There are many in the world who have had enough of the instabilities and insecurity of microsoft software who will do just the same. Just look at the ratio of enterprise applications running on java vs .net. It seems that .net is for the little guy's who are too cheap to spend the money on an enterprise product.

Time to buy those Options on Microsoft Stocks.

JsD
[karma=(moz+nix+ooo)-ms]

Re:.Net == .Not

[blueberrry]

Ignorance must not be modded as interesting.

Have you ever tried .NET? This is not VB. .NET is very stable, in fact if all Microsoft applications were written in .NET they would be a lot more stable and secure. I'm really starting to get pissed off about people who haven't even used .NET and talk crap about it.

Remove your tin foil hat and get the facts. I'm not pro-Microsoft, i'm happy not to use their products when I can. However, .NET is pretty rock-solid. I've used it for dozens of projects and I've had a better overall experience than Java (faster, more coherent, less bloat).

Please give some examples to support your claims.

"Profits" vs "Market Share"

[KiltedKnight]

Actually, while Microsoft may have posted record profits, they've also noted that their sales of Windows have actually declined. Their entire profit increase was more due to cost cuts and sales of Halo 2.

Read about it here

Re:"Profits" vs "Market Share"

[ChatHuant]

Actually, while Microsoft may have posted record profits, they've also noted that their sales of Windows have actually declined.

Ok, I read the article you suggested and it doesn't say what you think it says. On the contrary, the Windows for PC division is forecast to have a sale increase of 5 percent in the quarter, and the server division is forecast to increase by 9 percent. You may be confused by the fact that the sales growth is lower (compared to last year's 21 percent).
The Office sales have declined (no new version since 2003), and are forecast to further decline by 5 percent.

Back to school for you (YOU FAIL IT)!

[temojen]

A natural monopoly is an industry where the most efficient production is through a monopoly. This means Municipal water supply, electricity distribution, local telephone service, public postal services, etc.

Microsoft's monopoly came about mostly by their exclusive contracts with hardware vendors, agressive bundling, and buying up competitors. This is the antithesis of a natural monopoly.

Re:Back to school for you (YOU FAIL IT)!

[graffix_jones]

Well, you only got a 'C' on your explanation. :)

A natural monopoly occurs when a company (not an industry... that suggests 'several' companies) can only become efficient once it reaches a certain size, meaning that they only become profitable once a certain economy of scale is reached. These are companies with high fixed costs, and anybody that's had some business training know that if you spread out the fixed costs over more units of production there is less fixed cost attached to each unit. In a natural monopoly, there are extremely high barriers to entry (i.e. power distribution grid, phone service grid, cable TV infrastructure, etc.), and extremely large economies of scale, so that it really only makes sense to have one player, but the government keeps tabs on them through regulation.

The main problem with natural monopoly regulation is the fact that the return they are allowed is based on the value of their assets, so it really invites inefficiency... companies spend all their time acquiring new assets rather than finding inefficiencies in their production to raise their profits, as a 'normal' business would have to do.

The government is sometimes quick to change it's tune in the face of new technology, however. AT&T went from being a regulated natural monopoly to seeing the inside of an anti-trust court in a very short time, mainly because technology caught up and there were new ways to transmit telephony data. AT&T tried to restrict access to the new technology since it owned all the current infrastructure, and got itself split up into the Baby Bells.

It's my opinion that Microsoft should be treated as a natural monopoly and be regulated, but that's food for another debate. :D

Uh...who cares?

[WheelDweller]

This is just another PT Barnam special; it'll put more immature code onto the streets, require we buy new, bigger, faster computers, and still have viruses (or purchase of the latest companies would be meaningless) and it'll be the same old thing.

Sure, it's pretty, and sure parts of it (like printing services) work very well. But it's still that same old plantation on which we all have lived. And those of us without courage to fight it will live there until they close, and beyond.

Guys, don't think for a MOMENT this is the promised land we were promised ever since Win3.1, it's not.

I RTFA, and was not amused...

[Orne]

Ok, so the whole article seemed to pivot around the notion that the biggest problem Microsoft has is that consumers are not upgrading their software fast enough to improve current market returns. Yes, "Many organisations are still using Office '97 - an 8 year old release - and see no compelling reason to upgrade."

Organizations are using Microsoft products, and are not switching (to other Microsoft products). Sounds like a net zero change in market share to me.

Yes, Linux is expected to close in on Windows in a couple of years. From a 90% dominance today, to a projected 58% dominence. Oh yeah, only if you count dominance on PDAs. You see, Microsoft has 48.1% of the PDA market in Q3 2004, with Palm at #2 at 29.8%, and is expected to decline.

In the browser usage stats, Microsoft is dropping, with a 64.9% share, compared to up and coming FireFox at 20%. The problem is, FireFox looks like it hasnt gained any share since it peaked in Nov 2004. That's the best I could find for FireFox, since other studies put Microsoft's Internet Explorer at around 92.9 % dominance worldwide. Its very hard to get any two companies to agree on stats, because they're both approaching the question with different agendas.

But desktops, well, the statistics for Microsoft and Linux are all over the place. Last spring, Microsoft had 93% of the worldwide desktop market in their corner, but was still fighting (in Jan 2004) the business side to upgrade to the latest and greatest MS products. Microsoft really starts to cry in the server market, where IBM via Linux are barrelling through to win. Except Microsoft still has 59% of the server market, 3:1 today and 2:1 on projected Linux share. This was one of the few business statistic sites that actually had hard numbers, and even there, desktop stats appear pretty stale.

In conclusion, from browsing through Google, people have been making these same claims on market share dominance since 2001, "Linux is the up and comer, watch out!" and noone seems to ever back up their sides with hard numbers... nothing that actually shows a survey on how Windows:Linux ratios that actually shows Linux having a chance... every year, "we're coming to get you, this year is our year!" Maybe its because for all the talk, Linux really is a niche market after all...

Wrong - Windows sales still increased

[Canberra Bob]

Sales GROWTH has slowed to 5.6% - the sales did not decline at all, in fact sales increased by 5.6% for Windows / Office

How can the OSS community accuse MS of spreading FUD when the article was not only FUD but making a totally untrue statement - "In the face of a declining market for MS Windows" - a 5.6% increase is not a decline.

Im no MS fan but it really gets me when the /. crowd just pulls fanciful ideas out of the air and claim them to be facts to support their view of the world.

OK, Ill beat you all to it too - Im a M$ troll astroturfer on the M$ payroll, as is anyone who says anything positive about M$ even if true.

Re:Wrong - Windows sales still increased

[Anonymous Coward]

That's NOT what the article stated. A more accurate analogy: Suppose you made $10 the first month, then $20 the second. That's a 100% growth increase. Then in the third month, you make $25. Your growth has now slowed to 50% in the amount you make month over month. Investors generally not only look for growth, but accelerating growth, which in general is hard to do when a company makes as much as Microsoft does.

The shortest route...

[DigiShaman]

...may be just to lobby in Washington DC to "bend" and create laws in their favor. Why fight for control when you can have the government help you at the expense of your tax dollars.

Re:Windows CE Strategy? Right . . .

[moosesocks]

yes, but I think the point is that Microsoft sees that embedded electronics are taking off at a rapid pace. if home automation/convergence ever takes off, the embedded OS market will be HUGE.

consumers only have one pc (usually. maybe two)

however, I've also got a
cell phone
music player (iPod)
radio
router
stereo
gaming console
tv
coffee maker
fridge + other kitchen appliances
digital camera

You see, even if Microsoft charges $5 per license to run CE on some embedded device which has a $10 microcontroller, they're still making the same profit per person as they would otherwise be making. sure, the profit per product is lower, but their total revenue stays positive.

the real question is if hardware developers will want to pay the $5 to gain access to all of the nice APIs CE will provide them with. By not having to write firmware code from scratch, companies save a bundle on R&D. Advanced chips for embedded devices have been available for quite some time now at a not-unreasonable cost (especially considering the tiny demand) -- the big problem is spending the R&D money to actually develop software for these chips.

my wireless router has more processing power than my PC did 5 years ago -- it runs embedded linux. and I can guarruntee that the CPU didn't make up a huge portion of the router's $50 MSRP pricetag.

really the only big tech company that ISN'T jumping on the embedded bandwagon is Apple. They seem pretty focused upon turning the PC into a 'true' multimedia hub, and they've been doing a damn amazing job at it. even embedded linux has a huge following -- I can almost promise however, that CE is easier to develop for than linux, as CE was designed for tiny underpowered machines and has the appropriate APIs to deal with that.

Re:Why MS bought VirtualPC _and_ What .NET is abou

[alan_dershowitz]

I'm still thinking it's far more likely that they did it so have a support path for people with DOS and win3/9x apps, then drop problematic legacy support in their current OS. VirtualPC does give them security against changing from x86 too though, so there's no penalty anyway.

As a side note, the NT 4 kernel also ran on Alpha, and I recall it could emulate x86 WinNT apps already.

Empire Strikes Back

[Doc Ruby]

The underlying story in that analysis, unaffected by its predictive likelihood, is that the WinTel cartel might be broken. The article makes much of the rise of the Cell CPU (IBM/Sony/Toshiba), and the ability of MS to produce new SW for it, rather than new Intel CPUs. .NET's CLR and some recent PPC cross-execution MS acquisitions all position MS to produce code that can run elsewhere, a direction MS hasn't moved since the NT/Alpha project was folded years ago.

All that follows Intel's growth in the Linux market. Linux runs on many CPUs that aren't Intel, but most Linux installs are on Intel, thereby displacing copies of Windows and the rest of its lockin environment. The WinTel alliance, that for years fed each company on the other's monopoly, might be dysfunctional already past the point of no return. That in itself was such a powerful anticompetitive setup, that its loss might represent the greatest opportunity for Linux and other OS'es. Since Microsoft's strategy so far seems to be a cross-platform approach, and since .NET is already more interoperable on, say, Linux with, say, Mono, that kind of HW/SW lockin might be diappearing for good. The simple arrival of a Mac as preferred development platform for (PPC) Xbox shows that the hegemony game has changed. Next we await an escalating move from Intel, like a Linux (-only) kernel patch that actually lets us use our x86 hosts in massively parallel arrays across the Internet, preempting both the Cell PR and the .NET PR to that effect in this article and elsewhere. We might have followed the Force through the darkness, and into the light, after all.

typical

[tekunokurato]

Declining market?? Typical linux bias! Maybe declining server market share or declining ability to automatically upsell versions, but not declining market in desktop windows or MS office. Not domestically, and especially not worldwide. This guy makes a big old logic jump based on his personal bias when he says that.

pure drivel

[Jodka]

The article states, as a central premise:

"What Microsoft really needs is some way of ensuring that software wears out at a similar speed to hardware. Unfortunately for them, although fortunately for the consumer, it is quite hard to build planned obsolescence into software."

WTF? That is utter nonsense. The Windows security model dates from before ubiquitous internet. It was not designed for a modern threat level and has NOT been adequately updated to deal with it. It does not get any more worn out than that.

The article makes it out that Microsoft's problem is that there is no market for innovation in operating systems. Bullshit. There is a huge market for innovation. Just look at all the features Apple is adding to MacOS (quartz extreme, spotlight..) and look at how the Linux Kernel continues to improve (real time support, reentrent kernel, massive multi-CPU scaling and clustering, constant time scheduler, ever more platforms). Microsoft's real problem is that their Windows development operation has become so bloated and inept that they can not supply timely improvements. They have not kept up with the competition or with the hackers, and are only falling further behind. And most of the "innovative" features announced in Longhorn seem to be inspired by OS X.

This does not seem to be a problem with Microsoft generally. They do execute well in other areas. IMHO Halo and the Xbox are good products, whatever their profitability. The .Net architecture seems like a sensible (more generality) and well-executed improvement over Java ideas.