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Microsoft Fights the Flab as it Turns 30
Alain Williams writes "This review of Microsoft, as it enters middle age, looks at it's problems in maintaining growth." Discusses the recent Kai-Fu Lee/Google debacle, as well as things like Apple's iPod.
How can microsoft continue to grow with it's current market share? Granted it still has competition, but that's not going to change much.
Tons of people use windows, the people that don't aren't going to switch any time soon. Most people (in the US at least) have computers (and probably running windows)... so the only place I can see microsoft going is into a new market section, or just down.
With embedded media centers not taking off that fast, I'm assuming the latter will most likely happen.
Kai-Fu Lee and the iPod represent MS's biggest problems, they have nothing to worry about.
Microsoft getting fat isn't news, Microsoft being fined half its cash reserves, further restricted and split into 2 would be news, good news.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Even if Microsoft has slowed down, I'd be very suprised if they all of a sudden went belly-up.
The increase of competition is a good thing, as companies have to make their products better than their competitors, and sometimes selling them at a cheaper price.
I just wonder how many small companies with great ideas were too intimidated by Microsoft to put those ideas into action (a certain Simpsons episode comes to mind, no?)
Or are people worried because they bought a stock which was far overvalued due to fervor and hype which was known to everyone at the time to be unstable, unsustainable, and a bad risk?
Religion is a gateway psychosis. -- Dave Foley
"Apple's iPod" is only a "debacle" for Microsoft beacuse they decided to make it one. If they concentrated on making good software that plays well with other children, rather than defining each actual innovation in the wider marketplace as a threat to their core competencies - or rather, redefining their core competencies to include any actual innovation as it turns up in the wider marketplace - they might be a "mature" company in two senses of the word.
yes, we have no bananas
When you hit 38 and realize that 18 year olds consider you old, you might retract that comment.
What's even worse are the 14 year olds that consider you really old.
But yeah, thirty is not middle aged.
if you steal from one source, that is plagiarism, if you steal from many, well, that's just research.
I'm not just harping on one company here, I'm thinking organizations in general. Just as individuals have a natural birth, aging, and death cycle, the same seems to hold true with other phenomena. Organizations become victims of their own success. They get larger and more unwieldy, and the presence of excess resources seems to create its own economy of waste. Internal empires form. Departments carve up the pie, and defend turf. As waste increases, the survival of the organization tends to trump whatever purpose it originally formed to serve. With hundreds or thousands of individuals depending on the status quo, or at least the continued existence of the organization, there is a convergence that takes place that makes one soul-less organization or government look much like the others after a while.
Software bloat we all know about. Features get added by divergent interests who don't fully understand the limits of the paradigm, until the structure starts to sag and/or crumble under the weight. Loose ends and bugs multiply and begin to take on a life of their own, like cancer cells multiplying out of control.
Sometimes organizations or programs can be "born again" and rise from their own ashes in a completely different form. But sooner or later, some kind of major destruction is inevitable, and maybe necessary.
Yeah that really sucks. But also the other way round: I find time and time again that I'm 37 but I don't feel that age. This is a problem sometimes when dealing with younger people.
-- Cheers!
Does anyone care what a 14 year old thinks?
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
The same can be said about many new companies. The fact any new company becomes strong and offers products shouldn't make them fodder for comparisons to Microsoft. The differences in starting circumstances are striking. Most notably, in my opinion, is Microsoft was aggressive and arrogant from the very beginning. This was probably easy for them from their leader, himself an arrogant spoiled millionaire brat who dropped out of college, drove Daddy's Porsche cross country gathering speeding tickets while thumbing his nose at anyone who got in his way or disagreed with him. (Was he a genius?, a great business man? Maybe, but let's not think the beginnings of Microsoft and Google are really similar at all.)
As for vendor lockin with Google. I suppose it's a possibility, but their business model isn't based on selling products to consumers. It's based on advertisers and those advertiser's continued faith in Google's excellent consumer services. A 180 degree reversal of that bent by Google would greatly upset their user community and likely create a huge ding in their relationships with their true customers, the advertisers. Not likey, in my opinion.
And finally, from your post: I remember the days when Bill Gates was every nerd's idol. I don't, and I was around and working in IT back then already. Bill Gates has long been reviled by many for his arrogance and disdain for the rest of the world. Yeah, there were nerds and geeks who adored him, but every as a quantifier is a stretch. The guy was an asshole from day one.
But that lack of quality plus the oil embargo encouraged consumers to try smaller, more fuel efficient foreign cars, specifically Japanese models.
Consumers discovered that the reputation of Japanese cars being cheap and poorly made was not true. Not only did they get better gas mileage, but they were really reliable cars. My first import was a Toyota Tercel and the only things I put in that car over 100,000 miles were gas, oil, a set of tires and brake pads. Today you couldn't give me an American car, even though the imports are made here and most American cars are assembled elsewhere. Impressions last a long time.
That's how I see MSFT. For years they were turning out crap and people are in the process of discovering that the alternatives are pretty good. I'm typing this on a Linux box. A few years ago I hadn't even heard of it. I'm never on the bleeding edge of technology and rarely even the leading edge. If I'm using Linux it's because it works. It works for me at home and, where appropriate, for my business customers.
MSFT will still be around for a long time, but I believe the market will change to include more alternatives and those alternatives will have a following of their own. There are a lot of people walking around with a MSFT chip on their shoulder that they'll never forget.
If it's one area MSFT has really fumbled it's inspiring customer loyalty. They're one of the few companies inspiring their customers to outright hostility. They've abused their market position by treating customers as a revenue stream. Most people will get tired of being porked after a while. We're there. MSFT traded short term quarterly gains for long term loyalty. That's what happens when bean counters run your company and Republicans run your country. And I believe people will remember a long time.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
If Google releases an online office suite, it's over for Microsoft. Imagine an office productivity suite that doesn't require installation, is always up-to-date, and is integrated with the 'net.
"Sufferin' succotash."
On the up-side, eventually you'll grow up and stop measuring yourself against the standards of teenagers.
Intellectuals! Liberals! Peacemongers! IDIOTS!!!
We all did once [for about 12 months]...
Microsoft is like oil (in more then one perspective). Sooner or later you have to shift to other resources. Just say that I believe it will be sooner then later. But if you still want to buy oil for your long term investment, be my guest.