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Leaked Memo Gives Microsoft New Direction?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the google-in-the-crosshairs dept.

daria42 writes "An e-mail memo sent from Microsoft chairman Bill Gates to top execs at Microsoft has been leaked, revealing the executive wants his company to hurriedly change its focus and start to tap online advertising and services as new revenue sources. In the e-mail, Gates cites another, earlier memo, sent from MS exec Ray Ozzie, in which Ozzie also warns MS of the importance of focusing on the online medium. 'It's clear that if we fail to do so, our business as we know it is at risk,' Ozzie wrote. 'We must respond quickly and decisively. We should've been leaders with all our web properties in harnessing the potential of Ajax, following our pioneering work in OWA (Outlook Web Access),' he continued. 'We knew search would be important, but through Google's focus they've gained a tremendously strong position.'"

4 of 407 comments (clear)

  1. Ajax by grazzy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Sure, it's great and all, but it'll never change the way the web works. Improve it, yes. Change it? No. You can build as large js-applications as you wish (and yes, spend exponentially as much time debugging them) - you will never escape the fact that you're just building hacks around a stateless technology from pre 90's.

  2. Programming Philosophies by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Unix: Do one thing, and do it well
    Mac: Do a few things, but be simple, and secure about it
    Windows: Do lots of things, some well, most not, but get them into production fast

  3. Article summary by Dekortage · · Score: 5, Insightful

    In a nutshell: "We missed the boat again. Smaller companies are beating us. Let's crush them. Go Microsoft!"

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    $nice = $webHosting + $domainNames + $sslCerts
  4. Re:Next up by jkrise · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Fact is ... And ... (hope all the Slashdotter's are sitting down) ... they don't care about OS security or a few bugs...

    Fact is.. this is Slashdot. For the rare Joe ServicePack reading these pages, he ought to be better informed. Not mis-informed.

    Bill knows this and knows what sells, "wasting" time on fixing security holes and the like does not deliver more profit to the shareholders.

    If enough developers got informed about the real Directions at Microsoft and stayed away from the Windows platform, the shareholders would turn a pck of hungry wolves. Ordinary users would have few, if any worthwhile apps to run on their Windows boxes.

    Once they start using Firefox and Opera and get comfy with the interface, they'd rapidly change the engine as well.

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    If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....