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Why Ballmer Should Leave Microsoft
An anonymous reader writes "In the wake of the announcement of Bill Gates' departure from the top spot at Microsoft, CNN Money is carrying an article arguing that Steve Ballmer should step down as well." From the article: "Since Gates stepped down as CEO in 2000 in favor of Ballmer, the company has floundered technically and strategically. As the company's chairman, chief software architect and supposed visionary, Gates deserves blame for missing the wave of Web-based software that has propelled Google and Yahoo. But Ballmer has made gaffes of his own in his longtime role as head of the company's business side. They include an undistinguished push into business applications to compete with Oracle, financial maneuvers that have failed to stir the stock - which has slumped 16 percent so far this year - and continuing antitrust problems in the United States and Europe."
If Ballmer and Microsoft had been wildly successful over the past few years most everyone here would be crying for the Microsoft juggernaut to be sunk or TOTALLY disbanded via political / legal means.
But many say they haven't been wildly successful over the past few years.
Either way the result is the same: people who don't like Microsoft are going to take pot-shots at them.
Cogito Ergo Sum
Ballmer should step down in favour of Mr T, because he pity the fool who don't got high-end video cards and 4GB RAM for Vista Aero!!!
Seriously... if Mr T was in charge of Microsoft, it would be profitable. This should not be modded funny because it's actually insightful.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Putting aside Rob Enderle's other failures as an analyst, I see him as simply trying to get back up on the wave of punditry that he completely missed with the revelation of Bill Gates leaving. If Ballmer doesn't leave, no one will care. If he does, then Enderle looks like he has an inside connection or excellent prognostication ability.
In reality, I don't see Mr. Ballmer leaving any time soon. The revolt wasn't due to the shareholders as much as Bill Gates just (apparently) getting sick of the day to day. Steve doesn't seem to share that boredom and he certainly doesn't have the hubris to realize that his leaving would be more beneficial to the stock price than any policy he enacts while in the driver seat.
"Gates deserves blame for missing the wave of Web-based software that has propelled Google and Yahoo"
Google and Yahoo's entire business model is web-based and advertisement based. One could just as easily argue that they deserve blame for having such a fragile model. It's not clear if building these web-based applications will be profitable or sustainable. Google in particular seems to be enjoying the same kind of unquestioning support that many dead dot-comms enjoyed.
I'll be the first to admit that I'm not Microsoft's #1 fan - I find thier business practices less than satisfying, and their software usually doesn't light my fires, but I have to give them a lot of credit for their business sense, so I'd like to see them do better.
Whether Ballmer leaves or not, there needs to be a shake up in the direction of the company, because in my mind, they've lost sight. Right now, they remind me of Sony: floundering about, trying to do several things at once, and not really winning either user love or support. They throw money at problems in the hope of winning something, but it doesn't seem like they really know what they are going to do when they get there except have another potential monopoly - and I think that's where they are failing. They're trying to recreate the Windows dominance, instead of just competing.
In a sense, it seems like what they keep trying to pursue is power, not money. And it keeps costing them user loyalty and potential revenue.
Take the Xbox: a $4 billion dollar loss. People can get up and shout "But they're number 2 in console sales", but they have lost $4 billion dollars, and it doesn't seem like they're going to do any better this time. Already the 360 in Japan has been a flop (even interesting looking games like "99 Nights" hasn't helped, through perhaps "Lost Planet" and "Blue Dragon" (if I got the name right) might help), their Xbox lead made users irritated by claiing that "nobody cares about backwards compatibility", a stance that he had to back pedal from as fast as possible. Then again, Sony's trying to figure out how to shoot their foot while sticking it in their mouth at the same time, so maybe they have a chance unless the Wii is as cool as people expect it to. But the Xbox division seems intent on "dominating" the gaming industry. As a counterpoint, look at Nintendo: 3rd place (whenever you take out the handhelds, which I never understand why people ignore), but profitable - and they don't care about being "first", just in making money on every sale.
Cable TV chasing, application server in big iron areas that hasn't panned out - it just seems like Microsoft's just throwing darts at a board, from what seems like an infinite supply of darts supplied by the Office and Windows monopoly. But if Google chips a little bit there, Apple a little bit there, all of the sudden bleeding money doesn't seem like a good idea.
My recommendation: they focus on what will make them money, not what will get them power. My father once made a comment that Bill Gates is intent on keeping Larry Ellison the 2nd richest man in the world (or in that area) by not porting MS SQL Server to Linux, Solaris, OS X, and everything else that they can. What if MS Office was *truly* ported to OS X (including true Outlook support instead of the "almost but close" version), with MS Project and Visio, and on Linux?
Instead of trying to make the world "support our monopoly", new leadership at Microsoft could focus on "what makes money?" Yes, there is a danger in making, say, SQL and Office for OS X and Linux, because that would potentially decrease the Windows desktop sales. But at the same time, it could ensure that if Windows ever goes away, they still have a steady source of income in the future - and it could make them a lot of money now.
It's a hard change to go from "We dominate the PCs, leverage that dominance and protect it" to "What do our customers want, and how can we fill that gap". Windows dominance has worked so well for so long, that I don't think MS can chance until that dominance is truly challenged. If Apple gets some sort of DarWine system working, if Vista keeps getting delayed, if Google actually makes the OS not matter - MS could be in trouble.
Granted, the odds are, nothing's going to happen to MS. People have predicted their demise for years, and I don't see things changing for them for 10 years. On the other hand, you never know when that "next big thing" that blows away the cu
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Whose to say Gates made a mistake letting google and yahoo create web based software? It's MS modus operandi to let others pioneer a field then they take it over. We all know the PC story and how IBM and apple and others pioneered it. Same with Wordprocessing and office software. And what about Programming IDEs?.
Now look at what is happening in the field of PDAs and telephones. And of course there's the Xbox which came lat to the party as well. And one might even speculate MS will make a bigger move on the Server side of computing soon.
MS is always late the to party. Pioneers get the arrows. Settlers get the land.
One can hardly say that google's web apps are either the wave of the future or that in the End it won't be MS that controls them. There was nothing defective about Gates strategy, it has worked in the past quite well.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Not ALL thick clients are irrelevant. You still need development environments, databases, and office apps that won't suddenly be "down for maintanance" in the middle of the day (and have more features than web-based systems can deliver at present). I'll be the first to say, I think the idea of distributed thin-client applications is fantastic, but there ARE problems that need to be solved first. And even then, how many people are going to accept the "pay per month" model that login-based services will almost certainly bring? The market for installable applications is far from dead.
As for "the whole idea of licenses for OS instances and that being a primary product is effectively dead IMHO"... what?? You still need a system on which to run the thin-client apps, even if that's all you use. And yes, some linux distros give it away for free, but that doesn't mean the idea of the OS as a marketable product is suddenly gone.
Slashdot needs a "-1, Wrong" moderation option.
The Urban Hippie
Seriously... if Mr T was in charge of Microsoft, it would be profitable.
:)
are you under the impression that M$ is currently not profitable?
http://kered.org
Unfortunately, the same "cancer" (to use an MS "Linux" term) that has affected MS has spread across the entire IT & service industry - namely, a complete redifinition (for the worse) of what is good customer service and what are good products.
It's because of hype, over-advertising & the gullibilities of the general populace that MS and its ilk can utilise the user community for "live testing" their software after that same community has already paid for it, that Hollywood can make profits from poor quality sequel movies, & that talentless plastic "musicians" (I use the term loosely) can be catapulted to chart success on the basis of a formulaic, manufactured ballad.
Added to this, customer service used to be about just *asking* your customers whether they were happy with what you did for them and listening to them when they weren't happy - now it's about graphs showing that "95% of all customer calls were answered within 10 seconds" with no mention of the fact that the caller and the agent probably do not share the same native language. But because *EVERYBODY* has done this (banks, utility companies, corporations, etc), everybody now offers lower quality statistical-dependent customer service and the poor customer suffers as a result.
I'd like to think that the reason for MS's worse fortunes over the past few years was due to we customers becoming more discerning - but then I look at the hideous amount of advertising and hype I'm pumped with every day and realise that if advertising didn't do its job, companies would *decrease* spending on it rather than increasing it...
No, it's nothing more than the capitalist bubble getting near to popping - Microsoft and all the others have to get greedier & greedier to consume larger and larger profits each year by creating products so fast that they have no time to test them properly before releasing them. In other words, their greed for money, not for serving the customer, is destroying themselves.
I like living in a capitalist society but capitalism only works when the customer-base exhibits self-control and intelligence before handing money over for any goods or service - unfortunately, 95% of the populace are brainless cattle...
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
The article disclosed a 16% deflation in MS stock.
That might be still profitable, but it's a sign of what's happening... they are moving in the WRONG direction.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
I just modded you Underated, happy now?
:)
And unrolled your moderation by posting. Good show.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Here's some entertainment for you. From google groups regarding Windows XP system requirements we get such gems as this:
OMG teh 300 MHZ and 128 MB ram!!! In a very short amount of time, the system requirements for Vista will be just as laughable.
Finding other idiots on
" He's believed to be behind a recent cost-cutting move to force the company's substantial contractor workforce to take an unpaid week off. Since contractors at Microsoft contribute to important projects and are often hired on as full-time employees, the move hurt morale."
/. about how some people at the top are really psychopaths, in the medical sense of the word. Still, technically that only has to mean not caring about others. But the more time goes by, the more it seems that some people at the top aren't just psychopathic, but also the sadistic kind. And some just seem to have a sort of hatred for those they're supposed to manage.
Ah, so he knows the magic words ("cost-cutting move") and likes to kick the workers in the teeth. I can see how Wall Street would love him.
*sigh* There's been a recent article linked to by
I mean, look at his cost-cutting move:
1. There are 52 weeks in a year, even if _everyone_ at MS was a contractor, and if salaries were the _only_ expenses MS ever has, it still would have saved less than 5% of the costs. But when you factor in that not everyone is, and also that execs salaries aren't the same as those of the peons thus shafted, and all the other costs, I'll take a wild guess and say that maybe he's saved 1% for the whole year. But wait, it gets better:
2. It's not like those people were sitting around idle. MS has enough coding going on at any given time, and taking enough flak over, say, Vista delays. So here's the more important part: that "cost saving" is more than offset by the fact that it was a week of them not producing stuff for MS. We're not talking a factory who's over-produced taking a week off, but forcing it onto people who were actually producing value for the company during that time. It's as idiotic a decision as, say, closing a bunch of Wal-Mart shops for a week: sure, you've saved the money for running them for a week, _but_ you've made a bigger loss by not selling anything in that time. So far from being a "cost-cutting measure", it was more like a profit-losing measure.
3. It was done purely for greed sake. It's not like MS was making heavy losses and needed that kind of penny-pinching to stay afloat. Forcing people to take unpaid time off when the company is making a healthy profit is... just pure unhealthy greed. Nothing more, nothing less.
4. It was accompanied by a drop in morale. Partially also because we're talking about people smart enough to understand points 1 to 3, and recognize a _stupid_ penny-pincher when they see one. Being shafted when the company is in dire straits is one thing, but being shafted for such a completely idiotic reason tends to leave a very bad aftertaste. Even if number 2 hadn't already done more harm than good, we're talking a loss of morale that'll span many months and for some people it will even stay around for ever. And it won't even affect only those shafted, but also the people who got to see their co-workers shafted by a dumb PHB. This alone is more than enough to cause more harm than any cost-savings he might have made.
So basically we're not even talking about a regular penny-pincher, we're talking about the dumbest kind of a PHB. The kind that makes the original PHB from Dilbert actually seem smart and competent by comparison. And the dumbest kind of decision one can do at a company.
And yet Wall Street loves him for it and likes the idea of him as a CEO...
I don't know... I really don't know... Are these people even focused on profit, or share value, or whatever, or are they just getting their jollies from shafting the workers and using profit as just an excuse?
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Yeah, but would you want to run XP a 300 MHz Pentium II and 128 MB RAM??? I believe those system requirements were a little too minimal...
Perhaps, but I like to think it was more a sly amalgamation of both those words as well as "queue", meaning "line up" and the Spanish "que?" or "why?" into an existential analysis of many of the world's malaises.
Clearly he is asking why the lineup of flying chair jokes is allowed or LET be started now. It is plaintive query about the values of a community which would reward those who would mock as august a personage as monkey-boy. An intellectual and insightful comment on the fragility of a society which fails to respect the sweaty and impulsive dancers on the stage of life.
There's a lesson here for us all..
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."