Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Encouraging OEMs to Beautify Computers
Grooves writes "Microsoft has shipped a 'Vista Industrial Design Toolkit' to PC manufacturers, meant to
encourage them to design computers that are more visually appealing. From the article: 'From color palettes to suggestions about how the power and reset buttons should appear, the kit basically describes Microsoft's vision of what a Vista PC should look like. The look features accelerated curves and purposeful contrast, among other qualities.' The report goes on to say that Microsoft wants 'PCs to be objects of pure desire.' Sound familiar? It's hard to see budget-conscious OEMs stepping up to this."
I was sure you were going to link to this one.
Please make it close to the size of a laptop.
I don't want a another pretty but big object in my house.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Dear Microsoft,
It seems that you are doing a lot of things lately to tell me what I want out of your products. Vista's new UI, and now these fancy industrial design specs.
Guess what? I couldn't care less what the shape of my PC is. It is under the desk with my UPS, subwoofer and trash can. And I have no need for a fancy new desktop UI, especially one that takes resources away from what I actually want to do with my computer, like photo and video editing.
What I want is excellent software, compatible with open standards, for a reasonable price. You used to deliver this. When you delivered virtual memory and preemptive multitasking, you were ahead of Apple. Now you seem way behind. And also, I want you to support open standards so that I can use other products with others that haven't paid you a licensing fee, such as open source. I'm not a sheep to lock in. Hello Linux and OSX.
And your prices are far from reasonable. The fact that I can't transfer a OEM Windows licence from one PC to another is rubbish. The fact that you want $399 for the standard edition of office, which I have paid you for several times over the years is robbery. I was happy with the functionality of office five years ago. Why should I need to buy it again? Hello, Open Office.
I'm not a sheep, Microsoft. You used to be innovative. Now you are all about marketing. Its been fun, but we're breaking up!
On one of my rare walks through Walmart yesterday, I noticed a DVD player for $34.00.
:)
It's hard to imagine that there is $1200 worth of electronics in the new Dell computer I just got at work. As cell phones and iPod-like devices become ever-more powerful at sub-$200 prices, it's going to cast an ever-more powerful spotlight on the PC market. I've thought for some time that we are on the verge of seeing PC's become commoditized like calculators.
This latest blurb from Mircosoft is an attempt to stop PCs from becoming generic commodities - because once they start to look like that consumers will expect them to be priced like that.
I already do.
Steve
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
When you've got a product in a comodity market where the software (which costs about $.50 to duplicates can cost more than the hardware (which costs $200 + to duplicate), you don't have a whole lot of room in the 'make it look pretty' department.
If you want a pretty box, then go to a corner computer store and buy one of their 'pretty' boxes for an extra $20-$50 -- or go to a custom box modder and pay out to your heart's content.
Apple can afford to put an extra $10-$20 into box design because they still have the software markup built into the price.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
You do realise, don't you, that software developers don't work for free at Apple (or Microsoft) and therefore the true cost of software is not the duplication cost? Oh and there's graphic designers, test hardware, etc. as well.
I would submit that Apple finally "got it" when they started using standard DIMMs (versus proprietary), PCI-based graphics (versus proprietary), IDE drives (versus SCSI), USB (in addition to firewire), standard monitors, and now Intel CPUs.
proprietary | (protected by trademark or patent or copyright; made or produced or distributed by one having exclusive rights)
NuBus was an IEEE standard. The Mac RAM wasn't proprietary either. If my memory serves FireWire did not predate USB on the Mac platform either. I don't recall Macs with built in FireWire and ADB ports, so I'm not sure about the USB in addition to FireWire comment. small video adapters were available to plug VGA/SVGA monitors into the earlier Mac video port (which were also another Int'l standard, nothing proprietary).
While I see something in your point, your examples seem weak by comparison.
[UID-HeinzIntel]
Then please explain MS's 95% marketshare versus Apple's 5%?
Actually, MS has 100% market share if you consider that Windows now runs natively on Apple hardware. But you'd be better off considering Apple as a harware manufacturer and comparing them to Dell, HP and the likes and not Microsoft.
Here are Gartner's numbers
Which show Apple is the 4th largest after Dell, HP and Gateway.
Comparing OS numbers is only relevant for Software developers now that Macs run Windows. Which may have been brilliant marketing, but also the new reality.
As a starting point, I'd like to suggest designers read, "A Whole New Mind" by Daniel Pink, and check out some articles at: http://www.danpink.com/. Furthermore, I suggest visiting IDEO http://www.ideo.com/ideo.asp. Pay special attention to their "method card" deck. Lastly (for purposes of this discussion) I suggest visiting http://www.mcdonough.com/# . The common thread in all this is DESIGN. William McDonough says that the need for regulation indicates a failure in design.
2 ,00.asp http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/input/ ) to really innovative interfaces ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croquet_project http://www.sun.com/software/looking_glass/).
The design of the product goes 'way beyond just cosmetics. There is only so much you can do with an enclosure for a PC board, but there is LOTS you can do with the system as a whole. Case modding is just a place to start. Functional design improvements are being made in everything from the input devices ( http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,111201
The IDEO method cards are different from the "Creative Whack Pack" or "Thinkertoys" cards, in that they redefine the product design domain. The jobs of the future are going to be design jobs requiring both high creativity and high technical ability. If someone in India or China can do your job as well and cheaper than you, or if a computer can do your job better and faster, your job is obsolete.
"The mind works quicker than you think!"
I don't see a large mass of people falling over themselves to upgrade to Vista. Most are just happy with what they have. My PC is nearly 6 yrs old, but I have no need to upgrade. I'm not editing video, and the last game I was into in a big way was Doom. Cruise the web and read email about does it for me nowadays. Compared to the vast majority of the people I meet, I'm a power user that lives for my computer. So how do we get people to buy new computers (MS' biggest source of OS revenue), if they're plenty happy with the one they have? Make the box pretty.
There was a big push to beautify boxes just after Apple started their resurgance. It had an impact, but not a big one. People still looked for the same thing...the cheapest price. I don't know anyone who will buy a new computer just because the new one has a prettier box.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
...and don't assume they *will* have all the game-friendly features and power that a non-Apple gaming machine has right now. It's great to speculate what power these new Macs will have, but at the present time, Macs are not stellar game machines.
LegendMUD
MS is a software company not hardware. Although, in the last decade it can be argued that the products only exist to give the marketing department something to do.
This "Industrial Design Toolkit" screams "we're afraid of Apple". MS obvisously wants to strongarm the OEMs into creating simulacrums of Apple's product design philosophy. It works for Apple because there's really only one person at the top: Steve Jobs. Never mond the fact that Apple hardware and software visually mesh, with the design itself being clean and elegant, if not minimalist.
MS plus all the OEMs will not be able to pull this off. Will Dell, HP, Lenovo, or any other OEM be willing to adhere to design guidelines that reduce or eliminate the recognizability of their products for the sake of the software installed on them (which is not their product)? Hell no. The next step would be for MS to require that all laptops have a light-up Windows logo on the back of the screen in order for the OEM to get reduced cost Windows licensing. The OEMs will laugh at that, and many lawyers will get rich off of the lawsuits.
The only way an industry wide hardware branding for Vista can happen is if MS outright buys the PC divisions of every OEM in existance, and begin to make themselves into a mirror of Apple. But, they won't do that, because a 400% margin on software (Office) is more profitable than an 8% margin on all the hardware to run Office. Of course, it's more than likely that they would completely botch this, and in 10 years there would be little left of the PC market.
Plus, this is just another seemingly innocent move which reveals that MS is very afraid that Vista won't sell on its own.
I'm not sure i'd want MS picking my color scheme, see the microsoft grovy wireless mouse as an example.
But i'm all for breaking away from the ubiquitous beige box. Granted these days it's the ubiquitous black box, but the point is valid. A computer is a household appliance not unlike your TV or your dish washer. People go out of their way to buy matching washers and dryers. Dishwashers are often sold with optional faceplaces to match the kitchen. And there is always a tendy color of the decade such as avacado or almond. If microsoft wants to go out of their way to create color pallets, more power to them. Odds are there would be one that is not too offencive. It would be nice to be able to at the very least get a matching monior, keyboard, and printer.
But most important, really most imporant I see is standarzing the size and shape and color of the power and reset buttons. This isn't an issue for slashdot users, but joe user and easily be confused with the placement of the power button. I'm not being insulting, you can spy them with ease if you look dead on but when the desktop moves under the desk, the only thing you can see is this round bit and this other round bit, where round bit could be sleep, reset, or off. And between the location and placement of power buttons on desktops, monitors, printers, well you can see where this would be an issue. This is one of those cases where it doesn't actually matter too much what the end result looks like, so long as there is something consistent. For example, no bugger knows how to turn on my canon ip5200 printer, they alway hit the silver button next to the unlit LED which is resume stop, or the button dead center which is the front cover release.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
Let me let you into a little secret about why people make games: They like making games, and will do what they can to keep making them. Noone inside much gives a shit about the platform. If you can't make games that sell you won't have an opportunity to make them long. Getting market share for the Mac is Apple's problem. Not EA's, not Bioware's, not anyone else's.
Your strawman argument is pretty amateurish, even by Slashdot standards. I would argue that misdirected idealism is the cause of most of the bloodshed throughout history, not apathy. If Pol Pot, Stalin, and Robespierre had cared about nothing but money their homelands might well be better off.
Define "good looking".
There is a difference between being an eyesore and being merely neutral in appearance. I don't buy a car for looks, I look at safety features, gas mileage, price, and fitting my needs. My PC buying is similar - it is within my price range, it does what I need, and etc. Looks never come into the equation because they all look about the same and are not unsightly.
Microsoft designing/building their own hardware? They're doing it with the "iPod killer", why not with PC's? Hell, if they threw enough bucks at it, I bet they could kill Dell, too.
The vast majority of PC users that make up their 9X% market share are 1) in the government and 2) in large corporations and other businesses. These users don't have a choice of which computer they use--it's decided for them by purchasing agents, etc., and those buyers couldn't care less about what a PC looks like, only that it's the least expensive box they can buy to do the job.
The difference with Macs is that the 100-9X% of Mac market share is overwhelmingly made up of consumers who personally choose which computer they're going to buy. How a computer looks is a more important consideration for them.
The consumer part of Microsoft's market, even though it's a minority, is starting to be eroded by Apple. The latest quarterly financial reports by Dell and Apple show that. Microsoft's call for "cool-looking" PCs is a knee-jerk reaction of their management to try to stem that erosion. If it adds cost to boxes, it ain't gonna happen.