Slashdot Mirror
New Microsoft Strategy
A New York Times story
reports that Microsoft has unveiled a big shift in its internet strategy. "Software as a service," no "dogmatic commitment" to the Intel platform, and new hardware (a low-cost NC). Plus a revamped MSN, a portal for businesses, and free ham sandwiches for everyone (well, maybe next year). Other news reports are more skeptical, saying "Strategy-less" and "Nothing new."
Isn't that kind of like saying "several analysts said that Microsoft would use Office Documents to compete with the C programming language"?
WWJD? JWRTFM!!!
If it catches on, or manages to somehow "obsolete" the Personal Computer, do you really think big bad Bill will let you run anything except Microsoft software on it?
If this were any other company I'd have laughed it off.. *cough* Oracle *cough* Sun *cough*.. but Microsoft is one of the few companies with the resources to pull it off.
It sounds like they're going into the same space with their little boxes as Sony is with the PlayStation. The difference is that Sony has a massive presence in the consumer electronics industry and MS has none.
Given Microsoft's past failures to expand their franchise, I don't think we have much to fear. In fact, it'll be interesting to see what happens if MS commits a few billion dollars to this effort and then sees their PC margins shrink in the face of competition from Apple and Linux. Massive spending + declining revenues = serious cash crunch.
I've been waiting for the right time to buy 'puts' on Microsoft stock. I think it's finally here.
It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail. - Abraham Maslow
Not that there's anything wrong with a good ham sandwich, but if if I'm going to suffer through another microsoft product, I'm holding hout for the pastrami sandiwch. Course, fatty pastrami, and chewy unfiltered beer to wash it down. (And if it doesn't make me belch, it was too mild :)
hawk, who didn't actually hate windows 95 untilhe had to spend a day using it last month.
check out the coverage from the trial. Economicsts who have studied the pricing have estimated that it *is* a monopoly price, or at least is substantially above the market price.
However, note that there is a single monopoly profit ot be had--the market is for computers running office software, and the same monopoly profit can be extracted from dos, office, or a combination of the two, but the monopoly profit remains the same either way.
I especially liked how he said (sic) that "Yahoo. . . is not customizable."
He's a bit more outspoken than old Bill was, and a bit more WRONG.
Besides, just looking at him, I see an orange jumpsuit. Ya think his prison numbers are going to be in hex? Little-endian or big-endian?
"The number of suckers born each minute doubles every 18 months."
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
OK, whenever somebody makes a really cool product that might steal from MS's software revenue stream, what happens?
MS announces a competing product . . . everybody waits to buy until they can compare the two "competing" products to see which one is better, then MS never has their product materialize.
This sounds like MS is trying to keep corporate dollars from going to Sun Ray 1 terminals and nifty Sun Ultra Servers . . .
Or am I way off base?
"Flame away, I wear asbestos underwear"
Read the essay, and note how software as service has the _potential_ to overcome the worst of the defects in the traditional software model.
Of course, this doesn't allow proprietary SW to overpower free software, but it does remove its greatest instability. Probably the best part of this move is that the need for agressive growth in order to survive will quite likely be removed. MS will be able to stop attacking and still make good money.
Now, I've analyzed this as a big shot in the arm for proprietary software. And so it is! But it's not bad for free software either, because as more people come to understand that software maintainance is the thing you're paying for, they'll come to understand that the code itself is a weapon in the hands of their enemy only when it's secret.
I'm very optimistic about this, for both free software and proprietary software. And best of all, for programmers' salaries -- this model change may removed the much-bandied about salary drop that even RMS sees as inevitable because of free software.
Software users of the world -- UNITE! You have nothing to lose but your chains.
A discussion of the many ways in which MS can mess this beautiful thing up is, of course, beyond the scope of this editorial. ;-). I'm sure others will cover the problem.
-Billy
No one will ever force you to buy one. PC's will not suddenly be banned when there finally is an alternative available.
True, but if they're not profitable anymore than no one will make them.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if the availability of an alternative even caused the prices to drop, which is always a good thing. If big bad Bill want's to sell a NC, but makes it impossible for non MS software to run on it, his NC will fail to compete with other NC's that do not pose such restrictions.
Microsoft's track record (and Intel's for that matter) proves that people will often buy what is cheaper over what is better. Because M$ would be making the hardware and the only software that could run on it, it could sell the NC at rock-bottom prices that absolutely no one else is in any position to match (except possibly Apple, but they won't do it).
It would make as little sense as making windows for microsoft apps only.
I'm sure they're working on it. There's already the hidden API.
Why should you care what a company you boycott sells to other people?
How about not a monthly fee, but a fee for each time you use a product? It would be absolutely brilliant for games, which I buy (I refuse to steal software, no matter how easy it is), play a lot for a few weeks, and then never again. Or a commercial spreadsheet or wordprocessor, which I only need a few times a month (emacs is a horrible editor to write lab reports in (-; and don't tell me I really should learn how to customize it. I really should learn how to speak Japanese too).
If the revival of the dumb terminal catches on, thew OS that runs on it is not going to be windows 2000, so the playing field will be more level in that area. Perhaps some company will even make linux-client terminals?
If they make the box on something like a Dreamcast or PlayStation2, and you can "do" things via whatever ROM-based programs you have, then it's still "useful" if your netconnection isn't up.
I think you miss the boat on MS & XML. The problem isn't that MS is using XML. It's that all MS is using XML for is to store ActiveX controls within MS XML documents. Great, but not if you're not using a MS XML document viewer (IE5 or Office2K), because you don't have an environment for the ActiveX control to run [amok] in.
Does that mean people will be 'renting' or 'leasing' software from Microsoft now? Granted, it's already happening in the corporate world, but will that move to the home and small-business markets, too? That seems like a strange move.
What I don't understand is why people still charge for software when other people give away hardware for signing up with an ISP or what-have you.
I would think that software is less likely than hardware to be considered a commodity. Insert standard line about the cost of replicating hardware versus the cost of copying software here. On the other hand, Microsoft doesn't sell much hardware, and their support doesn't seem worth the price to home users.
Not that home users account for much revenue there, but the NY Times article did talk about MSN....
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QDMerge 0.21!
how to invest, a novice's guide
Microsoft may no longer have "a dogmatic commitment to the PC platform" but the PC platform has a dogmatic commitment to Microsoft. And that platform is going the way of all flesh.
... Expect a change ...
:-)
Intel ain't gonna make no more. They've got a whole bunch of new toys they want us to buy and if we're not paying a tithe to Redmond, it means we can afford to spend more on those toys. Intel wants to change partner and is dancing with a Penguin on its new 64 bit ballroom. Motorola's happy with that too.
I suspect we'll see MS go the way DRI did when the Z80 and 8-bit machines got supplanted by the 8086, 68000 and the 16 bit machines...
The war for 16 bits on the desktop was won by Intel and Microsoft Windows against Motorola and the Apple GUI based on their existing pre-eminence in the business market (No manager ever got fired for recommending IBM and then for saving some corporate bucks by recommending IBM compatible.)
The 32-bit skirmishes are now coming to a close with Intel and MS hanging on but with Motorola and Apple still very much in fighting trim.
But now that the x86 architecture is hitting the wall and the PPC chips are crawling up the evolutionary ladder with gigaflop machines with 128-bit wide AltiVec straight out of the Apple boxes.
Intel doesn't want to put a hundred more billion dollars in anybody else's pocket but their own. Neither does Motorola.
Result? Look for the Free Software Foundation to get some major funding "slid under the door" until it starts to look like a P.A.C.
(You heard the prognostication here first!
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
The company called the new approach its "everyday Web" strategy and, in a complete turnabout, said it no longer had a dogmatic commitment to the PC platform.
What? This is the same company that dropped the Alpha from its NT2k build. Hmm. No commitment to the Intel world. Baloney. What a load of crock. I guess we could interpret this as to mean something web-centric not PC-centric? Hasn't this been tried many times before (the laughable NC) and failed each time? Sorry. This is insane. When will these "bright" companies wisen up and figure out that we don't want these stupid NCs. In two words, they suck. No control is given to the user at all with these boxes. They have their places, but it is not on my desktop (no matter what Ellison thinks).
About XML, I've worked with it before. It is servicable. But, the key idea behind XML is that everyone HAS to use it in order for it to succeed. I have sincere doubts about that. Microsoft's entering in to this arena makes it even more dubious that it will succeed on its own merits (or lack thereof).
Justin
Mu. P.S. The address you see is real. =)
Wow, kudos to Mary Joe Foley for her well written response.
And she's right. There's an interesting comparison that can be drawn between restructuring for perceived market value (MSN) versus doing it out of, well, desperation.. (SGI) SGI is making huge strides and sweeping changes to their company, their rebuild is an all-content, no BS move. MSN is more la-la land nonsense.
To paraphrase someone from SGI recently, the market punishes lack of focus. MSN is nothing more than a continuation of M$'s strategy to get their BRAND in front of everyone. It doesn't really have to work or provide value to accomplish its goal. In other words, MSN, as a company, has no focus. So, they'll continue to be punished. I personally doubt that this matters much to M$, tho.:)
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Blue
i browse at -1 because they're funnier than you are.
But the reason that MSFT has all the office revenue is because they own the platform on which it runs. So long as they hold on to their OS monopoly, they can introduce OS updates that kill off competitors products (Remember:"DOS isn't done until Lotus won't run"?).
They don't guage the public by charging "monopoly prices" on the OS... they treat the OS as a "loss-leader" in order to sell their overpriced Office-Suites and Development Tools, not to mention NT Client Access licenses.
Office, which is a business necessity, suffers from no reasonable competition, so it floats on HUGE profit margins. In areas where MS has competition, their products are priced substantially below the competition (SQL Server vs. Oracle 8i)///
I KNOW! Linux is free and blah blah blah, but really. I work in a huge company, and the only plans that I've heard for possible Linux use are in Server applications (DNS, EMAIL, possibly intranet) and is most definetly not headed for desktops anytime soon.
Not the most credible thing in the world, even coming from the NYT.
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Wage Slave Journal
You're right about one thing: the place for NCs is not on your desktop. It's in your car, in your house, in your refrigerator, in your TV set, in your alarm system, in your pocket, in your eyeglasses, and eventually in your brain.
Face it, baby: the death of box-sized $1000 computers is nearing, and before you know it, speaking about a computer as separate from the network will be an anachronism. No matter what you (or Larry) want.
To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
You see, the commitment isn't "dogmatic", it's "pragmatic". It was just too darn hard to keep it limping along on the more modern architectures. Nothing dogmatic about it.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
In case people don't know this, Windows (all versions included) is not M$'s primary source of revenue. That would be their Office suite, which accounts for 40% of that very large pie.
"Our research shows that as many as 50 percent of AOL members are extremely dissatisfied and would switch to another provider with better and more reliable service," he said.
I think it's more along the lines of "50% of AOL realized that AOL sucks, they are no longer newbies, and can do without the constant handholding and advertising."
Also I still think NC's are a bad idea. We already have mainframes on our desktop (at a a grand a pop), why go back to dumb terminals? Unless they can sell them for $100 (which, BTW, you can get a full computer for, with rebates) and have full servic^H^H^H^H^Hprograms for $20/month it will never fly.
Does anyone else see bad decisions forced by a slight sense of panic? Market leaders don't have to innovate to stay ahead, they can lag and then buy. "Push" technology part two. The bandwidth isn't here for this stuff yet, and won't be for probably another generation. I (and my mom with my advice) will NOT buy a network computer.
+&x
Don't be too sure Apple wouldn't do it. Apple has been very interested in the network computer idea. The iMac, in fact, is thought to be a repackaged failed network computer design. It even identifies itself on the network when searching for a netboot server as "MacNC". Also, Oracle is very interested in network computers, and Elison(sp?) is not only on Apple's BoD, but is known to be good friends with Jobs. It isn't all that difficult to imagine a joint Apple/Oracle network computer project.
So if MS does move into this market, there might well be competition. Not just from (possibly) Apple, but from set top boxes, things like the iToaster, and Sun's Java computers.
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Please take the following comments for what they are, speaking from the perspective of an independant developer.
Unlike a large majority of the users here, I'm not totally against microsoft. For me, they've done quite a bit, made computing easy for the average user. This has created a huge market for independant developers, and MS has to some degree catered to developers (the documentation on MSDN is an amazing resource for any serious Win32 developer).
Perhaps one of the primary reasons (aside from the market share) that I've continued to target the Win32 platform is microsoft's ability to negate the NC concept at every turn. Obviously they've done this for their own benefit, to protect their PC market, which is also the market that independant developers target.
I can only wonder if MS realizes the implications of changing it's focus away from PCs. The only reason windows is where it is is due to software. An OS is nothing without software, and contrary to what MS believes, they cannot develop it all themselves.
I really have to wonder if they're serious, because if they are, I envision a mass exodus of developers from the windows platform. I know I will be among the first, as I've already started analyzing alternate operating systems for server applications.
All I really want is a real IDE for Linux/BSD.
Their idea of a NC is funny to me.. 'Windows Terminals' as they called them, with 'Windows Terminal Server'. Brand new technology, they called it. Cheaper end computers, as they are simply stipped computers with Monitors and a keyboard..
;-P
;-P
I'm feel like I've seen this before..
Oh wait.. THAT'S X-Windows..
Wow, X-Windows is NEW? Who woulda known, I coulda sworn it's been around for YEARS..
-- I'm the root of all that's evil, but you can call me cookie..
Well, I've played with an Oracle NC and it was terrible.
/. :)
However, MS has the software to get it done...and if they don't they could buy it.
If MS really pushed a NC to the business world as a cheap thing to put on everyones desk, I wonder what that would do to back-end servers. Right now a Linux box can sit behind a windows network just fine because of things like Samba.
But what happens when a MS NC is just a windows terminal...then that pretty much means the server behind it needs to be an NT server. And once one NT server gets in the door, many IS shops will just move everything to NT for the interoperability.
Another way for MS to make sure people buy NT?
Or am I just getting paranoid from too much
This is a subtle move by Microsoft to move itself in a position to take advantage of the "alternative OS" marketplace should it's primary source of revenue collapse. They may sell bad software, but they're not stupid - they know the marketplace inside out. Am I suprised? No. But I'm still not going to buy "winux 2005".
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The real value of information is the organization of that information.
Yes, there are millions of websites out there. Yes, there are probably dozens of them with information relating to what I want to know at any given moment. Now how do I find them? (Substitute 'websites' with whatever you prefer.)
THAT will be the killer application and the killer service to provide -- not generating new information nor providing access to it, but helping people find and use it.
I think the OSS community had that in hand a long time ago. Would you rather sit on the phone for four hours to talk to a low-paid support technician who might be able to send a bug report to a Bug Report Engineer who might have met a programmer once on the line, or would you rather read the kernel-dev archives?
If information is free, then the ability to find the information you want is invaluable.
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QDMerge 0.21!
how to invest, a novice's guide
I used to be a dev lead on the a MSN team. Yes I worked for the evil empire and since I have run very fast from anything looking like M$ jobs. But hey it looks real good on my resume. When I was there, signs hung in the all above machines with AOL accounts setup stating "Know Your Enemy" I did, we all did. Anything that was not Microsoft. Not just AOL but the whole world. The need of M$ to be the top of what they do is amazing. These are people that where the top of the class over-achievers all there life's. I know I am one too. It is very hard to have a few hundred of these type of people working together, egos clash, but you know what? EVERY PRODUCT WAS THE BEST THAT COULD BE DONE. JD Powers thought so, naming MSN the best ISP for service etc. I believe that the guys there will get their shit straight and deliver a good product. What the world does not know is MSN is part of M$ not M$. The idea of service is top concern on the minds of the brass within MSN. Now as I think back, would I do it again? Fuck no. Will I ever again, fuck no. Will MSN be a power on the net? Maybe. Will MSN innovate fast enough to match the rest of the worlds needs. I doubt it. Will this little box work? The public wants it. What does M$ and it's divisions/subsitararies do best? Give people what they THINK they want. Will it be a success? Yes, anyone can be brainwashed, just look at all the people that use Office.
If Microsoft was giving away ham sandwiches, I might be convinced to start liking them as a company. Of course, my shift in opinion rests on the assumption that the mayonnaise will not be rancid, the ham isn't really from a cow, and I won't be forced to upgrade to larger mustard packets half-way through my meal.
Remember, you is what you am; a cow don't make ham.
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I thought "Me Too!" was a service mark of AOL. Micorsoft is probably going to find themselves in court again over this one....
Seriously, this whole thing is funny as Hell. After all the bullturf about how innovative Micorsoft is and what a visionary Bill Gates is, a single announcement from Sun makes them stop on a dime and announce a new vision setting the company off in a direction 179 degrees away from where they've been headed since... since... since last time this happened. With all the visionaries, futurists, seers, shamans, astrologers, and hinge-with-butt-straps designers on board, why do they always let someone else announce The Next Big Thing (TM) first?
The only thing that could make this richer would be for Sun to come out tomorrow and say "Just Kidding!"
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
10) Competitors now to be broiled in lemon butter before being swallowed whole
9) Software will be offered as services, due Microsoft's stellar performance in the service department
8) Windows refund requests to be considered by an additional layer of management before being rejected
7) Brand-new innovative network computing device bears no resemblance whatsoever to Sun's network computing devices
6) Windows2000 slogan announced -- Windows2000: Not Just the Kitchen Sink
5) Bill Gates' charitable contributions not directly tied to Microsoft's PR engine
4) Plan to increase worker productivity by allowing play of Civ:CTP during coffee breaks
3) Plan to dock all workers playing Linux version of Civ:CTP during said coffee breaks
2) Customers who sign up for 3 years of MSN to get free PC, rebate, small Carribean island
1) There's a strategy!
We want endless gardens of data, where the bits can flower, flourish and reproduce. -- Andy Mueller-Maguhn