Microsoft barely broke even on the 360 console mainly because of the $1 billion they had to dish out to extend warranties and etc for the ring of death issue (at least they recognize their fault and did the right thing). If not for this they would have turned a huge profit on the 360.
I own a 360 and never even thought about buying the HD DVD add on, I was actually very happy that it was just an add on and didn't force me to choose sides like the PS3 did (which is also the reason I bought a 360 instead of the PS3).
MS backed HD DVD because it uses VB scripting versus Blu Ray uses Java scripting, I'm fairly sure that competing with Sony/Blu Ray was not that high of a priority.
HD DVD loosing is definitley not a good thing for MS, but it is not by any means a 'nail in the coffin', making the HD DVD an add-on actually saved them.
What's so innovative about an iPod? It's just an MP3 player... err hard drive really. What's so innovative about Google... it's a search engine, there were many like it before and many will follow.
There are many underlaying technoliges behind those products that are very innovative (google's search algorithm oblitirated all others for ex.) I would say sync is more or less innovative in certain areas. Xbox live in xbox... Plus twenty thousand other technoliges you don't really see because Microsoft's products are closed-source.
If you wanna make money in business you don't do it by researching, you do it by copying what other's have spent money researching and implement/sell it for less because others are eating the Research costs... if anything, copying other very succesfull technologies is nothing but smart business.
Where do you get your facts? Saying that Office/Windows are the only profitable products at MS is far from true, if this was the case than they wouldn't be doing as good as they are (with profits).
Which is why there's a link with them all listed..... Half of the shit in windows/zune/xbox/server/sync..... was in some way created or innovated at MSR. MSR comes up with some idea, hands it off to a product group and they put it in where it fits, whether it be the spam filter in outlook or search algorithm in live. I don't think there are any purely made by MSR products on the market other than surface and some other prototypes.
Gates has not left yet.... He's never going to 100% leave, even once he's gone, he is still running MS part time along with Ballmer who has just as much of a passion for MS as Gates.
A lot of the technologies you see on the market today were born at MSR. There are also tons of projects brewing in there that are sci-fi like and probably won't hit the market for a good number of years if ever. The whole point of Research (not R&D) is to give researchers funds/space to brew ideas, most of which do not make it anywhere since they're either ahead of their time or simply fail. Those few that do come through and you actually see on the market are far between, the other majority simply end up in a patent or two and get shelved/trashed, this is the nature of it.
My point is that they do come up with a lot of stuff, most of which every day consumers don't get to see. Research at any company is an expenditure and pretty much never a profit but everyone should be glad that they at least put money into it instead of only "buying/acquiring" all new ideas. I know all you Microsoft haters are disagreeing but at least try to name a few new and innovative things that have come out of Google/Apple's/IBMs Research labs and I bet you'll see that they're just as few as at Microsoft.
Microsoft not coming up with new ideas? They only spend about $7 billion a year on research which last time I checked was more than Google, IBM, or anyeone else for that matter. I believe this counts as 'attempting to come up with new ideas'.
They've been buying a crap load of companies every year (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_acquired_by_Microsoft_Corporation), this is nothing new...
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Microsoft barely broke even on the 360 console mainly because of the $1 billion they had to dish out to extend warranties and etc for the ring of death issue (at least they recognize their fault and did the right thing). If not for this they would have turned a huge profit on the 360.
I own a 360 and never even thought about buying the HD DVD add on, I was actually very happy that it was just an add on and didn't force me to choose sides like the PS3 did (which is also the reason I bought a 360 instead of the PS3).
MS backed HD DVD because it uses VB scripting versus Blu Ray uses Java scripting, I'm fairly sure that competing with Sony/Blu Ray was not that high of a priority.
HD DVD loosing is definitley not a good thing for MS, but it is not by any means a 'nail in the coffin', making the HD DVD an add-on actually saved them.
What's so innovative about an iPod? It's just an MP3 player... err hard drive really. What's so innovative about Google... it's a search engine, there were many like it before and many will follow.
There are many underlaying technoliges behind those products that are very innovative (google's search algorithm oblitirated all others for ex.) I would say sync is more or less innovative in certain areas. Xbox live in xbox... Plus twenty thousand other technoliges you don't really see because Microsoft's products are closed-source.
If you wanna make money in business you don't do it by researching, you do it by copying what other's have spent money researching and implement/sell it for less because others are eating the Research costs... if anything, copying other very succesfull technologies is nothing but smart business.
http://www.microsoft.com/msft/download/Financial%20Operating%20Segment%20History.xls
Which is why there's a link with them all listed..... Half of the shit in windows/zune/xbox/server/sync..... was in some way created or innovated at MSR. MSR comes up with some idea, hands it off to a product group and they put it in where it fits, whether it be the spam filter in outlook or search algorithm in live. I don't think there are any purely made by MSR products on the market other than surface and some other prototypes.
Gates has not left yet.... He's never going to 100% leave, even once he's gone, he is still running MS part time along with Ballmer who has just as much of a passion for MS as Gates.
http://research.microsoft.com/research/projects/default.aspx Majority of those are not for everyday people use but they are advancing the CS field in vast strides which is what drives innovation...etc.
A lot of the technologies you see on the market today were born at MSR. There are also tons of projects brewing in there that are sci-fi like and probably won't hit the market for a good number of years if ever. The whole point of Research (not R&D) is to give researchers funds/space to brew ideas, most of which do not make it anywhere since they're either ahead of their time or simply fail. Those few that do come through and you actually see on the market are far between, the other majority simply end up in a patent or two and get shelved/trashed, this is the nature of it.
My point is that they do come up with a lot of stuff, most of which every day consumers don't get to see. Research at any company is an expenditure and pretty much never a profit but everyone should be glad that they at least put money into it instead of only "buying/acquiring" all new ideas. I know all you Microsoft haters are disagreeing but at least try to name a few new and innovative things that have come out of Google/Apple's/IBMs Research labs and I bet you'll see that they're just as few as at Microsoft.
Microsoft not coming up with new ideas? They only spend about $7 billion a year on research which last time I checked was more than Google, IBM, or anyeone else for that matter. I believe this counts as 'attempting to come up with new ideas'.
They've been buying a crap load of companies every year (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_acquired_by_Microsoft_Corporation), this is nothing new...