He is right about Windows 7 though. Best version. Wrong about Vista. Why Microsoft wouldn't work for a more seamless upgrade to 7 from XP is almost inexcusable however. For the people who think XP is good enough, they'll stick with it.
Microsoft should have made just two versions of Windows 7. Windows 7 Professional (for business and enterprise) & Windows 7 Consumer (for all home users). But that would make too much sense now wouldn't it.
I wouldn't dare say they should make only one version, that would be ludicrous!
If they did however I came up with an amazing name for it, took me weeks of deep thought, analyses and research: Windows 7
Win7 is good. MS knew it when they released an open Beta a half-year before it would hit Ty shelves. Vista is even good now, but the damage is done and a rebranding was required. I think we'll see Win7 eat away at some of Apple OS marketshare this holiday quarter despite Apple having another record Mac quarter. All that is fine.
As for the version variances, I think business model requires multiples versions. Apple acts like a boutique PC maker and dominates the premimium market, but MS sells OEM copies of consumer and business PCs rangeing from $300 (maybe less in some countries) to several thousand dollars. Apple uses HW features to upsell their Mac, but MS can only use softwarw features to upsell their OS.
As for the version variances, I think business model requires multiples versions. Apple acts like a boutique PC maker and dominates the premimium market, but MS sells OEM copies of consumer and business PCs rangeing from $300 (maybe less in some countries) to several thousand dollars. Apple uses HW features to upsell their Mac, but MS can only use softwarw features to upsell their OS.
So you were at that "Profit V Simplicity" meeting too?
I was going to upgrade my daughter's now unused netbook from XP Starter to Win 7 basic, but the price is way too high for that. Also, the hassle is just too much.
Have you looked intonthe OEM price? It's leagal, you just don't get any MS support like you do from the retail version, which I doubt you want anyway.
Win7 is good. MS knew it when they released an open Beta a half-year before it would hit Ty shelves. Vista is even good now, but the damage is done and a rebranding was required. I think we'll see Win7 eat away at some of Apple OS marketshare this holiday quarter despite Apple having another record Mac quarter. All that is fine.
As for the version variances, I think business model requires multiples versions. Apple acts like a boutique PC maker and dominates the premimium market, but MS sells OEM copies of consumer and business PCs rangeing from $300 (maybe less in some countries) to several thousand dollars. Apple uses HW features to upsell their Mac, but MS can only use softwarw features to upsell their OS.
Let's put it this way, 7 is what Vista should have been when it first came out.
Otherwise, it's not much of an upgrade. Even Ballmer made the statement that 7 is "Vista done right".
And people complain that Apple is charging $29 for 10.6, but where are all the Windows fans about the price of 7?
If it's just Vista done right, then shouldn't it be free? After all, despite Ireland's cheapness, 10.6 has more than a few major new structures and innovations. Vista does not.
What I am not sure here is who got screwed more, MS, Verizon or T-Mobile. Lucky for Motorola they told MS to take a hike last year. They probably figured when MS bought Danger they were going to compete directly with them.
I can tell VZ and MS deserve each other, both companies destroy innovation, I just find it funny that VZ probably lead MS along saying they would take their phone and probably encourage MS that it would be the iphone killer, but they were saying the same thing to every other phone company. I can tell they told Motorola for years they want this and that in a phone and Motorola would do it only to have VZ say sorry we decide to go with someone elses phones. MS has done the same thing to customer and to business partners.
- the Pink MS phone is dead, right? Win CE still rules forever, no new OS approach will be allowed. ...
Not sure about this part.
We don't actually know what they are doing with WinMobile 7.0 do we? One might assume that it's a whole new codebase given that WM 6.5 is just a new UI bolted onto the old stuff.
On the other hand MS is famous for dumb moves like that so perhaps WM 7.0 will just be 6.5 with even more fins and chrome bolted onto it.
Engineers like to add features. one of their favorite phrases is " Why don't we add...".
You have to tell them "NO!". And mean it.
I don't think that there's anyone at MS who can do that.
This is very well said. Saying 'no' internally is the big difference between a decision that might please colleagues with a decision that gets the product right for consumers.
The assumption that good, rational sensible decisions are being made inside companies is mostly the stuff of text-books, not what really goes on.
It seems that the PM who shouts loudest, and who has the strongest political ties, gets to ship his team's product, often at the expense of a competing project which may ultimately better align with corporate brand strategy.
Sadly, this is true in many large organizations. But it never helps to have a CEO who can out-shout everyone else below him, and who also doesn't have a shred of class.
A lot of Microsoft's problems may be deeply rooted, given their history of legacy-worship. But even for entirely new products (except when they directly copy an already-successful competitor), the stink of Ballmer and the rest of his executive cronies wipes out any chance of elegance or attention to design details. I imagine there are three kinds of people who work there: Frat-boy toadies who love Ballmer; weekly paycheck drones who wear blinders to get through the day; and misguided dreamers who thought the resources of Microsoft could be guided towards better products and either squeak out a rare success or buckle under the reality that their efforts can be stomped on by corporate politics or a clueless marketing department.
Let's put it this way, 7 is what Vista should have been when it first came out.
Otherwise, it's not much of an upgrade. Even Ballmer made the statement that 7 is "Vista done right".
And people complain that Apple is charging $29 for 10.6, but where are all the Windows fans about the price of 7?
If it's just Vista done right, then shouldn't it be free? After all, despite Ireland's cheapness, 10.6 has more than a few major new structures and innovations. Vista does not.
I would argue that Vista SP1 is Vista done right, though Win7 has a new look and streamlined features that are Mac-like which is why I prefer it.
I don't think it should be free because how could MS charge for OEM copies then and if it was priced the same as SL then they would have to less than thagvfor OEM copies. The vendors could then just buy the retail version an push OS support to MS. If the market supports $300 for a retail version of Windows then so be it. I would pay that, but I support their right to do so.
I can't agree with Ireland's stance that SL is not worth the cost. I've been using it as my primary OS since about March. I'm impressed at how much they have redone and how well they hve set themselves up for the future.
I was going to upgrade my daughter's now unused netbook from XP Starter to Win 7 basic, but the price is way too high for that. Also, the hassle is just too much.
I suspect that a lot of people wanting to upgrade from XP to 7 will either just wait until they need a new machine, or will buy 7 not knowing all the problems involved in the upgrade, which is well beyond what the average PC owner, who, after all, knows nothing about the system, can do.
Then the complaints will begin. What will happen when people spend $100 to $250 to buy the upgrade, only to find it's too much work, or too difficult to do? Likely they won't find out until they attempt the upgrade. After all, most people don't actually read the documentation that comes with products.
Possibly, instead of Win 7 slowing the migration to Macs, this will hasten it.
Considering that most people are still using XP...
Is it really that difficult?
Is it something that could be improved by writing some kind of migration assistant?
Is there some virtualization app on Windows 7, analogous to Parallels, where you could run XP and Win 7 to ease the migration?
If none of this is practical, wouldn't it be preferable to by a Mac and VM app of choice and run them both along with OS X?
Or, do you see people just migrating XP to OS X rather than to Win 7?
... And Steve Ballmer is simply a mindless salesman who doesn't have the critical thinking skills/vision to bring Microsoft into this new era of software/hardware development (i.e. adding value/support to well designed, market proven, open technology rather than ideologically working against it). Sorry Steve, but the era of vacuous sales pitches being able to win people over in the technology sector due to ignorance is coming to a close. I for one am glad to see it.
I really like this assessment of Steve Balmer. I think it's spot on.
The fact that he's "a salesman at heart" (as he himself admits), is well known, but the idea that he is a sort of bamboozler who has succeeded mainly due to the ignorance of the simple country folk he sells his "tonic" to is priceless. I believe that when the historians look back on this early computer period they will see Microsoft, and specifically Balmer as exactly that. Business focussed "hucksters" that actually held back the development of the computer rather than contributed to it, and who were only successful due to some real old fashioned arm-twisting, and the general ignorance of the times.
If you look ahead, it's easy to see that almost nothing that Microsoft or Bill Gates ever stood for or believed in as part of the "future of computing" will ever come to pass. Certainly not in the way that they envisioned at least. Microsoft was wrong about open source, wrong about their proprietary OS's replacing everything else, wrong about "suites" of software being better than focussed tools, wrong about software domination being better than integrated products, etc. etc.
I think historically Microsoft will just be seen as a "block" on the real progress that followed them.
Win7 is good. MS knew it when they released an open Beta a half-year before it would hit Ty shelves. Vista is even good now, but the damage is done and a rebranding was required. I think we'll see Win7 eat away at some of Apple OS marketshare this holiday quarter despite Apple having another record Mac quarter. All that is fine.
As for the version variances, I think business model requires multiples versions. Apple acts like a boutique PC maker and dominates the premimium market, but MS sells OEM copies of consumer and business PCs rangeing from $300 (maybe less in some countries) to several thousand dollars. Apple uses HW features to upsell their Mac, but MS can only use softwarw features to upsell their OS.
Correct. Apple's desktop OS market penetration has probably gotten as far as it is going to, now that Windows has a decent version too. that market is "mature." but of course Apple has added a whole new iPhone OS line of mobile computing products, into a market that will be fractured between 5 or 6 different OS's, with Windows Mobile definitely an also-ran. this market is new and rapidly expanding. one needs to add the sales figures - and more importantly, revenues - from both to get the true picture of what is happening.
also worth noting, Apple has successfully melded its desktop and mobile OS's from a user perspective, reinforcing the market strength of both. MS has not. and no one else has both (but Google plans to).
You are *definately* on to something. I attempted to post this article on Danger/Sidekick's own forums and it was removed within a few hours. They usually only ban rumors when they become too truthfful!!
Great article. Great read! Great Danger/Microsoft history lesson.
They had a woman called Ho leading a top project? Only in microsoft...
Look at her in that tasteless tacky pink bordello wall coat and the cheap faux leather chair. Who would have ever thunk that this would be another miserable failure.
At least they did manage to paint the walls the namesake of their failed project.
Correct. Apple's desktop OS market penetration has probably gotten as far as it is going to...
With a 92% dominance in the $1000+ market in the US, I see only 3 avenues for Apple to expand despite this market saturation: market Macs more in other countries, sell more Macs variances, sell cheaper Macs.
For this reason, I speculate that a 13" and 15" MacBook will need to be released to maintain current growth.
They had a woman called Ho leading a top project? Only in microsoft...
Look at her in that tasteless tacky pink bordello wall coat and the cheap faux leather chair. Who would have ever thunk that this would be another miserable failure.
At least they did manage to paint the walls the namesake of their failed project.
Do you have anything to contribute other than quasi-racist negative remarks?
With a 92% dominance in the $1000+ market in the US, I see only 3 avenues for Apple to expand despite this market saturation: market Macs more in other countries, sell more Macs variances, sell cheaper Macs.
For this reason, I speculate that a 13" and 15" MacBook will need to be released to maintain current growth.
I'm probably way off in my thinking here but I can see a future scenario where "cloud computing " has a much more dominate position in any desktop OS necessity ( all computers could "borrow" OS and necessary apps from the cloud and not "carry them" on their computer.) If that was, in fact, to happen, I think M$ market share wouldn't be worth very much whereas Apple's hardware sales would hold it in a strong position. Thoughts?
If there was ever a time to use blockquote, the third page of this article was it.
I agree but my issue is what's with all the open ended quotes. I couldn't tell where the "tipster" and the author's thoughts began or ended. He'd start each paragraph with a quote and no other closing quote even after falling to the next paragraph!
I agree but my issue is what's with all the open ended quotes. I couldn't tell where the "tipster" and the author's thoughts began or ended. He'd start each paragraph with a quote and no other closing quote even after falling to the next paragraph!
This is actually the exact way you are supposed to use quotes.
Comments
Woah, cred shot!
He is right about Windows 7 though. Best version. Wrong about Vista. Why Microsoft wouldn't work for a more seamless upgrade to 7 from XP is almost inexcusable however. For the people who think XP is good enough, they'll stick with it.
Microsoft should have made just two versions of Windows 7. Windows 7 Professional (for business and enterprise) & Windows 7 Consumer (for all home users). But that would make too much sense now wouldn't it.
I wouldn't dare say they should make only one version, that would be ludicrous!
If they did however I came up with an amazing name for it, took me weeks of deep thought, analyses and research: Windows 7
Win7 is good. MS knew it when they released an open Beta a half-year before it would hit Ty shelves. Vista is even good now, but the damage is done and a rebranding was required. I think we'll see Win7 eat away at some of Apple OS marketshare this holiday quarter despite Apple having another record Mac quarter. All that is fine.
As for the version variances, I think business model requires multiples versions. Apple acts like a boutique PC maker and dominates the premimium market, but MS sells OEM copies of consumer and business PCs rangeing from $300 (maybe less in some countries) to several thousand dollars. Apple uses HW features to upsell their Mac, but MS can only use softwarw features to upsell their OS.
As for the version variances, I think business model requires multiples versions. Apple acts like a boutique PC maker and dominates the premimium market, but MS sells OEM copies of consumer and business PCs rangeing from $300 (maybe less in some countries) to several thousand dollars. Apple uses HW features to upsell their Mac, but MS can only use softwarw features to upsell their OS.
So you were at that "Profit V Simplicity" meeting too?
I was going to upgrade my daughter's now unused netbook from XP Starter to Win 7 basic, but the price is way too high for that. Also, the hassle is just too much.
Have you looked intonthe OEM price? It's leagal, you just don't get any MS support like you do from the retail version, which I doubt you want anyway.
Win7 is good. MS knew it when they released an open Beta a half-year before it would hit Ty shelves. Vista is even good now, but the damage is done and a rebranding was required. I think we'll see Win7 eat away at some of Apple OS marketshare this holiday quarter despite Apple having another record Mac quarter. All that is fine.
As for the version variances, I think business model requires multiples versions. Apple acts like a boutique PC maker and dominates the premimium market, but MS sells OEM copies of consumer and business PCs rangeing from $300 (maybe less in some countries) to several thousand dollars. Apple uses HW features to upsell their Mac, but MS can only use softwarw features to upsell their OS.
Let's put it this way, 7 is what Vista should have been when it first came out.
Otherwise, it's not much of an upgrade. Even Ballmer made the statement that 7 is "Vista done right".
And people complain that Apple is charging $29 for 10.6, but where are all the Windows fans about the price of 7?
If it's just Vista done right, then shouldn't it be free? After all, despite Ireland's cheapness, 10.6 has more than a few major new structures and innovations. Vista does not.
Have you looked intonthe OEM price? It's leagal, you just don't get any MS support like you do from the retail version, which I doubt you want anyway.
Yes I have, the $100 IS the OEM price for Home Premium last I looked.
I can tell VZ and MS deserve each other, both companies destroy innovation, I just find it funny that VZ probably lead MS along saying they would take their phone and probably encourage MS that it would be the iphone killer, but they were saying the same thing to every other phone company. I can tell they told Motorola for years they want this and that in a phone and Motorola would do it only to have VZ say sorry we decide to go with someone elses phones. MS has done the same thing to customer and to business partners.
So the take-away from all this is:
- the Pink MS phone is dead, right? Win CE still rules forever, no new OS approach will be allowed. ...
Not sure about this part.
We don't actually know what they are doing with WinMobile 7.0 do we? One might assume that it's a whole new codebase given that WM 6.5 is just a new UI bolted onto the old stuff.
On the other hand MS is famous for dumb moves like that so perhaps WM 7.0 will just be 6.5 with even more fins and chrome bolted onto it.
/snipped/
Engineers like to add features. one of their favorite phrases is " Why don't we add...".
You have to tell them "NO!". And mean it.
I don't think that there's anyone at MS who can do that.
This is very well said. Saying 'no' internally is the big difference between a decision that might please colleagues with a decision that gets the product right for consumers.
The assumption that good, rational sensible decisions are being made inside companies is mostly the stuff of text-books, not what really goes on.
It seems that the PM who shouts loudest, and who has the strongest political ties, gets to ship his team's product, often at the expense of a competing project which may ultimately better align with corporate brand strategy.
Sadly, this is true in many large organizations. But it never helps to have a CEO who can out-shout everyone else below him, and who also doesn't have a shred of class.
A lot of Microsoft's problems may be deeply rooted, given their history of legacy-worship. But even for entirely new products (except when they directly copy an already-successful competitor), the stink of Ballmer and the rest of his executive cronies wipes out any chance of elegance or attention to design details. I imagine there are three kinds of people who work there: Frat-boy toadies who love Ballmer; weekly paycheck drones who wear blinders to get through the day; and misguided dreamers who thought the resources of Microsoft could be guided towards better products and either squeak out a rare success or buckle under the reality that their efforts can be stomped on by corporate politics or a clueless marketing department.
Let's put it this way, 7 is what Vista should have been when it first came out.
Otherwise, it's not much of an upgrade. Even Ballmer made the statement that 7 is "Vista done right".
And people complain that Apple is charging $29 for 10.6, but where are all the Windows fans about the price of 7?
If it's just Vista done right, then shouldn't it be free? After all, despite Ireland's cheapness, 10.6 has more than a few major new structures and innovations. Vista does not.
I would argue that Vista SP1 is Vista done right, though Win7 has a new look and streamlined features that are Mac-like which is why I prefer it.
I don't think it should be free because how could MS charge for OEM copies then and if it was priced the same as SL then they would have to less than thagvfor OEM copies. The vendors could then just buy the retail version an push OS support to MS. If the market supports $300 for a retail version of Windows then so be it. I would pay that, but I support their right to do so.
I can't agree with Ireland's stance that SL is not worth the cost. I've been using it as my primary OS since about March. I'm impressed at how much they have redone and how well they hve set themselves up for the future.
I was going to upgrade my daughter's now unused netbook from XP Starter to Win 7 basic, but the price is way too high for that. Also, the hassle is just too much.
I suspect that a lot of people wanting to upgrade from XP to 7 will either just wait until they need a new machine, or will buy 7 not knowing all the problems involved in the upgrade, which is well beyond what the average PC owner, who, after all, knows nothing about the system, can do.
Then the complaints will begin. What will happen when people spend $100 to $250 to buy the upgrade, only to find it's too much work, or too difficult to do? Likely they won't find out until they attempt the upgrade. After all, most people don't actually read the documentation that comes with products.
Possibly, instead of Win 7 slowing the migration to Macs, this will hasten it.
Considering that most people are still using XP...
Is it really that difficult?
Is it something that could be improved by writing some kind of migration assistant?
Is there some virtualization app on Windows 7, analogous to Parallels, where you could run XP and Win 7 to ease the migration?
If none of this is practical, wouldn't it be preferable to by a Mac and VM app of choice and run them both along with OS X?
Or, do you see people just migrating XP to OS X rather than to Win 7?
*
... And Steve Ballmer is simply a mindless salesman who doesn't have the critical thinking skills/vision to bring Microsoft into this new era of software/hardware development (i.e. adding value/support to well designed, market proven, open technology rather than ideologically working against it). Sorry Steve, but the era of vacuous sales pitches being able to win people over in the technology sector due to ignorance is coming to a close. I for one am glad to see it.
I really like this assessment of Steve Balmer. I think it's spot on.
The fact that he's "a salesman at heart" (as he himself admits), is well known, but the idea that he is a sort of bamboozler who has succeeded mainly due to the ignorance of the simple country folk he sells his "tonic" to is priceless. I believe that when the historians look back on this early computer period they will see Microsoft, and specifically Balmer as exactly that. Business focussed "hucksters" that actually held back the development of the computer rather than contributed to it, and who were only successful due to some real old fashioned arm-twisting, and the general ignorance of the times.
If you look ahead, it's easy to see that almost nothing that Microsoft or Bill Gates ever stood for or believed in as part of the "future of computing" will ever come to pass. Certainly not in the way that they envisioned at least. Microsoft was wrong about open source, wrong about their proprietary OS's replacing everything else, wrong about "suites" of software being better than focussed tools, wrong about software domination being better than integrated products, etc. etc.
I think historically Microsoft will just be seen as a "block" on the real progress that followed them.
Win7 is good. MS knew it when they released an open Beta a half-year before it would hit Ty shelves. Vista is even good now, but the damage is done and a rebranding was required. I think we'll see Win7 eat away at some of Apple OS marketshare this holiday quarter despite Apple having another record Mac quarter. All that is fine.
As for the version variances, I think business model requires multiples versions. Apple acts like a boutique PC maker and dominates the premimium market, but MS sells OEM copies of consumer and business PCs rangeing from $300 (maybe less in some countries) to several thousand dollars. Apple uses HW features to upsell their Mac, but MS can only use softwarw features to upsell their OS.
Correct. Apple's desktop OS market penetration has probably gotten as far as it is going to, now that Windows has a decent version too. that market is "mature." but of course Apple has added a whole new iPhone OS line of mobile computing products, into a market that will be fractured between 5 or 6 different OS's, with Windows Mobile definitely an also-ran. this market is new and rapidly expanding. one needs to add the sales figures - and more importantly, revenues - from both to get the true picture of what is happening.
also worth noting, Apple has successfully melded its desktop and mobile OS's from a user perspective, reinforcing the market strength of both. MS has not. and no one else has both (but Google plans to).
Great article. Great read! Great Danger/Microsoft history lesson.
Pity Sidekicks are teetering close to death!!
(posted from a Sidekick LX-2007)
Look at her in that tasteless tacky pink bordello wall coat and the cheap faux leather chair. Who would have ever thunk that this would be another miserable failure.
At least they did manage to paint the walls the namesake of their failed project.
Correct. Apple's desktop OS market penetration has probably gotten as far as it is going to...
With a 92% dominance in the $1000+ market in the US, I see only 3 avenues for Apple to expand despite this market saturation: market Macs more in other countries, sell more Macs variances, sell cheaper Macs.
For this reason, I speculate that a 13" and 15" MacBook will need to be released to maintain current growth.
They had a woman called Ho leading a top project? Only in microsoft...
Look at her in that tasteless tacky pink bordello wall coat and the cheap faux leather chair. Who would have ever thunk that this would be another miserable failure.
At least they did manage to paint the walls the namesake of their failed project.
Do you have anything to contribute other than quasi-racist negative remarks?
With a 92% dominance in the $1000+ market in the US, I see only 3 avenues for Apple to expand despite this market saturation: market Macs more in other countries, sell more Macs variances, sell cheaper Macs.
For this reason, I speculate that a 13" and 15" MacBook will need to be released to maintain current growth.
I'm probably way off in my thinking here but I can see a future scenario where "cloud computing " has a much more dominate position in any desktop OS necessity ( all computers could "borrow" OS and necessary apps from the cloud and not "carry them" on their computer.) If that was, in fact, to happen, I think M$ market share wouldn't be worth very much whereas Apple's hardware sales would hold it in a strong position. Thoughts?
If there was ever a time to use blockquote, the third page of this article was it.
I agree but my issue is what's with all the open ended quotes. I couldn't tell where the "tipster" and the author's thoughts began or ended. He'd start each paragraph with a quote and no other closing quote even after falling to the next paragraph!
I agree but my issue is what's with all the open ended quotes. I couldn't tell where the "tipster" and the author's thoughts began or ended. He'd start each paragraph with a quote and no other closing quote even after falling to the next paragraph!
This is actually the exact way you are supposed to use quotes.
I guess you failed Grade 8 English class eh?