I agree about Maps and Mail, but I disagree about your assesment of Microsoft only failing - they had quite a few misses, but you're discrediting their hits. T

I agree about Maps and Mail, but I disagree about your assesment of Microsoft only failing - they had quite a few misses, but you're discrediting their hits. The XBox's innovation (according to developers) was in making game development easier (DirectX) - heck, it was called DirectX Box originally!. .Net started as a Java clone, but outpaced it significantly (LINQ, Lambdas, Generics, extensions, anonymous types) mostly thanks to Anders Hejlsberg. I agree they had their share of high-profile failures, Windows CE and all of Microsoft's mobile forays failed, the current Windows Mobile was starting to get good but they had to kill it. Excel was better than anything that came before and was a category-killer, so not "just another office suite" (although they did use their monopoly to force it). They did have some wins (Azure) and they still have their cash cows to fall on.