5 ms·

MS cannot deliver successful stuff on the web at scale. They can deliver unsuccessful stuff on the web at scale, they can deliver successful stuff that turns o

MS cannot deliver successful stuff on the web at scale. They can deliver unsuccessful stuff on the web at scale, they can deliver successful stuff that turns out to be inconsequential for their bottom line on the web in the long-term (AJAX came from MS), but it's just not in their DNA to take over the web. They had lots of chances to do it during the last 20 years or so, they had all the silver bullets at their disposal, they just couldn't deliver what it took.

moufestaphio 4y ago
Uh sorry what? Azure is the second largest cloud provider, well ahead of google.. That's like the definition of 'web scale' Not sure what decade you're stuck in here with comments about ajax
- sidibe 4y ago
  Not agreeing with GP but the capacity of their public clouds is very different from total capacity. Amazon and Microsoft have bigger public clouds, but Google's own workload is probably bigger than anyone else's or even the public clouds by a large factor.
- paganel 4y ago
  > Azure is the second largest cloud provider, well ahead of google. I explicitly mentioned the "web", as in, what we're doing right now on this website. Leaving aside the fact that Azure is mostly used big corporate/government entities, there's no web-startup that will potentially dominate the web and that would go into Azure just as.
  - rezonant 4y ago
    What makes you think anything being discussed in this thread is specific to HTML and web browsers?
ctvo 4y ago
> MS cannot deliver successful stuff on the web at scale. It's this type of confidence that you come back to HN over and over for. Let's ignore Azure, Office 365, and Microsoft's other online properties. In just video games: Microsoft owns and operates the Xbox network with over 100 million active monthly users[1]. That runs on the internet with all the features of a social network and more. I think they can deliver successful stuff at web scale OK, whatever their other shortcomings. 1 - https://hothardware.com/news/xbox-live-surpasses-100-million-active-monthly-users-gamepass https://hothardware.com/news/xbox-live-surpasses-100-million...
- paganel 4y ago
  > Azure, Office 365 I explicitly mentioned the web, Office365 is not a successful web story. It is a successful enterprise story (afaik it is still wildly profitable for MS the company), but it is not a successful web story. Ditto for Xbox.
  - ctvo 4y ago
    It doesn't fit your very niche definition of the web, that you still haven't defined explicitly. Let's try: Is the web a consumer product that runs on the internet?
    - paganel 4y ago
      > It doesn't fit your very niche definition of the web What's niche about websites? Leaving aside the snarky tone, I'll give you an example of how MS has continuously botched their web work for 20 years. If I go on Bing Maps (which I'm actually using on one of my pet projects on account of their permissive licensing) and I type in my Bucharest street address the auto-completion thing works fine, which is a plus (Apple's is much worst at that), but then again their map web project ends up pointing me about 200-300 meters from where I actually live. Google Maps does it pitch-perfect, has done it pitch-perfect for years (I think there have been around 10 years since they've added exact address searches for Bucharest). Many other such cases. Later edit: Forgot to mention, two of the closest POIs shown on Bing Maps have been closed for two years with other places having taking their place in the meantime. Again, GMaps has been almost instantaneous on putting that on their maps, MS seems to be a lot slower at that. That's what the web is all about, data that counts and that is of interest.
gremlinsinc 4y ago
You're absolutely right, if they closed up github tomorrow, nobody would even notice. They could also pull vscode off the repositories, and download sites as well and there'd be nary an eye flutter. /s These two products alone are used by maybe 70% of developers, and don't forget about copilot and all the integrations between github/vscode.

moufestaphio 4y ago

Uh sorry what? Azure is the second largest cloud provider, well ahead of google.. That's like the definition of 'web scale' Not sure what decade you're stuck in here with comments about ajax

sidibe 4y ago
Not agreeing with GP but the capacity of their public clouds is very different from total capacity. Amazon and Microsoft have bigger public clouds, but Google's own workload is probably bigger than anyone else's or even the public clouds by a large factor.
paganel 4y ago
> Azure is the second largest cloud provider, well ahead of google. I explicitly mentioned the "web", as in, what we're doing right now on this website. Leaving aside the fact that Azure is mostly used big corporate/government entities, there's no web-startup that will potentially dominate the web and that would go into Azure just as.
- rezonant 4y ago
  What makes you think anything being discussed in this thread is specific to HTML and web browsers?

ctvo 4y ago

> MS cannot deliver successful stuff on the web at scale. It's this type of confidence that you come back to HN over and over for. Let's ignore Azure, Office 365, and Microsoft's other online properties. In just video games: Microsoft owns and operates the Xbox network with over 100 million active monthly users[1]. That runs on the internet with all the features of a social network and more. I think they can deliver successful stuff at web scale OK, whatever their other shortcomings. 1 - https://hothardware.com/news/xbox-live-surpasses-100-million-active-monthly-users-gamepass https://hothardware.com/news/xbox-live-surpasses-100-million...

paganel 4y ago
> Azure, Office 365 I explicitly mentioned the web, Office365 is not a successful web story. It is a successful enterprise story (afaik it is still wildly profitable for MS the company), but it is not a successful web story. Ditto for Xbox.
- ctvo 4y ago
  It doesn't fit your very niche definition of the web, that you still haven't defined explicitly. Let's try: Is the web a consumer product that runs on the internet?
  - paganel 4y ago
    > It doesn't fit your very niche definition of the web What's niche about websites? Leaving aside the snarky tone, I'll give you an example of how MS has continuously botched their web work for 20 years. If I go on Bing Maps (which I'm actually using on one of my pet projects on account of their permissive licensing) and I type in my Bucharest street address the auto-completion thing works fine, which is a plus (Apple's is much worst at that), but then again their map web project ends up pointing me about 200-300 meters from where I actually live. Google Maps does it pitch-perfect, has done it pitch-perfect for years (I think there have been around 10 years since they've added exact address searches for Bucharest). Many other such cases. Later edit: Forgot to mention, two of the closest POIs shown on Bing Maps have been closed for two years with other places having taking their place in the meantime. Again, GMaps has been almost instantaneous on putting that on their maps, MS seems to be a lot slower at that. That's what the web is all about, data that counts and that is of interest.

gremlinsinc 4y ago

You're absolutely right, if they closed up github tomorrow, nobody would even notice. They could also pull vscode off the repositories, and download sites as well and there'd be nary an eye flutter. /s These two products alone are used by maybe 70% of developers, and don't forget about copilot and all the integrations between github/vscode.