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Don't know if I agree with your first point. AWS got a head start, but Azure is gaining and fast (Azure revenue - not profit - is at least 30+% of AWS already).

Don't know if I agree with your first point. AWS got a head start, but Azure is gaining and fast (Azure revenue - not profit - is at least 30+% of AWS already). That says nothing about SkyDrive either, which is already the biggest cloud syncing service out there. So saying Microsoft is getting "crushed" in the cloud is _far_ from being true.

theatraine 13y ago
Right, from the revenue report: "Commercial cloud revenue grew 103%". This appears to be the largest section of growth reported, so it looks like Microsoft is doing pretty well in the cloud space.
- csense 13y ago
  Business 101: Whenever you see a ridiculously huge growth figure like 103%, it's usually measured against a tiny base. See http://xkcd.com/1102/ http://xkcd.com/1102/ Improving growth does mean either Microsoft's doing something right and/or the size of this market is increasing. But seeing a growth number this high means you should be very skeptical that cloud products will be able to carry the rest of Microsoft on their back going forward, or successfully challenge market leaders.
  - outside1234 13y ago
    Usually, but not in this case.
sac2171 13y ago
Something about this sounded sketchy... http://www.liveside.net/2013/05/06/skydrive-reaches-250-million-users-a-significant-number/ http://www.liveside.net/2013/05/06/skydrive-reaches-250-mill... places Sky Drive in fourth, behind Dropbox, Google Drive, and ICloud....
- Maascamp 13y ago
  From your source, "According to OPSWAT’s data (which admittedly could be wildly skewed depending on who actually downloads their software, take it with multiple grains of salt)." Admittedly I'm referencing data I read somewhere which I can't find right now, so I'll retract the statement about SkyDrive being the biggest. It is certainly up there though and growing according to this financial report.
  - TrainedMonkey 13y ago
    Almost every windows tablet sold is another user for SkyDrive. I am not sure about Windows 8 and 8.1, but significant portion of those sales will add users to SkyDrive as well. Let's not even talk about Office 365 which forces you to use SkyDrive. So while SkyDrive might not be #1 in terms of number of users, given aggressive bundling strategy, I would expect it to be close to the top in terms of growth.
    - hamburglar 13y ago
      But as a metric for actual popularity, that is a completely useless stat. Microsoft also used to crow about how many tens of millions of people had Windows Media Center, but most of them were just people who bought a "premium" version of windows with their pc and didn't even know what Windows Media Center was. If gazillions of people are technically users of skydrive simply by virtue of having windows, that really says nothing about skydrive's actual popularity. It's like claiming solitaire is the world's top-selling game.
      - rbanffy 13y ago
        > If gazillions of people are technically users of skydrive simply by virtue of having windows Or Hotmail. I don't use Windows, but I use Hotmail and I have some files stashed away on Skydrive. This is stuff I don't access frequently where it's fine to go through the browser to get them. I even tried it on a Mac, but it needs a case-insensitive filesystem. Amateurs...
duaneb 13y ago
I think Azure is great, but it remains that people are using linux for their servers.
- biot 13y ago
  Azure is OS agnostic; Linux runs great on it.
  - duaneb 13y ago
    Hence why I said it was so great. My point was that windows is dying as a server OS, though I'm sure enterprise will keep it kicking for several decades
- eball 13y ago
  Microsoft even charges less for Linux VMs on Azure than Windows Server VMs with the same specs.
  - duaneb 13y ago
    Exactly! Windows is a dying beast.
myko 13y ago
SkyDrive is bigger than Dropbox? Is it bundled with Windows/part of the install then?
- TheAnimus 13y ago
  With Windows 8, and has been part of the windows phone ecosystem for ages. But it's more than that, SkyDrive was launched in 2007, DropBox 2008. In classic Microsoft style, they didn't really tell anyone it existed for a few years. I'll be honest, I don't 'get' dropbox. Their security record means I'll never, ever trust them with anything beyond a lolcat, they don't really have any killer features. The fact that on Windows SkyDrive offers much better user experience than DropBox, the implementation of JIT-downloading files, the fact it hasn't messed around with ASLR in my web browser. I gather dropbox is better if you run OSX, but at the end of the day having 1% of windows market is better than 10% of OSX market.
  - gizzlon 13y ago
    A big use of dropbox is sharing files with other people.. so unless all your friends run windows as well, cross platform is actually a big deal. I'm sharing some vacations photos with Windows, Mac, Android, iPhone and Linux users.
    - TheAnimus 13y ago
      All of which can be done on SkyDrive. Not sure why the downvote for this. The only one lacking a first party client is Linux. There are 3rd party ones serving it. For simple sharing, it can be done entirely in a web browser. In fact for photo sharing SkyDrives web-based offering is much better than dropbox, from handling of exif/geotags to the whole commenting and such.
      - gtirloni 13y ago
        GNOME can integrated with SkyDrive since June 2012.
      - 13y ago

theatraine 13y ago

Right, from the revenue report: "Commercial cloud revenue grew 103%". This appears to be the largest section of growth reported, so it looks like Microsoft is doing pretty well in the cloud space.

csense 13y ago
Business 101: Whenever you see a ridiculously huge growth figure like 103%, it's usually measured against a tiny base. See http://xkcd.com/1102/ http://xkcd.com/1102/ Improving growth does mean either Microsoft's doing something right and/or the size of this market is increasing. But seeing a growth number this high means you should be very skeptical that cloud products will be able to carry the rest of Microsoft on their back going forward, or successfully challenge market leaders.
- outside1234 13y ago
  Usually, but not in this case.

sac2171 13y ago

Something about this sounded sketchy... http://www.liveside.net/2013/05/06/skydrive-reaches-250-million-users-a-significant-number/ http://www.liveside.net/2013/05/06/skydrive-reaches-250-mill... places Sky Drive in fourth, behind Dropbox, Google Drive, and ICloud....

Maascamp 13y ago
From your source, "According to OPSWAT’s data (which admittedly could be wildly skewed depending on who actually downloads their software, take it with multiple grains of salt)." Admittedly I'm referencing data I read somewhere which I can't find right now, so I'll retract the statement about SkyDrive being the biggest. It is certainly up there though and growing according to this financial report.
- TrainedMonkey 13y ago
  Almost every windows tablet sold is another user for SkyDrive. I am not sure about Windows 8 and 8.1, but significant portion of those sales will add users to SkyDrive as well. Let's not even talk about Office 365 which forces you to use SkyDrive. So while SkyDrive might not be #1 in terms of number of users, given aggressive bundling strategy, I would expect it to be close to the top in terms of growth.
  - hamburglar 13y ago
    But as a metric for actual popularity, that is a completely useless stat. Microsoft also used to crow about how many tens of millions of people had Windows Media Center, but most of them were just people who bought a "premium" version of windows with their pc and didn't even know what Windows Media Center was. If gazillions of people are technically users of skydrive simply by virtue of having windows, that really says nothing about skydrive's actual popularity. It's like claiming solitaire is the world's top-selling game.
    - rbanffy 13y ago
      > If gazillions of people are technically users of skydrive simply by virtue of having windows Or Hotmail. I don't use Windows, but I use Hotmail and I have some files stashed away on Skydrive. This is stuff I don't access frequently where it's fine to go through the browser to get them. I even tried it on a Mac, but it needs a case-insensitive filesystem. Amateurs...

duaneb 13y ago

I think Azure is great, but it remains that people are using linux for their servers.

biot 13y ago
Azure is OS agnostic; Linux runs great on it.
- duaneb 13y ago
  Hence why I said it was so great. My point was that windows is dying as a server OS, though I'm sure enterprise will keep it kicking for several decades
eball 13y ago
Microsoft even charges less for Linux VMs on Azure than Windows Server VMs with the same specs.
- duaneb 13y ago
  Exactly! Windows is a dying beast.

myko 13y ago

SkyDrive is bigger than Dropbox? Is it bundled with Windows/part of the install then?

TheAnimus 13y ago
With Windows 8, and has been part of the windows phone ecosystem for ages. But it's more than that, SkyDrive was launched in 2007, DropBox 2008. In classic Microsoft style, they didn't really tell anyone it existed for a few years. I'll be honest, I don't 'get' dropbox. Their security record means I'll never, ever trust them with anything beyond a lolcat, they don't really have any killer features. The fact that on Windows SkyDrive offers much better user experience than DropBox, the implementation of JIT-downloading files, the fact it hasn't messed around with ASLR in my web browser. I gather dropbox is better if you run OSX, but at the end of the day having 1% of windows market is better than 10% of OSX market.
- gizzlon 13y ago
  A big use of dropbox is sharing files with other people.. so unless all your friends run windows as well, cross platform is actually a big deal. I'm sharing some vacations photos with Windows, Mac, Android, iPhone and Linux users.
  - TheAnimus 13y ago
    All of which can be done on SkyDrive. Not sure why the downvote for this. The only one lacking a first party client is Linux. There are 3rd party ones serving it. For simple sharing, it can be done entirely in a web browser. In fact for photo sharing SkyDrives web-based offering is much better than dropbox, from handling of exif/geotags to the whole commenting and such.
    - gtirloni 13y ago
      GNOME can integrated with SkyDrive since June 2012.
    - 13y ago