6 ms·

> I think the world needs a strong Microsoft again It's extremely dangerous to think if Microsoft as weak. They have enormous profits and revenue - far, far bi

by zmmmmm 13y ago

> I think the world needs a strong Microsoft again It's extremely dangerous to think if Microsoft as weak. They have enormous profits and revenue - far, far bigger than Google, for example - that are secure far into the future. They are willing to plow this money for an almost indefinite amount of time into any product to brute force it to success (see Xbox) and they are willing stoop lower and employ underhand tactics to an extent that nobody else in the industry will match. So fear not, Microsoft is a long way from weak. We should worry a lot more about the possibility of them actually becoming completely dominant again than we should worry about the relatively benign prospect of them becoming weaker.

BlackDeath3 13y ago
Strong may not necessarily mean "without potential or resources". How about strongly innovative, or strongly visionary? Just a thought.
brianmcdonough 13y ago
Agreed. Microsoft tried to create a closed system, but they were prevented by governments worried about them consolidating their power forever. Now, we are faced with two closed systems fighting for power, ios and android. Companies like facebook talk about their "mobile moment" the time when their presences on closed systems eclipsed their presence on an open system, the Internet. I long for a time when data flowed freely along pipes and tubes.
- amaks 13y ago
  How can we be certain that a stronger, with a strong developer engagement, Microsoft will not start creating proprietary closed systems and protocols again, siloing open systems into a closed ones (by using its embrace and extend tactics)?
  - marshray 13y ago
    Disclosure: developer at Microsoft. Microsoft is a big place. I predict we're going to continue to create and ship new stuff, and it will vary in all degrees of 'open'. But in my experience as a 3rd party outside developer, it's pretty rare that stronger engagement leads to things being more closed.
- konspence 13y ago
  I'm not entirely sure I agree that Android is closed. Sure, distros of it seem closed - but the project itself is open source.
- Tmmrn 13y ago
  > Microsoft tried to create a closed system, but they were prevented by governments worried about them consolidating their power forever. Now, we are faced with two closed systems fighting for power, ios and android. Am I in opposite world? People want microsoft software on their mobile devices because an open source OS is too "closed"? I would believe what you actually want is an alternative to google apps on android...
deeviant 13y ago
Well, Google does have a higher market cap by some 21%, so obviously the market values Google more. History is littered with corporate walking corpses that owned markets at times that are are coasting or dead. Just look at how long AOL raked in billions after they long since ceased to be relevant to anything at all. I am not saying that MS is this, but they are feared to become one if they don't find a way to become much more relevant to how many people see the future going.
porker 13y ago
> they are willing stoop lower and employ underhand tactics to an extent that nobody else in the industry will match. Worse than Google or Amazon's dominance of the marketplace? The squashing out competition that they do? I don't think so - Microsoft could be on a par perhaps, but certainly no worse.
- zmmmmm 13y ago
  Not sure about Amazon. But I'd definitely say worse than Google. For all of Google's dominance they offer APIs using open standards for the vast majority of their products, their operating systems are all open source, they guarantee to give you your data with takeout. Mostly where they are dominant it is because they've made products people really want and not because they've locked their customers in. I'm sure you can find exceptions but I think overall their track record is substantially better than Microsoft's ever was.
  - porker 13y ago
    That's a fair assessment of Google. My views are coloured because of a few really good startups I saw crushed when Google released products for free (specifically Calendar, and Reader IIRC). I have a long-running joke with friends when we come up with ideas, that we'd better not do it as "Google's going there soon". Thankfully it seems to have slowed down its expansion a bit in the last few years. Also the power they wield with search and adwords, to make businesses thrive or die - especially if they play the rules (cf RapGenius). Though I don't expect it would be any better if Bing was the dominant search engine. tl;dr: I don't like semi-monopolies. Small, competing and thriving businesses are the best.
mattlutze 13y ago
Except that, I'd dare say most of the successes in the last 5-10 years, IMO, have not been merely "brute force" successes. XBox is a fantastic product, all things considered. Azure is a compelling competitor. It would be more accurate to say Microsoft is willing to plow money into a product long enough for that product development to get past the barriers to success that are inherit in a 130k person software company.
- Tmmrn 13y ago
  > XBox is a fantastic product, all things considered. Fantastic in what regard? Can I put my favorite linux distribution on it? Can I even write and release software for it under GPL? Without "applying" to microsoft and waiting for them to "approve" it? Maybe it's just me but I don't really see why I should buy hardware that is 100% controlled by microsoft when it can't do anything that a general purpose computer couldn't do...
  - mattlutze 13y ago
    It's not a computer, it's a home theater / gaming machine. (With the exception of maybe the newest, which I haven't used yet) Why on Earth would you want to buy one to use as a general computing PC? That'd be dumb. Frankly, it works very well for what it was designed to be. 4-5 years ago it provided an awfully intuitive platform to plug into your TV and stream video, tv shows and music from your home network or increasingly from the Internet. Almost no configuration necessary, rarely has issues, and fixes for those issues are pushed fast and often. It's a home media PC for people that don't have the gumption or wherewithal to build one, and a much more pleasant interaction than many/most of the other HTPC distros out there. And really, almost no one wants to go through building a home server and HTPC, thus the continued advances in "smart" TVs and game-consoles-as-HTPCs.

by zmmmmm 13y ago

BlackDeath3 13y ago

Strong may not necessarily mean "without potential or resources". How about strongly innovative, or strongly visionary? Just a thought.

brianmcdonough 13y ago

Agreed. Microsoft tried to create a closed system, but they were prevented by governments worried about them consolidating their power forever. Now, we are faced with two closed systems fighting for power, ios and android. Companies like facebook talk about their "mobile moment" the time when their presences on closed systems eclipsed their presence on an open system, the Internet. I long for a time when data flowed freely along pipes and tubes.

amaks 13y ago
How can we be certain that a stronger, with a strong developer engagement, Microsoft will not start creating proprietary closed systems and protocols again, siloing open systems into a closed ones (by using its embrace and extend tactics)?
- marshray 13y ago
  Disclosure: developer at Microsoft. Microsoft is a big place. I predict we're going to continue to create and ship new stuff, and it will vary in all degrees of 'open'. But in my experience as a 3rd party outside developer, it's pretty rare that stronger engagement leads to things being more closed.
konspence 13y ago
I'm not entirely sure I agree that Android is closed. Sure, distros of it seem closed - but the project itself is open source.
Tmmrn 13y ago
> Microsoft tried to create a closed system, but they were prevented by governments worried about them consolidating their power forever. Now, we are faced with two closed systems fighting for power, ios and android. Am I in opposite world? People want microsoft software on their mobile devices because an open source OS is too "closed"? I would believe what you actually want is an alternative to google apps on android...

deeviant 13y ago

Well, Google does have a higher market cap by some 21%, so obviously the market values Google more. History is littered with corporate walking corpses that owned markets at times that are are coasting or dead. Just look at how long AOL raked in billions after they long since ceased to be relevant to anything at all. I am not saying that MS is this, but they are feared to become one if they don't find a way to become much more relevant to how many people see the future going.

porker 13y ago

> they are willing stoop lower and employ underhand tactics to an extent that nobody else in the industry will match. Worse than Google or Amazon's dominance of the marketplace? The squashing out competition that they do? I don't think so - Microsoft could be on a par perhaps, but certainly no worse.

zmmmmm 13y ago
Not sure about Amazon. But I'd definitely say worse than Google. For all of Google's dominance they offer APIs using open standards for the vast majority of their products, their operating systems are all open source, they guarantee to give you your data with takeout. Mostly where they are dominant it is because they've made products people really want and not because they've locked their customers in. I'm sure you can find exceptions but I think overall their track record is substantially better than Microsoft's ever was.
- porker 13y ago
  That's a fair assessment of Google. My views are coloured because of a few really good startups I saw crushed when Google released products for free (specifically Calendar, and Reader IIRC). I have a long-running joke with friends when we come up with ideas, that we'd better not do it as "Google's going there soon". Thankfully it seems to have slowed down its expansion a bit in the last few years. Also the power they wield with search and adwords, to make businesses thrive or die - especially if they play the rules (cf RapGenius). Though I don't expect it would be any better if Bing was the dominant search engine. tl;dr: I don't like semi-monopolies. Small, competing and thriving businesses are the best.

mattlutze 13y ago

Except that, I'd dare say most of the successes in the last 5-10 years, IMO, have not been merely "brute force" successes. XBox is a fantastic product, all things considered. Azure is a compelling competitor. It would be more accurate to say Microsoft is willing to plow money into a product long enough for that product development to get past the barriers to success that are inherit in a 130k person software company.

Tmmrn 13y ago
> XBox is a fantastic product, all things considered. Fantastic in what regard? Can I put my favorite linux distribution on it? Can I even write and release software for it under GPL? Without "applying" to microsoft and waiting for them to "approve" it? Maybe it's just me but I don't really see why I should buy hardware that is 100% controlled by microsoft when it can't do anything that a general purpose computer couldn't do...
- mattlutze 13y ago
  It's not a computer, it's a home theater / gaming machine. (With the exception of maybe the newest, which I haven't used yet) Why on Earth would you want to buy one to use as a general computing PC? That'd be dumb. Frankly, it works very well for what it was designed to be. 4-5 years ago it provided an awfully intuitive platform to plug into your TV and stream video, tv shows and music from your home network or increasingly from the Internet. Almost no configuration necessary, rarely has issues, and fixes for those issues are pushed fast and often. It's a home media PC for people that don't have the gumption or wherewithal to build one, and a much more pleasant interaction than many/most of the other HTPC distros out there. And really, almost no one wants to go through building a home server and HTPC, thus the continued advances in "smart" TVs and game-consoles-as-HTPCs.