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And in any case, if Microsoft were suddenly to chuck 30 years of their work in the bin and go all open-source, wouldn't that just transform them into a services
by kyllo 12y ago
And in any case, if Microsoft were suddenly to chuck 30 years of their work in the bin and go all open-source, wouldn't that just transform them into a services company?
Isn't that exactly what they have said they are trying to do? Become a "Devices and Services" company instead of a software company?
- 72deluxe 12y agoHadn't thought of that, but I wonder if it is just terminology? How can they be a cloud provider without an OS?
- kyllo 12y agoThey could just as easily run their cloud services on a Linux or BSD based OS. Nothing about a "Devices and Services" company requires a proprietary OS. I think it really just shows that they aren't that serious about actually pivoting their business model. Their leadership aspires to be a devices and services company because they look at their competitors and see that Apple is making money from devices, and Google and Amazon are making money from services, so they think they need to compete in those fields. But they're not going to truly pivot because that would require spinning off or killing their core, cash cow business model, which is a PC operating system and a suite of productivity software products.
- 72deluxe 12y agoThat's a good analysis. Interestingly, Apple also seems to be a services company (with their iTunes system and iCloud) but their iCloud system in particular seems to be a service that only exists to help their devices. Pretty clever. I will wait to see what Microsoft does. As you say, for them to be truly "devices and services" only, that would be a massive change. And not what people expect from Microsoft..?
- kyllo 12y agoYes, meanwhile Microsoft has been trying to be all things to all people, and the result is they are always last to market, with a subpar product.