MacDailyNews Take: Microsoft never brought people the future, they brought people a flawed, insecure, upside-down and backwards Mac OS ripoff and an Office suite. Most of Microsoft’s “innovations” are things Apple did with their Mac operating systems years before. When Microsoft tries to “innovate” on their own they come up with things like MS Bob and a $10,000 five hundred pound Big Ass Table. Wake up, Dick.
Brass continues, “Some people take joy in Microsoft’s struggles, as the popular view in recent years paints the company as an unrepentant intentional monopolist. Good riddance if it fails. But those of us who worked there know it differently. At worst, you can say it’s a highly repentant, largely accidental monopolist. It employs thousands of the smartest, most capable engineers in the world. More than any other firm, it made using computers both ubiquitous and affordable. Microsoft’s Windows operating system and Office applications suite still utterly rule their markets.”
MacDailyNews Take: Ah, we see. You used to work there (Dick Brass was a vice president at Microsoft from 1997 to 2004). Hey, Dick, McDonald’s rules the hamburger market; doesn’t mean they make the best hamburgers. There are very few instances where having the most market share equals the best-in-class product. In fact, it’s so rare that only three spring quickly to mind: iPod, iTunes Store, and Coca-Cola. Look at any other market, from sports cars to operating systems and the best product in it never has the most market share. And, if Microsoft’s engineers are so smart, how come Microsoft’s products suck so routinely? Windows is a joke, XBox is a $1+ billion faulty Red Ring of Death mess, Zune is an even bigger joke than Windows… We could go on for quite some time. Her’s an oldie, but a goodie: By its very nature Wintel cannot be the best – September 18, 2002.
Brass continues, “The company’s chief executive, Steve Ballmer, has continued to deliver huge profits.”
MacDailyNews Take: Aye, may Steve Ballmer remain Microsoft CEO for as long as it takes!
Brass continues, “Its founder, Bill Gates, is not only the most generous philanthropist in history, but has also inspired thousands of his employees to give generously themselves.”
MacDailyNews Take: Bill Gates is trying to buy his way into heaven with ill-gotten gains. It’s easy to be generous with Steve Jobs’ money.
Brass continues, “Microsoft has become a clumsy, uncompetitive innovator.”
MacDailyNews Take: Now we know for sure that Dick worked at Microsoft; he doesn’t know the definition of “innovator.” Microsoft doesn’t innovate, no matter how many times Ballmer says the word in interviews and presentations. Microsoft copies poorly and steals. In the rare times they do try to “innovate,” the results are ridiculous.
Brass continues, “Its products are lampooned, often unfairly but sometimes with good reason. Its image has never recovered from the antitrust prosecution of the 1990s. Its marketing has been inept for years; remember the 2008 ad in which Bill Gates was somehow persuaded to literally wiggle his behind at the camera? While Apple continues to gain market share in many products, Microsoft has lost share in Web browsers, high-end laptops and smartphones. Despite billions in investment, its Xbox line is still at best an equal contender in the game console business. It first ignored and then stumbled in personal music players until that business was locked up by Apple.”
Brass writes, “Microsoft’s huge profits — $6.7 billion for the past quarter — come almost entirely from Windows and Office programs first developed decades ago.”
MacDailyNews Take: Let’s see: Again, Microsoft Windows wouldn’t exist without Apple’s Mac and Microsoft’s Office monopoly wouldn’t exist without their Windows monopoly. SO, without Apple, Microsoft either wouldn’t exist today or they’d be a two-person shop making a paint program for Macs and Amigas.
Brass continues, “Like G.M. with its trucks and S.U.V.’s, Microsoft can’t count on these venerable products to sustain it forever. Perhaps worst of all, Microsoft is no longer considered the cool or cutting-edge place to work. There has been a steady exit of its best and brightest.”
MacDailyNews Take: When was Microsoft ever considered “cool” or “cutting edge?” Never. They paid well, had good benefits, a nice location, and, long ago, their stock used to appreciate; that’s why people wanted to work there.
Brass continues, “What happened? Unlike other companies, Microsoft never developed a true system for innovation. Some of my former colleagues argue that it actually developed a system to thwart innovation. Despite having one of the largest and best corporate laboratories in the world, and the luxury of not one but three chief technology officers, the company routinely manages to frustrate the efforts of its visionary thinkers.”
MacDailyNews Take: Okay, so there actually is some innovation at Microsoft, but it just never gets out the door? We can see that as a possibility.
Brass continues, “Not everything that has gone wrong at Microsoft is due to internecine warfare. Part of the problem is a historic preference to develop (highly profitable) software without undertaking (highly risky) hardware. This made economic sense when the company was founded in 1975, but now makes it far more difficult to create tightly integrated, beautifully designed products like an iPhone or TiVo.”
MacDailyNews Take: Agreed. Please see: Apple was right all along: vertical market quality trumps horizontal market woes – April 30, 2006. Also check out: Fragmandroid: Google’s mad dash to Microsoftdom – December 15, 2009.
Brass continues, “Internal competition is common at great companies. It can be wisely encouraged to force ideas to compete. The problem comes when the competition becomes uncontrolled and destructive. At Microsoft, it has created a dysfunctional corporate culture in which the big established groups are allowed to prey upon emerging teams, belittle their efforts, compete unfairly against them for resources, and over time hector them out of existence. It’s not an accident that almost all the executives in charge of Microsoft’s music, e-books, phone, online, search and tablet efforts over the past decade have left.”
MacDailyNews Take: That matches very closely what we hear frequently from people inside and outside Microsoft. It’s a morass of politics and petty jealousies.
Full article, in which Brass details some examples of how internal feuding at Microsoft killed or delayed products, here.
MacDailyNews Take: While we obviously disagree with Brass’ assessments of Microsoft’s past (they were never an innovator), we agree on his appraisal of Microsoft’s current situation and do not see much room for improvement in the future given the company’s current “leadership” (giggle). Even if a radical departure was made, the Microtanic would still take far too long to turn.
Excerpts from a BusinessWeek interview with Apple CEO Steve Jobs, October 12, 2004:
Steve Jobs: Apple had a monopoly on the graphical user interface for almost 10 years. That’s a long time. And how are monopolies lost? Think about it. Some very good product people invent some very good products, and the company achieves a monopoly. But after that, the product people aren’t the ones that drive the company forward anymore. It’s the marketing guys or the ones who expand the business into Latin America or whatever. Because what’s the point of focusing on making the product even better when the only company you can take business from is yourself? So a different group of people start to move up. And who usually ends up running the show? The sales guy… Then one day, the monopoly expires for whatever reason. But by then the best product people have left, or they’re no longer listened to. And so the company goes through this tumultuous time, and it either survives or it doesn’t.
BusinessWeek: Is this common in the industry?
Steve Jobs: Look at Microsoft — who’s running Microsoft?
BusinessWeek: Steve Ballmer.
Steve Jobs: Right, the sales guy. Case closed.
Source: The Seed of Apple’s Innovation
Again, glasses up: May Steve Ballmer remain Microsoft CEO for as long as it takes!
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Mark H.,” “JES42” and “qka” for the heads up.]
Microsoft’s accidental success was assured when DOS was chosen as the IBM operating system (greatest mistake in IBMs history was not creating their own OS). IBM’s gold plated reputation in those days, and dominance in the enterprise ensured the success of DOS and Microsoft. I was there. Apple had a head start but never had a chance in businesses and therefore in the operating system competition — not that Apple didn’t screw it up after Jobs left, and by giving allowing Microsoft permission to copy its OS in Windows.
I disagree that Office was not better when it was first released. Again I was there and bought Office 1.0.0. WordStar and WordPerfect were the leaders and innovators in word processing and VisiCalc was the innovator in spreadsheets, but Microsoft Word was the best word processor the day it was released and it was one of the first integrated into a suite of programs. It gained market share initially on merit (later by monopolistic practices)
Lastly, let me say that while I generally admire MDN’s “Takes” I find it astonishing that he refuses to admit that Bill Gates, whatever he may think of him as a computer executive, is not doing great things as a philanthropist. I know the Gates Foundation and the things they support well in my position as a senior medical professor at a major institution. There is no question that Bill and Melinda Gates care deeply about what they are doing and are making a great difference. To argue that they are doing this to “buy their way into heaven” is stupid, repugnant, repulsive, illogical, reprehensible, reproachful, ridiculous and beneath the dignity of this blog. It is shameful when animosity reaches the point that everything the other side does is evil just because their doing it.
I don’t mind if Microsoft and Windows stays in the corporate world as long as they allow for other alternatives to be offered. I just don’t particularly like the idea that a few IT managers can force 50,000 employees to use Windows and Windows PCs without them having a choice. It makes it far too easy for certain companies to gain impenetrable footholds in the corporate realm and they may not even be the best solutions.
I suspect and it’s entirely understandable from Microsoft’s point of view to make their back-end software as locked down as possible so that nothing but Microsoft software and hardware will be compatible. I just don’t think that it’s in the corporation’s best interest to have a system work like that. I wonder how far this support for 40-year-old legacy hardware is going to go and is it really even necessary. I would figure it would slow down corporations from making faster transitions into a rapidly changing, ever more mobile society.
So I completely understand Microsoft doesn’t want to give up a nice comfy position running the corporate desktop world. Some company is going to have to come in and make the desktop less relevant in order to weaken Microsoft’s grip. Show corporations that there are other solutions other than just the Microsoft way.
What Brass has missed – – despite his reference to GM – – is that the handwriting has been on the wall for not just months or years, but for DECADES.
I can recall my father telling me that GM was in decline and that its days are numbered …. back in the 1970s.
Since 1974, roughly 3/4s of their vehicular purchases haven’t been from Detroit; I think their last Detroit product was a first generation Chevy Lumina APV (‘dustbuster’) which dates from a decade ago.
The handwriting is on the wall for MS too. Like GM, it still might take another 20 years, but thre’s already been a clear shift in the US Consumer market, which is narrowing MS’s product base to just corporate Enterprise.
In the meantime, Mom & Dad’s kids are increasingly getting rid of their Windows PCs at home and going to Apple…its now down to “One to Go”. So for how much longer do you think that the kids who maintain Mom & Dad’s Windows ME machine are going to keep that as a Windows PC?
-hh
@WriterGuy: Sorry, 25 years ago windows didn’t exist, and as far as I know MS never worked with IBM on anything Windows-related. By 1985 MS had pilfered all the help they needed for Windows by looking over the shoulders of Mac programmers, but it wasn’t until years after that that they actually shipped a barely-functioning version.
@Kevin J. Weise: As I said, MS had lots of help from Apple in creating Excel (don’t remember much about Word), and it’s work on the Altair amounted to porting a version of Basic to it. For a considerable time MS had a fine reputation for developing programming environments, which was their core strength (and Gates’ & Allen’s background). But application programs? Not so much, and never without someone else showing them the way.
“Its image has never recovered from the antitrust prosecution of the 1990s.”
It wasn’t the prosecution that hurt Microsoft’s image,
it was their antitrust execution.
Here is hoping that the brilliant engineers from Microsoft all find jobs in truly innovative companies.
Actually, it won’t be the lack of innovation that will kill Microsoft. Rather, it will be how they compensate their personnel. When Microsoft succeeded in their early days, it was in part, because they compensated their best and brightest with fast growing stock options. That mechanism allowed their employees to benefit enormously – thus the Microsoft millionaires. But all that is now gone. Microsoft will never be a growth stock again and stock options are all mostly under water. Where is the incentive for a really bright software engineer to join or stay with Microsoft? The best always are the first to go. And they take their best ideas with them. Sad really. But inevitable.
Microsoft was a great hope for me back in ’93. But boy did they squander that hope.
I have rarely felt the need to be outspoke about a business and the people who promote it, but MS is the exception.
That piece was incredibly kind to you. I really want to see you truly broken.
It’s really quite amazing (well not really), but all of a sudden eBooks and tablets are the cool new thing and Microsoft isn’t even in the game. They keep skating to where the puck was 5 years ago. Don’t they ever just look at where we are now and say to themselves,”gee, wouldn’t it be great if we had…” and then build it?
Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer… I guess an IVY LEAGUE Harvard Ed is not all that it’s cracked up to be!
@Basil Ganglia: I agree with you that Bill (and Melinda) Gates deserves a lot of credit for his philanthropic work, which to all appearances reflects a genuine commitment (albeit with a little nudging from his father years ago).
It’s also true, as you say, that Microsoft’s fortune was set when it got the contract with IBM to produce DOS (although, again, they bought one, spruced it up, and delivered it as their own). The signal act of Gates’ genius (“innovation?) was to structure the IBM contract such that they retained the right to sell their own version of DOS to 3rd parties. Of course, IBM didn’t really care at the time, as they didn’t really see a future in “home computers.”
The dominance of Windows in business is partly generational; many large and small companies are still led by men who grew up uninvolved with computer technology. The joke about CEOs who have their secretary print out their emails because they don’t know how to access them is not a joke. These men are helpless at the hands of IT departments who are afraid that they will lose their power and jobs if they introduce technology that everyone can use without constant problems and hand-holding from IT. Because they don’t themselves use computers much, they don’t understand how much productivity is lost through the wrong choices of hardware and software. They look at front end buy-in cost and really don’t know how much they lose further along through inefficiencies, break-downs and security issues. They are not, for the most part, willfully stupid; they really don’t see it, in part because the IT staff doesn’t want them to see it. I worked off-site for a company that required me to use a Dell craptop with Windows. I kept my Mac beside so that I could actually get some work done. It was not unusual to spend several hours a week on the phone with IT when projects had to be done with the PC. I was one of 5000 employees. Any CEO who received correct data from IT managers about the impact of this foolishness on the bottom line would not hesitate to make a change. As top positions are filled with people with hands-on technology skills it will be easier to break some old habits. But the IT won’t give up without a long fight.
You can take this one to the bank!
HEY MDN
How About Heinz Ketchup Market Domination?
I’d guess bigger than coke.
“Puck? What puck? WTP!?!?”
@ chaz
They also forgot Q-tips and Kleenex.
People are forgetting, for various excellent reasons, that Ballmer debuted not one, but three tablet-type devices at his CES keynote. And the world shrugged. See “Ballmer shows HP slate/tablet PC in CES snooz-athon” here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/jan/07/ballmer-ces-2010-keynote-microsoft.
My friends and I used to call people who used were once hugely popular but not on their own merits, and who now are past their freshness date, “was-beens” instead of “has-beens.” Microsoft is now a was-been.
@Basil Ganglia: I don’t agree Gates is doing anything wonderful. He just sees his medical philanthropy as the fastest and most likely way to get him the Nobel Prize–the goal he’s set his sights on. If he really wanted to make a difference in the world he’d do something like buy up half the US Pacific coast’s ancient forests and turn them into a National Park or the Amazon or even make all Microsoft’s plants and offices energy self-sustaining.
Some future stuff from MicroSoft of the past:
Remember Teddy?:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7071413
Got time?:http://www.epill.com/spot.html
Whoops!
Some future stuff from MicroSoft of the past:
Remember Teddy?: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7071413
Got time?: http://www.epill.com/spot.html
Damn him for making me thing of that nauseating ass-wiggling TV commercial again!! If only I’d never seen it, talk about being scarred for life…
Ouch! Ha ha.
What is Microsoft’s hedgehog? For decades, it’s been “leveraging their dominant position” It’s the only thing they know how to do.
Unfortunately, smaller companies have been able to stake out smaller markets and dominate them over time. This has lead to an erosion of MS’s dominant position in several of their key markets.
And because of their culture they just don’t know how to deal with it. There’s nobody left in management who has any vision, or inkling of how to motivate the troops toward quality.
Unless the stockholders get wise and put new blood into the organization STARTINGFROM THE TOP-DOWN, there will never be the culture change needed at MS to stop their slow, but relentlessly inevitable, decline.
@ Planar,
“Microsoft takes some credit for fueling the personal computing revolution and putting a lot of power in the hands of a lot of people, No, not without flaws, but power to imagine nonetheless”
Close Planar, but no cookie. Let me fix it for you.
Microsoft takes all of the credit for fueling the personal computing revolution by putting all of the power in the hands of IT people. A lot of flaws but no way to get rid of Microsoft with IT’s Microsoft trained grip on enterprise.
Remember IT’s motto, “No one gets fired in an all Microsoft shop, we need the manpower.”
Microsofts existence is very important!
If the comp industry has no ms, ppl couldn’t compare and realize how beautiful apple is.
On a side note, if MS wasn’t the big tough guy back in the late 90s making apple to troubles, Apple probably won’t be as successful as today bcoz they knew they had to work their ass off, to innovate like crazy, to do a damn good job to fight for existence.
In a way, thx Ms.