“The problem is that Microsoft is utterly incapable of innovation,” Taylor writes. “Over the past three years the company has spent about $25-billion on research and development.”
Taylor writes, “What do shareholders have to show for that investment? Vista, an operating system that users were frantically uninstalling within days of loading the cumbersome beast onto their laptops? Zune, the supposed competitor to Apple’s iTunes and iPod? Kin One and Kin Two, Microsoft’s answer to the smart phone? Two intense years in the making before they hit store shelves, they were pulled after two months and scrapped.”
“The stark truth is that Microsoft has rarely invented anything that mattered. It didn’t invent the operating system. It didn’t invent the graphical user interface. It didn’t invent the spreadsheet or the word processor or the Web browser,” Taylor writes. “It didn’t invent the gaming console or the search engine or the tablet PC or server software. It has, in short, invented nothing – or at least nothing of consequence. What other technology company in the history of business has invented nothing and survived for long? Many of them invented very cool things and still didn’t last.”
Taylor writes, “The company should stop messing around and behave like a utility: Cut costs, including R&D, focus on what it does reasonably well and give all the money it can back to shareholders to maximize their returns.”
There’s much more in the full article – recommended – here.
MacDailyNews Take: And, the world awakens at long last.
May Steve Ballmer remain Microsoft CEO for as long as it takes!
So many will soon die off and you can put PCWorld in the heap bag as well.
I could have told you all that.
“I like their strategy. I like it alot.”
– Steve Jobs
I am truly surprised
</sarcasm>
[chant]
Balmer … Balmer … Balmer …
For as long as it takes!
Like I said, anyone with an ounce of brain matter knows that MS can’t innovate their way out of a paper bag. MS locked in the business world with their deal with IBM, who was stupid enough to fall for it. Poor Gary Kildall, got screwed in the process…
This is bs. Apple has 10% or less of pc market and only makes money off of products that also works on pc. Why does apple products also work on pc well because over 90% of us use windows pc. And ooooo kin failed it didn’t it’s just being moved out of the way for windows phone 7 which will let you connect to windows messenger and xbox live users wow that’s innovation. I love apple but windows will never die they run our world.
Microsoft has made a couple of good innovations: ODBC for databases, and the scroll wheel for the mouse. That pretty well sums up their list of useful innovations.
@Eric
I was mildly entertained watching your ruptured artery of stupid spurt glops of retardation all over my computer screen. Please post more.
Didn’t MS invent that talking paperclip thing?
@eric spielberg
troll and moron… nice combo
@MDN take…
spot on.
And it’s only taken, what, 20 years??
@eric spielberg…
People eventually stopped using horse-drawn carriages and buggy-whips too. But I suppose that with you hope continues to spring eternal. Keep the faith. Dolt.
Yay Clippie! And Bob, of course.
Not to mention the Microsoft Store fiasco. Check out this article about the MS Store in Arizona. Pathetic: http://bit.ly/9SfhzH
Wasn’t there some kind of Wizard that would pop up and try to help you?
I remember a purple wizard hat.
Eric, there are no versions of Logic or Aperture that run on windows.
Windows trolls apparently know nothing about spelling or grammar, either.
Thanks for playing!
Microsoft is kinda like a giant turd that you just can’t flush down the toilet. It continues to float and stink up the room and there’s little you can do about it.
(Microsoft’s Modus Operandi)
Steal, Bribe, Buy, & Bully their way into Others Innovation.
“Hey Bill, Karma is a Bitch Ain’t it”
“May Monkeyboy Remain as Microsoft’s CEO 4 as Long as it Tales”
MicroSoft’s days of true hegemony are ending. BUT, it will be around for the foreseeable future as a major player. Maybe not the great dramatic might, but a lot of folks are still buying Windows PCs. You may not like them, but there they are, still with huge amounts of market share. Yes, Apple may capture a sizable share of the $1,000+ computing segment (the one it cares about), but for the “average user”, that $600 Dell or $800 Toshiba is “good enough”. They use Word a couple times a week, maybe excell to write a paking list, and their kid will use PowerPoint to make a presentation on the seasons for school. They make about $50,000 a year, so that $600 investment is a sizable one, and the computer works “good enough” for them.
In fact, as we move on, most consumers are going to be looking for an even more “bottom of the barrel experience”. That average person doesn’t even need Microsoft Office, Google Docs (which will happily exploit their privacy but oh, who cares) works just as well for them. The Home Computer has reached a breaking point where it offers a bigger capability than the average home user will ever need.
Not saying that’s me… I’m a professional musician, my iTunes library is over 100 GB alone, the more ram the better my notation software runs, the iMovie and Garageband are really useful for recording music lessons for me, I love my mac and will probably never get a Windows machine again in my life. Just saying, to the average home user, a 200 GB hard drive is about as useful as a 500 GB hard drive, 4 GB RAM is about as useful as 8 GB RAM, and for this core group of computer users, Windows is “just fine”
“And ooooo kin failed it didn’t it’s just being moved out of the way for windows phone 7…”
So Kin is released and about a month later (sure, it’s still out there in the US, but neither MS nor the carrier are doing anything for it at this point), more than a few months before Windows Phone 7, it is killed, but that is not failure, it is strategy? If that is true, then MS strategy is pretty fucked up.
Seriously, you believe that they actually meant to bring out a product for a only a month? If not, then it’s a failure.
It did not connect with the teen/early twenty crowd to which it was supposed to connect. FAIL. It’s failure is probably linked to WP7, but more because of an internal power struggle between the Kin and WP7 teams than some grand product rollout scheme.
That said, you do have a point about MS being too heavily embedded to go away even in the next 20 yrs. Business PC users and Windows in devices everywhere in the economy (it is the wonderful reason the the self checkout system at my supermarket is always down) require that it will be around for quite a long time.
They may suck, but so many things do suck that stick around because it is too difficult to change.
Gut Feel: 2 outcomes are possible for MicroSoft
1. Attempt to do everything with a half-hearted salesman as CEO as they are now (Balmer has to have been under extreme BoD pressure for some time).
2. Break Microsoft up into separate public companies; PC OS & server, Applications, Mobile, Gaming.
The questions is when will the Board get tired of #1 and do #2. Given Balmer & Gates shareholding and other institutional investors control of shares, it will take a revolution from the large shareholders.
How long can you take before you admit failure to grow and match the competition?
I’ve worked for and around a few guys with attitude like Balmer and NONE of those ever achieved much, because they didn’t know how and people behind their backs looked at them as sales clowns.
Kin failed because tween parents scoffed at the notion of being forced into a $30 a month data plan, a “kid phone” shouldn’t cost the parents about $70 a month, you can get a fully featured Android from VZW for that price. If the Data would have been optional, and had included free wifi, or even if VZW would have put it on their $9.99/month Data plan and promoted it (partnered with pre-movie commercials for the new Twilight movie, or product placed on some show on ABC Family) the phone could have actually succeeded. I doubt most tweens even know what a “kin” is.
So WP7 would be next of “kin”?
Great points Lamos. Only thing that is missing there is the fact that those computers that the “average user” is buying will fill up and bloat up with it’s limited memory and hard drive storage. Then when Microsoft has another update, they will discover that they need to purchase yet another computer or update what they have. Since a new computer is so inexpensive, they will just opt for purchasing a new one. Rinse, repeat, and recycle. Meanwhile, with every update that Apple has given us, we have discovered that our old Macs actually run faster. Cost of ownership on a Mac if FAR less than with a PC! Once you factor in all the applications, ease of use, setup, support, and lack of virus’s just to name a few.
Why ANYONE would want to buy a PC is beyond me other than games. That arena is soon to change too!
@Eric,
Why do Apple products work well on PC’s? Because Apple knows how to write software as well as make great hardware. Their software works DESPITE the limitations of Windows.
Actually, there are a lot of complaints about iTunes on Windows; your praise for Apple software just goes to show that the alternatives aren’t very good. Why are there complaints? For one thing, because iTunes is designed for a modern and stable OS that allows the creation of new processes, not the garbage work- around that bundles processes together into system processes.
Next, why do Apple products work great in a mixed network environment? Again, it’s despite Windows. Apple promotes interoperability through open standards and just works — plug- and-play. Invariably, PCs require far more support in a networked environment. Heck, PCs require support to open documents created by different versions of MS software. Apple created, promoted or contributed toward most interoperable standards: network protocols, CUPS and Bonjour for printing, etc., USB, Firewire, and lots more.
Mac OS supports things like PDF at a system level, and even plays better in MS’s own playground: connecting to MS own mail servers, etc. much easier than PC’s do! Many enlightened IT managers use Macs to do all their network management because it is so much easier.
I live in Seattle, and the local NPR station had one of the VPs of MSFT’s marketing on for an interview yesterday. It was almost embarrassing to hear how the poor guy had to defend all the failures. He held up Xbox as an example of a success, but from what I’ve read MSFT loses money on Xbox. He also said Tim O’reilly’s opinion of where developers want to be (see other story from yesterday) was of no importance. He insisted they are innovative.
Oh and in addition to the dancing paper clip innovation, don’t forget the barking pooch with the tail wagging who brings you your search results. And the incredibly icky Office Ribbon. Gack!
@liebman Dude, that’s a joke site.
It’s fun to bag on Microsoft, but it’s also important to remember that they know how to sell to big business, who wants cheap, standardized software and machinery that can be locked down. What is hopeful is that enough consumers will figure out that there is an alternative to enslaving themselves to big business priorities to keep Apple flourishing.
But the bigger question is what will happen to Zune Tang?
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When an organization fails, you look at the top.
Steve Jobs has the eyes for real talent and innovations.
Inside MSFT, I would not be surprised to find lots of mediocre execs think they’re Steve Jobs, while a few brilliant minds toil away unknown. And even if the smart ones get noticed, either their projects get buried or they get *promoted* into management and never innovate again like the freedom that Jonathan Ives enjoys.
We will sing.
We will sing this,
“Ding Dong
The witch is dead!
The wicked witch of the (North)West is dead!”
With headlines like this, you really should consider renaming the site to “MacDailyOpEd”. This site is about as good as Fox News in terms of objectivity.
MS innovated bloatware. End of discussion.
“But the bigger question is what will happen to Zune Tang?”
He’ll be replaced by Eric Spielberg.
@Eric spielberg:
“it’s just being moved out of the way for windows phone 7”
…Cause that’s the smart thing to do with successful products – destroy and replace. That’s why Apple gave up on the iPhone 3GS. Oh wait, they didn’t.
Re: This is bs. Apple has 10% or less of pc market and only makes money off of products that also works on pc. Why does apple products also work on pc well because over 90% of us use windows pc. And ooooo kin failed it didn’t it’s just being moved out of the way for windows phone 7 which will let you connect to windows messenger and xbox live users wow that’s innovation. I love apple but windows will never die they run our world.
——
Apple may have 1% Market share but they are more profitable and making more money than Microsoft now.
Global marketshare is totally irrelevant these days.
What’s the point of running a company that has 99% Market share that has a profit margin of 10% when you can make more money as a company a fraction of that size but has a profit margin of 60%.
I know which business I would want to run, and it ain’t the one with 99% marketshare.
Microsoft = Lame
Isn’t that headline 15 years old?
Btw, for the record Apple makes money on ALL it’s current product line.
Proof: 13billion turnover last quarter with a profit of 3billion!
Blows your argument out the water!
@Lamos
The consumers you are describing are going to “settle” for ipads and whatever the ipad morphs into in the future. That will be more than “good enough” for them.
MDN Magic Word: wall
as in Microsoft has run into a wall; and that wall is a company called Apple Inc.
@Eric
“And ooooo kin failed it didn’t it’s just being moved out of the way for windows phone 7 which will let you connect to windows messenger and xbox live users wow that’s innovation.”
Kin failed because MS gave it their Midas Touch — took somebody else’s product that had some kind of potential (Danger) and tried to turn it into a MS product because they can’t bear to think that anyone else can do something better.
They took two years to do this: competed against other teams internally, designed by committee, second-guessed by bureacrats, focus-grouped by 9-yr old girls, aimed at the iPhone OS of 2007 (and missed); and finally put out a product that shamed the carrier — and even MS was forced to admit they were embarrassed by it. Pretty par for the course.
. . . the Mop and Pail ran that story. The Grope and Flail and its corporate masters, CTV/Bell Telephone, crawled into bed with Bill Gates five or six years ago because those running the joint had nothing but disdain for Apple, and spent zillions on a jury-rigged Windows system that was out of date 15 years before.
Heads may be falling.
Why picking on Kodak and Remington? Both have great point and shoot devices!
@ Colenzae
Yes, hopefully they will in 3-5 years… but not yet. For them, they still need to be able to use their printer, for them a $500 screen that they can’t hook up their current keyboard with and have to buy a new version doesn’t sound good, “losing” all their microsoft office files scares them (even though they really wouldn’t), not being able to use any CDs (the cloud isn’t there yet)
and for now, when that average person looks at numbers, a new bargain basement PC or laptop still does have more power than a comparable iPad (bestbuy.com has right now a 250GB HD with 2 GB of memory for $299, compared to the $499 iPad with 512MB of Memory and 16GB HD.
“I got three words for ya — I – love – this – company!!!” (dripdrip)
To paraphrase Winston Churchill, with respect to Microsoft: “Never in the history of mankind has a company made so much money off of so many, by offering so little.”
There is one phrase from the article that really amused me, “… and give all the money it can back to shareholders …”
Maybe it won’t be long before we start seeing people refer to “Beleaguered Microsoft”.
@Eric spielberg
Enjoy your summer. Good luck with 6th Grade next fall.
“But the bigger question is what will happen to Zune Tang?”
“He’ll be replaced by Eric Spielberg.”
Thanks, how refreshing, I mean what would M$ topics on MDN be without the village idiot.
“Microsoft has no history of innovation, and therefore no culture that the innovative find attractive.”
I love it.
You guys won’t be laughing when Cairo finally ships. >.<
agreed, yet I still don’t want to short it for some reason….
Zune tang will be freeze dried, ground up and used as a laxative.
For a company that is supposedly dead, they sure do make a lot of money. I hate microsh*t as much as the next person; probably much more. Their bad business strategies that are killing them sure doesn’t bring a tear to my eye. Nevertheless, just like apple who circled the bowl but made a comeback, never discount a rival until they are wound up for good. So I would hold off of the pronouncements of death just yet. Its remarkable how similar the journalist’s outlook is to Michael Dell’s famous words about apple.
If history has taught us anything it is this: the market leader never survives. Of all the companies in the top 100 of the market in 1900 about the only one left by 2000 was Westinghouse. They were never the market leader in price or innovation. They just kept chugging alone, happy seemingly to be second or third in their markets, and they survived. They left in their wake a large number of so called innovators and market leaders. Sure innovation is essential, but a large, loyal customer base and reasonably priced and reasonable quality products also helps. And often this is what the majority of consumers want: not the latest and flashiest, but solid, dependable and doing the things they want done (Cooper’s right that most people never become experts at the technology they use). So time will tell…
C1,
Apple made a comeback because Steve Jobs returned to save them.
Who’s gonna return to save Microsoft? Bill Gates? He’s no better than Ballmer, so that wouldn’t change anything.
I’d say MS already is wound up for good, it’s just that a corpse that large takes a while to fully decompose.
@C1: Cairo?.They should call it Beirut!.
Microsoft has been a leader in innovation throughout these years whereas rivals like CRAPPLE follow its tails.
From now on bing and decide. http://www.bing.com
There’s something to the RING of a Microsoft death knell that just brightens up my day!
I think it has something to do with ending the ongoing computer Dark Age.
This article is severely biased. Sure, Microsoft didn’t “invent” anything of major consequence, but neither did Apple.
Apple didn’t invent the GUI, the OS, the mouse, the Internet, the cell phone, the portable music player, etc., so one could make the same accusations about Apple not “innovating.”
People have been predicting the death of Apple for the past 20 years. . . I guess now they have decided to predict the death of Microsoft
Employee: “Mr.Ballmer,whats are next product?”
Steve Ballmer: “We’ll see what we can get from the next WWDC.”
That’s not true, Microsoft came up with InstaLoad all buy themselves! Oh wait, the article did say “…or at least nothing of consequence”.
My bad.
@ MDN: Kindly copy and paste this “muwahahahahah!!” to the end of your take
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‘Proud Puppy’ sez: “Zune tang will be freeze dried, ground up and used as a laxative.”
As an entomologist I must report that data indicates metamorphosis has taken place. Zune Tang has completed his life cycle as a maggot eating MS feces, become a chrysalis, and emerged as a fly that lays eggs on turds, now calling himself “I’m a PC”.
Same effect. Same inane hilarity. Boink and decide.™
I still love my xbox 360
Over 50% of all Xboxes are defective and returned for repair.
That’s Microsoft.
That’s a-gonna die.
That makes-a me happy.
For info, Apple invented the first ever tablet PC in 1993 called the messagepad.
Microsoft as usual followedin their trail copying Apples innovation.
re: Microsoft has been a leader in innovation throughout these years whereas rivals like CRAPPLE follow its tails.
From now on bing and decide. http://www.bing.com
—-
Ah yes… Bing, that dead duck useless search platform that Microsoft cobbled together because it couldnt out buy Google or Yahoo.
Sure gota love Microsoft’s ‘innovation’.
Excuse me while I leave the room in hysterical laughter! :DDDDD
Actually Microsoft DID invent something… bad products that no one needs or wants that dont sell.
Now THAT’s real innovation!
Every other business on the planet, from the single guy in a garage to the massive global business does a thing called ‘market research’.
Amazingly enough, if you do this before you launch a product you actually make a product that people want to buy, and infact you start making abit of money.
Amazing how a company so large has lost the basic knowledge of business.
The problem with all the PC commodity producers is that they treat a great invention and tool – the computer to be a cheap commodity. There are many things in life, e.g. water, air, love, sex, etc, when you take the values out of them, they become staid and unappreciative. Water is a very valuable item in life but because it has become so cheap and widely available, people tend to waste it. There are cars and cars but only those cars like BMW, Lexus which are considered as “scarce” will people considered them as desirable. So too are Apple products such as the Mac, iPod, iPhones and iPad. Apple understands the psychology of scarcity and that is why its products are considered as desirable. The PC commodity producers, such as Dell, do not understand this principle and that is why their products are being considered and treated as “garbage”.
The buy dissertation service will provide students with the masters thesis but the nice thought associated with this good topic students could find out only here.
M$ is the Soviet Union of technology.
@vsp
The PC commodity producers, such as Dell, do not understand this principle and that is why their products are being considered and treated as “garbage”.
No, they’re treated like garbage because they are.
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@GRANDxADMIRAL
…Cause that’s the smart thing to do with successful products – destroy and replace. That’s why Apple gave up on the iPhone 3GS. Oh wait, they didn’t.
It’s only smart when you succeed. Remember a little iPod called the Mini? At the time, it was Apple’s best selling iPod, they replaced it with the Nano.
I wonder how truthful this is:
http://blogs.computerworld.com/15785/whos_the_worlds_most_inventive_tech_company_based_on_patent_quality_its_microsoft
Microsoft is utterly incapable of innovation..Thanks
custom bedroom furniture
Thanks for the article..
custom bedroom furniture
Er, I think the author busted his credibility with the Kodak comment.
Kodak is #1 in digital cameras, and has busted the inkjet printer scam where companies like HP, Epson, etc give the printers away for almost free, but then rape their customers on the price on ink cartridges.
Kodak is also still king of the photo processing industry supplying companies like Target, CVS, etc (and yes, Apple!) with photo processing services.