Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> espoused:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> ____/ nessuno@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx on Thursday 29 May 2008 19:25 : \____
>
>> On May 28, 6:47 pm, Roy Schestowitz <newsgro...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> wrote:
>>> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>>> Hash: SHA1
>>>
>>> Five reasons to fire Ballmer
>>>
>>> ,----[ Quote ]
>>> | 1) The Vista Technology Flop. Technically, Vista was crap.
>>> |
>>> | [...]
>>> |
>>> | 2) The Vista Business Failure: Microsoft has managed to sell junk before
>>> | but this time it had set itself an impossible job.
>>> |
>>> | [...]
>>> |
>>> | 3) The Yahoo Fiasco: If Microsoft had pulled off the hostile takeover of
>>> | Yahoo...
>>> |
>>> | [...]
>>> |
>>> | 4) The Fall of Microsoft Office. Remember when Microsoft was talking up
>>> | how great the initial sales of Office 2007 were? A year later, in
>>> | Microsoft's third quarter results, we see that Office's operating income
>>> | has dropped from $3.4 billion, to $3.1 billion.
>>> |
>>> | [...]
>>> |
>>> | 5) Who doesn't love you baby? The stock market that's who. Today,
>>> | Microsoft's stock is wobbling just over $28. The 52-week high was $37.50.
>>> | What do you think will happen to Microsoft's stock when Bill officially
>>> | retires? It won't be pretty.
>>> `----
>>>
>>> http://blogs.computerworld.com/five_reasons_to_fire_ballmer
>>>
>>
>> I didn't know it was SJVN until I read it. Here's a quote from a
>> reader:
>>
>> Ballmer is the best thing that ever happened to Apple and FOSS. Long
>> Live Ballmer as M$'s fuerher!!!
>>
>> Which are my sentiments exactly. Ballmer has the same aggressiveness
>> and contempt for ethics that Gates had, but he's not as effective.
>>
>> And by the way, one of the biggest reasons Vista has been a flop is
>> the way it is infested with DRM. That explains at least part of the
>> sluggishness and heavy resources required, as well as the trouble over
>> drivers and the lack of support for older software. It probably also
>> explains in part why it took MS so long to produce Vista. It was a
>> gamble by Ballmer that Vista and its DRM could lock in the
>> entertainment market. That doesn't seem to be working, and has to
>> count as another big failure of Ballmer's.
>
> DRM was more 'alive' some years ago (for music at least) but awareness of its
> harms has increased. I don't think DRM was Microsoft's reason for delay. I
> also know for a fact that 7 will be procrastinated endlessly and end up like
> turd that's just a Vista 'SP' (Allchin talk about renaming SPs before) with a
> new task bar or whatever... which will confuse users like those ribbons people
> loathe... before running back to the "better" 2003 version.
>
Microsoft do not have the resources to rewrite windows. For 7 to be
successful, they really need to adopt, at the very least, an open-source
base operating system, probably like Apple, a BSD licensed one, since
this will let them take the work without paying anything back. At that
point, of course, the ultimate failure of Windows would become clear to
the world at large, as MS would be adopting a Unix model. Whether that
could be counteracted with enough spin is unknown, but I wouldn't put it
past Microsoft to be able to do that. They've shown, more than anyone
else, that they are able to market and spin better than any organisation
currently on this planet.
Of course, the future is not in operating systems, nor is it in desktops
nor any other 1980s artefact. The future is in devices, appliances and
mobility, coupled with network-hosted capability. Business models based
on "owning" information seem unlikely to survive such a transition. It
seems likely that in the future, musicians will be compensated for
performances, and ict vendors for integration and support.
--
| mark at ellandroad dot demon dot co dot uk |
| Cola faq: http://www.faqs.org/faqs/linux/advocacy/faq-and-primer/ |
| Cola trolls: http://colatrolls.blogspot.com/ |
| Open platforms prevent vendor lock-in. Own your Own services! |
|
|
