Brian Tinkler

Pro-Microsoft bloggers? Well I guess if you can defend the common Windows user experience, then you can defend anything. Seriously. Those folks should look into assisting Saddam Hussein's legal team, or for that matter, Michael Schiavo's.

Heh. I like how you equate "incredibly innovative products" with a "mass-market monopoly play." This is precisely what stinks about MS. IE has high market share because we make it impossible to remove and corporate box-buyers lock alternatives away from users? Perfect, lets stop wasting time developing it! MS profits from market manipulation, not from the strength of its products.

There is another way: develop a greaqt product, one that consumers love, find a market niche for it, and strive to make it the best it can be as time goes on. Sound like anything? Yeah -- Apple. They make solid profits from products that are actually innovative. And the only time they try to be monopolistic is when they counter MS (AAc vs. WMA, Quicktime vs. WMV). By this same token, however, Apple is no strategic threat to MS's business. Apple operates as a profitable niche player, they have no designs on the overall market. MS's Achilles heel is this: their business model depends on market dominance. If that slips the profits dry up.

Let Microsoft play the violin while the fires rage... It all begins with little clans of barbarians picking away at the frontiers and eventually ends up in the forum.

Microsoft's ability to turn on a relative dime and address the internet circa 1995 was a spectacle to behold, and is a (rare) example of an eloquently stated concern swiftly making its way up through the ranks to a surprisingly open-minded Gates. I think that example has been unconsciously subsumed into the external perception that Microsoft is giant but nimble. Ever since Gates moved from CEO to tech head he has not indisputably demonstrated his worth as a macro-level technologist. He clearly shuns all thoughts of putting the customer first, and customers know that. It is Microsoft first and the customer gets what Microsoft wants them to get. Sony is stumbling for these reasons too… “No, you WILL use memory stick and you WILL use this silly new optical format in your PSP…” Well, the internet proliferates opinions, news and experiences quickly and the solid viable alternates to Microsoft (FireFox and Mac OS X for starters) are getting well-deserved attention. Microsoft's cultural DNA has drifted away from innovation and they can never properly address these sorts of threats to a questioning public and therefore will see ongoing erosion (at varying paces). Microsoft will take decades to disappear because they have so many businesses that are not immediately threatened along with tons of $$, and they could always pull an "Apple" style recovery down the line with new management, but I suspect ten years from now we'll be looking at a sick shadow of the Microsoft we once all admired.

Just my two cents…

Until 2 months ago, 99+% of my income was made directly via MS products (I am a developer) and I get just as angry regarding Microsoft's continuous legal, marketing, and other blunders because when they do stupid things, it effects me and my future.

When Microsoft makes my clients want to avoid Windows, it means less work for me.

When Microsoft lets IE dry up and become Netscape 4.7, it means more problems for my clients and more work for me (and not in a good way, I mean longer hours to achieve the same result, which boils down to less money per hour).

Defend Microsoft? Yes, please do! Defend Microsoft from themselves! The anti-MS zealots aren't Microsoft's problem at all, few to none of MS's customers know about nor care about them. But when MS fakes evidence in a Federal trial and then doesn't publicly tar and feather that employee, my clients begin looking for ways to avoid associating themselves with Microsoft and begin questioning me about alternatives.

Unfortunately, I'm not the lying type so I can't defend MS's bad moves. I will, however, try to point them out and hope they stop the madness. Pretending stupid moves are smart is NOT the way to help a company.

Pro-Microsoft bloggers? I think it speaks volumes when you look at the market share Apple has and the per capita Pro-Apple websites, and then conversely the hand full of Pro-MS websites. People use Windows probably because they have to and probably because they don't know or think there are alternatives. People don't "love" Windows. It's just a tool. When MS can start putting out really innovative products and get a grasp of what people really want, there is no doubt they can turn the mind share. In the mean time, their stock price has been flat for two years, and they already have pretty much saturated the market with Windows and Office. In the other arenas they try to compete in they are losing money (XBox, MSN, WebTV, MSNBC, etc.). Face facts: MS is not going out of business anytime soon. But they cannot grow any more either. Too many niche players who produce very good products or services (Apple, Sony, etc.). MS is not going to persuade anyone to buy something from them in mass until they make a much better product. And I haven't even talked about the black eyes MS gets every time they settle with someone who sues them because of patent infringement or the ongoing case in Europe.

Pro-MS bloggers? Why would anyone really want to defend them?

http://homepage.mac.com/metroxing/iblog/B1641024610/C1851367553/E17168270/index.html

The man on top, is the one who gets the most heat.

Most people that "rip" on Microsoft products don't understand those products very technically. From my experiences, about 90% of the time I experience a bug while using Windows is all related to a third party driver. No one blames the driver/hardware manufacturers because its just easier to point your finger at Microsoft, not to mention the fact that 90% of the computer users don't even know what a driver is.

Most of the posts on forums and blogs that I read which contain negative comments towards Microsoft and their products are posted by people that either don't really know how to use the products or aren't that knowledgable

...in the products they are talking about.

After I learned how to develop software with .NET, I never wanted to look back. The .NET Framework is just that great. What company makes the best development tools in the world? It's Microsoft!!

In reply to those who talk about Microsoft not being innovative... What do you call the .NET Framework? If you don't think .NET is anything significant, then you mustn't really know that much about it. (Yes, I know .NET just expands upon what Java did, but .NET does it way better.)

The new features in .NET 2.0 are all things I am really excited about. One of the things I'm the most excited about is Click-Once. Click-Once will allow my grandma to install and run an application. Talk about making computers easier to use! Now combining Click-Once with the Smart-Client architecture and you get something (which I believe) will really change the way we use the Internet.

Brian,

I totally agree with you. I think Microsoft is a great company. Sure they have their issues, just like any other company, but they also turn out some great products...and their products keep getting better. Windows 2003 is a great OS. .NET is a great programming language. VS.NET is a great IDE. Outlook is a great email client. Sql Server is a great database.

I'm a big advocate of Open Source, but I also realize that open source can only do so much. If you think open source is the end all, then you haven't spent much time with it, or paid attention to the news. Tomcat got trashed in SDTimes. Linux is in a heap of legal issues (SCO vs. IBM, although I'm confident IBM will win), OS is in danger in Europe due to emerging patent laws, the Firefox team is disentigrating because only one developer is left, who's greatly overworked, mySql has gone commercial, etc.

Likewise, Thunderbird still doesn't rival Outlook. OpenOffice still doesn't rival Office 2003. Linux still doesn't rival XP for regular user usability. Eclipse still doesn't rival VS.NET. Java is rapidly losing to .NET...and it's not because of a monopoly, but simply because .NET is better and SUN can't get it's stuff straight. People that trash IE obviously didn't spend too much time doing DHTML or CSS development with Netscape...it sucked.

Apples look good and work good, but there's very little you can do with them beyond graphics and music. And, I think that's the fault of consumers - the market demand isn't there - and Apple, for their numerous misteps throughout the past decade.

Yes, Microsoft is a tough competitor. Yes, they take other peoples ideas and build on them. But, Apple is praised for building iTunes when they built their concept on Napster. I don't see anyone screaming about the monopolistic tendencies of Apple, or how they sold out because they're targeting the bottom dollar. For some reason, they put out iPod and iTunes, make a bunch of money, and they're geniuses. Microsoft does the same and they're monopolistic monsters.

As an advocate of open source, I think there's actually a good relationship between Microsoft and the opensource community. First, they've started to embrace it - think FlexWiki, Enterprise Library, gotdotnet, etc. Secondly, open sourcers are able to pave the way for excellent ideas that Microsoft doesn't address out of the box. Then, once the industry has settled on some key features, Microsoft integrates them and throws behind it documentation and customer support...

If you don't like Microsoft, who do you like? Oracle, who charges TONS of money for their DB? If you think they play fare, you haven't read Ellison's biography. His whole life is built on the concept of the Samurai philosophy and total elimination of your oponent. SUN, who refuses to open source Java, fights open-source companies like JBoss, and keeps putting out bad products? HP, who's management destroyed the company from the inside out and cost thousands of people their jobs?

I agree with Chris...the top dog gets the heat. I owe most of my livelihood to Microsoft, and I wouldn't have spent a career with their technologies if I didn't like it. Likewise, I wouldn't have written open source projects in .NET if I didn't like it. Microsoft rocks in my opinion, and they're only going to get better.

Sean