Innovation only works when it doesn't get in your way.
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Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer will retire within next 12 months
- Thread starter Courage
- Start date
Innovation only works when it doesn't get in your way.
hellmonkey
Member
Darte gets it. The desktop might be losing foothold in the home, but gamers are always going to have one, or maybe a high end laptop. But there is no way in hell the desktop is leaving the business world anytime soon. Workstations are going to be needed for a very long time.
Edit: I hope this is good news. From a business perspective, Win 8 sucks a big hairy wang. As bad as a tablet based OS is for a workstation, its 100 times worse on a fkn server. Its cool if they want to experiment with stuff on the consumer end, but you don't bend over your business/professional customers. The whole windows 8 and Metro theme thing are just painful to use.
Sapiens
Member
This. J Allard knows what's what. The XBOX and 360, love it or hate it, started a small revolution and it was thanks to Allard.
I could only imagine a Allard XBone.
ElRenoRaven
Member
All I have to say is WOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!
Hopefully they'll bring in someone with some sense and who actually knows what they're doing.
Hopefully they'll bring in someone with some sense and who actually knows what they're doing.
badcrumble
Member
I had forgotten how much gaming-side GAF overrates J Allard. I seem to remember a thread on here at one point comparing him to Steve Jobs, lol.
Boogalogist
Member
Ahhhh, finally!! Not only does GAF hate Ballmer, apparently so does the shareholders. Share price shot up on the news of his retirement!
Various Artists
Banned
Pretty major news actually. MS needs a visionary to lead the company right now. There are so many failures in recent memory a major change needs to take place.
Zune Failed
Surface Failed
XBone is failing
Windows 8 Failed
They got the 360 and Windows 7 right but even before that was Vista.
Zune Failed
Surface Failed
XBone is failing
Windows 8 Failed
They got the 360 and Windows 7 right but even before that was Vista.
Good.
Ballmer sucked because MS was late to everything even though they had mountains of resources and a lot of talent. They weren't innovating and by the time they finally caught up the leader had planted deep roots. Windows Phone, Bing, Surface, etc. are really great products (I even like Windows 8, 8.1 looks even better), but they came only after the Apple, Samsung, Google, and others established those respective markets and cemented themselves as leaders. They need to get better at entering emerging markets earlier and iterating faster to continue adding value. The old approach of release only major product updates every 2-3 years was on its deathbed long, long ago and MS took too long to adjust, letting competitors make better products faster.
Which would conflict heavily with the objective for a devices and services company, because Xbox delivers both in a growing games market (generation over generation). He's not going to hire someone that's going to exit that market, not when Live makes a billion a year and games are moving towards a service model (in 10 years they'll be delivered by the cloud and Xbox will be an app on any device). If anything, they'll spin off Xbox into its own company.
Ballmer sucked because MS was late to everything even though they had mountains of resources and a lot of talent. They weren't innovating and by the time they finally caught up the leader had planted deep roots. Windows Phone, Bing, Surface, etc. are really great products (I even like Windows 8, 8.1 looks even better), but they came only after the Apple, Samsung, Google, and others established those respective markets and cemented themselves as leaders. They need to get better at entering emerging markets earlier and iterating faster to continue adding value. The old approach of release only major product updates every 2-3 years was on its deathbed long, long ago and MS took too long to adjust, letting competitors make better products faster.
Which would conflict heavily with the objective for a devices and services company, because Xbox delivers both in a growing games market (generation over generation). He's not going to hire someone that's going to exit that market, not when Live makes a billion a year and games are moving towards a service model (in 10 years they'll be delivered by the cloud and Xbox will be an app on any device). If anything, they'll spin off Xbox into its own company.
Erm, aside from the fact that this vague and sort of PR-speaky and obviously nonsense in a large number of cases, what kind of innovation do you have in mind? FWIW I do think that Metro and desktop stuff should be kept separate, I'm just not entirely sure what kinds of 'innovation' MS could bring to Windows. Unless you're talking about stuff like the task bar changes in Win7, in which case, I guess I agree? I just wouldn't really call that innovation, more like (much-needed) refinement.
Mark Pincus (Zynga)
TheLegendary
Member
Dancing in the streets!
The backend of Windows 8 is what I call innovation. Near Solid State like speeds on a traditional HDD is short of nothing but amazing in my books. As far as I can see, the back end of Windows was *vastly* improved over Windows 7. There is stuff that works and stuff that does not blend well.
I can get twitter on my toaster, but why the hell would I want it?
SkullplateMurray
Member
Goodnight sweat prince.
BleachAndPepsi
Banned
Nobody is really turning the Xbox division around, since it's not like they've come up with anything new lately. Doing the opposite isn't the same as a new idea, it's just doing the opposite.
ThePeoplesBureau
Member
Sir_Crocodile
Member
Wonder if Gates will bring back Steve Sinofzky for this.
witchedwiz
Member
I'll not miss his overabundant sweat..
AyaisMUsikWhore
Member
This is the greatest news ever. I officially believe that now, I might come back to the team.
Didn't he lead the charge on Windows 8?
Interfectum
Gold Member
Windows Trading Cards
User created hats for Windows icons.
At Window's level 20 you can use the calculator.
Phoenician_Viking
Banned
Who's the successor? Is there next in line after Balmer?
ThePeoplesBureau
Member
Well I agree that MS should do those things, and they are, but they're only ever going to be managing a declining market in that regard.
For OS software?!
Impeccable
Member
This won't change much.
Sir_Crocodile
Member
Yeah, but win 8 is a great OS barring one design flaw.
I've been using it for ages now, and with classic shell on to bring back the start menu, it's my favourite gui-based MS OS. Backend's great - the OS is super smooth and responsive.
Enterprise level customers would kill for this. Anything to make the work environment more efficient would have them lining up for ever. I don't have a number I can pull out, but I'm fairly sure they get a lot of money from Licensing Windows to businesses.
Creating a variant for customers would be a simple step if they cater to the business folks.
For desktop OSes? Yes.
I'm sure they make an enormous amount of money licensing to businesses. I think you're overlooking the extent to which many home users want an enterprise OS installed on their machine, though. Even including gamers; that market is tens of millions, MS are used to selling hundreds of millions of Windows licenses.
I've been using it since April and I've grown to like it a lot. The software is good, but the transition was rough as hell. If he had given in on a few critical things in the beginning (i.e. responding to just enough consumer feedback) things could have turned out differently regarding consumer response.
That's why Windows 8 was built at its core to serve multiple devices, desktop/laptop, tablet, and phone. They have their hands in all 3, but Apple and Google have taken over the tablet and phone OS markets. MS has to take a bigger part in making devices people want, but they have to start doing it earlier rather than just waiting until a market is mature and then try to take it over. It's part of why they're moving to a devices and services company. They recognize they need to own the whole package.
purpletentacle
Member
Stitched leather for everyone!!!
Mystic River
Member
hope MS change for the better after his leave
purpletentacle
Member
Captain Tuttle
Member
Poor guy? Dude owns a shit ton of that stock
Neuromancer
Member
What's J Allard up to these days?
For desktops yes. If the market switches to a complete touch monitor based solution, you could have some merit in that. AFAIK, touch monitors (and laptops that have touch based systems) have not exactly been a hot commodity since the inception of windows 8 based hardware.
What we're really seeing is an adjustment of the market where all the facebookers are buying a tablet to do their not-work things. The logic should be to come out with a competitive tablet that doesn't infringe upon the desktop setup, yet somehow they feel like forcing their existing user base out of an unfamiliar environment that they have grown accustomed to over 20 years of business.
gaming_noob
Member
This is GREAT news! It's going to take several years for MS to recover, and just in time for the next Xbox to come out BEASTING.
legacyzero
Banned
BAIL OUT!
geek_box12
Banned
Windows 8, Zune, Kin, Windows vista, Windows RT, Surface RT, xbox one fiasco, and totally complacent over the last decade. They were late to wvery single new market since 2001. They're the sears of the IT world.
He's the best thing MS had going for them, no joke. I don't even drink the J Allard Kool-Aid, but compare X-box 180->360 launch era to X-box 360/post-J->720 launch.
Yeahhhh...
(And if that Win 9 rumor is true, plz2bdroppingMehtroandthewalledgardenstoreMSkthx)
Lasthope106
Member
I think he made the right call. It's been a decade since he took charge and by most accounts MS has struggled more than it should. Time for a new guy to inject a fresh perspective and take Microsoft to the next level.
edit: Most people think MS sucks because of their stumbles in the consumer side. Their enterprise business is a money-printing machine.
edit: Most people think MS sucks because of their stumbles in the consumer side. Their enterprise business is a money-printing machine.
badcrumble
Member
Kin. Courier.
What rumor would this be?
MaximoffZero
Banned
You can put me down as "cautiously optimistic". I'm pretty sure Ballmer was part of Microsoft's problem, but the question is how big of a part.
Ronan_Berthelot
Member
So, Xbox is dead...