William Goodall's Blog Occasional mutterings

February 4, 2010

Former Microsoft VP Dick Brass weighs in on why Microsoft ‘no longer brings us the future’

Filed under: Apple,iOS,IT,Microsoft — William_T_Goodall @ 15:06

It’s a sad tale, if you hear Dick Brass tell it. In a new op-ed for the New York Times, the former Microsoft VP explains how he thinks the Microsoft corporate culture has “never developed a true system for innovation,” and that while the company is obviously strong at the moment, he doesn’t see the company retaining its dominance if or when the Office and Windows revenues die down. His own anecdotes are a little heartbreaking: his team developed ClearType (first announced in 1998), but due to infighting and jealousy within the company, was kept from shipping as a default until 2007 with Windows Vista. Similarly he argues that the Tablet PC was much restricted by an Office team that didn’t believe in the concept, and therefore never developed a version of Office that was stylus-friendly. Dick left the company in 2004, and he says the tablet group at Microsoft has since been eliminated, and that almost all the executives in charge of “music, e-books, phone, online, search and tablet efforts over the past decade” have also left. The man isn’t out to get Microsoft: he sees the company as important, and its profits have obviously gone to great philanthropic ends through Bill Gates and others, but if what he says about the anti-innovative corporate culture is true, it sounds like Microsoft has some work to do before it can return to its place of preeminence as an innovator, instead of the fast and effective follower it seems to be becoming in many areas.Former Microsoft VP Dick Brass weighs in on why Microsoft ‘no longer brings us the future’ originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 04 Feb 2010 09:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.Permalink | New York Times | Email this | Comments [From Former Microsoft VP Dick Brass weighs in on why Microsoft ‘no longer brings us the future’]

Moribund and soon to be beleaguered Microsoft lost its way many years ago.

January 27, 2010

Britons waste up to eight days a year on computer problems

Filed under: Apple,IT,Microsoft — William_T_Goodall @ 11:35

Britons waste up to eight days a year dealing with computer problems at work and home, a new study found. [From Britons waste up to eight days a year on computer problems]

They should switch to a Mac.

January 26, 2010

Apple sees profits increase 50%

Filed under: Apple,iOS,IT,Microsoft,Nokia — William_T_Goodall @ 01:55

Apple reports a 50% increase in profits after seeing its most profitable quarter ever over the Christmas period. [From Apple sees profits increase 50%]

These results just mask the fact that they are really beleaguered.

January 8, 2010

Jackass of the Week: Henry Blodget

Filed under: Apple,iOS,IT,Microsoft — William_T_Goodall @ 09:46

Remember how with the iPod, year after year, we were inundated with punditry arguing that the iPod would suffer the same fate as the Mac — “superior technology beaten in the market by cheaper commodity products because Apple tried to maintain too much control”. Or some similar analogy. That didn’t work out well for those pundits.

I haven’t seen as much of that with the iPhone, but Henry Blodget is giving it the old college try, positioning Android as the Windows in the analogy. Now, it’s true that Android is open and the iPhone isn’t, and Android is definitely gaining attention and market share. But the analogy has no legs. The mobile OS market today bears almost no resemblance to the PC market of the ’80s. Blodget can’t even muster an argument as to what Apple should be doing differently. Really: What? License the iPhone OS to other handset makers? Give me a break.

Anyway, this argument is stupid if for no other reason than that iPhone sales are still growing fast.

[From Jackass of the Week: Henry Blodget]

With hindsight it seems that argument didn’t even apply to the Mac/PC situation in the first place! Different forces were at work.

December 23, 2009

Software development’s winners and losers, 2009 edition

Filed under: Apple,iOS,IT,Microsoft,Nokia,www — William_T_Goodall @ 12:13

In 2009, the computers got smaller, the databases got bigger, and HTML’s dominance grew. None of these trends are new, and some of these changes are as old as computers themselves, but the magnitudes are greater or smaller than ever before. Here are the winners and losers we spotted on the software development landscape in 2009. For the programmers, alas, many of the year’s ups had downsides. [From Software development’s winners and losers, 2009 edition]

Pontification and punditry for the end of the year. Some good points, some interesting links.

December 22, 2009

Will developers be the next battleground in smartphones?

Filed under: Apple,iOS,IT,Microsoft — William_T_Goodall @ 15:11

A couple of weeks ago, Gartner issued a market report indicating that Microsoft’s share of the smartphone market had fallen to less than 8 percent in the last year, while Apple and RIM both made significant gains. Microsoft is at risk of falling into last place in mobile phones if it doesn’t do something about it. So what’s the one strength Microsoft can bring to the table? [From Will developers be the next battleground in smartphones?]

Commercial developers follow the money, and there’s little money in Microsoft mobile compared to iPhone. FOSS developers develop for Android first and Microsoft last.

December 21, 2009

Steve Jobs named world’s best CEO

Filed under: Apple,iOS,IT,Microsoft — William_T_Goodall @ 22:16

Redmond’s Steve? Not so much The prestigious Harvard Business Review has published a ranking of the world’s best-performing CEOs, and we’ll give you one guess as to who is El Numero Uno.…Offloading malware protection to the cloud [From Steve Jobs named world’s best CEO]

And Steve Ballmer isn’t in the top 100.

December 16, 2009

“Apple has a two or three-year lead” in mobile internet domination

Filed under: Apple,iOS,IT,Microsoft,Nokia — William_T_Goodall @ 15:46

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Internet, Apple, iPhone, iPod touch

Philip Elmer-DeWitt has an excellent article over at Fortune’s Apple 2.0 blog on Morgan Stanley’s The Mobile Internet seminar. The article is full of juicy tidbits, but here is the main course:

Based on past performance, according to Morgan Stanley, Apple is in the “pole position” in the race to dominate mobile Internet computing, which is supposed to be for the 2000s what desktop Internet computing was for the 1990s, personal computing for the 1980s, mini computing for the 1970s, and mainframe computing for the 1960s.

“Apple has a two or three-year lead” according to Katy Huberty, thanks to an installed base of 57 million handsets, 100,000 apps and 200 million iTunes subscribers with credit card numbers on file.
Another interesting tidbit that DeWitt spotlights is a diagram that compares Facebook’s 350,000 apps and 137% year-over-year growth with the iPhone’s 100,000 apps and 163% growth. As DeWitt points out, “The place where Mark Zuckerberg’s 430 million users overlap with Steve Jobs’ 57 million is the sweet spot of the mobile Internet. It’s here, according to Morgan Stanley, where we find the future of computing.”

Be sure to check out DeWitt’s article, as it’s a great read, but if you want to delve deeper, you can check out the 92 slides of the Morgan Stanley presentation, the 659-slide “key themes” presentation, and the massive 424-page Mobile Internet Report, all in PDF format.TUAW”Apple has a two or three-year lead” in mobile internet domination originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 16 Dec 2009 09:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments [From “Apple has a two or three-year lead” in mobile internet domination]

Nokia’s response to the iPhone may work or not. Microsoft doesn’t seem to have one yet, and is pressed on the other side by Android.

December 2, 2009

Top 5 Assclowns Laughing at the iPhone Back in 2007 [Retromodo]

Filed under: Apple,iOS,IT,Microsoft,Nokia — William_T_Goodall @ 17:37

Top 5 Assclowns Laughing at the iPhone Back in 2007 [Retromodo]: “I wonder how many times Steve Ballmer laughed about the iPhone after pooping all over it in this 2007 interview. My guess: Not many. Don’t worry Steve, here’s the rest of the top 5 assclowns who dug their own grave: gawkerGallery(5416781,6,’Top 5 iPhone Assclowns’);

(Via Gizmodo.)

Nothing like lame punditry to raise a laugh.

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