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http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2704,2209837,00.asp
by John C. Dvorak
Microsoft has extended the life of Windows XP because Vista has simply
not shown any life in the market. We have to begin to ask ourselves if
we are really looking at Windows Me/2007, destined to be a disdained
flop. By all estimates the number of Vista installations hovers around
the number of Macs in use.
How did this happen? And what's going to happen next? Does Microsoft
have a Plan B? A number of possibilities come to mind, and these
things must be considered by the company itself.
So what went wrong with Vista in the first place? Let's start off with
the elephant in the room. The product was overpriced from the outset.
Why was it so expensive? What was special about it? All the cool and
promised features of the original vision of Longhorn were gutted
simply because it was beyond Microsoft's capability to implement those
features.
This failure to deliver what was promised--even after several delays in
the product's release, by the way--did nothing to excite anyone. It
made the company look bad. It directly resulted in a no-confidence
vote that was manifested in a lackluster reception and low sales.
Microsoft should have scrapped the project two years ago and instead
patched XP until it could deliver something hot.
To make things worse, there are too many versions. Exactly what is the
point of that? Don't we all just want Vista Ultimate? The other
versions seem like a way to maybe save money for some users who cannot
afford to get the real thing. You can be certain this version glut
results only in complaints about what each variation is missing.
Microsoft's initial approach to marketing this turkey was obviously
going to be to put it on just new machines, which would eventually
saturate the market, but the PC manufacturers squawked and demanded
the continuation of XP sales. Though there is some chatter about how
Linux could use this lull in the Microsoft juggernaut to make some
real headway onto the desktop, this is unlikely to happen. But
Microsoft, with all its paranoid thinking, might have believed it to
be possible. So XP is still with us and will be until deep into next
year.
I should mention here that much of this mess, I strongly believe, is
due to Microsoft's recent obsession with Google and online search. Now
Microsoft wants to be in the advertising business because Google is in
the advertising business. Meanwhile, it can't do its real job.
So what can Microsoft do to improve things with Vista? Here are three
suggestions:
1. It can give up on the stupid variations and lower the price on the
one good Vista, Vista Ultimate. I'd say $99 would be a price everyone
can live with.
2. Microsoft can scuttle the entire product. Why not? Work on a whole
new OS starting today with one team and work on SP3 for XP with
another team to keep users on Windows.
3. Roll out Vista 2.0. Figure out some way to add some nifty features,
perhaps stolen from the next version of the Mac OS. Bring in some
outside designers if you have to. Oh, and lower the price on this one,
too.
I remember the old Bill Gates speeches of the mid-1980s when
Microsoft, as he told it, "sold code." Selling code was what he did,
and selling code is a terrific business once you are established. It's
even better if you can monopolize a market with your code. It's easy
money compared with most businesses. Halo 3 is code. It sold $175
million worth of code on its first day of release. Once code is fixed
in place and burned onto a CD-ROM or DVD, it has a manufacturing cost
of a buck or two and sells for anywhere from $30 to $1,000 or more.
But Microsoft sees a new kid on the block, Google. Google is a service
combined with an advertising sales engine. It looks profitable, too.
But is it as profitable as selling code? Apparently Microsoft thinks
it might be. Besides, there is no $2 manufacturing cost.
Until now, Microsoft could sell code better than anyone, but it seems
the company would rather sell services: software as a service, ads,
search engine results--you name it. This is like the local storefront
that opens as a knife-sharpening business and is soon selling junk
jewelry, moose heads, toaster repair, and cheap chocolate. In the
meantime, the knife-sharpening business goes by the wayside. This is
what has happened to Microsoft, and Vista is the result.
I'm certainly not going to be a happy camper if I have to switch to a
Mac or Linux system full-time, yet that is exactly where this
scatterbrained company seems to be sending me.
by John C. Dvorak
Microsoft has extended the life of Windows XP because Vista has simply
not shown any life in the market. We have to begin to ask ourselves if
we are really looking at Windows Me/2007, destined to be a disdained
flop. By all estimates the number of Vista installations hovers around
the number of Macs in use.
How did this happen? And what's going to happen next? Does Microsoft
have a Plan B? A number of possibilities come to mind, and these
things must be considered by the company itself.
So what went wrong with Vista in the first place? Let's start off with
the elephant in the room. The product was overpriced from the outset.
Why was it so expensive? What was special about it? All the cool and
promised features of the original vision of Longhorn were gutted
simply because it was beyond Microsoft's capability to implement those
features.
This failure to deliver what was promised--even after several delays in
the product's release, by the way--did nothing to excite anyone. It
made the company look bad. It directly resulted in a no-confidence
vote that was manifested in a lackluster reception and low sales.
Microsoft should have scrapped the project two years ago and instead
patched XP until it could deliver something hot.
To make things worse, there are too many versions. Exactly what is the
point of that? Don't we all just want Vista Ultimate? The other
versions seem like a way to maybe save money for some users who cannot
afford to get the real thing. You can be certain this version glut
results only in complaints about what each variation is missing.
Microsoft's initial approach to marketing this turkey was obviously
going to be to put it on just new machines, which would eventually
saturate the market, but the PC manufacturers squawked and demanded
the continuation of XP sales. Though there is some chatter about how
Linux could use this lull in the Microsoft juggernaut to make some
real headway onto the desktop, this is unlikely to happen. But
Microsoft, with all its paranoid thinking, might have believed it to
be possible. So XP is still with us and will be until deep into next
year.
I should mention here that much of this mess, I strongly believe, is
due to Microsoft's recent obsession with Google and online search. Now
Microsoft wants to be in the advertising business because Google is in
the advertising business. Meanwhile, it can't do its real job.
So what can Microsoft do to improve things with Vista? Here are three
suggestions:
1. It can give up on the stupid variations and lower the price on the
one good Vista, Vista Ultimate. I'd say $99 would be a price everyone
can live with.
2. Microsoft can scuttle the entire product. Why not? Work on a whole
new OS starting today with one team and work on SP3 for XP with
another team to keep users on Windows.
3. Roll out Vista 2.0. Figure out some way to add some nifty features,
perhaps stolen from the next version of the Mac OS. Bring in some
outside designers if you have to. Oh, and lower the price on this one,
too.
I remember the old Bill Gates speeches of the mid-1980s when
Microsoft, as he told it, "sold code." Selling code was what he did,
and selling code is a terrific business once you are established. It's
even better if you can monopolize a market with your code. It's easy
money compared with most businesses. Halo 3 is code. It sold $175
million worth of code on its first day of release. Once code is fixed
in place and burned onto a CD-ROM or DVD, it has a manufacturing cost
of a buck or two and sells for anywhere from $30 to $1,000 or more.
But Microsoft sees a new kid on the block, Google. Google is a service
combined with an advertising sales engine. It looks profitable, too.
But is it as profitable as selling code? Apparently Microsoft thinks
it might be. Besides, there is no $2 manufacturing cost.
Until now, Microsoft could sell code better than anyone, but it seems
the company would rather sell services: software as a service, ads,
search engine results--you name it. This is like the local storefront
that opens as a knife-sharpening business and is soon selling junk
jewelry, moose heads, toaster repair, and cheap chocolate. In the
meantime, the knife-sharpening business goes by the wayside. This is
what has happened to Microsoft, and Vista is the result.
I'm certainly not going to be a happy camper if I have to switch to a
Mac or Linux system full-time, yet that is exactly where this
scatterbrained company seems to be sending me.
