

If Windows 8 Fails to Impress, Ballmer Could Be Out - mtgx
http://news.softpedia.com/news/If-Windows-8-Fails-to-Impress-Ballmer-Could-Be-Out-315303.shtml

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polyfractal
Wow, this claim is basically fabricated. The content of this article is
sourced from an NYT post
([http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/window_pain_for_ballme...](http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/window_pain_for_ballmer_4hGeo5cjUHOi6WM0n3UuNJ)),
where the claims that Balmer may be fired are being speculated by "Gartner
analyst Carolina Milanesi", who says:

> _The success of Microsoft’s mobile strategy doesn’t hinge only on this
> quarter’s sales. But if the company can’t boost results into next year,
> Ballmer would become vulnerable, Milanesi said.

> “If Windows 8 were to fail, Ballmer would be questioned,” she said._

So this isn't even a rumor, it's some analyst making speculations and then
being rebranded as a rumor by a 2-bit news outlet.

~~~
ChuckMcM
A lot of people want Steve Balmer to leave, of those, a subset seem to think
that Steve Balmer is _the reason_ that Microsoft isn't competitive with Apple
or Google at the present time. A subset of those, have blogs and/or are
reporters and they construct stories to support their belief structure.

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swalsh
Whether Windows 8 fails badly or mildly succeeds, I think Microsoft could
benefit largely from a fresh perspective. They need someone who's thinking
about the future, not someone who is trying to recreate the success from their
past. They lost a few strategic battles, and the game has changed. Web is
huge, open source systems are becoming more widely adopted, they don't own a
monopoly any more.

In my opinion With windows 8 they saw a split in the market. Consumers are
becoming mobile, and producers are migrating to laptops. Rather then creating
2 perfect operating systems for both they decided to create a zipper to merge
them back together. It reeks of a regressive perspective.

Microsoft still employs an army of talented engineers, and they have a
successful platform. I'm a .NET developer. I'm proud of working on Windows.
But I can't see their future, and I suspect neither can they.

~~~
macspoofing
>Rather then creating 2 perfect operating systems for both they decided to
create a zipper to merge them back together.

I think that's the right approach in general, though Windows 8 may not be the
right implementation. The reality is that you can no longer neatly sub-divide
market segments. We're exiting the era where we can point to a device and
categorize them as a phone, tablet, laptop or desktop. There is overlap
between the phone and tablet categories and even more overlap between the
tablet and laptop categories - and things will get more and more confusing as
manufacturers experiment with designs. The upcoming Surface Pro is a great
example. Is it a laptop, or an iPad-like tablet? Well, it's neither and both.

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bntly
It's failed to impress -

The travesty that is Windows Server 2012 is /bad/ just really really bad. I
like some things they did with it (No gui - admin by powershell? awesome!)

But Windows 8 as a desktop user experience and "Metro" or whatever they are
calling it now is nearly unusable. There will always, always be people that
embrace and enjoy new technology and new interfaces but they haven't broken
the Skip one buy one philosophy yet.

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velodrome
What Microsoft needs is a fallback option. Same issue as Ubuntu/Unity debacle.

Here is what Microsoft needs to do:

1) Bring back old start menu (as an option).

2) Go straight to desktop (as an option).

The problem is that users expect no learning curve.

~~~
astrodust
Microsoft really needs to make a split between Business/Professional and Home.

The Home version with the touch _Metro_ -esque interface and social network
integration makes a lot of sense.

This simultaneously seems completely inappropriate in a professional
environment. It shouldn't even be a part of Professional, or if it is, then as
an add-on after the fact.

Microsoft is famous for making one-size-fits-all solutions to problems that
aren't so simple, and this is one of those cases.

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macspoofing
I'm not sure about that, but Ballmer should leave regardless. Microsoft did OK
in the 2000s, but largely played catch-up to Apple and Google and now lags in
categories it wants to lead. Some fresh leadership could do Microsoft a world
of good.

