
Microsoft Appoints Kevin Scott as CTO - ghosh
http://news.microsoft.com/2017/01/24/microsoft-appoints-kevin-scott-as-chief-technology-officer/#sm.0000kotnlds95ejwph729vdp4mmhf#Smvs70bGj6r6ms74.97
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andyjohnson0
From his "executive bio":

"Scott holds an M.S. in computer science from Wake Forest University, a B.S.
in computer science from Lynchburg College, and is an all-but-dissertation
drop out from the computer science Ph.D. program at the University of
Virginia." [1]

Props for not trying to paper-over that last part.

[1] [http://news.microsoft.com/exec/kevin-
scott/](http://news.microsoft.com/exec/kevin-scott/)

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KKKKkkkk1
No, if you didn't graduate then you didn't graduate. Bragging about your drop-
out status reminds me of Elizabeth Holmes.

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fsloth
It's not bragging, it's explaining where those years went. And doing
publishable work _does_ carry merit, thesis or no thesis.

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KKKKkkkk1
When you say "drop-out from Hogwarts University" you are appropriating the
Hogwarts brand to yourself. When you say "ABD PhD" you are misleading people
into thinking that you're some kind of a PhD. This is doing unjustice to the
people who actually did the work to get a PhD from said university. If you
don't have a PhD, don't put the words PhD in your bio.

~~~
pc86
Come on. It literally says "drop out" \- no reasonable person could possibly
believe the guy has a PhD, and being ABD is a hell of lot more than 99% of the
population. Not to mention the fact that UVA is a good school generally so I
can't imagine it's a cakewalk to even get admitted to their doctoral programs.

If he didn't mention an _n_ -year gap in his background you'd say he was
trying to hide the fact he was a drop out. You're just looking for something
to complain about.

I finished my Bachelor's many years after I left school. I still had to list
the school and the timeframe because otherwise I'd get questions about. I
wasn't able to just say "I went to school but didn't graduate, but I don't
want to appropriate the brand of my former university!" That's idiotic.

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chubot
Kind of interesting because I assume Microsoft has deep technical talent in
operating system kernel and user space design.

But they chose someone who I assume must be a distributed computing
("web/cloud") guy instead. I guess that's where they see the bulk of their
business being in the future.

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maxxxxx
I would think his role as CTO is less specifically about one field like
distributed computing and more about creating a coherent vision over the whole
of Microsoft which has been lacking for a long time .

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supernovae
Microsoft has a vision, it just had problems executing on it. Those who paid
attention knew of what was coming these years because of their infamous 10
year vision and interim video releases they had. Terrible at execution and I
hope this guy can help that.

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samfisher83
I think Bill Gates achieved his vision which was put a computer on every
persons desk running his OS. Its still a highly profitable company with pretty
much a monopoly on desktops.

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throwaway91111
While that's nice, that's not saying Microsoft succeeded since the early 90s.

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65827
Was linkedin really known for their engineering? Honest question I don't
recall ever hearing anything good or bad.

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SEJeff
Yes, for starters they wrote things like Kafka and Samza there @ LinkedIn. I
consider this post required reading for anyone wanting to build serious
business distributed data pipelines, and guess where it came from? :)

[https://engineering.linkedin.com/distributed-systems/log-
wha...](https://engineering.linkedin.com/distributed-systems/log-what-every-
software-engineer-should-know-about-real-time-datas-unifying)

~~~
eternalban
Microsoft's technology portfolio & research /far outstrips/ anything LinkedIn
did or would encounter.

I'd guess that this appointment is Cloud/Azure related.

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SEJeff
Sure, and it is also likely 100x the size. That wasn't the original question,
the question was what has LinkedIn done engineering wise. I'd say Kafka was a
pretty smashing success having met all of Neha, Jun, and Jay Kreps and talked
Kafka with them.

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jbuild
I think it should be noted that LinkedIn was recently acquired by Microsoft
just last month. [https://techcrunch.com/2016/12/08/microsoft-officially-
close...](https://techcrunch.com/2016/12/08/microsoft-officially-closes-
its-26-2b-acquisition-of-linkedin/)

edit: link

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openmosix
The acquisition was ~6 months ago (June 2016). Last month was the close of the
acquisition - post domestic and international regulatory approval.

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rajdevar
"Empowering people" is Satya's favorite word. Looks like every Microsoft
executive is using this now lol.

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sumitgt
It's actually the company motto

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dsimms
The PR mentions he'll continue to serve on the LinkedIn executive team, so
does that mean he'll continue to be based in MV? That'll be quite a change!
(and challenge for him, I assume).

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caseymarquis
Who is he replacing?

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SuperbSoko
That's the best part of the news. I don't think people really recall the ex-
CTO of MS.

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Irishsteve
What does a CTO in Microsoft do ?

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desireco42
This is insanely tough job to have, but honestly, fantastic place to influence
technology.

I wish someone is crazy enough and give me such job :).

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hantusk
We wish that you are crazy enough to ask for such jobs and work on any
barriers towards them :)

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wmccullough
This is why I leave HN for a few weeks every once in awhile. People in this
thread shitting all over the guy, meanwhile back in their own lives, they
still have to argue with project managers over the "right" way to get code
done.

The crabs are reaching out of the bucket hard today.

~~~
justinlaster
There has always been an attitude of cynicism that tries to masquerade as
wisdom around these parts.

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whkr1
An absolute goldmine for
[http://reddit.com/r/iamverysmart/](http://reddit.com/r/iamverysmart/)
material.

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pikzen
There's a reason /r/ProgrammingCirclejerk is basically /r/HackerNews

~~~
Yhippa
That sub is kind of a heat check against the hype of pretty much everything
these days.

~~~
pc86
They could change the name to /r/ShitHNSays

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general_ai
He will be out in 2 years or less. The problem with Microsoft is it has a
massive old boys network. Once Ye Olde Microsoft mafia moves in, people who
haven't been with the company for 15-20 years tend to move out, irrespective
of their position. This is also why all Microsoft acquisitions where old boys
network was allowed to intrude (basically all but Skype) have been promptly
run into the ground within 2-3 years after acquisition.

