

Saving Microsoft - graiz
http://www.raizlabs.com/graiz/2013/09/30/saving-microsoft/

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superails
> "We believe every person deserves the chance to live a healthy, productive
> life."

> What if something like this was the purpose and vision for Microsoft?

They need to combine what they are good at while still focusing on what made
them.

1\. The XBox was a success, prior to big brother concerns about the One. They
need to get back to basics: the fastest and best technlogy and the best games.

2\. Their OS and enterprise apps were mostly a success, prior to
cloudification (or SAAS-ification) and mobile. They failed at mobile and need
to cut their losses and go back to focusing on desktop/server systems.

3\. .Net and C#/VB.net and their development ecosystem has been a success.
They should continue this, enterprise product lines and development support.

4\. Office was a success, prior to cloudification. They should go back to
software and focus on usability.

5\. Things to drop/split off/sell to gain focus: Bing, Windows Mobile, any
hardware, software, or services unrelated to the top 4 above.

There is something that I think brings some of these together: home
automation. Not cloudified home automation, but developing an OS that supports
it that is capable of running without a net connection. People need to believe
and understand that it is not big brother watching from the NSA. They could
buy up existing home automation companies and maybe a security company or two
to get a hold of the market and be able to take advantage of much of the
technology they have developed so far. They could utilize Kinect technology
and their Windows OS tech to run it. By running the home, they serve the apps
and licenses from there as well, completely removed from the net if desired-
just a local network.

The vision would be "Microsoft enables products that your family uses so that
you can be free, happy, safe and secure."

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drill_sarge
Last time I checked MS was still making the big money

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superails
Surface/2 = fail, Windows phone/mobile = fail, Ballmer left, XBox One = NSA
big brother/bad timing fail, now known to have been working with NSA first to
help access user data of privately bought/installed systems since at least
early-mid 90s = fail, Windows 8 = fail.

Yes, they are making lots of money, but the shark was jumped long ago, and we
are in Joanie Loves Chachi-land now (2 Happy Days references for you there). I
think it is perfectly reasonable to start armchair quarterbacking to try to
influence the new CEO.

~~~
jmduke
You are calling the XBox One a failure before it has even launched, which
reminds me fondly of everyone who called the 360 a failure before it had even
launched.

~~~
venomsnake
Well 360 was a failure. They had the cards stacked in their favor and managed
to snatch tie straight out of the jaws of victory.

