<p><pre><code> FTA: "Ballmer's Microsoft wasn't lacking for ideas; it was lacking execution."
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Derek Sivers said it best "To me, ideas are worth nothing unless executed. They are just a multiplier. Execution is worth millions." (see <a href="https://sivers.org/multiply" rel="nofollow">https://sivers.org/multiply</a>)<p>Whatever the reason for Microsoft's inability to execute, the history shows that Gates (a programmer) could get stuff done, and Ballmer (a salesman) can't.<p>IMHO it's probably stack ranking that killed their execution (<a href="http://slate.me/19Jf74r" rel="nofollow">http://slate.me/19Jf74r</a>). Salespeople (like Ballmer) use external fear to motivate people (Make the sale or my boss will fire me!). Programmers (like Gates) use internal fear to motivate themselves (Make this code work or my colleagues will think I'm stupid!). How can any programmer execute properly in an environment of both internal and external fear?
Ideas are worth nothing. A 15 minute conversation with any expert in HCI 15 years ago would cover 95% of these ideas.<p>Execution is everything. Microsoft tried to execute on some of these ideas, but the result was always too cumbersome/confusing.
Ballmer building any of that would be equivalent to Microsoft actually building some of the technology from their latest "Vision" clip: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6cNdhOKwi0" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6cNdhOKwi0</a><p>All of those things seem simple in hind sight, but there were very real hurdles preventing them from being realized at that time (for example, the Internet infrastructure for real-time video chat).<p>Concept videos like this are just the tech world's version of concept-cars by the auto industry. They make the company seem innovative and research oriented without the significant resources required to make a practical product. True, they sometimes yield useful research, but most of the time they're just meant to be good P.R.
But they did build a lot of that video. A few things even succesfully, like Lync/Skype (video conferencing) and SharePoint (document sharing)<p>However, they failed at most things:<p>- they were too early and the market and technology was not ready for it (Pocket PC)<p>- they were too late (Zune, Windows Phone)<p>- plans were blocked by companies who's support they needed but who were scared of them (music/movies/mobile phone industry)<p>- execution sucked and products were not good enough (Windows Mobile, home server, media center, everything speech)<p>- their reputation with consumers was tainted and the press wrote very negatively without really understanding much (hailstorm, drm)<p>- they made it cost money and other offered it for free, ad supported (MapPoint)<p>- negotiation power and influence in the market diminished after the monopoly abuse trials<p>- it took a long time before they understood their problems
Some of these were built, other ideas just don't scale.<p>But most of these? They exist now. Not quite as nice as the video shows, but they exist.<p>Kinect actually enabled a lot of the voice control experiences, Skydrive and Sharepoint do some of the other sharing scenarios, just not as nice as they all should be. I saw some awesome mapping stuff working on Windows Mobile well before the iPhone came out, including actual building maps and linking into ones "social network" (however limited that was at that time) to show where one's friends sat.<p>It is actually sort of sad that none of the experiences have been polished nearly as well as they should have been, by any of the players in the market really. Google Hangouts comes close with some of their collaborative tools, but then something falls apart in the experience, for example in the case of Hangouts, it can be a pain to start one depending on which UI path ones chooses to take, and various bugs pop up and just break the immersion of the experience.<p>MSN Messenger had a lot of good stuff, video and voice conferencing both worked long ago, but then that market fell apart.<p>Collaborative Document Editing was done right by Microsoft with One Note 2007, and then completely ignored from then on by the rest of the Office line. Amazing technology, not sure why it wasn't more widely adopted (I'm guessing due to file format needs, presumably the One Note team had the advantage of building up from scratch).<p>Perhaps most amusing in this video is what people thought LCD screens would look like! I am thankful the ID on LCDs did not go that way!
I was reading about the worlds navies around the turn of the 19th century. The British dominated the seas and were very innovative during the wars with the French and Dutch.<p>But then they stopped. They knew that they had the best sailing ships and knew that changing the technology will only disrupt seas in a way threatening their supremacy.<p>And so the torpedo was invented by the Austrians, the steam and iron ships were pioneered by the French and Americans. This continued even in the 19th century - the century was of Pax Britanica was a century of catchup.<p>In the end economics was important - Britain remained the worlds leader in industry and trade.
Most of these devices were built, some of them with Microsoft technology, but the technology wasn't ready, the implementation was bad (the interfaces are horrendous, for instance), the licensing was prohibitive and Microsoft didn't see themselves as a device company. They saw themselves as building the technologies that supported those devices, not the devices themselves.<p>We must all keep in mind these concepts were showcased 13 years before in the famous Knowledge Navigator video or in Sun's less known 1994 Starfire video.<p>And, probably, on many others that remained unseen by the masses.
Kind of reminds me of the Windows tablet being way before the iPad, yet the iPad blowing it out of the water. Microsoft had all these great ideas, but failed to execute. It really reinforces the 'ideas without good execution are worthless' motto.
What's become more and more clear is that while Ballmer is resigning now, he actually largely abdicated the powers of CEO to the heads of the office/windows/mobile fiefdoms over a decade ago.
Because they saw everything through Windows lenses - and in the end that's how they built those tablets anyway. They still see things that way. They killed Courier for the same reason - it wasn't Windows.
Apple's 1987 vision on computing is nice for comparison: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIE8xk6Rl1w" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIE8xk6Rl1w</a>
Because they did. Windows-powered touch-screen Pocket PCs and Tablet PCs existed years before the iPod. Microsoft just didn't find mobile devices important enough and wasn't willing to re-invent Windows for it. Windows Mobile was pretty terrible to use.
For the same reason they wont execute anything on that Microsoft 2019 video in 6 years. They'll ride Office to their deathbed, which is coming into clear view. Nice run.
>Business users did get some of the promised technology. SharePoint and Lync provide project sharing<p>Strange how the promised land looks like hell on earth.
I've recently came across "The Road Ahead" written by Bill Gates in 1995, and in it he details many of the technologies we have today with surprising accuracy (We'll all have digital wallets that contain all our info, take movies and photos, allows us to converse with anyone anywhere wirelessly etc).<p>Microsoft had a great vision for the future they just failed in execution.
Their version of the web seems to be mostly A/V which is not really realistic as most people can't afford the time nor have the skills to contribute content in that fashion. Does that mean that they were underestimating how valuable user generated content would be?
Like all MS concept videos, it's all very pretty but useless except for the most shallow kinds of collaboration - it's not so much promising any specific technology so much as a future in which you don't actually have to do any work. How many people do companies really need whose role in its entirety consists of quickly slapping together pretty-looking "reports" full of 3D graphs?<p>These superficial concept videos have about as much relevance to the world of actual usable technology as porn has to the complexity and compromises of married life. The encyclopaedia we have today is Wikipedia, not Encarta, and no-one cares that it doesn't have embedded videos of antelopes bounding or the galaxy turning.
Ballmer and his stooges were too busy making fun of Apple and Google (aka. Microsoft's version of marketing). Gosh, when Ballmer leaves, I hope all his VP's would be taken out as well.