I've long thought that it may have actually been better for Microsoft in the long run if the antitrust trial had resulted in breaking them up. Who knows though.<p>The constant forays into new markets isn't new- they've been doing that since the mid-90s at least. At that time they had essentially "won" the PC market and achieved 90%+ market share with Windows and Office. Those products grew and grew until they had nowhere to go. You'd think that would be great for them (and it has been), but stock prices for the tech industry are driven by growth, not profits. If you aren't constantly growing and expanding, your stock price will flatline or start declining. So, for the last 15-20 years Microsoft has been taking the profits from their cash cows and throwing them into one attempt at expansion after another- MSN, Web TV, Zune, Xbox (which was ultimately successful, but not especially profitable)...on and on.<p>Hardly any of their expansion attempts worked out for various reasons. Often their products were clones of some other company's already successful product, and coming out with something just as good (or even a little better) a year or two later is just not good enough to unseat a firmly established competitor. They also push the Microsoft and Windows branding hard, on everything they make, but those are just not brands that most consumers have positive associations with.<p>That's the fate of many tech companies, and it's kind of depressing: they have huge success with some core products, blow up over a short period of time, and effectively achieve monopolies with those products. The core products become cash cows, reliably raking in tons of money quarter after quarter, but they have nowhere left to go. So the company dedicates itself to throwing that cash cow money at one (usually) failed attempt at expansion to new markets after another, but hardly anything takes hold and they are punished by the stock market and their shareholders, despite the fact that they are still insanely profitable. In the worst case, some sea change in the industry comes along after a decade or two, and all of a sudden their dependable cash cow starts drying up. It happened with IBM, it's been happening with Microsoft, and it'll probably happen to many of the top tech companies right now. It sucks and it's stupid, but that's the nature of the tech industry; being publicly traded is a double-edged sword because if you're not constantly growing and expanding, your shareholders think you are failing. I wish more companies could settle into a state of doing one thing really well and not have constant pressure to expand, because that's ultimately what kills them.