Ballmer Hits 10th Anniversary As Microsoft CEO 185
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CmdrTaco
from the bill-icon-remains-intact dept.
from the bill-icon-remains-intact dept.
bednarz writes "Ten years ago on Jan. 13, 2000, Microsoft's Bill Gates turned over the CEO reins to Steve Ballmer. Back in 2000, Microsoft was still under threat of being broken up by the Department of Justice. Today, Ballmer is trying to meld enterprise and cloud computing. He has spent the past decade working through lawsuits, mergers, acquisitions, competitive battles and, of course, new software including Windows 7, which could become the legacy of his leadership at Microsoft. Not that we'll ever forget Ballmer's 'developers, developers, developers' rant."
Re:but..... (Score:4, Insightful)
Living proof (Score:1, Insightful)
Ballmer is living proof that excessive executive compensation doesn't correlate with talent.
The other day (Score:4, Insightful)
I saw one of those annoying pop up ads saying that Bill Gates would pay you x amount of dollars to do Data Entry for Microsoft from home.
I just kind of sighed and went "Really? REALLY?"
He hasn't been the CEO of Microsoft for a decade now. Ask all of the people you know "Who runs Microsoft" and I am willing to bet a fair share of those not in the computer industry will still say Bill Gates.
Re:Moron (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, what a complete moron.
It seems to me .... (Score:2, Insightful)
It seems to me he's just slowly, gently, running Microsoft into the ground. He's not a horrible failure, but there seems to be a complete lack of inspiration and mojo.
Has Microsoft had any major hits since 2000? Like, real killer apps or disruptive new technologies?
10 Years of Wasted Stockholder Value (Score:2, Insightful)
http://www.google.com/finance?client=ob&q=NASDAQ:MSFT [google.com]
Even if you take into account that 10 years ago was the height of the tech bubble, it is amazing how much money Microsoft has wasted trying to get into new markets without any appreciation to its stock price.
All that Zune R&D money should have been given out directly to stockholders so they could have done something useful with it.
Re:10 years of change (Score:3, Insightful)
During these 10 years, there's been change in the target audience of Windows.
Older versions of windows were designed specifically for office use.
Windows 2000 and XP did not change this line and were still clearly aimed for business users.
So please explain Windows 95, 98, 98SE, and ME? Those are all HOME OSs. No really separate user directories, no granular file permissions, and really weak security. NOT something for office use, although I have seen them used in offices.
Re:It seems to me .... (Score:4, Insightful)
Microsoft, like many huge businesses, is much like an oil tanker. They keep running for a long, long time even with the engine off. You don't even notice a change when the engines are turned off, they lose speed so gradually that you only notice it when you concentrate on it. Unless you're standing right next to the engines and see that they're not moving, and in that case, especially if it's your fault that they're off, you better keep your mouth shut about it, do your best to fix it and give the captain a thumbs-up every time he bothers to show up and see if everything is allright.
Ballmer is currently frantically trying to fix those engines and give a thumbs-up to the shareholders, even though he doesn't know jack about the engines and also has no idea what tools to use.
Re:Moron (Score:4, Insightful)
Not only gained, but kept, for a full decade, without any media speculation of "who will succeed him?" his CEO job. There's a large number of major corporations that rotate through CEOs every 3-7 years, and even right now, even though he's secured another 3 year contract, the media is already asking who NBC's current CEO will be. Not to mention the big three automakers in the last year, along with many major banks. Balmer's done some pretty dumb, boneheaded stuff in his decade at Microsoft, but nobody in the media has ever honestly questioned his ability to run Microsoft in ten years; a rare feat for such a high profile company.
The wrong ceo (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Moron (Score:5, Insightful)
Just because he got that job (from hist long-year friend und co-partner), doesn't qualify him to be _not_ a moron.
Bastard? Sociopath? Arsehole? Prick?- maybe.
Moron? I'd say no. A *moron* would have fouled it all up somehow, either not getting the job in the first place or not retaining it for the last 8 years. He didn't.
Re:Moron (Score:3, Insightful)
You can be a moron and still be successful. For reference, see politics.
Granted, it's rarer in areas where you are chosen not for your looks or your ability to kiss baby asses but for your (alleged) knowledge and where you're (allegedly) accountable for your blunders, but it works here too!
For reference, see banks.
Re:Moron (Score:3, Insightful)
A *moron* would have fouled it all up somehow
Have you ever _used_ Vista?
Re:Moron (Score:4, Insightful)
To be a successful CEO, you simply have to be less of a moron than your shareholders (or rather, your board of directors). Given the current crew running most large corporations, that's really not that great of an accomplishment.
Re:Moron (Score:2, Insightful)
O RLY? And how do you explain this guy's [wikipedia.org] job performance? I agree that Balmer is certainly not a moron, but keeping that kind of job for 8 years doesn't prove it.
Re:Moron (Score:4, Insightful)
From a tech CEO perspective: yes. For everything else; no.
Don't confuse business with technology. The only reason that Microsoft is even in business today is because most people are morons when it comes to anything remotely logical and technical... But that also doesn't mean that most people are morons.
sooooooooo (Score:3, Insightful)
because he has gained a ceo position, he cant be a moron ?
Re:Also titled (Score:1, Insightful)
Don't worry, Obama will take it from him soon enough.
Re:Moron (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:10 years of change (Score:5, Insightful)
Vista and 7 changed the playfield. Apple came along with OS X, and Windows started to compete for home users market share, and somewhere on the line pretty much forgot the business users. The OS is no longer clearly aimed for business users.
Oh yeah, I remember clearly when they threw away Active Directory, File Sharing, Smart-card Authentication, Shadow Copy and all of those other business-class features that were just slowing home users down. Or... maybe you're smoking crack.
You can't just say things, you have to actually justify them. What makes you say that Windows no longer has a business focus? Please cite specific examples.
Vista was a disaster pretty much every way you look at it,
Not my way of looking at it. I call it, "rational human being who doesn't make decisions based on Slashdot or hype." I'm not going to say that Vista is the best product ever, but it's not even close to Microsoft's worst OS.
Part of the problem is the overly simplifying things and forcing old reliable tree-browsing into libraries.
I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. I suspect you also do not.
Library-like browsing is fine, if you want to watch photographs or browse mp3 collections at home, but it doesn't really work for corporate cases.
What is "library-like browsing?" Why doesn't it work for corporate cases? (You also can't just pull terms out of your ass and use them as if everybody else knows exactly what you mean.)
Fileservers are easier to use if you can logically follow the treeview.
What exactly is Vista or Windows 7 doing to prevent you from logically following the treeview?
Is your entire complaint centered around the fact that you've never bothered to check "Navigation Pane" from the Organize menu in an Explorer window? I hope that's not the case, because you'd end up looking like a real idiot.
(yes 7 has treeview too, but it sucks compared to old xp model)
Sucks how? Again, you have to actually justify statements like this... you can't just spout crap out of your noisehole and expect me to take it seriously.
Re:but..... (Score:3, Insightful)
Your numbers show that Microsoft went from 96% market share to 90% market share. All that does is prove my point.
They're losing market share.
When Firefox was at 10% market share and slowly chipping away, people scoffed at it and said, "well, IE still has 90% market share, so who cares about the trend?"
How did that turn out?
Again, Google has deals with tons of major vendors and retailers. Currently the cheap PC market is all Windows. When Google suddenly dominates the cheap netbook market with a Linux variant, I can't imagine Microsoft will be super-pleased. And if Microsoft has to start giving away licenses for $10, or for free to compete with the free Chrome license, that certainly won't help the profit margins for Microsoft.
PC costs keep dropping. Dell can't hide a $50 Microsoft tax in a $250 netbook as easily. Either Microsoft kills their profit margin and charges next to nothing for Windows, or they lose market share.
You insist complementary sales are important. With Google bringing some main-stream credibility to Linux's already strong hardware support, pretty soon you'll find more and more hardware working on Linux.
You can still sell a digital camera or webcam with a Linux notebook. In fact, they might be easier to use on Linux than on Windows. Plug them in, and they work.
It certainly doesn't help that Microsoft basically paid Best Buy employees to lie, but more and more people are turning to geeks they know for advice, and buying products online. Every year, retail stores sell less, and online retailers sell more.