Microsoft is (Unfortunately) Alive and Kicking
Yesterday, Paul Graham wrote an essay asserting that in the age of Web 2.0 Microsoft is dead. As much as I would truly love to believe this, I can't. I, like Paul, try to avoid using Microsoft products whenever possible. But the truth is, most people still use Windows, and therefore I must use Windows if I want to develop useful (desktop) software for those people. Try as I might, I can't just stop and expect them to follow me to Linux or Mac.
A good example of this is my own father. He's hooked on Microsoft. It's not because he's a Microsoft fan-boy by any means, he's just seen that, for a somewhat computer literate person, Microsoft strikes a very good balance between features and usability. For him, they made the computer approachable and easy to use.
I've tried countless times to get him to switch to Firefox, but he just won't do it. There is nothing he sees nothing he sees wrong with Firefox, it just doesn't have the all-in-one features (browser, email, calendar) of that translucent-menued, AOL-ripoff of a program, MSN browser. Among normal people, Microsoft has a positive brand recognition.
This is one of the reasons why the "Office-killer" AJAX apps like Writely (now Google Docs) have failed to gain any traction in the Office market. Another reason is that all of these applications, including AbiWord and OpenOffice, are just bad ripoffs of Microsoft Word. Down to their menu structure, they are visual replicas of Word. Yet they are incomplete replicas; in neither can I do a simple grammar check. In this market, the best the competition can do is follow Microsoft's lead. Moreover, Office's popularity makes it even more powerful to its users because of network effects. Even if the current replacements can read Office format, which they can't fully do, there's value even in having a group of people all using the same program, because they can help each other, since everyone knows something about using Word. Move them to OpenOffice, and they'll be stuck.
This is extremely powerful. Despite the bugs and performance problems and security holes, thousands of people are still flocking to Vista like it's the second coming. Microsoft may be dead to us, but to normal, everyday users, it is alive and well, and it is dangerous, and downright stupid to think otherwise. We all love David, but the whole reason why David and Goliath is a compelling story is because most of the time the giant wins.
Paul also argues that Microsoft doesn't know how to keep up in an AJAX world. But the truth is Microsoft has a strong push with it's Live! offering. As much as I hate to admit it, Microsoft Maps often has better features than Google Maps. They have a foothold in that market, and as the Live! campaign continues, they will exert more and more power there as well.
Of course, that does not mean we should be frightened off by Microsoft. If anything, we should be using the fact that they are not dead as motivation to make our software better, more approachable, and more user friendly. We just have to understand that they do have power, and we need to account for that.
At 10:22 AM on April 9, 2007, Joel said,
Not that I want to see Microsoft "win", but... Microsoft revenue from corporate IT needs must be significant, and I imagine not too many companies are thrilled to use webapps over the Internet to handle their internal IT and office needs. There's a little bit of Dick Vitale in that Paul Graham's essay, a lot of excitement calling the game before it's over based on a little 9-0 run in the past 5 minutes.
At 2:21 PM on April 16, 2007, Tom said,
I have to agree with you on this subject. Many people flock to MS Aps just because in many cases it is the path of least resistance. And you are right many of the alternatives are incomplete and not compelling enough. The team and company I work with makes a viewer for project that not only makes it cost effective but EASIER to use. Our application lives and dies by it being better than the bar that MS set. I don't mean to plug, but you can check it out at www.steelray.com
At 4:13 PM on April 16, 2007, Greg said,
As for the argument that MS can't keep up in an AJAX world, their new suite of AJAX toolkit controls seem to be very useful. After writing so much of our own AJAX libraries, even just their UpdatePanel seems to be a dream.
Btw, Joel, nice basketball reference. It really fits!