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Comment by maxxxxx | Hacker News Reader

In what way was MS sinking under Ballmer? Maybe they were not exciting but they were super profitable every year. I think it's more about better PR.

Not everything is golden at MS now either. I am working on creating a platform for our medical software on Windows 10 and it really makes me want to switch to Linux or iOS. Windows is a big mess of old and new code and attempts of sandboxing like iOS but only half-hearted. Keeping up with the semi-annual channel is also insane. I would much prefer annual or biannual releases that are actually stable. It's a very developer unfriendly platform now.

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I mostly agree, I’ve been a .net developer for over a decade and the current state of things is very wonky. For the past couple years I’ve been unsure where to focus my efforts to make sure I don’t wind up in another situation where I get very good at Silverlight just to have it all thrown away. At this point with Microsoft half backing away from UWP and half continuing to push it, I don’t know if it’s better for me to make the jump or not. Also it’s more clear now that .net Core the future, but for a while it’s been very confusing and it’s still not 100% clear if it’s going to encompass all the scenarios I need or if I’m going to have to keep abreast of both sides. Rather than staying at the bleeding edge of .net like I used to, I’ve been finding it safer to just give it space and wait for things to solidify. All in all, developing for the Microsoft platform has become very confusing over the past several years.

Still better than trying to keep up to date on the NodeJS or frontend development world though :-P

Blowing billions regularly on terrible acquisitions? aQuantive, Nokia, more...

Windows always been a pain to develop for. And every Windows version redundantly includes "a new api for everything" alongside all the horrible legacy stuff.

But Microsoft's recent efforts on Linux & macOS, i.e. VSCode, has been surprisingly good. They do a lot of things, I think Typescript is run by MS as well.

So that's something that positively changed under Nadella.

I believe this is because MS wants to move away from being an OS provider to being a service provider. If a service runs on Linux they won't care as long as its generating revenue for them. Whether this is Nadella's push or obvious from MS's accountants is hard to say.

They may turn into an IBM variation long term. Profitable, stable business. Not glamorous, but good money.

As a Microsoft shareholder, this was my favorite line from the article: "for Microsoft, 'profitable and boring' is just a longer way of saying 'profitable.'"

Don’t all companies become IBM at some point?

Probably.

So it's kind of like baldness?

TypeScript came about in 2011, while Ballmer was CEO.

Remember this comic: https://amp.businessinsider.com/images/50a25c45eab8ea8c41000...

Ballmer brewed the culture to be like that.

It's not like that at MSFT anymore.

Ha-ha-ha, tell it to the folks driving UWP vs WPF debacle.

The rest of the comic, for those curious about how the other big companies compare: http://bonkersworld.net/organizational-charts

> In what way was MS sinking under Ballmer?

In a relative way.

If you are going to talk about operating systems, iOS and Android/Linux blew by Windows on his watch despite Microsoft's big head start in the smartphone space. I think that's directly the result of Microsoft not being exciting.

MS also had a big head start on Tablets: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Tablet_PC

And how much has Android “winning” help Google? From the Oracle trial, it came out that Android has only made Google $21 billion in profit during its entire existence and the largest market for “Android”, China, doesn’t make Google one dime.

Google has generated tens of billions of dollars in profit (and a lot of money for Microsoft via licensing). iOS turned Apple into a trillion dollar company. Meanwhile it's not clear if Microsoft made anything from their Windows Phone investment.

Again not according to official court records. iOS turned Apple into a trillion dollar company because of hardware sells. Selling phones haven’t been profitable for any Android manufacturer. Even Samsung’s ASP is around $270 for phones.

I'm not sure what your point is. Microsoft sells hardware as well. If anything, that's another nail in Ballmer's coffin.

The hardware that Microsoft sells is inconsequential to the bottom line. XBox’s sell at a loss and the few surface computers they sell don’t move the needle.

I'm suspicious of that figure as you've presented it, but I'm not all that familiar with the trial either.

If it weren't for Android, how many fewer people would be using Chrome as their daily mobile browser? How can we quantify the data slurped up and clicks generated on google.com by those added chrome instances? What about YouTube impressions? How many fewer people would be using Google maps daily? How much less location data would Google possess without living in people's pockets?

How did they measure the value of the Google play services ubiquity?

Have these things plus the app store really only generated 21 billion?

> Have these things plus the app store really only generated 21 billion?

Considering why the number was revealed, Google had every incentive in the world to understate as much as they could get away with. Plus, how is $21 billion profit not a great thing for them? The revenue number was north of $30 billion.

Every incentive in the world to understate except maybe they didn’t think lying to a federal judge was a good idea? Can you imagine the penalties for not being truthful during discovery?

Understating isn't necessarily lying. The value of intangibles on a balance sheet often comes down to a guess in some range.

I'm suspicious of that figure as you've presented it, but I'm not all that familiar with the trial either.

https://www.theverge.com/2016/1/21/10810834/android-generate...

If it weren't for Android, how many fewer people would be using Chrome as their daily mobile browser?

Chrome doesn’t make them any money besides Google.com being the default search engine. Pre-Chrome, Google already had an overwhelming share of the search engine market.

What about YouTube impressions?

The same with YouTube. My old Blackberry phone came with a YouTube app as did the iPhone before there was even an App Store. Would Apple have been so fast to not bundle Youtube or Google Maps if it weren’t for Android?

Have these things plus the app store really only generated 21 billion?

I would hope that Oracle’s high priced lawyers would have taken all that into account.

Is "opportunity sinking" a thing? Remaining stagnant for years and years when there was growth to be had if only Microsoft would go after it was on Ballmer.

They grew under Ballmer almost every quarter. Yes, they missed opportunities but by any standard it was a highly profitable and successful company.

True that. Windows always had its warts, just like everything else, but it didn't used to make me want to strangle someone like it does today.

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