Microsoft closes consumer skunkworks unit | Hacker News Reader

Microsoft closes consumer skunkworks unit

news.cnet.com

31 pointsssclafani15 comments

Anybody know the real reason Courier was trashed? I'm sure it woulda been a little pricey -- with 2 screens -- but honestly, it was the first MSFT product that excited me in a long time.

Since then, I've really been turned-on by Kinect and WP7 but Courier would've been a great product.

Hell, it STILL would be.

I'm not sure if this is "the real reason" but here's an explanation from a former Microsoft GM: http://hal2020.com/2011/03/07/why-microsoft-shouldnt-do-a-ki...

Personal preferences left aside, I don't think there is time for Microsoft to relearn to crawl. By the time they manage to do it, PCs will be a thing of the past, desktop OSs will be a relic, the server space will be dominated by Unixes and the average user will keep only a local copy of data stored in those servers.

Sad. My wife visited the office during a brief stint consulting for MS last year. She said the space was beautiful and the people and environment were vibrant and exciting.

It looked like a new hope for MS, a fresh division with new blood, and set apart from the corporate politicking, introducing new ideas like Courier and Kin[1]. Instead, it looks like the ultimate confirmation of how bad it really is there.

[1]: I think Kin was more a failure of marketing and market execution than of product design. It could've done fine as a low-end teen-targeted phone with a cheaper data plan, and maybe a bit more attention to the software.

I'd suggest that the contrast between Kin and Kinect shows why an ivory tower design studio was a poor fit for Microsoft culture. The failure was a study an in consumer market segmentation, the successful one is an effective hack.

I get the feeling that the XBox team really isn't part of Microsoft culture.

I used to visit that office frequently - it is one beautiful place in the heart of Seattle (the entire elevator door is painted with a big KISS mural, which I believe is one of J's favorite bands).

I don't think the closing of that office signifies too much about product strategy. A lot of those folks still work at Microsoft on similar things.

A beautiful office space. Article says it was designed by http://www.skbarchitects.com/

What an awesome looking office. Sad to see it not filled with great people. I dont' see how MS can't afford not to fill that space...

> I dont' see how MS can't afford not to fill that space... That's a lot of negatives....I'm not really sure what you're trying to say.

One more nail in MS's coffin when it comes to consumer-facing products.

Being in Seattle, I'm seeing more and more outflow of engineers from MS these days...

Being at Amazon, I'm seeing more and more inflow of former MS engineers... damn good ones too. We're happy to have 'em :)

I left Microsoft on Friday but it has nothing to do with the reasons that seem to be spoken about on this thread.

To be honest, I have seen a ton of ex-Amazon folks show up on my team and in other teams :). There are only a few players in Seattle so people tend to go to one of them when they want to stay there (I decided to move to the Bay Area). That might change with people like FB, Zynga now having development centers there and giving folks more options apart from AMZN, GOOG and MSFT.

I'm sorry to hear that you're leaving. Thanks for posting about your reasons for leaving.

In any case best of luck with your move. You may want to drop by Noisebridge in SF sometime, you might enjoy meeting some of the people there. Since you're in Palo Alto, there's also Hacker Dojo near you as well.

Beware of the inflow of MS managers...

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