Preaching From the Ballmer Pulpit - New York Times

Preaching From the Ballmer Pulpit - New York Times:

There's a great deal of truth here. Nevertheless, no one should underestimate Microsoft. They have the brainpower, cash, and leadership to emerge as a continued winner in the Web 2.0 and 3.0 race.

People speculate that the browser and online apps can replace the operating system (the network is the computer philosophy). Perhaps someday, but I predict MS will make barrels of money on the new Windows Vista and Microsoft Office 2007.

One must always be careful not to underestimate ferociously competitive people with tons of cash and brains. For example the leader, Steve Ballmer, the focus of this column. ("Mr. Ballmer took college graduate courses in math at nights with Mr. Kuss, participated in a summer National Science Foundation math program for advanced students and scored a perfect 800 on the math SAT exam. Mr. Kuss, now an actuary for an insurance company in Ohio, said Mr. Ballmer was fun to teach because “he just soaked it up.”

Yet Mr. Kuss recalled that what impressed him most was when Mr. Ballmer said his proudest achievement was shaving 20 seconds off his time running the quarter-mile. Even then, his time wasn’t good, and his main event in track was the shot put.

To his former teacher, Mr. Ballmer’s remark years ago speaks of persistence and character. “The things that he was good at and came easily to him, like math and science, he enjoyed,” Mr. Kuss observed. “But the things he had to struggle with were the things that gave him the most satisfaction.”")

"More homes and offices are getting wired with high-speed Internet connections, a market-altering shift that is buttressed by a stream of advances in data storage, computer-processing and software. This second generation of Internet technology animates advertising-supported Web services like search, and opens the door to the delivery of online alternatives to Microsoft’s popular desktop programs like e-mail, word processors and spreadsheets.

The consumer rollout this week of new models of Microsoft’s mainstay products, Windows and Office, is one that many industry analysts view as the last hurrah of the fading order of computing, dominated by the PC and ruled by Microsoft."

"...Others who have worked with Mr. Ballmer over the years have no doubts about his intelligence, persistence and underlying pragmatism. Even so, Microsoft, despite its deep pockets and immense resources — in fact, precisely because of those vast resources — has potentially much more to lose in the Internet age than other companies. “This is every bit as disruptive for Microsoft as it is for others,” said George F. Colony, the chief executive of Forrester Research, the technology consulting firm. “The dilemma for Microsoft is that it is a prisoner of its business model, and the fact that it is a gilt-lined prison makes it brutally hard to change.”

One of the evolutionary laws of business is that success breeds failure; the tactics and habits of earlier triumphs so often leave companies — even the biggest, most profitable and most admired companies — unable to adapt..."