I’m generally not a fan of beta testing browsers because its hard enough to get reliable rendering even on solid releases but Firefox is worth making an exception for. Today the Mozilla Foundation released Firefox Release Candidate 1 and the list of enhancements is remarkable.
With Firefox and developments with Adobe AIR the webapp world has never been more exciting.
These Microsoft rants are starting to get tiring, don’t you think? I feel like every morning brings in another disappointment from my largest partner, and since they don’t seem to be talking about changing or sending me a cease & desist letter I think it’s time I stopped beating this dead horse.
It’s a little bittersweet to be honest, I love Microsoft, they have very impressive workers and processes, I continue to copy them in a number of ways as I grow my company and to be honest, I really would have loved to have a job there in the long, long ago. Today, they are a tired, frustrated, directionless mass of incompetence and if you read their blogs you’re starting to see the frustration build too.
Steve Clayton recently asked on twitter (paraphrasing): “Why does Microsoft get beaten up about every piece of beta software but Google is instantly forgiven?”
On the face of it, poor Steve is seeing a double standard. There is only a slight distinction. Google is a search advertising company with at best a few years of software writing expertise that addresses big pains for free. Microsoft is a 30 year old software enterprise, with talent and history to the beginning of computing time. Microsoft ought to be held to a higher standard. But even when the playing field is leveled, Microsoft is a company that buys solid commercial products, destroys them, puts them through years of alpha, Customer Technology Previews, betas, release candidates and sprinkles in a little bit of pullback and re-release magic. No company should be allowed to slide for taking stable products and destroying them through the process of rebranding, sorry.
You want forgiveness Steve? As a Microsoft partner of 13 years, I have forgiven you for Windows 98. I have forgiven you for ME. I have forgiven you for the ::$DATA dumping raw ASP code into the browser. I have forgiven you for the SQL slammer, Nimda, Code Red. I have forgiven you for deadend products, one after another, stuck in perpetual unstable condition. I have forgiven you losing your focus and starting to compete with me, your partner. I have forgiven you for the unethical treatment of your partners and being generally predatory towards your consumers and partners. I have forgiven you for your licensing.
There comes a time when even I am not able to forgive you, I think you need to address this with a higher power.
Just to make sure that we’re all on the same page here, I do not feel like I am better than Microsoft or that Microsoft owes me anything – believe me, I know who the bitch is. However, the problem with being a street prostitute without a pimp is that when you’re out and about trying to make a dollar and the customer pushes you on all the problems and lack of direction, you have nothing to provide them with. I need Microsoft (as a pimp) far more than Microsoft needs me as a Vista/Server/Office-pushing whore.
Yes, Microsoft is that incompetent. Here, check this out. They gloated about this mega data center push, how they signed up a 70,000 seat Coca Cola customer to Exchange hosting. Look at the email they sent out the other day:
Again, this is not a joke. This is a dead serious official letter sent to the Microsoft customers indicating that they are likely to be out for about 24 hours lights-out total outage. Not to some ancillary vapor bullshit service like Mesh or Grove – but to the entire Microsoft productivity suite that supposedly Microsoft manages for them.
Apple ads are becoming true. Why even bother? Is there any sign, public sign, that anything is getting done? Because www.microsoft.com makes it seem like things are A-ok. Why am I wasting my time trying to bring this to your attention?
In that light, I want to thank and apologize to Microsoft for my rampant frustration. Last year Steve Ballmer promised me that Microsoft Online will open up a whole new set of opportunities for Microsoft partners. I didn’t know that he meant their incompetence would make me look like a shining star – but thank you, we’re now heading towards double-digit headcount increases on a monthly basis and we’re pushing ahead. Thanks to Microsoft.
I’m going to dedicate more time to working with Microsoft SMB and Microsoft SBSC partners and try to focus on the positives because.. well.. it doesn’t sound like this is helping anyone and until you can come out in a public way and explain to your customers why they should trust you I don’t intend to either.
Rock on.
Someone the other day mentioned to me that I’m being unfairly tough about Microsoft lately. So I am going to say something nice and leave the comments wide open and encourage you to provide the end to my blog post. If you do, the ten most creative endings get a Shockey Monkey shirt:
Microsoft today released Virtual PC 2007 SP1, the groundbreaking customer virtualization product that still doesn’t include 64bit guest support because….
Post your response in the comments. Let’s see if I’m just a basher or if we as a community are just horrible people.
One of the Microsofties and I often argue about Microsofts lack of (inability, unwillingness) advertising in the mainstream media. This is really a double edged sword and any change could potentially piss off a large number of customers or partners so here is my take on why Microsoft’s marketing, for the lack of a better word, sucks:
Microsoft has never successfully marketed to end users.
Microsoft has always perfectly targeted technology decision makers.
Microsoft excels at marketing things like servers and workstations to those that are in the market to buy and manage them for a business. They even do a fair bit of promotions and incentives around the office.
However, look at the mainstream media advertising for Vista for example. When was the last time you saw a TV ad for Microsoft *anything* – how about the ads for Blackberry and Mac? I saw at least a dozen of them last night during the NBA playoffs.
Why doesn’t Microsoft market to the mainstream? Well, for one, Microsoft software is generally too difficult to use. Chalk it up to “choice” and the complexity that comes from it. The more choices the people have, the more uneasy they get on an impulse buy. Don’t think buying a shiny laptop with the purple back cover is an impulse decision? Do I want one with a big screen, small screen, big drive, small drive, laptop, tablet, blah. Try the same at an Apple store.
The second reason, que flamethrowers SPFs, is that any attempt to market something that goes around the gatekeepers gets met with huge resistance. Look at Microsoft’s online offerings – most people believe they will be put out of business if Microsoft markets them to end users in a significant way. Who needs a server if they can get Exchange and SharePoint for $10?
So what is Microsoft to do? From a purely impartial point, I say take the money and don’t ask any questions. Microsoft makes bulk of its money from sales of office software to businesses – windows client, server and office suites. So, do you just take all the money pouring in or do you go out of your way to change what has worked up until now and risk pissing off a large part of your partner base?
The decision seems fairly easy when you put it this way.
However, Microsoft should be afraid that mainstream advertising actually works and in the same way that it is not willing to back its partners and its brand in a very public way from an all out assault by Apple and Blackberry, it’s partners too will take the easy way out. You want a Mac and a Blackberry? Deal. Who are we not to take your money? After all, we make money on services and as my pal Dave says: “I will manage anything that can be measured.”
Microsoft did a lot of right things over the years, it earned the loyalty of a lot of people and adoration of a lot of IT professionals. But if you have been reading this blog over the past few months, you’re starting to see that brand leadership and loyalty is starting to crumble. Not due to anything that the partners are doing, but by a combination of things that Microsoft is doing and a stack of things that they are not doing enough.
Microsoft, through people in roles like Kevin Beares and Eric Ligman, needs to find a way to open up a conversation with a larger audience. The main problem is that the message that is reaching us, is not reaching the customer.
And for what its worth, the message that you read here is directly influenced by the pushback from the partners and customers. I’ve got no horse in the Blackberry vs. Windows Mobile race, I’m just showing you the odds.
Looking for a job in IT? I need to fill six roles, quick, in the beautiful downtown Los Angeles, at 600 W 7th Street 90017. Two Sr. system admin gigs, four Jr. system admin gigs, all include absolutely zero (0) contact with the customers or end users. Role responsibilities include hardware and facilities management (networks, routers, switches, load balancers, SAN, bladecenters).
Requirements: college degree in IT field or military experience with IT certification. Relevant work experience in the enterprise / complex hardware field, these are not entry level or SMB jobs.
Email: vlad@ownwebnow.com
… because at least the bad food is free …
Today, McDonald’s is offering a Free Southern-Style Chicken Biscuit w/ purchase of a medium or large drink, or a free Southern-Style Chicken sandwich in the evening or afternoon. For my foreign friends not familiar with “southern style” it basically means if your momma and pappy aren’t at least second cousins or closer, eating one of these comes with a mandatory four hour bowel movement that will either chip the porcelain on the toilet or create special effects only seen at the Yellowstone National Park. Not to be outdone, Dunkin’ Donuts is offering a free 16-oz iced coffee, from 10am to 10pm. Cause you know… you need iced.. coffee at 9:50 pm.
Is this a great country or what?
Fantastic news from Redmond, just when you thought Windows Home Server could not suck any worse, they find a way to do it. Yes, ladies and gentleman, the product designed to be the central point of backup and storage, previously found to corrupt many file types opened from it, has found a way: they removed the database backup feature from the upcoming update designed to fix the bug of file corruption in the first place. Yes, really.
Are you f’n kidding me?
Someone go right ahead and put the tombstone on the Windows Home Server cause that product is officially and completely done.
I am all about holding the product back until it’s perfect, but if you ship a product and then yank its primary feature set what are you left with? How can you ever deploy anything built by a team that after so much time couldn’t come up with a solution, so their solution becomes total and complete lobotomy?
Seriously guys, you have lost your fucking minds and the time to get your shit together has all but run out. But good for you, I sure hope the telescope software you’re writing helps you find a new group of customers in space because nobody with their right mind would trust your software on earth.
Someone from Microsoft needs to explain some of this shit to the public, quick, because your reputation as a company is going to sink not only Vista and WHS, but everything around it – Welcome to 2008, “experimental until 3.0” no longer flies.
Chris went to NOLA this weekend. Made a presentation. People liked it a lot, one of my guys even texted me about it being the best presentation of the weekend. Turns out you can make quite a business if you use mobility to fit the SMB business, not check off boxes on the Microsoft sales brochure.
Chris then went to O’Briens and had a Hurricane. And a Hand Granade. Another. And Another. Sooner or later it was bound to produce some brain damage, manifested in willingness to help complete strangers be more successful in a role they are grossly unqualified to be in: SMB technology sales.
If you would like to support Chris, who is still living large off his SBS Show royalties, in another fruitful community effort to postpine the inevitable, here is a survey:
Please don’t let my apathy towards the iPhone Roadkill and Microsoft get in a way of you filling out this survey and helping Chris try to turn the leaking oil tanker that is Microsoft’s business software. He is trying to make things better for us (and Microsoft) but Microsoft is a company of numbers and statistics so if you’ve got the time and will, please, help a brother out.
Eric is taking down payments on SBS/EBS orders, get in the line:
Examples of licensing improvements over the current Windows Small Business Server 2003 R2 product include these:
Windows Small Business Server & Essential Server Solutions pricing* is as follows:
Can you be held liable for damaging personal property of asshole lawyers who are asking for it?
In case the pic is too blurry, that is a proud (proud as in “fabuloooussss”) Florida plate: “I SOO 4U”
For the less coherent, more grammatically correct realtime insight, follow me on Twitter at @vladmazek or on Facebook.
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