Just because you suck at something doesn't mean you should automatically give up. I think it's to Microsoft's credit that they're continuing to go after search. And they're making progress with Bing, albeit very slowly. I don't see anyone else attacking Google in search.
I agree. Around 2000, I remember reading all these articles in video game magazines talking about how microsoft will never be a major player in consoles. "Microsoft is not a video game company, its not in their dna". Fast forward a bit and look at the console landscape now. 5.5 million xbox 360s were sold in the 4th quarter of 2009. The xbox can now be considered a runaway success, despite the numerous setbacks that have occured (red ring of death).
With search the landscape is a bit different, but we shouldn't be so shortsighted as to count microsoft out of the game or think that bing will never gain >50% marketshare. We could look at articles like this in 3-4 years and laugh out how off the mark it was, just like the articles in game magazines bashing the xbox in the early 2000's.
On the other hand, do big companies ever get BETTER at something?
Large companies tend to walk off their own skyscrapers. Microsoft toppled IBM with the "PC on every desk" mantra. In turn, Microsoft never won on the Internet, because they just never understood that humans network. Phone+cable+Internet companies are begging for a sassy upstart to eat their lunch when competition opens up. American car companies missed game-changing trends in consumer automobiles towards fuel efficiency.
Should Microsoft abandon search? Probably not, but they're more likely to make money if they attack markets that only have awful products. Attacking a market with strong loyalties and gold-standard type products seems like a fool's errand
as said in the article, attacking Google in search is not going to get them anywhere. Facebook, or Apple, or Nokia (with its free GPS service on its smartphones) may steal a bit (or a lot, perhaps) of the show from Google, but I doubt Microsoft ever will.
Bit of a baity article insofar as MS can't "admit" they suck at the web and it would be suicide if they gave up on it.
I have a question regarding Bing, though. A while back, someone here made a suggestion that struck me as brilliant: that Bing provide an option to exclude web pages with Adsense ads on them from search results. This would get rid of untold jungles of webspam and deprive Google of revenue at the same time. Of course it would also exclude many legitimate pages, but webspam has turned into such a horrible problem that at this point I just don't care (especially if the filter were an option I could turn on and off). If MS did this, I would use Bing regularly. I can't think of any other reason to say that.
My question is: what besides accusations of anti-competitive behavior (which strike me as rather weak in this case, MS being far from the monopolist in search) would prevent MS from trying this?
According to the graph in the article they actually made profit in 2004 and 2005 and only a small loss in 06..
I'll admit some of the web products suck (hotmail?) but not bing, they haven't been able to profit from it. I guess currently they are after marketshare rather than profits. Think of it like a startup burning through some initial VC money to get customers except that they have a lot of money to burn!
Disclaimer: They pay my bills, but am not really a fanboy just not anti-microsoft.
Ok, but who, other than Google, does actually make a lot of money on the web? Yahoo is struggling and most of what they offer is generic crap monetizing their old brand.
I have no idea whether Facebook makes any money. It can't be easy judging by their desperate attempts to trick users into doing things that are bad for them.
Twitter should make tons of money considering their service is trivial (I know it's not trivial to operate at that scale) and their mindshare huge. But how much money do they make?
Content creators like journalists, authors or musicians find it very difficult to make money as well.
Amazon does make money, but they are a retailer, not a web company I would say.
In my view, it's an open question whether the ad funded web is a viable business model for a lot of companies or just a niche in which very very few big players make all the money.
Microsoft always seems to need one or two attempts before they make a really good product. Win95 -> WinME -> WinXP. Zune -> Zune2. Vista -> 7. They may not be as agile as Google, but a lot of smart people work at MS. I hope they succeed with good search. Google needs some competition.
Pretty much everyone I met at Microsoft was very smart. But at least within my division, the available energy was never utilized very effectively. I always compared it to a muscle car, sure that V8 has a lot of power, but boy that car can't handle for anything.
With that said, you just can't apply blanket statements to the company. "Microsoft isn't good at the web" just doesn't really mean anything. The Bing team is for all intents and purposes, a completely different company from the IE team, from the Xbox and Zune teams from DevDiv... How a given team at MS does largely depends on how effective its management is. Some teams have really effective managers, PMs, and developers that can execute. Others don't. There is very little (almost none) energy, process or direction that gets applied across the entire company.
"Does Microsoft not realize that all the spoils of the mobile web are going to the companies that control the front-end interface — that is, the big mobile OS players like Android and iPhone and not the fringe players like Windows Mobile?"
Sounds like what folks said about desktops in the late 90s. History tells us that the device/PC ends up simply being a way to access the web. Sure, there are always some intensive apps that require the local cpu, but those are rarely for the mass market.
[+] [-] aneesh|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] brandonkm|16 years ago|reply
With search the landscape is a bit different, but we shouldn't be so shortsighted as to count microsoft out of the game or think that bing will never gain >50% marketshare. We could look at articles like this in 3-4 years and laugh out how off the mark it was, just like the articles in game magazines bashing the xbox in the early 2000's.
[+] [-] rabidgnat|16 years ago|reply
Large companies tend to walk off their own skyscrapers. Microsoft toppled IBM with the "PC on every desk" mantra. In turn, Microsoft never won on the Internet, because they just never understood that humans network. Phone+cable+Internet companies are begging for a sassy upstart to eat their lunch when competition opens up. American car companies missed game-changing trends in consumer automobiles towards fuel efficiency.
Should Microsoft abandon search? Probably not, but they're more likely to make money if they attack markets that only have awful products. Attacking a market with strong loyalties and gold-standard type products seems like a fool's errand
[+] [-] dotcoma|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] scrrr|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gruseom|16 years ago|reply
I have a question regarding Bing, though. A while back, someone here made a suggestion that struck me as brilliant: that Bing provide an option to exclude web pages with Adsense ads on them from search results. This would get rid of untold jungles of webspam and deprive Google of revenue at the same time. Of course it would also exclude many legitimate pages, but webspam has turned into such a horrible problem that at this point I just don't care (especially if the filter were an option I could turn on and off). If MS did this, I would use Bing regularly. I can't think of any other reason to say that.
My question is: what besides accusations of anti-competitive behavior (which strike me as rather weak in this case, MS being far from the monopolist in search) would prevent MS from trying this?
[+] [-] epochwolf|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bobbyi|16 years ago|reply
I don't think Microsoft could find a buyer for its online division.
[+] [-] awa|16 years ago|reply
I'll admit some of the web products suck (hotmail?) but not bing, they haven't been able to profit from it. I guess currently they are after marketshare rather than profits. Think of it like a startup burning through some initial VC money to get customers except that they have a lot of money to burn!
Disclaimer: They pay my bills, but am not really a fanboy just not anti-microsoft.
[+] [-] kalid|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dangrossman|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fauigerzigerk|16 years ago|reply
I have no idea whether Facebook makes any money. It can't be easy judging by their desperate attempts to trick users into doing things that are bad for them.
Twitter should make tons of money considering their service is trivial (I know it's not trivial to operate at that scale) and their mindshare huge. But how much money do they make?
Content creators like journalists, authors or musicians find it very difficult to make money as well.
Amazon does make money, but they are a retailer, not a web company I would say.
In my view, it's an open question whether the ad funded web is a viable business model for a lot of companies or just a niche in which very very few big players make all the money.
[+] [-] benologist|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] boundlessdreamz|16 years ago|reply
Successfully bought and developed
Analytics, Blogger, Google Earth, Picasa etc
[+] [-] city41|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] scrrr|16 years ago|reply
Having said that: Bing sucks b*s in Germany.
[+] [-] city41|16 years ago|reply
With that said, you just can't apply blanket statements to the company. "Microsoft isn't good at the web" just doesn't really mean anything. The Bing team is for all intents and purposes, a completely different company from the IE team, from the Xbox and Zune teams from DevDiv... How a given team at MS does largely depends on how effective its management is. Some teams have really effective managers, PMs, and developers that can execute. Others don't. There is very little (almost none) energy, process or direction that gets applied across the entire company.
[+] [-] thristian|16 years ago|reply
MS-DOS: v1.0, v2.0, v3.3
Windows: v1.0, v2.0, v3.0
Windows NT: v3.1, v3.51, v4.0
Word for Windows: v1.0, v2.0, v6.0
Visual Basic: v1.0, v2.0, v3.0
There's probably other examples, but I'm not sufficiently familiar with Microsoft's other (or newer) products to list them.
[+] [-] raganwald|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Batsu|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] johnrob|16 years ago|reply
Sounds like what folks said about desktops in the late 90s. History tells us that the device/PC ends up simply being a way to access the web. Sure, there are always some intensive apps that require the local cpu, but those are rarely for the mass market.
[+] [-] akamaka|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] epochwolf|16 years ago|reply
I have an MSN Messenger account but I never use their client for it. I've always used 3rd party applications.
[+] [-] pvg|16 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dondemarco|16 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] metatronscube|16 years ago|reply