April 22, 2005
hunger or die
Rich Segal has a lucid post about how to fix Microsoft: Make it as reliable as dialtone.
Robert Scoble wants Microsoft to make products that thrill people. Perhaps making Microsoft as reliable as dialtone would be thrills enough for most people?
Yesterday I said that Skype thrills me more than anything Microsoft makes, which is basically true. Having spent a lot of time on both sides of the Atlantic (over 15 years total on each) I’ve given a lot of money to phone companies over the years. So of course a viable internet alternative would please me greatly.
That being said, gapingvoid for the most part was all typed in on my trusty Dell computer, which is powered by Windows 98. MS played a key part in building the most important medium in my life (besides cartoons) and yet, I call myself unthrilled. I should love them more, but I don’t.
But that’s the price you pay when you become a monopoly. People start taking you for granted. You just become part of the background noise, like the phone company or Commonwealth Edison.
I’ll say the same thing to Microsoft that I said to McDonald’s seven years ago: You want people to love you again? Then get hungry again.
“Blog or Die”, Robert? How about “Hunger or Die”?
[PS: McDonald’s didn’t take my advice. Instead they spent x-hundred million on the heartbreakingly uninspired and formulaic “Did somebody say McDonald’s” campaign.]
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For me the Rick Segal link brings up some pictures of you showing your business cards to someone…
Thanks, Ulrich, I fixed it.
Microsoft products (Windows and Office) are basic to us doing things with our computers. They are really just tools to get something done.
They don’t need to be and probably shouldn’t be thrilling. I don’t need my copier or pen or stapler to be thrilling, I just want them to work right every time.
Dialtone is better choice then thrilling for some things. Let other apps be thrilling like games.
Is that your age or your IQ?
Oh my goodness gracious sakes alive… I mean good golly… I didn’t know we had ranks in the technology sector.
“MS played a key part in building the most important medium in my life“
Do you mean the Internet? If so, what is the “key part you are referring to?
Also, as a PC user who is familiar with the ad industry, why don’t you use something else than MS?