Oh, Dave, I couldn’t say “clone the Google API” in public! But you did. So I’ll riff on it. I agree with it. I’ll even repeat it. Clone the Google API. Clone the Google API. Clone the Google API. Without the limits. Without the limits. Without the limits.
Here’s my riff:
See, there are two diseases at Microsoft:
1) We look at the world only through a businessperson’s eyes.
2) We have no clue about the power of influentials.
The first one makes us look like greedy, rapacious, businesspeople. And, generally, we are. 😉 Let’s just get that on the table here, OK? We would like to see our stock price go up. We would love to make a boat load of money. And be able to do even more to change the world. I don’t know why we try to run away from that, but the more we try to run away from the fact that we’re trying to make a profit here the less credible we’ll be.
The thing is, if we want to be in the advertising world, we need to be in the audience thrilling business. That’s not going to be easy for us. Why? Cause thrilling an audience is a different skill than identifying, strategizing, and executing a business plan (er, making a boatload of money). That’s why when you’re at a baseball game they try to hide the business guys off in some box somewhere. Or, why, during a rock concert they don’t let executives who wear ties out on stage. Unless it’s to write a check to some charity.
So, if we want to gather an audience together, we must think differently. We must do things that thrill audiences. We CAN NOT chase Google’s tailpipes. Audiences NEVER go for copies. Ever see all those copies of Star Wars? I saw a few. They all sucked. Not because they did anything wrong, but they were copies and we all knew it.
We need to go in new directions that Google isn’t going in.
And, in fact, that’s what Google is doing to us. Larry Page told me last week that teams inside Google often try to create projects to copy Microsoft. And he kills them. Why? Cause he knows that he will never get a big audience by copying something we do.
We also need to get out of the greedy mode. We need to share. Why will someone put Virtual Earth on their Web site? Well, let’s look at why Chris Pirillo puts a Google AdSense component on his site. THEY PAY HIM.
That tells Chris that, while Google might be a greedy group of businesspeople too who are trying to make a boatload of money, they SHARE WITH HIM some of that money!!!
We’ve gotta get that. That’s the whole key to having a successfull Internet advertising business.
This leads me to the second point.
2) We don’t know how to thrill influentials. Google does. Maybe by accident. Maybe by plan. I don’t care anymore. They found a way to bring us a little better search with advertising that sucked a lot less. That’s really why they are on fire.
How did they do it? They didn’t do it by doing committee meetings. By doing focus groups. By studying millions of users. They did it by understanding the leading edge of users and serving them well. They did NOT serve my dad well in the early days. It took me two years to switch my dad from AltaVista to Google. They DID serve ME well, though. On every user study I’ve seen I’m way off the end of the bell curve. But Google groks people like me. They serve people like me. And they romance people like me in a way that no other company does.
Hint: Google is still not doing things for my dad. They are doing things like Google Talk. For me. Things like Google video. For me. Not for the mass markets, but for the influentials.
So, when you see Microsoft not supporting Firefox out of the gate, you are seeing that we don’t get the role of influentials in gathering audiences.
Now, we’re not out of this game yet. It might be the end of the third quarter. Or the beginning of the fourth. We might be down 48-3. But, if we play a different game than Google we have a shot.
It’ll take doing things that Google can’t do. 1) Being transparent. 2) Supporting an open attention system. 3) Changing the search game by opening up its APIs. 4) Investing in gadgets and services that don’t have any monetization strategy other than to thrill audiences (er, influentials first).
If we do those four things then you’ll know we’ve really gotten this services thing. If not, well, I don’t want to even consider the possibility that we won’t. Those are my four agenda items for the next year.
And, yes, this little technical evangelist seven levels down from the CEO who makes less than $100,000, will bet his career on these four things. They are that important.
Oh, anyone see that Robert Scoble Services spells RSS? Heh!
Scobleizer 
Nice Post Robert. Yeah, I like all of the excitement of late, I just hope that the web’s value continues to increase. There is a limit to what ajax can do.
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Nice Post Robert. Yeah, I like all of the excitement of late, I just hope that the web’s value continues to increase. There is a limit to what ajax can do.
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MSN Search will never be as good as or popular as Google, Google is a movement, you can’t buy it or create it on purpose. making msn.com frontpage blank like Google’s won’t make you popular, it will make you a copier and everyone know’s Microsoft invests in copy machines.
remember when Altavista,Netzero and all those search engines had free Banner ad ISPS.. well that failed .. you know what? because the product was getting in the way of surfing. now when Google comes along it gives you what you want without the other crap. It simplifys it.
when you goto msn.com, what do I see? a website designed to host ad revenue not a website that gets funded by ads.
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MSN Search will never be as good as or popular as Google, Google is a movement, you can’t buy it or create it on purpose. making msn.com frontpage blank like Google’s won’t make you popular, it will make you a copier and everyone know’s Microsoft invests in copy machines.
remember when Altavista,Netzero and all those search engines had free Banner ad ISPS.. well that failed .. you know what? because the product was getting in the way of surfing. now when Google comes along it gives you what you want without the other crap. It simplifys it.
when you goto msn.com, what do I see? a website designed to host ad revenue not a website that gets funded by ads.
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99.5 Percent of search engine users don’t use programs that use the search engine API’s. the Google API is not the answer. Please think again scoble.
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99.5 Percent of search engine users don’t use programs that use the search engine API’s. the Google API is not the answer. Please think again scoble.
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Orbit: no, but having an open API would let OTHER PEOPLE PROFIT OFF OF OUR INFRASTRUCTURE. What would that cause? New businesses. New types of search engines that we can’t forsee today.
Remember the lessons of 1989? Remember how Apple was kicking ass back then? I do.
What happened since then?
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Orbit: no, but having an open API would let OTHER PEOPLE PROFIT OFF OF OUR INFRASTRUCTURE. What would that cause? New businesses. New types of search engines that we can’t forsee today.
Remember the lessons of 1989? Remember how Apple was kicking ass back then? I do.
What happened since then?
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Thank you God or should that be thank you Mr Scoble for this post. Please listen all you mypoic marketeers in your Microsoft cubicles who don’t use anything other than your own products and have no idea what Web 2.0 means – if you EVER want to see your share price and stock options worth anything more than chump change! Print this post out, stick it to your desk partition and remember “The Influentials” they are not like normal people (users) they have super powers to make your product live or die just by talking to their friends!(no pun on yesterday’s anouncements intended)
I recently tried to explain the role of early adopters/influentials to a senior MSN business manager as one element of a strategy I was asked to propose on how to improve MSN’s services reach. I got the email back saying “in our next 1:1 I do not want to discuss developers, API’s or blogs but [still] tell me how we can beat Google.”
The short answer should have been you won’t. The longer answer was ” I will review the market landscape and test this with a varied demographic mix across your target audience before presenting to you and your peer group in Powerpoint a 5 point strategy on how to beat Google. This will take me 30 days …” You get the point. This MSN marketing guru is as happy as larry now. It seemed a shame to upset his status quo. 😉
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Thank you God or should that be thank you Mr Scoble for this post. Please listen all you mypoic marketeers in your Microsoft cubicles who don’t use anything other than your own products and have no idea what Web 2.0 means – if you EVER want to see your share price and stock options worth anything more than chump change! Print this post out, stick it to your desk partition and remember “The Influentials” they are not like normal people (users) they have super powers to make your product live or die just by talking to their friends!(no pun on yesterday’s anouncements intended)
I recently tried to explain the role of early adopters/influentials to a senior MSN business manager as one element of a strategy I was asked to propose on how to improve MSN’s services reach. I got the email back saying “in our next 1:1 I do not want to discuss developers, API’s or blogs but [still] tell me how we can beat Google.”
The short answer should have been you won’t. The longer answer was ” I will review the market landscape and test this with a varied demographic mix across your target audience before presenting to you and your peer group in Powerpoint a 5 point strategy on how to beat Google. This will take me 30 days …” You get the point. This MSN marketing guru is as happy as larry now. It seemed a shame to upset his status quo. 😉
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The fact that you see that change is needed, even after the live.com event at least gives me some hope that you have your ear to the ground with the community. However, I hope you can do it faster than a year from now – That is way to long to make a “turn” when you have already put on your blinker!
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The fact that you see that change is needed, even after the live.com event at least gives me some hope that you have your ear to the ground with the community. However, I hope you can do it faster than a year from now – That is way to long to make a “turn” when you have already put on your blinker!
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Robert: steering Microsoft is like steering an aircraft carrier. It takes a LONG time to turn, but when it does it is IMPRESSIVE!
In the meantime, those who are faster and smaller will run circles around us.
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Robert: steering Microsoft is like steering an aircraft carrier. It takes a LONG time to turn, but when it does it is IMPRESSIVE!
In the meantime, those who are faster and smaller will run circles around us.
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You touched a key point here. Transperency. Why hasn’t anyone figured out how to make ad’s that don’t even seem like ads?!
Whoever figures this out will be the champion in my book.
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You touched a key point here. Transperency. Why hasn’t anyone figured out how to make ad’s that don’t even seem like ads?!
Whoever figures this out will be the champion in my book.
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I think there is a third problem at Microsoft, and it’s a pandemic inside the Redmond walls. I think the reason live.com didn’t have Firefox support out of the gates certainly means that Microsoft doesn’t “get” influencers. But I think the firefox fruit was hanging pretty low and the reason no one at live.com grabbed it was due to Microsofts systemic “Not invented here” syndrome. NIHS doesn’t just mean “not invented at Microsoft” it means “Not invented in my product group” and “not invented by me” at Microsoft. How long has start.com had Firefox support, I think from the 2nd day after start.com/3 launched. Why wasn’t that technology and knowledge re-used at live.com?
1) Microsoft doesn’t “get” influencers.
2) The live.com team appears to be a different product group or team than the start.com team.
NIHS only hurts Microsoft, none of the users are really affected.
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I think there is a third problem at Microsoft, and it’s a pandemic inside the Redmond walls. I think the reason live.com didn’t have Firefox support out of the gates certainly means that Microsoft doesn’t “get” influencers. But I think the firefox fruit was hanging pretty low and the reason no one at live.com grabbed it was due to Microsofts systemic “Not invented here” syndrome. NIHS doesn’t just mean “not invented at Microsoft” it means “Not invented in my product group” and “not invented by me” at Microsoft. How long has start.com had Firefox support, I think from the 2nd day after start.com/3 launched. Why wasn’t that technology and knowledge re-used at live.com?
1) Microsoft doesn’t “get” influencers.
2) The live.com team appears to be a different product group or team than the start.com team.
NIHS only hurts Microsoft, none of the users are really affected.
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2) It’s the same team. They just needed to meet a deadline. There’s a saying in software: 1) Quality. 2) Low price. 3) On time. You can have any two.
I agree with you, though.
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2) It’s the same team. They just needed to meet a deadline. There’s a saying in software: 1) Quality. 2) Low price. 3) On time. You can have any two.
I agree with you, though.
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” but having an open API would let OTHER PEOPLE PROFIT OFF OF OUR INFRASTRUCTURE. What would that cause? New businesses. New types of search engines that we can’t forsee today.”
not really, you will have small search engines that will catch niche markets like blog search but people won’t go to those often. a RSS search engine won’t be popular because the majority doesn’t know what RSS is or have a need for it, what you propose is one simple solution to conquer a Google who has become a fashion like DCSHOES COUSA, NIKE a billion dollar company is having problems trying to get into the
skateboard,skater industry. people who are into that group won’t buy NIKE labeled products because they don’t have the reputation behind it..aka slap a label on a skateboard and make money off of it.
what I call for is a whole redesign of msn.com and fresh blood. “search relevantcy” is not the battle you can win. Content is the name of the game..
how valuble would it be having MSNBC live streaming on msn.com :).
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” but having an open API would let OTHER PEOPLE PROFIT OFF OF OUR INFRASTRUCTURE. What would that cause? New businesses. New types of search engines that we can’t forsee today.”
not really, you will have small search engines that will catch niche markets like blog search but people won’t go to those often. a RSS search engine won’t be popular because the majority doesn’t know what RSS is or have a need for it, what you propose is one simple solution to conquer a Google who has become a fashion like DCSHOES COUSA, NIKE a billion dollar company is having problems trying to get into the
skateboard,skater industry. people who are into that group won’t buy NIKE labeled products because they don’t have the reputation behind it..aka slap a label on a skateboard and make money off of it.
what I call for is a whole redesign of msn.com and fresh blood. “search relevantcy” is not the battle you can win. Content is the name of the game..
how valuble would it be having MSNBC live streaming on msn.com :).
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But Google doesn’t make money by thrilling influentials. They do it by being a dependable workhorse and finding people what they want.
Actually, Google seems to piss influentials off, doesn’t it?. They so often seem to think that Google is evil. Heck, at least they incite discussion.
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But Google doesn’t make money by thrilling influentials. They do it by being a dependable workhorse and finding people what they want.
Actually, Google seems to piss influentials off, doesn’t it?. They so often seem to think that Google is evil. Heck, at least they incite discussion.
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But should the goal only be those influencers? Take my wonderful wife. She doesn’t blog, she doesn’t podcast, heck i doubt she even knows what a podcast is. She does have an iPod and loves to run with it. However she uses the computer to check email, balance the budget, and write email. She has a hotmail address that she has used for years.
At work she is a power user of Office doing things w/ Word that I’ve never seen as she is a technical editor for a large company.
Our main computer is a Windows 2000 Professional box that is at least 6 years old and runs great. It is perfect for her chat boards and email. She doesn’t care about gmail or live.com or anything else. She uses Google Maps and Google for search and that is it.
Now should MS care about her as well as the people that live in Web 2.0? I would argue they should. MS should make her job easier by improving Office to help her out. (I get an email every day on how Word crashed doing a search and replace on some 300 page document.) MS should help her balance the budget with improvements to MS Money which she hates and uses a spreadsheet instead.
Remember not everyone chooses to live in the Web 2.0 world.
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But should the goal only be those influencers? Take my wonderful wife. She doesn’t blog, she doesn’t podcast, heck i doubt she even knows what a podcast is. She does have an iPod and loves to run with it. However she uses the computer to check email, balance the budget, and write email. She has a hotmail address that she has used for years.
At work she is a power user of Office doing things w/ Word that I’ve never seen as she is a technical editor for a large company.
Our main computer is a Windows 2000 Professional box that is at least 6 years old and runs great. It is perfect for her chat boards and email. She doesn’t care about gmail or live.com or anything else. She uses Google Maps and Google for search and that is it.
Now should MS care about her as well as the people that live in Web 2.0? I would argue they should. MS should make her job easier by improving Office to help her out. (I get an email every day on how Word crashed doing a search and replace on some 300 page document.) MS should help her balance the budget with improvements to MS Money which she hates and uses a spreadsheet instead.
Remember not everyone chooses to live in the Web 2.0 world.
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Jonathan: my wife didn’t blog either until last month.
It’s the influentials that tell the others about new things.
Larry: Google is now a $100 billion business. It’ll piss people off from time to time. But it gets the fundamentals right (and most of the influentials love Google cause they get paid by Google).
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Jonathan: my wife didn’t blog either until last month.
It’s the influentials that tell the others about new things.
Larry: Google is now a $100 billion business. It’ll piss people off from time to time. But it gets the fundamentals right (and most of the influentials love Google cause they get paid by Google).
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>> We also need to get out of the greedy mode. We need to share.
here’s a suggestion for you then:
http://www.winextra.com/2005/11/01/Security+Is+A+Load+Of+Crap.aspx
the last paragraph or two
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>> We also need to get out of the greedy mode. We need to share.
here’s a suggestion for you then:
http://www.winextra.com/2005/11/01/Security+Is+A+Load+Of+Crap.aspx
the last paragraph or two
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Jonathan: But should the goal only be those influencers?
You sound an awful lot like a Microsoft employee. Of course that’s not the goal. But, you can’t look past the influentials. You must please them first. Then they take what they like and tell other people.
So, if your goal is to get to other people, you gotta please the influentials FIRST.
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Jonathan: But should the goal only be those influencers?
You sound an awful lot like a Microsoft employee. Of course that’s not the goal. But, you can’t look past the influentials. You must please them first. Then they take what they like and tell other people.
So, if your goal is to get to other people, you gotta please the influentials FIRST.
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Every month I get an envelope from Google with a check in it.
I want to put a small piece of code on my website and start getting checks from Microsoft.
Is this going to happen?
People like to get checks in the mail. People like companies that send them checks.
If being liked is important to Microsoft, they should think of ways that people can get checks from them.
Have you searched lately for “car logos”?
On Google my page comes as the second result. On MSN/Start/Live my page is on the third page of results. I don’t like it. I don’t like Microsoft.
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Every month I get an envelope from Google with a check in it.
I want to put a small piece of code on my website and start getting checks from Microsoft.
Is this going to happen?
People like to get checks in the mail. People like companies that send them checks.
If being liked is important to Microsoft, they should think of ways that people can get checks from them.
Have you searched lately for “car logos”?
On Google my page comes as the second result. On MSN/Start/Live my page is on the third page of results. I don’t like it. I don’t like Microsoft.
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Hanan just made the argument perfectly.
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Hanan just made the argument perfectly.
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Robert,
I am not a MS employee, but I am afraid that a lot of what the influencers are talking about are really missing the common average person.
I used to do tech support for an ISP and every January we would have our hands full of elderly people who received for Christmas a year free from thier kids. So they would call up and you would be working on the phone and they wouldn’t know the difference between a right-click and a left-click. Let alone how to create a new connection in Dial-Up-Networking. So we would hold their hand and get them connected to the Internet and then they could receive pictures of their grandkids over email and it was the greatest thing in the world.
These are the people that are not going to be moving over to *nix or going to be rushing out to try live.com. They are the people that think the internet is still AOL.
So how does MS reach them?
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Robert,
I am not a MS employee, but I am afraid that a lot of what the influencers are talking about are really missing the common average person.
I used to do tech support for an ISP and every January we would have our hands full of elderly people who received for Christmas a year free from thier kids. So they would call up and you would be working on the phone and they wouldn’t know the difference between a right-click and a left-click. Let alone how to create a new connection in Dial-Up-Networking. So we would hold their hand and get them connected to the Internet and then they could receive pictures of their grandkids over email and it was the greatest thing in the world.
These are the people that are not going to be moving over to *nix or going to be rushing out to try live.com. They are the people that think the internet is still AOL.
So how does MS reach them?
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This is one of those areas where there is someone way ahead of the game and they may not even know it. Amazon already has a fairly open API, a search engine, and you want attention? Amazon already knows what an awful lot of people are buying, what they want to buy next, and in some cases what they won’t buy and why. And they’re already paying people too, just not to the extent Google is.
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This is one of those areas where there is someone way ahead of the game and they may not even know it. Amazon already has a fairly open API, a search engine, and you want attention? Amazon already knows what an awful lot of people are buying, what they want to buy next, and in some cases what they won’t buy and why. And they’re already paying people too, just not to the extent Google is.
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No question – you are on a roll. A link is up on our internal system as an example of passion that comes from the burning desire for success.
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MSFT needs to go where it can gain the highest marginal revenue per user. Google seems to have no problem getting more marginal revenue per user. Why can’t MSFT do the same?
I think it actually goes beyond the “services” that MSFT has just tried to introduce (poorly). It goes to the CONNECTION between people and the bonds therein. Why does my 17 year old brother spend two to three hours a night on MySpace? He’s using a Windows machine, yes, but he isn’t going on MSN Spaces. MySpace figured out what a certain class of people wanted and gave it to them. Maybe by accident, but its working.
MSFT needs to step back and connect with people emotionally. I would recommend (ahem) reading “Got Game” as a start. We wrote it, and its a good look into what motivates members of the “Game Generation” in terms of mental and emotional drivers. I think so, anyway!
adam
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No question – you are on a roll. A link is up on our internal system as an example of passion that comes from the burning desire for success.
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MSFT needs to go where it can gain the highest marginal revenue per user. Google seems to have no problem getting more marginal revenue per user. Why can’t MSFT do the same?
I think it actually goes beyond the “services” that MSFT has just tried to introduce (poorly). It goes to the CONNECTION between people and the bonds therein. Why does my 17 year old brother spend two to three hours a night on MySpace? He’s using a Windows machine, yes, but he isn’t going on MSN Spaces. MySpace figured out what a certain class of people wanted and gave it to them. Maybe by accident, but its working.
MSFT needs to step back and connect with people emotionally. I would recommend (ahem) reading “Got Game” as a start. We wrote it, and its a good look into what motivates members of the “Game Generation” in terms of mental and emotional drivers. I think so, anyway!
adam
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I’m afraid that’s too late for MS to trying to show a friendly face. It’s about years and years of arrogance, greed and self importance.
Don’t get me wrong but I think it’s over. Look at gadgets site in a month and you will see maybe 20 gadgets (80% of it lame and created by MS itself). Even a possibility of winning XBox will not work. You see what’s “power of influentials”?
Note – I’ve been working as a developer with MS Windows since version 3.0 (Turbo C guy;-)
I just bought my first iMac…
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I’m afraid that’s too late for MS to trying to show a friendly face. It’s about years and years of arrogance, greed and self importance.
Don’t get me wrong but I think it’s over. Look at gadgets site in a month and you will see maybe 20 gadgets (80% of it lame and created by MS itself). Even a possibility of winning XBox will not work. You see what’s “power of influentials”?
Note – I’ve been working as a developer with MS Windows since version 3.0 (Turbo C guy;-)
I just bought my first iMac…
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I can think of a few more diseases in Redmond.
The petri dish overfloweth.
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I can think of a few more diseases in Redmond.
The petri dish overfloweth.
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Well, between Christmas 2003 and now, Apple has gone from a $10 stock to a $60 stock. Microsoft has gone from a $24 stock to a $26 stock.
Surprisingly, from 1989 to now, Apple has gone from a $10 stock to a $60 stock. Microsoft has done much better, going from a 50 cent stock to a $26 stock.
Owning Apple between 1989 and 2003 was a dead money experience (which, is of course, a money losing experience). How the iPod changed things.
Lately, Microsoft has been dead money. Will that change?
Can you set out to thrill the influential? The gadflies?
First, I don’t think you can do it by plan – see your comments on design by committee.
Second, does it pay? Are the influential really about influence or about seeing their own name in ink? They will knife you as soon as it benefits them.
Third, isn’t this approach like the political parties serving to the activist wings of their parties? Can it get much uglier?
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Well, between Christmas 2003 and now, Apple has gone from a $10 stock to a $60 stock. Microsoft has gone from a $24 stock to a $26 stock.
Surprisingly, from 1989 to now, Apple has gone from a $10 stock to a $60 stock. Microsoft has done much better, going from a 50 cent stock to a $26 stock.
Owning Apple between 1989 and 2003 was a dead money experience (which, is of course, a money losing experience). How the iPod changed things.
Lately, Microsoft has been dead money. Will that change?
Can you set out to thrill the influential? The gadflies?
First, I don’t think you can do it by plan – see your comments on design by committee.
Second, does it pay? Are the influential really about influence or about seeing their own name in ink? They will knife you as soon as it benefits them.
Third, isn’t this approach like the political parties serving to the activist wings of their parties? Can it get much uglier?
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It could be that many of the senior MS leaders have forgotten about what is exciting about technology. They seem to want to tel us what is exciting about it rather than listen to people about what is really exciting. And while they think they are, probably aren’t very influential anymore.
But I think the problem goes beyond just influencers. I think much of Microsoft lives in its own world in everything they do; they don’t relate to normal people or normal business anymore either. They design collaboration tools around their way of collaborating, not the way smaller businesses do. I’m not sure who designs their licesning programs; obviously Gates and Ballmer have never had to wade through an EA or they wouldn’t let the licensing mess out the door.
They should rethink how they use focus groups too; these groups are giving MS the wrong impression about what is really going on in the marketplace and what is really needed.
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It could be that many of the senior MS leaders have forgotten about what is exciting about technology. They seem to want to tel us what is exciting about it rather than listen to people about what is really exciting. And while they think they are, probably aren’t very influential anymore.
But I think the problem goes beyond just influencers. I think much of Microsoft lives in its own world in everything they do; they don’t relate to normal people or normal business anymore either. They design collaboration tools around their way of collaborating, not the way smaller businesses do. I’m not sure who designs their licesning programs; obviously Gates and Ballmer have never had to wade through an EA or they wouldn’t let the licensing mess out the door.
They should rethink how they use focus groups too; these groups are giving MS the wrong impression about what is really going on in the marketplace and what is really needed.
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if your expecting a Giant titan to move stock price like they did in the late 90s you must be kidding. They will grow slowly because they are a mature company. Apple reliance on a mp3 player is laughable when they are a computer company.. It’s like a car company only sells its car by special employee programs..your selling the employee price programs not the car.
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if your expecting a Giant titan to move stock price like they did in the late 90s you must be kidding. They will grow slowly because they are a mature company. Apple reliance on a mp3 player is laughable when they are a computer company.. It’s like a car company only sells its car by special employee programs..your selling the employee price programs not the car.
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having a cool open api and the ability to create cool gadgets that people could get paid for creating and sharing is totally the way to start bubbling up the best ideas, instead of trickling down.
that’s where the love affair will start.
the toys and widgets will hold out their hands for a folksonomic fandango, which will be sexy and fun.
the creators will get the number.
but the influencers will know who was responsible for the introduction. and those people the best man, or maid of honour at the wedding.
if this plan works, I think you’d better dust off your tux, Robert – or buy Maryam a hat 😉
good luck!
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having a cool open api and the ability to create cool gadgets that people could get paid for creating and sharing is totally the way to start bubbling up the best ideas, instead of trickling down.
that’s where the love affair will start.
the toys and widgets will hold out their hands for a folksonomic fandango, which will be sexy and fun.
the creators will get the number.
but the influencers will know who was responsible for the introduction. and those people the best man, or maid of honour at the wedding.
if this plan works, I think you’d better dust off your tux, Robert – or buy Maryam a hat 😉
good luck!
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1) Being transparent.
Yeah, you’re really good at that. Ha, ha, ha!!
2) Supporting an open attention system.
Yeah, you’re really good at that. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!!
3) Changing the search game by opening up its APIs.
Ha, ha, ha… Wooo, do I need to say it? My ribs hurt!
4) Investing in gadgets and services that don’t have any monetization strategy other than to thrill audiences (er, influentials first).
Bwahahahahahahahaha!!!! Ha!!! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!!!
I thought that was supposed to be a list of things Google can’t do, not things Microsoft can’t do?
Ha, ha, ha!!
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1) Being transparent.
Yeah, you’re really good at that. Ha, ha, ha!!
2) Supporting an open attention system.
Yeah, you’re really good at that. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!!
3) Changing the search game by opening up its APIs.
Ha, ha, ha… Wooo, do I need to say it? My ribs hurt!
4) Investing in gadgets and services that don’t have any monetization strategy other than to thrill audiences (er, influentials first).
Bwahahahahahahahaha!!!! Ha!!! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!!!
I thought that was supposed to be a list of things Google can’t do, not things Microsoft can’t do?
Ha, ha, ha!!
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See, there are two diseases at Microsoft (just for start’ers):
1) Not looking at the world thru a businessperson’s eyes (i.e. Software Assurance trainwreck and the monocultural thrust and the lack of a predictable Road Map). You say they do, I say they don’t (which is the problem).
2) Listening to edge-market self-appointed so-called influentials with blogs and extra loud megaphones. Focusing on the blog crybaby’s and various web creatures will never get the quality middle-market feedback you really need.
You are so Googlejuiced that you think copying a Google API is the solution. Wrong answer. This Google talk is pointless, the web is not a pure platform, just work on SQL/ERP/Vista/Office 12/CRM 3, ship those before you try and ‘bull in China shop’ in a overglutted Search Engine market. If you need to work on the web, work on taking on Salesforce.
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See, there are two diseases at Microsoft (just for start’ers):
1) Not looking at the world thru a businessperson’s eyes (i.e. Software Assurance trainwreck and the monocultural thrust and the lack of a predictable Road Map). You say they do, I say they don’t (which is the problem).
2) Listening to edge-market self-appointed so-called influentials with blogs and extra loud megaphones. Focusing on the blog crybaby’s and various web creatures will never get the quality middle-market feedback you really need.
You are so Googlejuiced that you think copying a Google API is the solution. Wrong answer. This Google talk is pointless, the web is not a pure platform, just work on SQL/ERP/Vista/Office 12/CRM 3, ship those before you try and ‘bull in China shop’ in a overglutted Search Engine market. If you need to work on the web, work on taking on Salesforce.
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Hey Scoble, have you ever seen http://msdn.microsoft.com/msn/ ? The APIs are out there, and are a lot better documented and nicer to use than Google’s.
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Hey Scoble, have you ever seen http://msdn.microsoft.com/msn/ ? The APIs are out there, and are a lot better documented and nicer to use than Google’s.
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Please DON’T clone the Google web search API, far as I know it still embeds HTML in the returned results. WTF? I might as well screen scrape!
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Please DON’T clone the Google web search API, far as I know it still embeds HTML in the returned results. WTF? I might as well screen scrape!
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Microsoft should look at the collective mirror one morning and realize that it no longer is a very smart company. Don’t make this very complicated. Don’t deceive yourselves by thinking that MSFT is full of smart people, it’ll just step it up when the time comes. The time is now and MSFT has to move in so many directions simultaneously. But it doesn’t have the intellectual capital or the common sense to pull it off. Manage the downfall intelligently.
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Microsoft should look at the collective mirror one morning and realize that it no longer is a very smart company. Don’t make this very complicated. Don’t deceive yourselves by thinking that MSFT is full of smart people, it’ll just step it up when the time comes. The time is now and MSFT has to move in so many directions simultaneously. But it doesn’t have the intellectual capital or the common sense to pull it off. Manage the downfall intelligently.
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All I can say is that anyone that has some passion around this post should be reading Seth’s Blog. This post could be a review of “Purple Cow”, I think Robert hit Seth’s theme dead on.
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All I can say is that anyone that has some passion around this post should be reading Seth’s Blog. This post could be a review of “Purple Cow”, I think Robert hit Seth’s theme dead on.
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Interesting post, Scoble. But it is still reflective of the echo chamber in which you like to live. Jonathan Jesse’s comment was more to the point. Does the average Joe give a crap about Web 2.0 or why Google does what it does? No. MS will make more money when they start to reach more people that want to use a computer to make their lives easier, not because it their crap supports Firefox, Web 2.0 or some other technogeek thingy that the majority of the population could give a rat’s ass about. The majority of consumers likely don’t know or don’t care what a blog, a podcast, or the like is. The influencers are the everyday Joe’s that talk to other everyday Joe’s and say “hey, this is cool”. Take even HDTV. My wife doesn’t care about the technology behind HDTV or even Tivo. All she knows it that Tivo makes her life easier and HDTV makes watching it more enjoyable. Same goes for the computer. As long as it does the 4 or 5 tasks she wants to do very well, without needing a PhD to figure out how, or if she can discover something new with new software that is easy to use and makes her life easier, she will buy it. As will every average Joe. They are the ones that will drive the stock price up. Not the geeks in the echo chambers.
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Interesting post, Scoble. But it is still reflective of the echo chamber in which you like to live. Jonathan Jesse’s comment was more to the point. Does the average Joe give a crap about Web 2.0 or why Google does what it does? No. MS will make more money when they start to reach more people that want to use a computer to make their lives easier, not because it their crap supports Firefox, Web 2.0 or some other technogeek thingy that the majority of the population could give a rat’s ass about. The majority of consumers likely don’t know or don’t care what a blog, a podcast, or the like is. The influencers are the everyday Joe’s that talk to other everyday Joe’s and say “hey, this is cool”. Take even HDTV. My wife doesn’t care about the technology behind HDTV or even Tivo. All she knows it that Tivo makes her life easier and HDTV makes watching it more enjoyable. Same goes for the computer. As long as it does the 4 or 5 tasks she wants to do very well, without needing a PhD to figure out how, or if she can discover something new with new software that is easy to use and makes her life easier, she will buy it. As will every average Joe. They are the ones that will drive the stock price up. Not the geeks in the echo chambers.
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as for your “going for copies” comment. I think you are a bit short sighted there. I mean, hell, didn’t the public go for a copy of the MAC OS in Windows? ;-). Didn’t they go for a copy of Lotus 123 with Excel? Didn’t they go for a copy of WordPerfect with Word? Seriously, if the copy is cheaper, faster, better, they will go for it. Why were the so successful in the automotive business? If it provides the same basic functionality, but is a better experience and is cheaper, or higher quality, they will go for a copy. Your StarWars example misses the point. MS is historicaly a very good copier of technology. Just ask Apple or Lotus, or WordPerfect.
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as for your “going for copies” comment. I think you are a bit short sighted there. I mean, hell, didn’t the public go for a copy of the MAC OS in Windows? ;-). Didn’t they go for a copy of Lotus 123 with Excel? Didn’t they go for a copy of WordPerfect with Word? Seriously, if the copy is cheaper, faster, better, they will go for it. Why were the so successful in the automotive business? If it provides the same basic functionality, but is a better experience and is cheaper, or higher quality, they will go for a copy. Your StarWars example misses the point. MS is historicaly a very good copier of technology. Just ask Apple or Lotus, or WordPerfect.
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See http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/46342 for one xample of non innovative MS Live is
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See http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/46342 for one xample of non innovative MS Live is
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The simple answer? Create things that make life easier, do it with elegance and simplicity, and do it cross platform.
Personal bugbear: If MS was able to bottle the anger its version of Media Player for Mac generates (which doesn’t play V10 files, even though Flip4Mac software does), it could power half the eastern seaboard.
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The simple answer? Create things that make life easier, do it with elegance and simplicity, and do it cross platform.
Personal bugbear: If MS was able to bottle the anger its version of Media Player for Mac generates (which doesn’t play V10 files, even though Flip4Mac software does), it could power half the eastern seaboard.
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>Does the average Joe give a crap about Web 2.0 or why Google does what it does? No.
You’re right, but the average Joe will use sites that fit into the Web 2.0 model like Zvents.
Does the average Joe care about why Google does what it does? No. But they will use it and they will click on the ads. Why? Cause guys like me told them to. At least that’s true of my dad and brothers and many many others.
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>Does the average Joe give a crap about Web 2.0 or why Google does what it does? No.
You’re right, but the average Joe will use sites that fit into the Web 2.0 model like Zvents.
Does the average Joe care about why Google does what it does? No. But they will use it and they will click on the ads. Why? Cause guys like me told them to. At least that’s true of my dad and brothers and many many others.
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“But they will use it and they will click on the ads. Why? Cause guys like me told them to. At least that’s true of my dad and brothers and many many others.”
You actually ask/suggest to your family to click the ad’s online. Or do you just not bring up the subject?And what about Google ad’s on the main search page?
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“But they will use it and they will click on the ads. Why? Cause guys like me told them to. At least that’s true of my dad and brothers and many many others.”
You actually ask/suggest to your family to click the ad’s online. Or do you just not bring up the subject?And what about Google ad’s on the main search page?
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“Does the average Joe give a crap about Web 2.0 or why Google does what it does? No.”
You’re missing the point Robert is making.
The people who create the environment necessary for the average Joe to try new tech stuff are the early adopters/influencers. Without these people, the tech never gets adopted by the average Joe. Why? Because Average Joe is a risk-adverse, group-oriented, run with the pack creature.
Average Joe requires an environment in which s/he feels safe trying new things: “Hey, everyone else is doing this, I can too”
The influencers help create that environment. They take on the risk of the new and shout that it’s ok to venture outside the cave.
Average Joe will eventually hear, but is unlikley to do any shouting. It isn’t in his nature…
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“Does the average Joe give a crap about Web 2.0 or why Google does what it does? No.”
You’re missing the point Robert is making.
The people who create the environment necessary for the average Joe to try new tech stuff are the early adopters/influencers. Without these people, the tech never gets adopted by the average Joe. Why? Because Average Joe is a risk-adverse, group-oriented, run with the pack creature.
Average Joe requires an environment in which s/he feels safe trying new things: “Hey, everyone else is doing this, I can too”
The influencers help create that environment. They take on the risk of the new and shout that it’s ok to venture outside the cave.
Average Joe will eventually hear, but is unlikley to do any shouting. It isn’t in his nature…
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“So, if we want to gather an audience together, we must think differently.”
As a long-time Apple user, I feel I need to correct your word usage here. It’s “we must think DIFFERENT.”
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“So, if we want to gather an audience together, we must think differently.”
As a long-time Apple user, I feel I need to correct your word usage here. It’s “we must think DIFFERENT.”
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I didn’t tell him to click on the ads. I told him to use Google. His clicking on the ads is just due to the usefulness of those ads to him.
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I didn’t tell him to click on the ads. I told him to use Google. His clicking on the ads is just due to the usefulness of those ads to him.
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What a long post… Windows is garbage no matter what, pretty much all you need to know 🙂
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What a long post… Windows is garbage no matter what, pretty much all you need to know 🙂
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I have to come back and say this is the best post on your blog in a long time. Reading it a second time, still got the same feelings in me again as if it were the first.
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I have to come back and say this is the best post on your blog in a long time. Reading it a second time, still got the same feelings in me again as if it were the first.
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One point which was addressed here and might really affect Google revenue.
As an influential I don’t really like to be influenced myself. I’m aggressively opposing ANY marketing pressure on me. What’s important in this post that it’s an eye opener for me – I’ve realized that I’ve bited the hook without noticing it. The cool tech content produced by Google is no different from cool content produced by NBC – the goal is to sell me ads wrapped into this content.
This discovery had really cooled off my Google excitement and my “influential” approval of Google.
Anybody else in the same boat?
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One point which was addressed here and might really affect Google revenue.
As an influential I don’t really like to be influenced myself. I’m aggressively opposing ANY marketing pressure on me. What’s important in this post that it’s an eye opener for me – I’ve realized that I’ve bited the hook without noticing it. The cool tech content produced by Google is no different from cool content produced by NBC – the goal is to sell me ads wrapped into this content.
This discovery had really cooled off my Google excitement and my “influential” approval of Google.
Anybody else in the same boat?
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still waiting to get some decent limits! current the score is:
google 1000 queries lol
yahoo id addressed based (meaning just random but i bet its low)
msn (cant find the limits but i bet its low) 😦
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still waiting to get some decent limits! current the score is:
google 1000 queries lol
yahoo id addressed based (meaning just random but i bet its low)
msn (cant find the limits but i bet its low) 😦
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If the hiearchy is setup like a court – google is king, yahoo is prince, and msn is court jester.
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If the hiearchy is setup like a court – google is king, yahoo is prince, and msn is court jester.
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I’m love this great website. Many thanks guy
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I’m love this great website. Many thanks guy
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