The rest of us will just think that you are pushing your agenda, and therefore, your own view of the world. Is it a coincidence a Web 2.0 investor supports an evangelically blinkered approach to non Web 2.0 solutions.
I am a fantastic believer in history telling us about the future. And in this case, history says, Microsoft will always be key to a desktop centric world. And desktop centricity is cyclical. For now Web 2.0 seems to have the baton, but as we nove into a very rich multi-media world we will become constrained by the broadband pipes. This will push apps, content, and everything else back to the user device, be it a Windows PC or a Windows Pocket PC. Apple stole the march with the single purpose iPod (don't pretend video or anything else on the iPod is a killer App), but Microsoft still own the multi-purpose device.
DRM has been the Achilles Heel of Microsoft. As they have come back from many Anti-Trust cases they attempted to sidestep more brouhaha in the world of Digital Media, and have attempted to play fair (don't get me wrong I know they usually do not play fair). This has allowed Apple to gain the upperhand in Music Devices. But, as Apple are now breaking the mold on this to allow DRM-free sales from EMI, they in turn will have just given Microsoft the opening it will need to reinforce its position. It wont be success through intent, as I believe that the Zune player will fail. But a new competitive ecosystem of devices will lead everything back to the desktop as the hub.
No matter what, no-one is going to trust their personal memories, be it music, video or photo's entirely to the Web. They will share it there, but not leave it there.
Microsoft is back where they were when Netscape first launched, they are the slow lumbering laggard.
But as history shows us, they turned themselves around, and owned (however briefly) the mindset of everyone who had money to spend (and this is not typically your 15-year old Web 2.0 consumer with no money), it was the corporates, with their large cheque books.
Google are moving more and more to follow the Microsoft lead. Microsoft is far from dead, but like all parents who have given life to others (such as Google, albeit through removed ways), they from time to time will be less involved in their Children's lives. But, they will always retain some criticality in their lives. MS will never really die in our lifetimes. They just move from being the soul point of attention.
Good luck to your startups, but imagining them operating in a world where they do not know and respect the importance of Microsoft, and try to emulate or utilise them in their goals, seems like a recipe for failure to me.
I am a fantastic believer in history telling us about the future. And in this case, history says, Microsoft will always be key to a desktop centric world. And desktop centricity is cyclical. For now Web 2.0 seems to have the baton, but as we nove into a very rich multi-media world we will become constrained by the broadband pipes. This will push apps, content, and everything else back to the user device, be it a Windows PC or a Windows Pocket PC. Apple stole the march with the single purpose iPod (don't pretend video or anything else on the iPod is a killer App), but Microsoft still own the multi-purpose device.
DRM has been the Achilles Heel of Microsoft. As they have come back from many Anti-Trust cases they attempted to sidestep more brouhaha in the world of Digital Media, and have attempted to play fair (don't get me wrong I know they usually do not play fair). This has allowed Apple to gain the upperhand in Music Devices. But, as Apple are now breaking the mold on this to allow DRM-free sales from EMI, they in turn will have just given Microsoft the opening it will need to reinforce its position. It wont be success through intent, as I believe that the Zune player will fail. But a new competitive ecosystem of devices will lead everything back to the desktop as the hub.
No matter what, no-one is going to trust their personal memories, be it music, video or photo's entirely to the Web. They will share it there, but not leave it there.
Microsoft is back where they were when Netscape first launched, they are the slow lumbering laggard.
But as history shows us, they turned themselves around, and owned (however briefly) the mindset of everyone who had money to spend (and this is not typically your 15-year old Web 2.0 consumer with no money), it was the corporates, with their large cheque books.
Google are moving more and more to follow the Microsoft lead. Microsoft is far from dead, but like all parents who have given life to others (such as Google, albeit through removed ways), they from time to time will be less involved in their Children's lives. But, they will always retain some criticality in their lives. MS will never really die in our lifetimes. They just move from being the soul point of attention.
Good luck to your startups, but imagining them operating in a world where they do not know and respect the importance of Microsoft, and try to emulate or utilise them in their goals, seems like a recipe for failure to me.