Mom Blasts Ballmer Over Kid's Vista Experience

Lucas123 writes "While on stage at a Gartner's ITxpo conference today, Ballmer got an ear-full from the mother of a 13-year-old girl who said after installing Vista on her daughter's computer she decided only two days later to switch back to XP because Vista was so difficult. Ballmer defended Vista saying: 'Your daughter saw a lot of value'; to which the mother replied: 'She's 13.' Ballmer said that Vista is bigger than XP, and 'for some people that's an issue, and it's not going to get smaller in any significant way in SP1. But machines are constantly getting bigger, and [it's] probably important to remember that as well.' Says the mother: 'Good, I'll let you come in and install it for me.'"

Translated for the Lay

[ackthpt]

"Let's start with the end user. Your daughter saw a lot of value," said Ballmer.

Translation: We spent a lot of money packing it with bloat.

"Users appreciate the value that we put into Vista," he said. But, as with earlier operating system releases, "there is always a tension between the value that end users see -- and frankly, that software developers see -- and the value that we can deliver to IT."

Translation: No matter how many versions we have, it's still one size fits all. The tension is generated because our developers don't lead normal lives and see things the way ordinary people do, which makes the end product obfuscated and confusing

"the most secure release of Windows you can humanly make," said Ballmer. "We have had better security, we have had fewer vulnerabilities, fewer issues with Windows Vista in its first six months than any OS that preceded it.

Translation: We're banking on bloat, the more there is the longer it takes the crackers to find the exploits, but sure as the Sun rises, they will find them because more code has more holes.

"I think there is a lot of value in Vista," he said.

Translation: Stock value. If we didn't come out with a new version of Windows everyone had to buy every few years our stock value would drop. We have to keep addicts supplied.

"When we initially shipped, fewer device drivers were ready for Vista than I would have liked, but we constantly worked with the device vendors to get new drivers available and implemented through our Windows update service," he said.

Translation: We rushed it to market. If we had waited until it was really ready we would have seen our stock drop. The premature release was purely driven by profit motives rather than care for our customers.

"We are in, from ... a corporate and enterprise side, an early adoption cycle," said Ballmer.

Translation: Revenue generating cycle - Bleeding edge, counting the casualties.

Or, better yet

[Rinisari]

Or, better yet, she can use an operating system that doesn't practically require new hardware for every new release, but operating system of which I speak can take advantage of new hardware when it's available, and that'll be sooner because she won't have to spend $400 on just the operating system.

Analyst?

[McMurphy's_Law]

I'd Like to know what kind of "analyst" listens to a 13 year old girl on the quality features of Vista? Seems to me the Mother never did a great deal of research/testing of this OS, otherwise she might have known that its a royal pain in the kester.
I'm not defending Vista or Ballmer in anyway but she almost sounds like a plant to make him look like the puppet he is.

Re:I hate to be the one defending Microsoft, but..

[Mattwolf7]

I love how every piece of software works with Vista except Microsoft's own programs...

I am a college student and needed to install MS Visual Studio for a project. Our CSE lab is partnered with MS through MSDN. We have access to most MS software. So I went online and noticed that Visual Studios 2003 Pro was on the website. (2005 is not available) Checked out the cd from the lab and went home to install it on Vista. After having trouble getting it to work I went searching for a fix.

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/aa948854.aspx [microsoft.com]

Q: What products are supported?
A: We are supporting Visual Basic 6.0, Visual FoxPro 9.0 and Visual Studio 2005 Service Pack 1 with the Visual Studio 2005 Service Pack 1 Update for Windows Vista.

So Visual Basic 6, created in 1998, is supported but software from 2003 isn't??

Re:Scary

[wodgy7]

I agree with you about the Vista brand being damaged in the minds of ordinary people. One anecdote: I'm in law school, and on Tuesday I noticed the girl sitting next to me had brought in a new MacBook Pro. I started chatting with her about it, and she told me the reason she had got it is because she needed a new laptop and didn't want to move to Vista. I've heard similar things (though not in such point-blank language) from other non-technical users. It's surprising to me. The word of mouth problems with Vista aren't just confined to OS bickering among nerds... there seems to be genuine negative buzz about Vista among ordinary, non-technical users. If you've ever run a business, word of mouth is the most powerful way to acquire or lose mindshare... no amount of advertising claiming "the WOW is now" will counter genuine, grassroots word of mouth. Will this have an impact on Microsoft? Probably not. But it's a sign that there are real limits to what users will put up with, even from a vendor with extraordinary market power.

Re:Oh really...

[Orange Crush]

Not if the machine shipped with XP preinstalled (which is almost certainly the case here).

Re:A lot of value...

[Anonymous Coward]

Sadly, the value she saw was equivalent to cakes, chocolates, and candy, and soon became sick of the sugar and just wanted same damn food.

Re:Sooo?

[realthing02]

While I'll agree with the idea of your post, we should also bring up the fact that the mother, who "cares about performance and utility" bought an OS for her daughter because of gadgets. If she is going to go and complain to Ballmer, she probably knew a bit about vista anyways, and i don't understand the kind of parent who goes out and drops 150 on software because of some little feature.

I understand that the average user is not as technical as the posters here, but if she was smart enough to know the OS was causing problems, and dedicated enough to show up and quiz Ballmer on this, i just have a hard time believing this isn't some form of stunt or something of the like.

Re:Am I reading that right?

[JamesP]

Actually, as the legend says, this was one of the turning points for MS, back the at the time when Lotus 1-2-3 reigned.

Back there, while Lotus was cramming everything to fit in 640k of memory, MS was making Excel w/o concerns for machines, and they got to ship earlier.

Than, by the time 1-2-3 shipped, modern machines were cheap enough, so people went with Excel instead

It really makes sense, in a way.

http://joelonsoftware.com/items/2007/09/18.html [joelonsoftware.com]

Re:I hate to be the one defending Microsoft, but..

[Hymer]

"You upgrade your OS and you'll probably need to upgrade your hardware too." Correction: "You upgrade your Microsoft OS and you'll probably need to upgrade your hardware too."
Neither my Linux nor my OS X needed hardware upgrades.

--

hint: try to look outside the cube...

Re:+1 Funny

[dascritch]

This is enough laughy (especially the final word). And I think Steve would be full red-face when she will start saying "when you was younger, you wasn't throwing chairs and you wasn't allowed to raise voice like that in front of strangers... who teach you to be so impolite?"

Re:Still

[MrBandersnatch]

Everyone different though. I put OO in my wifes laptop a few months back and was surprised when she said to me this morning "I like this open office. Its better than word". Probably because she had been using an older version of office (maybe as old as 97 but I think 2000) but it IS possible to switch users.

Re:Still

[berashith]

I eliminated support by allowing her to choose what she wanted. When it breaks, I tell her that it was her choice to use that crap. If she wants my help, she plays by my rules.

Thankfully she is smart enough to solve the windows issues that pop up, so this scenario actually works.

funny note... to avoid support calls from the mother in law, I gave her an old IBM laptop running ubuntu. The only time she claims it didn't work was when the ISPs DNS was in the toilet.

Re:Still

[Kintar1900]

You can turn UAC off, y'know. I don't mind Vista for the most part, but it is getting progressively slower :-(

Yeah, I could, but I actually agree with it in general. It's the constant nagging about programs I've already allowed that bothers me. I'm actually fine with it popping up and saying, "Hey, administrator access for component X is being requested. Did you know about that and initiate it?". It's when I've got one specific program that I use once every 30 minutes, and it asks me if I'm sure I want to run it every single time that makes me want to whack MS security folks over the head with a clue-by-four.

As for it getting slower, my main complaint in that department is its seemingly random disc thrash-o-thons. I've got all the automatic backup and drive-shadowing features that I can find turned off, and it still decides to do constant access to the hard drive every now and then for no obvious reason. If I could solve that one last issue, I'd be fairly happy with it.

Of course, I'd be even happier if I could run all the games I want to play under my Linux install. =)

13-year olds are the future

[OxFF52]

A long time ago, I heard of the "13-year old effect"... which basically says that whatever a 13 year old wants today will be expected when they enter the workforce. Never discount the opinion of a 13-year old! If gadgets and 3-D interfaces are what gets them excited you better bet your a$$ that those features need to be in the operating system... especially one that goes 5+ years between versions.

Ballmer also gets that corporations want a more secure and reliable desktop platform for Microsoft Office and e-mail... and to his best effort he attempted to point out these "values" were more important than a few gadgets. He couldn't care less if someone has trouble upgrading because he gets his OS revenue from OEM and corporate licenses, not a few excited users willing to shell out for an upgrade that doesn't work on old, incompatible hardware.

I might also add that the future of "operating systems" are DEAD... and not just Windows... Linux and OSX are on their way out too. Eventually (if not already), devices will interact with each other without complicated, hardwired interfaces and device drivers. The next version of the Xbox or Playstation will eliminate the PC at home. So all you fan-boys can bash each others' favorite OS all you want, I look forward to the day when I never have to sit down at my in-law's computer for hours eliminating spyware because I'm the only "geek" they know.

Re:Okaayyyy.

[stewbacca]

I have a 12 year old son who asked me to buy him a video iPod because he wants one (values it for peer reasons, personal reason, materialistic reasons, whatever). No need to lecture me about not understanding kids...I get it already.

You missed my point entirely. Allow me to clarify. A thirteen-year old child does not understand the term value in the same manner that a 50-something year old Microsoft executive does. That executive, then, is way off base on trying to use that trump card.

I'm saying a teenagers concept of value is incongruent with a mega-corporation's concept of value, because a teenager has no concept of the adult world when it comes to business practices. Of COURSE value is subjective, which was my point in the first place in pointing out why Ballmer is so wrong.

Re:A lot of value...

[Caged]

No, Microsoft have re-arranged the places for many options and it generally takes more mouse clicks to get something done under Vistan than XP. Vista has a new 'Network and Sharing Center', the interface is confusing and difficult to utilise.

UAC is incredibly annoying and not a real safety feature as the average user will become so frustrated by the popups' frequency those warnings will not be read, the end user will simply click 'continue' so he or she can use the damn thing. UAC isnt about improved security, its about Microsoft being able to say 'oh, well its' the user's fault for clicking continue'.

I give you an example of Vista's 'improved' interface design - changing the date and/or time. Under XP its simple - double click the clock in the lower right hand corner of the screen and presto! you can change the date-time.

Under Vista, you need to click on the clock, then click on a lick 'change date and time'. Which opens up another dialog box.... which has a button labelled 'change date/time'.... clicking on this button.... brings up a UAC dialog. Click continue. Hurray! I can change the date and time!.

XP to Vista - a double click to 4 mouse clicks. Nuff said.

Re:Question for the geeks here...

[darkonc]

I'm of the opinion that much of the Vista-specific bloat comes from the DRM layer. Under the DRM paradigm, every driver doesn't just have to worry about doing their normal work -- it also has to worry about doing some, apparently innocuous, thing that pisses off some other random driver (or, eve, program) in the system. It also has to worry about whether it is required to get 'pissed off' by what some other random element is doing.
That constant looking-over-the-shoulder (both your own and others') has got to result in a lot of the lost performancethat is being seen in Vista.