Microsoft Says Goodbye To CES 79
theodp writes "Microsoft has traditionally delivered the pre-show keynote and put up a mammoth booth at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas each January. No more. GeekWire reports that Microsoft will bow out of CES after this year's show (Steve Ballmer says buh-bye on Jan. 9). 'As we look at all of the new ways we tell our consumer stories,' explained Microsoft's Frank Shaw, 'it feels like the right time to make this transition.'"
Re:Consumer Expos on the way out? (Score:2, Interesting)
Counterpoint: the Big Show is a useful tool for focusing attention of the engineering staff, including the gatekeepers (like the build team) who otherwise enjoy telling people why their special request can't be done. It gives engineers and small teams developing new stuff something concrete to shoot for. And once projects and products are committed for the show, serious issues MUST be resolved by that date, so slipping the schedule by one week every week is no longer an option.
I agree with the MS guy that January is an awkward time for the development staff though - I'm sure that working 60 hour weeks through the holidays gets old fast.
Not just Microsoft (Score:5, Interesting)
Trade shows are largely a relic of the pre-Internet world. Nowadays we can get pretty much any information we need about a brand new product simply by visiting the vendor's website. We've seen technology-driven companies moving away from announcing and/or releasing products at mega-trade shows especially over the past 4-5 years, whether they're computer companies (Apple, Microsoft), camera companies (Nikon, Canon), or "we do it all and do it badly" companies (Sony).
Microsoft CES Exit Echoes Apple MacWorld Exit (Score:5, Interesting)
Microsoft (Dec. 21, 2011) [technet.com]: As we look at all of the new ways we tell our consumer stories â" from product momentum disclosures, to exciting events like our Big Windows Phone, to a range of consumer connection points like Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft.com and our retail stores â" it feels like the right time to make this transition.
Apple (Dec. 16, 2008) [gizmodo.com]: Apple is reaching more people in more ways than ever before, so like many companies, trade shows have become a very minor part of how Apple reaches its customers. The increasing popularity of Apple's Retail Stores, which more than 3.5 million people visit every week, and the Apple.com website enable Apple to directly reach more than a hundred million customers around the world in innovative new ways.
Re:Inovate to ass fuck? (Score:4, Interesting)
I've seen some of the stuff they are working on in their "labs", and a lot of it is indeed quite innovative. Yet very little ever makes it to a product. Wonder why? There are some smart people working on interesting things in Redmond, but apparently at some level on the Microsoft machine, it all gets patented and forgotten (until they need to ass fuck someone with the patent?)
Thing is, this observation isn't new- it's been commented on for *years* that Microsoft have labs stuffed full of very clever and innovative people, yet still seem to end up churning out mediocre, uninspiring crap. One explanation is that internal politics are responsible- this article comment from someone who claims to have worked at Microsoft [dailytech.com] (click link for full version) is informative:-
There have been many instances at Microsoft where genuine innovations have sat on the shelf or been half-heartedly brought to market [.. In 2002 MS had..] a prototype smartphone that had (essentially) all the useability features of an iPhone, including a trick interface, accelerometer and multi-touch. It was cobbled together and not very pretty, but as a proof of concept, it worked. Yet it never saw the light of day. Why?
Brass’s tablet project was well advanced in the labs too, but somehow never got the traction it deserved internally. [..]
Microsoft has a Darwinian internal structure. Each business unit has to fight for scarce resources, - they compete with each other and only the strong survive. Succeeding in that environment involves more than just having a good (or even great) product or project. Unless you’re Office or Windows, you have to build symbiotic relationships with other business units (preferably the big guys) just to ensure your survival. You have to make their success (at least partially) dependent on yours
[..Secondly..] in its youth, Microsoft could afford to hire only the best and the brightest. Smart people are flexible and innovative in their approach and this reflects in the company’s culture. As the enormous growth of the late 90s took hold, we couldn’t keep up with the demand for more employees and as a consequence, the quality bar dropped. We started employing people who were merely good, not outstanding. These new people were less flexible, less able to handle organisational ambiguity and less passionate about what they were doing. They started to build bureaucracy as a safety-net and as a structure in which they were comfortable operating. Goodbye to dynamic decision-making and rapid market responses.
Anyway, bottom line; the "smart" people starting work there know (or must be really, *really* blinkered not to know) of this reputation, so why are they working there? Silly money?
I'll grant that they came up with Kinect recently, which was pretty innovative (albeit as a response to the Wii controller) and smacked of research turned into a workable product. But that was pretty recent (so couldn't have inspired any but the newest recruits) and probably benefitted from being an XBox product that was out of the way of the entrenched interests and politics of the main Windows-focussed divisions, and in an area where MS had more to gain than lose from innovation.
Re:Nah. It is all those stores they are opening (Score:4, Interesting)