Microsoft is a dying consumer brand

Microsoft's consumer brand is dying - Oct. 27, 2010

Go ahead discuss away.

I will say this that if MS ever went away I would not be an Apple customer. No disrespect to our Apple members. I just don't like the pompous, arrogant attitude the company has shown over the years. If MS did go away I would go with Linux as my only choice for OS.

 

Oh boy. If Microsoft died, I don't know what I would do... I'd probably turn to Apple... Actually, come to think of it, why don't I do that in the not too distant future!?

 

The poll title is not correct. It should be (in line with this thread): Is MS a dying consumer brand.

OS wise, MS really has no competitor. Linux is a great OS; but really not targetter towards the consumer morons. Win 7 has enhanced security with ASLR, Applocker etc. I gather IE can be made (or will be made) super secure.

Apple is overpriced; and it blows my mind that Apple is valued more than MS(in terms of total company price).

Now, if we talk about the consumer domain; MS has never really obtained a foothold in this area. So its not a question of whether MS consumer segment is dying, but rather whether it can succeed. I think it CAN succeed, although it wont become the market leader in everything; no company has ever done that.

 

i would even go google chrome befor i go apple sory mac folks but i wanna be able to open and upgrade part of my computer when i wish how i wish without voiding my warrantie

but microsoft won't die maybe window 8 won't be that much of a great thing considering how many new thing they are considering but the polish release aka windows 9 will be well worth it

 

Windows Phone 7 is purely consumer focused right now, and I think it'll go over quite well enough. It'll also bolster the gaming image of Windows, IMO, with it's XBOX Live capabilities. As for MSFT being a "dying" consumer brand, I'll believe it when I see it.

Side Note: A 14MP DSLR does absolutely NOTHING for Ballmer. Somebody needs to run his face through LightRoom and play with the "Luminance" slider!

 

What's wrong with a company sticking to a few things and not doing crazy expansion? As long as Windows remains more popular than Mac, all is right. Microsoft should stay out of the hardware business and focus on what it does best.

 

Microsoft will not die. Most of their points are pretty biased, and the "Zune was DOA" just screams Apple fan. I'm surprised it was even published since its all opinion and poorly written.

 

I agree. The article actually made me chuckle a bit. He didn't even support his points all that much, and the majority of markets he said MS is "dying" in are relatively new to them and they never were market leaders in those areas in the first place.

 

Microsoft doesn't have a universal cool factor, and isn't a hot company these days. It isn't that common anymore to hear someone talk about the cool new Microsoft HW/SW they have. That said it does depend on the product. There are some bright spots for Microsoft.

Windows was a bit of a punching bag when Vista was the most current OS. But Windows 7 has a good reputation now, and you actually do see a lot of people upgrading to Windows 7, even when they aren't buying a new machine. While not a "must-have" or selling quite like hotcakes, Windows 7 definitely generated market excitement, and probably convinced more people to upgrade their OS than any OS since Windows 95. I'd go so far as to say people were more excited about Windows 7 than Snow Leopard. Sure, OS X 10.6 has more than half the Mac market share, but a lot of that is new cusomters, and it only cost $30. Convincing a lot of people who paid $1200 or so on average for their computer to spend $30 on a newer OS version will be easier than convincing people who paid $600 on average to spend $100 on a newer OS version, so I think MS did pretty well here.

XBox has been a consumer success IMO. Although not raking in the dough, it's as popular as the PS3, which is an enormous success. The Wii has sold more units, but hasn't targeted the same market, either. For entering this market in 2001, I think Microsoft has done very well.

Windows Mobile 6.5 definitely doesn't have consumer mindshare, and having used a friend's Windows Mobile phone, it certainly doesn't impress the way something like WebOS does. It's too early to say if Windows Mobile 7 will catch on.

Zune is an interesting case. It probably was hurt more than anything by being late to the market. It's great in the value department, but most people are either shoveling their money to Steve Jobs and not caring that they are, or still pirating music like it's 1999. The hardware is smooth, the software seems smooth (although I don't think it's as smooth as it looks - throw a mp3 collection accrued from many Zune competitors at it and it balks), and the price is reasonable. I think marketing may be part of the issue - you see Zune advertisements in newspapers and in subway stations and the like, but what about on television or even the radio? And where's the retail presence? Somewhere being the Walkman (mp3 version) from what I've seen. High-end consumers know about the iPod and that's about it, old-timers know about the Walkman brand (which benefits from more Sony stores than MS stores as well), and someone on a budget will probably be pitched a Sansa. I think mindshare (marketing) and lateness are the two problems for Zune. One is fixable, and fixing it takes care of the other.

IE is hanging on by inertia, really. In terms of advertising, MS does well enough with its "try a more secure browser" campaigns on its own websites (better than Firefox or Safari's advertising), but that only really helps with people upgrading from IE6 or IE7. But IE has shown that inertia is a much more powerful force in browsers than it was in 1997 when Netscape was beginning to fall.

The lack of a big new category is also a problem. You don't have to be the first one with a new product to be the big, exciting player (Apple certainly wasn't first with mp3 players, XBox wasn't the first console, and IE was late relative to Netscape), but Microsoft hasn't hit big here for awhile. The one product that does seem to generate excitement is the Surface, and it's not a consumer product.

So I don't think MS is a dying consumer brand right now. They aren't firing on all cylinders, but Windows 7 was a considerable gain for them, and the XBox is a definite success. Zune and IE are faring poorly, and they're lacking a big new category, but none of those are hopeless. It's too soon to tell with the phones. Recent history bodes poorly (Kin), but the average consumer won't care about that (probably won't even know about it). If 6 months from now Windows Phone 7 is doing well, the author of that article is going to look pretty foolish.

Microsoft Mice are awesome. They should definitely stay in the keyboard + mouse business.

 

@apollo13...cogent analysis!

+1 rep

 

Still, MS controls most of the market share in terms of OS. I don't think Xbox's or XBL is going anywhere anytime soon either. Other stuff they have tried to compete in such as cellphones or other gadgets I don't know enough about so I wont comment on those.

 

Once upon a time, a long long time ago, articles started appear with headlines equivalent to 'Is IBM a dying brand'.

At the time the idea that a small company like Microsoft could ever be thought as serious competition for Big Blue's software products seemed ridiculous to many people.

So things can change.

 

Articles like this have been appearing for over a decade. They really don't mean anything most of the time, and if you take a second to read this one you'll see that this one is especially bogus.

 

Apple will die out 100 years b4 ms .. or wait .. ms will just buy it up for pocket change

 

Apple currently has no debt and has nearly 51b in cash. Dont quote me on that though because I've heard this through a friend who reads more articles about this than I do. They are also thinking of purchasing sony right now, but thats still in speculation stages.

So yeah, neither Apple or MS will die anytime soon.

 

Apple has a MASSIVE stockpile of cash. And he has it correct below. It's roughly 51Bln in USD. That's more in cash assets than just about ANY other US based company period. Apple isn't going anywhere. Even BP, the oil company, didn't have enough in cash to cover the gulf cleanup... which was escrowed at just 20Bln.

Fantasies. That's about as far as that speculation has credit.

 

Gee, I wonder where Apple got such a massive stockpile of money.

Let me think.

Leeeet me think.

 

Could just be Steve jobs messing with the stock market, lol.
Considering that sony stock went up 3% the day this was leaked haha.

None of my money is in there!

 

Anyone else think Microsoft should start making/designing Microsoft brand notebook/computers?

 

A strong marketing department and a charismatic CEO?

 

Microsoft needs to focus on their software. The Zune team is the only one with hardware design permissions. But I have no doubt, if they attempted it, it would end up looking great... I mean look at the Zune HD!

 

That's a nice way to put it.

 

Sky-high margins on middle-of-the-road hardware?

 

That's another way to put it. But Apple does a fantastic job of marketing their products as well.
Their huge margins on middle-of-the-road hardware (Core 2 Duo, I'm lookin' at you) is a testament to this.
As far as a charismatic CEO, Steve Jobs is also a massive jerk sometimes.

As far as software goes, OS X is nice if you have a very specific set of tasks. There isn't much room to move outside of that. It targets casual users that don't demand much from their machines, and wanna-be YouTube stars\kids in college that always thought it would be nice to take pictures of stuff, set them in black-and-white, and call it art.

=S

 

I think overall I disagree - but there is some truth in that.

It seems to be in fashion to bash Microsoft - and that does turn some of the younger people away.
Would I ever freely buy an apple product - no.

Is freeware always better as the OpenSource fanatics want everybody to believe - no.

In this respect - Microsoft is and will be needed.

 

remember, that's $51bn in cash and securities

microsoft has more cash than that..and look how much bigger the company is

 

Honestly, almost everyone accepts that fact that Apple's strong point is integration of their hardware and software.

Microsoft's business software will never be outdone by Apple's simply because of money. Businesses are out to make money, not spend a fortune on hardware.

On the consumer end, Apple's advantage is simply upkeep, or lack there of. Win OS can be a hassle, luckily everything can be set up to run automatically.

In all honestly, Microsoft will always have a spot in the consumer Market - simply because of money.

 

DING! DING! DING!

The show is over everyone, this guy just nailed it.

 

I don't know about that. Their mice and keyboards are really good. Heck I wish they never stopped making gaming peripherals. I still have a good old trusty Microsoft Precision Pro joystick with a gameport to USB adapter, a force feedback one too, and a force feedback wheel. These things still work great over ten years later. Heck I even bought a second Precision Pro 2.0 and Force Feedback Wheel still sitting in original packaging because I loved it so much. I bought them when MS said they were going to stop making them and got them on clearance for something like half off, lol.

I also think the Microsoft Kinect will be a huge hit. Although the current gen console is getting really long in the tooth.

Overall I don't think they're a dying brand, but I think they're too much of an "old fashioned" stodgy company. I don't think of them as innovative as much as I do progressive. They keep up but don't go above and beyond.

I couldn't move away from Windows considering the vast software library I've acquired.

 

Microsoft announces a record first-quarter revenue of $16.20 billion, $5.41 billion in profit -- Engadget

Well done CNN writer.

 

Same Again

Microsoft says business demand picking up | Beyond Binary - CNET News

 

Yep, they are sure dieing.

 

If by dying you mean "making off like thieves," then yes, they're dead men walking.

R.I.P. and all that jazz.

 

I'm not sure that Microsoft is a dying consumer brand, but in my opinion they are becoming more and more irrelevant in today's market. Windows is the ONLY operating system that requires product activation. I think this is the one thing that Apple has over Microsoft, not to mention open source software.
Unless you build your own system, it is extremely hard to find computers that don't have Windows, and what most people don't realize is, some of the purchase price of your computer goes to your windows license. Windows does NOT come free with your computer.
Microsoft has been very bullish in their tactics. Releasing operating systems every 3 years, requiring product activation and only allowing a limited number of activations per license is creating a *consumable* product. That's how Microsoft is able to report record profits every quarter.
Personally I think we are in the age of open source software and viable free alternatives, there's just no reason to choose Windows any more. That I can download it for free, install it as many times as I want on as many computers as I want, needless to say if you read articles on the net about it, Microsoft is frightened of that. I just don't see Microsoft hanging on to their market share given all of these points. A dying brand? No, but irrelevant? Yes.

 

Exactly what I was going to post... At least almost 89% of the voters in this thread's poll disagreed with CNN's article.

 

No disrespect but you wrote an awful lot of crap just there. Since when product activation is an issue? Unless your copy is pirated you don´t have to worry about that, iPhones need activation btw.

Do you think Apple doesn´t charge you for Mac OSX? It may not seem like it but they do, on top of those outrageous prices for the aforementioned "middle of the road" machines. And last time I checked my laptop came with W7 x64 preinstalled, if that´s the "free" definition you mean.

OS every 3 years? I guess that´s a proper release schedule, however from XP to Vista I think it was like 6-7 years? Of course Apple doesn´t do that... Oh wait! Mac OSX Leopard - Snow Leopard - Lion within like what 4 years?

I´ve reinstalled Windows 7 many times and I didn´t have a problem, even with OEM keys I can do a clean install and enter the OEM and it will work. IT IS FALSE THAT YOU HAVE LIMITED ACTIVATIONS PER OS COPY.

Irrelevant? Only time will tell, but with people like you I think they are winning the battle...

Regards

 

Did I? Maybe for someone as old school as me it might be a problem. I for one believe that if I purchase software, I have the right to use it without needing to jump through hoops to "validate" software I legally purchased, to get permission to use software that I legally purchased. That's one reason I'm still very nostalgic for Windows 2000.
That's another reason why I refuse to support any game company that uses any form of activation or DRM. It only serves to hurt the honest paying customers while the pirates get to use the software with such hurdles removed.
It's all about principle for me. So, if you say Microsoft is winning because of "people like me", then good luck to them, more power to them. I'd suggest you do a simple google search, there's a lot of reports of people being told that their license was no longer valid due to too many activations and told to buy another license to reactivate windows.

Regards.

 

MS denied me an activation. It was an OEM license for a desktop, and only activated a few times, with same hardware, just occasional reformat/reinstalls. Then I upgraded the CPU and hard drive. Everything else was the same. Had to call to activate. They said that it wasn't the same machine and I had to buy a new license. Needless to say it was one of the few times I ended up using an "extended evaluation" version of Windows.

 

That's weird. They usually consider changing the motherboard the only way for it to be considered a different computer. Did you call multiple times and get the the same answer?

 

Twice. I've had to call even when the machine is same hardware sometimes.

They gave me a hard time once too with another machine, saying I installed it too many times. It was the same dang machine and with XP, I mean nearly ten years running. I still have the machine hasn't been updated or anything, athlon xp 1800+, 1GB DDR, 80GB IDE HDD. Probably reinstalled a dozen times because I did it about every six months, sometimes sooner. Using an original XP license before any SP's.

 

Microsoft beats street, knocks down Apple worry - Reuters -

ms makes more profit in a quarter than apple makes in a year lol
most of apples 'value' comes from its overvalued stock that people within its distortion field are willing to buy, just as they are willing to buy their middle of road products (computers).

 

Most of Apple's profits come from iPod and iPhone. MacBook's aren't quite the money makers nor is the OS. If Microsoft could tap the mobile market a little better, it would probably start to beat Apple to a pulp (mmm, Apple Juice!)

Problem is that Microsoft is too darn conservative and not very innovative. While I think the Kinect will help push Microsoft ahead in the console arena, it's still a knock-off of what Wii did on launch day four years ago with a console that cost $100 less, and made profit from day one.

Although I am happy to see Microsoft react quickly to the issues with Vista and give us one spectacular OS that is Windows 7. Sometimes a kick in the pants is all anyone needs to excel. Just not sure what else MS can offer with the quick follow up release of Windows 8.

 

You have to go through the phone process and say one computer is activated at the end. Works just fine.

And no Microsoft is not a dieing brand - Microsoft announces a record first-quarter revenue of $16.20 billion, $5.41 billion in profit ( Microsoft announces a record first-quarter revenue of $16.20 billion, $5.41 billion in profit -- Engadget)

 

for anyone interested:
MSFT - MICROSOFT CORP Financial Ratios - Forbes.com
AAPL - APPLE INC Financial Ratios - Forbes.com

microsoft is a much much bigger company than aapl or google. its profit margins are double that of apple at a whopping 84.4%

however if you look at aapl's book value and p/e ratio , you clearly see how the market has overvalued this stock as compared to its performance.
to me aapl has always been a gadget company. the problem with that is, their gadget needs to sell. by the inherent nature of gadgets, people eventually get bored and replace them. aapl has been lucky in that almost all their gadget offerings have been met by incredible enthusiasm by the market.
but it only takes one failed gadget; since aapl only comes out with new gadgets every so often, to drastically affect their revenues. and for an oversold stock, that could spell disaster for the stockholder/investor.

 

This is very true and the "biggest" difference in their offerings....apple makes its money by designing both hardware/software (and as someone else wrote 'middle-of-the-road') and then tweaking the complete hell out of it...they sell a "platform" whereas Microsoft sells "software" to the vendors. So honestly, it's the vendors mostly who are writing these crappy drivers, softwares and apps that are breaking the pc's but MS often is the only one who gets the blame...if any one of the vendors actually took the time to tweak and make every possible setting in windows work on say one of their lines of laptops/desktops....they would have a run away winner imo...but instead they leave it upto the users which is where a lot of frustration happens of course

 

I linked the article for reference but I remember that time very well and IIRC Apple was in bad shape financially. I also remember reading about how the Apple fanbois booed Bill Gates when Steve introduced him and informed them of the Microsoft/Apple alliance. If it weren't for that loan who knows where Apple would be today? Apple turned around it's fortunes and the rest is history including a very arrogant company that came out of their financial mess.

And MS was more interested in not getting the DOJ pursuing anti-trust lawsuits which was the big issue back then with Windows 95 and Internet Explorer built into the OS. So to keep the government off it's back it helped it's rival.

 

It's the same in the EU - Microsoft is FORCED to offer Windows without the Media Player (N version - did anybody ever see any on sale? Or do they only exist theoretically) and FORCED Microsoft to "offer users a browser choice" - yuck... if MS prevented other browsers, I could understand t it, but they didn't.

Apple can do what they want - and the worst part of it - other companies can just give you something and that's it. In our European Toyota Yaris Vero you cannot change the stereo - why isn't Toyota Forced to offer a choice?
Why aren't car makers forced to offer different types or suspension? Different manufacturer Sound systems? - You can go on, and on, and on.

What it boils down to is, that governments are NEVER consistent in their decisions.
So they will restrict one company while others get away with the same or worse... ah well... that's a modern free market economy - governments dictate what companies have to do with their software products...

 

Exactly, see you get it !

 

I was very much into Apple when I bought my first generation MacBook in Spring 2006. This was with Mac OS X Tiger and when the Intel macs were JUST coming out.

I enjoyed it, but I needed some extra power, so I sold it and got a "Penryn" MacBook Pro in Spring 2008 with Mac OS X Leopard.

I could tell just from the difference between Tiger and Leopard that Apple was headed the wrong direction. Leopard was basically Tiger with flashiness added to it and only a couple useful features added on. Apple really doesn't care about Macs as much as their iOS devices anymore. Macs are secondary.

So I sold the Penryn MacBook Pro for $1200, and got a $500 HP DM3z that I am pretty satisfied with.

Leopard had severe wireless connection issues that are published quite vocally on the macrumors.com forums, with specific models being culprits. Apple refused to do anything about it, instead selling a $30 Leopard SP1 known as Snow Leopard that still doesn't fix the issue. Running Windows through Apple's Boot Camp is also a joke. The drivers are terrible. Everybody that's tried it knows it. You get half the battery life, the graphics drivers are terrible, the touchpad drivers aren't refined, and the Mac runs way hotter under Windows. Yet Apple advertises that running Windows on a Mac is the same as running Windows on a PC.


Leopard was a RAM hog compared to Tiger with no real benefit. Tiger took about ~220 MBs of RAM to run, Leopard took ~500 MBs to run. Tiger took up about 6-7 GBs to install. Leopard took 12-13 GBs to install. Leopard was bloated and added no real benefit.

So what did Apple do? They took Leopard, stripped it down for only Intel, added some under-the-hood improvements, and repackaged it for an additional profit. That's what Microsoft did with Windows 7... but somehow everyone portrays Microsoft as the moneypinching old man and Apple as the computing company of the future. Hardly anybody buys Windows upgrades, people usually just buy new computers for the new OS or stick with the OS they are using when it comes to Windows.

In addition, Apple's new Mac OS X "App Store" scares me. Apple has always been a closed company since Jobs took it over in 1997. That's a fact. But they are going to the extreme now. Whether people want to admit it or not, the App Store is just one more way Apple can control what people can or cannot do on their Macs.

The point I'm trying to make is this. Apple's focus is now on iOS. Yes, Apple's hardware and industrial design is the best in the industry. There really is no arguing that. That's the only reason why Apple is getting away with running the company the way it is. Mac OS X is pleasant to use, but it is far from perfect and the fact that Apple is most likely going to control users what they can and cannot do in the future scares me.

 

He "was" back in the day (couldn't find a tech mag without his face being next to the word microsoft or ms)...the two of them have come along at different times, remember, Steve was ousted by his own company at one point and returned only when they were sinking