ē Services, not Devices:

The crux of the problem is in that second paragraph: no one is asking Microsoft to design its “customer interaction” to “reflect one company.” Customers are asking Microsoft to help them solve their problems and get their jobs done, not to make them Microsoft-only customers.

The solipsism is remarkable.

The truth is that Microsoft is wrapping itself around an axle of it’s own creation. The solution to the secular collapse of the PC market is not to seek to prop up Windows and force an integrated solution that no one is asking for; rather, the goal should be the exact opposite. Maximum effort should be focused on making Office, Server, and all the other products less subservient to Windows and more in line with consumer needs and the reality of computing in 2013.

Devices are vertical, services are horizontal

Source: stratēchery

Solving problems sometimes requires work.:

Biz Stone said something very clearly and concisely that defines the way tech is funded these days. He says if he can’t figure out an app in a minute, he moves moves on.

[snip -ed.]

Why does it matter? Well, software is, in every way, the leading edge of the technology. If we limit the edge to simple ideas, ideas as simple as an advertisement, what chance do we have of solving the massive problems that face us? we face? Many of those problems are technological in nature, and require thought and organization. Tools that tackle those problems can be pretty simple, but not so simple that they pass the The Biz Test.

Source: Scripting News