Windows RT can't be dead because it was never alive

When the whole Surface line was originally announced I found myself in many debates about Windows RT. Even very well read geeks had a hard time grasping (only momentarily of course) that the Surface would in fact have two flavors ... Windows RT and Windows 8.

• Windows RT would not run Windows applications
• Windows RT could not run the full version of Office
• Windows RT software was only available from the Windows Store ... since legacy apps didn't work, the selection was sparse to say the least
• Windows RT doesn't work with Windows Media Center
• Active Directory authentication? No

It simply didn't make any sense. Windows RT offers absolutely nothing over Windows 8 except longer battery life. Honestly, I could care less about Windows. But if you did like Windows, there's absolutely no reason to buy a Surface RT. But Surface RT is cheap? Correct, because it's useless - a Microsoft OS without access to the Microsoft ecosystem. If you really want an RT device just be patient, the prices have been falling and they'll continue to do so.

So, here's Microsoft strategy in nutshell:

• Update a desktop OS and build a touch OS, smash them together = Windows 8
• Launch your own hardware that has:
• The new frankenstein OS 
• The new frankenstein OS without the features people who buy Windows machines are actually looking for 

I see more Macs than I do Windows 8 machines. I've never been able to say that about any previous Microsoft OS. While it's obviously anecdotal, that's my reality and I expect I'm not alone. 

RT was never alive. So, yes it's dead. Here's a better question, is Windows 8 terminal? I certainly feel sorry for anyone who has it. 

Train Wreck in Redmond

Here's Microsoft's latest creative masterpiece.

Let's ignore for the moment that Microsoft's representation of iPad functionally is almost entirely incorrect, let's pretend the iPad can't offer the functionality they mention. 

Good commercial? Maybe that's the wrong question. Maybe they're focused on the wrong software. Where is the commercial showing how incredible PowerPoint on the iPad can be? 

Today's Killer Apps are available on more than one OS. An app that only runs on one OS can't be that killer, in fact that sounds pretty lame. 

If PowerPoint sucks on the iPad (which it really doesn't thanks to apps like Quickoffice, well thanks to XML, .pptx) that's Microsoft's fault. Today the client-side OS is a commodity and most businesses have 5+ different versions roaming their hallways. 

No one cares about Windows 8, most people don't really care what OS they're using. The Windows-centric world of the 1990's and early 2000's is never coming back. Things change, the world changes; even a corporation as rich and powerful as Microsoft can't alter reality, especially with FUD like this. 

Outlook and Excel are not killer apps.

When people spend a lot of time working with a variety of different businesses, they are initially surprised by how much of the world runs on Excel spreadsheets. Most knowledge workers use spreadsheets as a poor man's database.

We use Excel because it's available, familiar and relatively easy to use. BUT a spreadsheet application is a commodity and a vast majority of use cases will work just fine with any modern spreadsheet application like Google Sheets, Apple's Numbers, or Zoho Spreadsheets.

The average company is supporting 5 operating systems. Excel is neither available or easy to use on most of these operating systems. Microsoft should be going crazy pushing Excel as a web-first application but that's not going to happen anytime soon.

What about Outlook? I think it's the Blackberry of enterprise software. Just a few years ago Blackberry devices were everywhere. Today, they're relatively hard to find compared to iOS and Android devices. Mobile device market share is controlled by the fast paced consumer marketplace, the business marketplace moves much slower but it moves all the same. Why do we need client software for something as basic as work email, while we're sharing anything and everything the rest of the time with nothing more than a web browser? We don't.

Outlook is familiar and at one time offered a good value. That time has long since past and in today's world of cloud, mobile and social; Outlook is just clutter.

Outlook and Excel aren't killer apps. They're not even needed apps and people are quickly figuring that out. In today's world Microsoft Office doesn't really matter.

Apple's 2012 WWDC Event

The Verge has excellent coverage of today's WWDC event.

June is a great month for geeks. Apple and Google both have their huge developer conferences. You can literally see the future being built right in front of your eyes.

Personally, I wish Apple and Google were still all buddy-buddy but that's just not possible anymore. Apple's release of their own mapping solution highlights this fact. iOS users finally have turn-by-turn. Big day for them! Ultimately it's a good thing. Google Maps needs a real competitor - consumers ultimately benefit from the increased competition.

There's one theme I can't get over. It's how quickly and exponentially Apple is pulling ahead of Microsoft. 5 years ago, Apple's complete dominance over Microsoft was unthinkable. 

Microsoft has fallen so far behind, they literally don't matter.

Windows Phone doesn't matter.
Bing doesn't matter.
Bing Maps definitely doesn't matter.
Internet Explorer doesn't matter.
Word doesn't even matter.

Every empire eventually falls. Microsoft's a rich company still turning in record quarters. Financial results suggest Microsoft's consumer business has largely been overtaken by their enterprise business. Great right? Absolutely, if it wasn't for 3 trends: cloud computing, mobile and consumerization.

Who owns the best solution for using Microsoft on mobile?

Google. Today Google announced its acquisition of Quickoffice.

The Google team has to be giggling hysterically - I would be. Why Microsoft never pulled the trigger on Quickoffice, I'll never understand. I figured it was only a matter of time. I also figured they would purchase Quickoffice primarily to kill it off.

Google Apps for Business, Government and Education will now have the best mobile experience across Word, Excel and PowerPoint files. Absolutely hilarious.

Microsoft has always underestimated the importance of mobile and the Internet. But that they allowed Google to get their hands on Quickoffice might highlight just how disconnected Redmond has become from reality.

Blackberry and Outlook sitting in a tree...

Research in Motion (RIM), the company behind Blackberry smartphones, is in the midst of one of the greatest company collapses in the history of business. If you're interested, tech-centric publication The Verge provides an excellent overview of events. The company itself has lost about 80% of its value in the last 12 months. You don't need to be a geek or financial wizard to figure out the problem. Bottom line, people aren't buying Blackberry phones anymore. At Umzuzu we encourage people and companies to move away from Blackberry devcies as quickly as possible but rarely do they need any additional encouragement from our team - they're making this move on their own.

There are many factors contributing to RIM's collapse into oblivion. A failure of leadership will certainly be at the heart of dozens of articles, business school case studies and books written about the once iconic company. RIM's collapse is also a direct result of a technology trend called consumerization.

Wikipedia describes the concept: 

Consumerization is an increasingly accepted term used to describe the growing tendency for new information technology to emerge first in the consumer market and then spread into business and government organizations. The emergence of consumer markets as the primary driver of information technology innovation is seen as a major IT industry shift, as large business and government organizations dominated the early decades of computer usage and development.

RIM didn't build phones for the consumer, they built phones for "the enterprise" - specifically for the IT department. Little know fact, consumers and employees are one in the same. Steve Jobs and the team at Apple were extremely aware of  this and built the iPhone first and foremost for people. It wasn't IT who first introduced the iPhone and later Android devices into the enterprise - it was the business user. People loved their iPhone, a device that served them better than their Blackberry in every conceivable way. The iPad has followed almost the exact same path into the corporate hallways of businesses of all sizes. 

Consumerization says, "nom nom nom"

Consumerization is a relatively new trend in technology. The term itself was used for the first time about 10 years ago. A majority of people, especially those in corporate IT, underestimate the impact it will have over the next decade.


What's the next iconic brand in consumerization's path? My guess is Outlook.


Like the Blackberry, Outlook is usually viewed as a necessary evil, the price of working in the "corporate world". Outlook can work well depending on the amount of continuous investment the firm is willing to put into their desktop and server infrastructure. In the SMB environment, Outlook is often a primary source of user frustration, lost productivity and general IT issues. 


Microsoft also sells their Enterprise Agreements (EA's) to the IT department. But people have started to reconsider their options. They forward their messages to Gmail, they share their schedules via Google Calendar, and business units at the world's largest enterprises regularly leverage Google Docs and Sites without their IT department's help much less permission. It's just easier.


I leveraged Social Radar to conduct a quick little test. Social Radar lets me research billions of online conversations in a few seconds. Here we look at a couple of basic phrases over the past 12 months ... see an interesting comparison? 

Consumerization transfers purchasing power, and the influence that comes with it, from large businesses into the hands of the individual. I wonder what they'll chose?  

Disruptive Technology 101

Cloud computing is a great example of a disruptive technology. The term was coined by Clayton Christensen and he developed the idea in both articles and books, The Innovator's Dilemma covers the concepts in great depth.

Disruptive technologies are, just that, to established markets and vendors. Think of MP3 players' impact on the market for CDs. Disruptive technologies put companies like Borders out of business.

Disruptive technologies often have common attributes. For example they are typically first adopted in seemingly insignificant markets and typically at lower costs than the established technologies. I was reminded again today of cloud computing's disruptive attributes.

First, U.S. News and World Report released their list of top 100 universities in the United States.  Google took the opportunity to announce that 61 of these universities are powered by Google Apps for Education. These students are learning new ways to communicate and collaborate.

Second, news about the finalists coming out of TechCrunch Disrupt, which is a conference geared at giving young new companies a platform to flash their stuff. One of the nice things about mail exchange (MX) records, which let people email each other, is that they're public. We can look at the MX records for some of the most exciting new companies around. Everpix, Bitcasa, Pressly - and on and on and on - these companies all leverage Google Apps for messaging. Next time you read about a cool new or young company, enter their url in http://www.mxtoolbox.com/ to see what comes back - chances are excellent you'll see the names of Google's messaging services.

Google Apps has moved well beyond education and new business, with clients like the General Services Administration, but its domination in these two critical sectors is telling.

Google and Motorola Mobility

Big news in the tech industry today with Google announcing they would be acquiring Motorola Mobility (MM), which is a separate company than Motorola Solutions, Inc.

If someone had suggested this move last week, I would have said "maybe but probably not, too many employees and it's a hardware business" although there were some people who saw a lot of potential with the move.

It's difficult to say what will happen to Motorola Mobility's 19,000 employees. Google has stated MM will be run as a stand-alone company but obviously having a new boss means setting new directions. If I were a MM employee working with Android I'd be optimistic. If I was working on older technologies, not so much.

This is obviously a big, bold move by Google. Could it be a "disaster" - no, Google had about $40B in cash when they made this move. Worst case scenario is that it doesn't pay off and MM could be spun back off. They actually got a pretty good deal for MM  - the price of $12.5B includes $3B MM has in the bank so the purchase price was under $10B. Sounds like a lot but Google also paid $1.65B for a technology to share videos. Motorola invented the mobile phone.

As the leading Internet and mobile OS company, I don't think there's much that Google could do at this point in history that would really throw them much off course. They're going to continue on an upward trajectory for the foreseeable future as are others.

I think Google's acquisition can and should pay off handsomely in two primary ways - one is short term, the other long term.

Short term.

Everyone knows the first reason Google agreed to acquire Motorola Mobility. They have 17,000 patents and some of the best in the mobile biz. Most firms cower from Apple's litigation team. Not Motorola, they actually went after Apple first and as the inventor of the first mobile phone, they've got some serious history on their side. For some perspective Microsoft has about 18,000 patents and Apple about 4,000.

The press has also been all over the fact that MSFT extorts payments from Android vendors like HTC. Guess who pays Motorola Mobility royalty fees for every Xbox sold? Karma is a bitch with a great sense of humor.

There's no question, should the acquisition be successful, that Google has "solved" their patent problem. (The system itself remains a disgusting waste of resources.)

Long term.

MM is the market leader in set-top boxes. All those DVR boxes we have on our TV's come from either Motorola or Cisco. You may have noticed something about your set-top box - it kind of sucks. Searching is awful, the hardware is disgusting compared with modern devices, the functionality is meh, Internet integration is typically non-existent (which is amazing considering TV and Internet services are often coming in on the same cable or at least from the same company), and the user interface hasn't really change that much in 10 years. With the acquisition (assuming it goes through) Google has just become the leading provider of set-top boxes? Holy shit, that's huge. Consumers have a lot to gain in this traditionally stagnant space.

Overall.

Google sends another signal with this move. Yes, they are a bunch of geeky engineers more concerned with innovation than patent litigation but they also have $40B in cash, won't be pushed around and everyone trying to can kiss their ass. Some are even speculating Google's pursuit of the Notel patents was a ruse - we'll never know. I tend to agree they would have been happy to win the bid but were aware they might not and were pursuing many possible patent acquisition options simultaneously - when they lost the Nortel bid they decided to go big. But to anyone who thinks the world's leading Internet company and leading mobile OS company is going to give an inch as the opportunities of the mobile Internet are realized you've been put on notice.

Other winners.

Amazon. They've been investing in Android with their marketplace, HTML5 apps and rumored Android powered tablets. Patents issues increased the risk of this investment. Amazon benefits from Android's new patent war chest without having to fork over the dough. Personally I think Amazon has more potential to be a long term mobile player than Microsoft, Blackberry, Nokia or HP.

Barnes and Noble's Nook. They've been fighting hard to protect their Android powered devices from litigation by Microsoft. Like Amazon, they should benefit from Android's new patent war chest.

Samsung, HTC, other Google partners. The MM acquisition causes some channel conflict but I'd bet these firms would rather have that conflict to manage than getting their asses sued or extorted left and right by Apple and Microsoft. A stronger Android means a stronger platform for these firms. Samsung is also a leading ChromeOS partner, a Google more invested in mobile computing is a Google more invested in Samsung. A look at the iPhone shows just how much quality and value Samsung components can add to Google phones, tablets and PC's. There's no reason MM does not take more, rather than less, advantage of foreign manufacturing partners now that its business model is a bit more dynamic to say the least.

Biggest losers.

Microsoft. They've been all over Android, basically making a business out of threats. "Pay us on your Android devices or get sued." The king of mobile patents is Motorola Mobility. With this move Google kills this "opportunity" for Microsoft. Microsoft even pays MM a royalty fee for every Xbox sold. Apple and Google will now both have hardware businesses at their disposal. Obviously Google will not match the profit margins of Apple but they don't need to - the firms have extremely different business models. Microsoft has tons of dough, they should just buy Nokia AND Blackberry. Revamp the hardware, optimize for Windows Phone 7 and shove the devices down the throat of every market on earth. It wouldn't be pretty or elegant but that's the only chance they have in mobile. Google just up'd the admission fee to play.

RIM. The phones are awful. The company's business model is obsolete. As everyone else gets stronger or consolidates into a larger player, Blackberry gets weaker. And just when everyone thought RIM couldn't be any more meaningless.

Microsoft Windows and Obesity

Just because a lot of people have it doesn't make it any better.

Advantage Google

It's been pretty amazing to see the advancements of Gmail over the past 5 years or so. Multitenancy has many advantages for customers but probably even more so for the vendor.

Gmail provides a good example.

Google's messaging service:

• Gmail

Microsoft's messaging products and services: 

• Exchange Server 2003
• Exchange Server 2007
• Exchange Server 2010
• Small Business Server 2003
• Small Business Server 2008
• Small Business Server 2011
• Business Productivity Online Suite
• Business Productivity Online Suite Dedicated 
• Office 365
• Office 365 Dedicated
• Hotmail 
• Office Communications Server 2007
• Lynx 2010 
• Office Live Small Business (forced sunset coming 10/11)
•  ...I'm sure there are a couple more. 

Consumerization is an extremely powerful force that's just getting started in the technology industry. The iPhone is the best example. Gmail is another great example. It was cool to see Facebook roll video chat into their service, it was also a reminder that Gmail has had this feature for more than 2 years. 

Today our personal computing experience is dominated by multitenant web-based services. Tomorrow our business computing experience will be as well.

Censorship is not a sustainable strategy...

...it is annoying though.

It all started with the Kansas City Cloud Computing User Group which is under the .org top level domain which would suggest some altruistic attempt to educate our local community about modern computing services delivered via the Internet, commonly referred to as Cloud Computing.

Everyone knows the Internet is one of the most disruptive innovations in human history - in short, its development, massive adoption, and the dozens of attributes that make it, well the Internet, have really screwed up and even destroyed many business models and businesses. Pick up a newspaper lately? Me either.

The Internet of the last 20 years mostly consisted of text and links, maybe a picture or two. Web sites like blogs were able to publish content and distribute it on a global scale at almost no cost. This destroyed the capital intensive and complex business model consisting of massive printing presses and complex supply chain distribution frameworks. This Chart of the Day from SAI shows what the total destruction of a business model looks like.

The last decade has been horrible for the newspaper industry - the very foundation on which the businesses were built no longer exists. The businesses are no longer valuable and many printing presses are likely worth more for their scrap metal than printing a newspaper or magazine.

Fast forward to mid year 2011. Today's Internet is MUCH MORE than text, links and some pictures. Today's Internet is full of applications - from Email, CRM , custom applications, pure infrastructure, highly specialized applications, to applications to pop some pigs!

Modern Internet services already dominate our personal computing experience. We use Google.com to find everything under the sun, Amazon to buy just about anything we want, Facebook to connect with friends and family, Craigslist to sell old washing machines, Gmail for personal email, Linkedin for professional networking, Google Maps to check out a street view or get directions - the list goes on and on and on. We live on the Internet.

Internet services are beginning to dominate our business computing as well. Commerce Bank leverages Workday, Perceptive Software runs Salesforce.com and Google Apps, Kansas City Southern Railroad leverages Salesforce.com, St. Luke's Hospital System leverages Postini, Zarda BBQ runs on Google Apps as does the YMCA of Greater Kansas City. Soon Kansas City will be home to the world's fastest Internet and adoption of modern Internet applications will continue to accelerate.

Who's business model does this screw up? Well, if the Internet is now the platform delivering applications the desktop environment simply becomes a commodity. Generally speaking commodities are very inexpensive compared to other goods and services. If you buy nails at the hardware store, you don't care who manufactured them - they're nails. Contrast this to an iPad and you have two extremes.

Everyone knows the king of the desktop is Microsoft - they're king of the hill that is quickly beginning to look more like a molehill than a mountain. Here's another fun chart from SAI.

Look familiar? When the very foundation of your business model is completely disrupted you're screwed. Every business model eventually becomes obsolete.

Microsoft is an extremely competitive company and they're not going anywhere anytime soon. They're sitting on a mountain of cash and have tons of smart employees. But has Microsoft peaked? Absolutely. As the king of the desktop, Microsoft was intrinsically tied to the same destiny and the chart above clearly shows how their Internet services business is doing.

You can't hide from reality but you can try and shut it up and that brings us back to the Kansas City Cloud Computing User Group (kccloud.org). I was excited when I found out about the group. Cloud Computing has the ability to increase the capabilities of Kansas City businesses of all sizes, our nonprofits and other community organizations and our schools. Cloud Computing offers more function at less cost - this is great for consumers.

However, these facts are horrible for Microsoft where these same high costs drive record revenues and profits. In the "user group" I quickly noticed my ability to submit blog posts, videos and events to the site was "broken" - I submitted a trouble ticket to the site's administrator and was told, even though I was a full member, only information from or about Microsoft could be submitted to the "Kansas City Cloud Computing User Group" which is obviously anything but. To their credit, they didn't delete my previous posts but they were quickly buried under fresh content.

I thought about trying to start a real user's group for Internet services but choose to focus my efforts in other areas (these groups take TONS of work to start, build and maintain) and eventually forgot about the censorship ... until today.

Microsoft's Tony Tai wrote an article on the Why Microsoft blog that was blatantly misleading. I don't post there often because it's intended for a Microsoft audience but sometimes I do speak up when the post is so obviously incorrect - it's called lying in grade school. Tony had stated Gmail does not have filtering while it's been a feature for at least 5 years. I pointed this out, he responded and I was looking forward to providing some additional feedback but rather than having a discussion they've decided it's easier to pretend reality doesn't matter and I'm unable to post.

When information was expensive to publish and distribute this type of marketing could be extremely effective but today it's just annoying. The facts are everywhere.

Most underestimated company?

I noticed something the other day in several separate conversations about the general direction of Enterprise IT. Apple's future role in Enterprise IT is still heavily underestimated even by the firm's biggest fans. I think this underestimation is driven by an instinctive belief that the past, in part, dictates the future and that the impact of consumerization will be relatively limited and has largely already played out. However, the past is just that and consumerization is just getting warmed up.

Let's think first about the past, all the way up to today. The reality is Microsoft controls about 90% of the market. I'm not sure it's still possible to find anyone outside of Redmond that argues that number is going up. How could it? Once you achieve total domination over a market there is only one direction to go - down. The conversation has moved from if it's going down to how fast and how far.

Microsoft has announced "Windows 8" will support the ARM architecture. So hypothetically this means you could have a full version of Windows running on a tablet like device with all the benefits of a full OS with the mobility and battery life of a tablet. This tremendous feat of technical innovation would basically make iOS and Android second rate "toys" with the "real productivity" still locked safe and sound, from Redmond's perspective, in Excel and Outlook - and full versions of the applications, not "second rate" web apps. Microsoft would pull off a major coup again and stay firmly planted as king of the hill. Could it happen? Well, I guess it ... no, not a chance. Even if Microsoft actually pulled it off perfectly the world has moved on to the next hill. In 3 years are you going to trade in your Android or Apple tablet so you can run Office? No way.

"Hi, I'd like to buy a new computer - I'm looking for one with Word." Does anyone say that? Maybe they do, I'm sure the guys and gals at Best Buy hear some incredibly stupid shit. Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook ... 4 applications. 10 years ago 4 applications meant something. Today we have hundreds of applications at our finger tips. 5 years ago people were reluctant to purchase a device that didn't support Office - today we buy machines without Office faster and in more volume than ever before in history. The affect is direct and indirect - we learn Outlook and productivity don't actually have that much in common and we're exposed to cool new applications for collaborating with others. Nobody buys an iPhone or Android device because it has Office. Microsoft's 90% market share in the OS market is going to fall Internet Explorer style.

If Enterprise IT departments think they've basically weathered the consumerization storm because they now support iPhones and decided to unblock Facebook they're mistaken. The business is remembering who works for who and, while they appreciate and are grateful for your help and support, they also know if you get in their way they have other options.  Apple's PC market share is roughly 5%. You know a lot of people who switch to Mac and then go back to Windows? Given the option of an iPhone or a Blackberry we know most people choose the iPhone.

What happens when they have the choice, which they will, of a MacBook Air or any device running Windows?

UPDATE: On August 9th and 10th, 2011 Apple passed Exxon mobile, in terms of market capitalization, to become the world's most valuable company. I think they still have a long way up to go.

Deep Thoughts... on Chrome OS

I've been testing Google Chrome OS now for about 2 months. Chrome OS is a new Linux-based operating system based on the open source Chromium project. The goal of Chrome OS is to deliver the web to the user as fast and easily as possible. 

Anyone who has spent anytime in technology knows, without question, that a vast majority of people are not "computer people",  never will be and could care less how things work - just as long as they do.

There are many opinions regarding Chrome OS but one fact is clear. Chrome OS is the world's simplest operating system. If you can browse on the Chrome browser, you're already a Chrome OS power user. For a Chrome browser user, any Chrome OS device is ready to go as "their device" in about 10 seconds. Anyone installed a new version of Office lately? How about upgrade a Vista device to Windows 7? How long did that take? An hour? Two, four, five, overnight? That's not even to make it "your device", that's just to make it capable of becoming your device.

In my work with Umzuzu I have access to multiple Chrome OS devices so I get to enjoy the potential enabled by the simplicity of Chrome OS first hand.

Writing this post actually provided a perfect example. I was working on a Chrome OS device from the comfort of my couch. The devices' batteries last for about a day's worth of work so I don't think of plugging them in that often. The particular device I was using prompted me with a low battery warning. "Darn," I thought, "I'm super comfortable and really don't feel like being tethered right now." ... because I would no longer be laying down. Then I noticed the other Chrome OS device within arms reach. Nice! This is a brand new device.

Turn it on, prompted with login, enter Google username and password, done. Not even 10 seconds. What did I get?

• My extensions ... stuff like Pandora, Bit.ly, Blogger, Picnik, Chrome to Phone, Hootsuite, Google Voice, Google Translate
• My bookmarks ... you can use your imagination here.
• My Apps ... Gmail, Google Apps, Salesforce.com, Box.net, Squarespace, Freshbooks, Blogger, Google Voice, Instant Messaging for 2 work accounts and 1 personal account, 5 calendars - work and personal, Picnik, Linkedin, Facebook, Hootsuite ... you know, the Internet. 

I have more and can do more on this brand new Chrome OS device in 10 seconds than most people even realize is possible or exists. What does this mean? This means Windows 7 is bloated. It's a waste of money and more importantly a waste of time, especially at scale. A retail copy of Office can cost almost $300 ... it is possible when Chrome OS devices hit the market some could cost less than Office.

Cloud computing is not a TV commercial. The cloud is the complete commodification of the client operating system. The browser is already the most used and useful application on a computer. The browser serves the Internet, in the Internet we find the Cloud, the Cloud is powered by millions of computers ... we can choose to use the power of 1 computer or we can choose to use the power of thousands of computers.

Larry Page, Google's CEO, is the son of a late computer scientist and computer science professor at Michigan State. Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. The point of Chrome OS is not to enable the potential of 1 computer - it is to enable the potential of thousands of computers. If you think Google is not going to follow through on Chrome OS, you're nuts.

As my friend Leo says, "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication."  I'll bet Larry Page knows Leo too. 

"Every computer has a browser" ... yes, and every human has a heart but if 70% of everything else is bloat you're hardly running at optimal performance. Chrome OS is fit and it stays fit - starting every time from a clean version, called Verified Boot.

5 years ago we didn't have iPhone, 3 years ago we didn't have Android, 1 year ago we didn't have iPad ... the pace of innovation and change in technology is accelerating. The thought that Apple would one day be worth more than Microsoft once seemed crazy. Today's its worth $100,000,000,000 more. Google will pass Microsoft by the middle of this year and IBM will pass them by the end of the year.

NOWHERE in technology is more stale than the desktop. They range from the rare "sweet Mac" to the more common "oh my god, you work on this everyday? I'd f'ing kill myself. You know computers aren't supposed to work like this, right?" We will see massive changes here in the next 5 years. Chrome OS will catch Windows in the next 5 years. Mac sales will continue to soar at triple digit paces, 300%+ in the enterprise, as well and will play a much more significant role in the Enterprise.

The Internet is the most disruptive innovation in human history. To think it will continue to influence every aspect of society and business and yet our soon to be secondary point of access will keep its form of the pre-Internet era is insane. Today the Web rules.

Microsoft vs. Google on Focus.com

"Google vs Microsoft. Which one is worthy of IT's trust?Google is an information harvesting Giant. Microsoft is the "evil empire". Which one do you trust your technology to?"

...kind of a silly, oversimplified question from Focus.com but it's in my wheelhouse so I let it rip...

You've asked two questions so I'll provide 2 answers. 


1. Both


Both firms are professionally run organizations with thousands of clients and intelligent, caring employees. Microsoft and Google are two of the most important companies our world has seen to date. They'll be in text books (ebooks?) right next to Ford and General Electric. For all the nonsense in the press, both firms continue to post outstanding numbers.


2. Both again, but now it gets more complicated. 


Microsoft is now about 32 years old. They are a mature, healthy on-premises software products company. They continue to compete aggressively across an impressive range of technologies. Microsoft likely competes against as many other technology companies as any firm on earth. Like it or not, the firm is going to fight for every dollar. Microsoft's profits are driven by Windows and Office. This client/server product-based business model created our world's richest man. It will continue to generate billions of dollars in revenues and profits for most of the next decade.  


Google is roughly 13 years old. They are a mature, healthy Internet services company. They also compete aggressively across an impressive range of technologies. The critical difference between the two firms is what lay at the foundation of their business models. One is a software products company, one is an Internet company. I'm not talking about what their marketing says - I'm talking about how they actually make money. So what? Well, the "so what" is the fact that the Internet is the most disruptive innovation in human history - rivaled only by the printing press and the plow. It's difficult to really get a sense of the moment in history we're experiencing first hand. As the leading Internet company, Google doesn't really have to be run all that well and they'll continue to make money hand over fist - that being said, the company is run extremely well and continues to flex its influence across a huge range of industries. 


I'll take my explanation above to a specific one-on-one case that I think you may be referring to in your question: Google Apps vs. BPOS


We'll start with Google. Today we take Google.com for granted but it is an extremely impressive SaaS application. The amount of data Google indexes, organizes and distributes globally on-demand is amazing. Google.com was one of the first globally available SaaS applications and certainly the most successful. In the quest to teach machines to understand content created by man, Google stumbled across AdWords - these two SaaS applications are a seriously powerful team. To enable these SaaS applications to be immediately available to anyone anywhere in the world, Google built a custom software and hardware infrastructure and has continued to invest heavily in this asset ... about $9,000,000,000 over the past 5 years or so. This is important because Google's other Internet services run on the same infrastructure - Google Apps for Business has much more in common with Google.com than it does Exchange Server or SharePoint. This is how Google is able to roll out new features roughly every 2 weeks to millions of users, this is how they're able to provide services at a fraction of the cost of the legacy options, this is how they're able to provide dozens of services as part of Google Apps, and this is how Gmail is able to run at 99.984% uptime. 


Now let's look at Microsoft. You noticed I used BPOS above instead of Office 365, why? Well, because Office 365 hasn't been released yet - it's not available. BPOS runs on the 2007 server products and while client/server itself was designed for a world without the Internet even these 2007 versions were designed for a world without the iPhone, Android, or the iPad. BPOS has nothing in common with Bing and everything in common with Exchange Server. Office 365 is built on the 2010 line of server products which are quickly becoming outdated themselves - the 3 year on-premises upgrade cycle just doesn't fit into the reality of today's technology environment - we move at Internet speed now. BPOS is more expensive than Google Apps and it only includes 4 services vs dozens from Apps. BPOS and Office 365 both require on-premises investments like Communications Server for BPOS and a required upgrade to Lync Server for Office 365. Is BPOS or Office 365 a smarter choice than their on-premises counter parts? Absolutely but that's hardly the measure that should be utilized - it's like comparing your car to your horse instead of the other cars. Just because Microsoft paints a racing stripe on client/server products and boards them for you doesn't turn that horse into a car. 


Google makes money with Internet services, they built a cloud and then decided they could run other SaaS applications on it along with Google.com. Microsoft makes money with client/server software products, they built data centers to host those products and called it a cloud. One's not inherently right or wrong - "cloud" is the new "light". Yes there is light ice cream but I doubt your personal trainer recommends it in any quantity. It's not Microsoft vs Google, it's business built on the Internet vs business built on client/server. 

"Will Google CEO shift undermine enterprise efforts?"

This post was written in response to an article of the same title. 

There is a general misunderstanding of Google's current role in the Enterprise. First and foremost, the company already has thousands of Enterprise clients. Including Microsoft and each of the Fortune 10. I don't know what each of these companies spend but Microsoft alone likely spends at least several hundred thousand dollars every month. All of these companies are paying to leverage a SaaS application. Just about every publicly well known Enterprise is already a Google customer. A majority of State Governments are also Google customers. Larry's Enterprise experience is being underestimated.

This is also important to note because Google Apps has much more in common with AdWords and Google.com than it does Office or Exchange Server. Google.com and Adwords run on MapReduce, BigTable, and Google File System - in 2010 Google made massive investments in infrastructure to support these systems. Google.com and Adwords are not the only SaaS applications that run on these systems. Google Apps also runs on MapReduce, BigTable and Google File System. This is the benefit of having an actual cloud computing infrastructure rather than just television commercials.

Google's investments in its core business and systems are also investments in Google Apps. This is how an Enterprise business, while small compared to those with 30 year head starts (duh), can be run profitably. Google Apps profit margins may not rival those of AdWords but they can contribute nicely to the bottom line. Schmidt is not the only Googler with an Enterprise background. You can't help but run into folks formerly of Microsoft, Oracle, IBM, and other "Enterprise-centric" firms. Google Apps already leads the market for hosted messaging at the University level - this is no fluke. (Nor is it because it's free, MSFT's offering is free as well) The next generation of leaders work on the Internet by default, they have no tie to, or thought of, the desktop for broadly adopted applications (i.e. email). Google itself has this culture as do more and more firms everyday. Google Apps and Android go hand in hand - Google Apps is as mobile as Google.com. Google also spent two thirds of a Billion dollars on Postini which has an impressive client list of its own and has been deeply integrated into the Google Apps suite. DocVerse was acquired last year for $25,000,000 and is explicitly designed to integrate Office with Apps. Who was DocVerse? Basically some of the same guys who helped build Windows, Office, SharePoint and SQL Server. Google's first acquisition in 2001 became part of Google Groups - a core component of the Apps suite. Google Apps' Video application is a private YouTube. Apps is not some side project - it is connected to every part of the firm. Another HUGE elephant in the room is consumerization. Everyday another consumer discovers what they can do with Google Apps. They got to pick their phone, what else can they bring to work to make their lives easier? Outlook on the iPad, no dice. Gmail on the iPad, no problem. Excel on that new Mac/iPhone/iPad? Pain in the ass. Google Spreadsheets? Easy as Google.com.

Google Apps makes the world a better place. Google Apps' core is the Web. Google Apps is a global SaaS application. Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. Google Apps is not out of Google's wheelhouse - it's right down the middle. Mr. Page knows this better than anyone. Break it off to make investors happy? The founders implicitly stated in their IPO they would often make decisions for the long term and/or that may seem strange risks to investors. To the world that runs on Microsoft, Google Apps may look strange. To the college students using Google Apps, Outlook is something their dad uses. Young business owners of today and tomorrow don't buy Exchange Server (nor did it ever cross their mind) - because that would just be strange. We have the Web now. We have Google Apps. It may take a decade for the change to be fully realized but Google Apps is Google's mission. This is all very obvious.

Thoughts on Windows Phone 7

Microsoft just released some "sales" figures for Windows Phone 7. Reporting that 1.5 million devices have been "sold" since it's launch in late October. To put this in perspective about 18,000,000 Android devices have been activated in the last two months.

I give Microsoft a lot of trouble on this blog. It's not because I dislike the company or its technology. Like millions of IT professionals, I have worked with Microsoft technology for most of my career as a user and as a consultant. I could rock SharePoint, Outlook, Word, Excel and PowerPoint (even Groove) as well as anyone and often served as the super user helping others utilize the software as effectively as possible. Microsoft has tens of thousands of super smart employees and lots of great technology. I give Microsoft trouble because it's the status quo - somebody has to be. Microsoft technology is great, but the day of the client/server has passed. You simply can't be the world's most profitable client/server software product company and also lead in the cloud - especially at the same time.

The Internet is one of the most disruptive innovations in our world's history. Right up there with the plow, the printing press and the combustion engine. From an economic perspective, the most important characteristic of a disruptive innovation is that it totally destroys business models that had previously been correct. Microsoft created the world's richest man by selling client/server software products more effectively than any other firm. They're going to continue to rake in billions of dollars in profits annually as a mature software product company of their size should. Nearly all of Microsoft's profit is driven by Office (client) and Windows (server). Before the Internet, client/server was the most effective means of providing the broadest range of technology to as many people possible in as efficient manner as possible. But we live in a world with the Internet now. The web rules! One company makes more money from the web than any other, Google. But Google's a consumer company that makes its money from search. Sure, but that's only half the story. Google's going to do about $30,000,000,000 in business this year, they're not getting that money from consumers. They're getting that money from businesses. Including 10 out of 10 of the Fortune 10. They're providing these firms global-scale Software as a Service (SaaS) applications. Big companies spend millions of dollars every month with Google. What looks like disruptive innovation from Microsoft's perspective creates the very foundation of every cent gobbled up by Google's business. In short, one company was created before the Internet and the other was created for the Internet.

Back to Windows Phone 7. No, Microsoft did not sell 1.5 million devices - their press release was misleading. They've "sold" that many phones to partners, not to customers. Microsoft has tons of cash, they're going to stay in mobile. But that doesn't mean it's a good option for people. Windows Phone 7 is an improvement over Windows Mobile as Windows 7 is an improvement over Windows XP but so what? The world has moved on. Most people know this intuitively. Anyone who compares an iPhone 4 or Android 2.3 device to a Windows Phone 7, 9.9 times out of 10 is going to choose the incumbents. Apple and Google have 3 and 2 year leads respectively, they're not slowing down and Microsoft's not speeding up - the gap in functionality will continue to increase.

Apple passed Microsoft as the world's most valuable technology company. The iPad was the fastest consumer product to $1,000,000,000 in history. The updated MacBook Air line redefines a 20 year old form factor and pushes the limits of display and storage technology. The iPhone has essentially redefined how people view their relationship with technology - it is personal. Google has pushed Android to the #1 smartphone platform in the US in just about 24 months. They push the limits of their architecture in their core business with innovations like Google Instant and more powerful search indexing. Google has invested around $9,000,000,000 in their infrastructure over the last 5 years - this infrastructure not only powers Google.com - it powers Google Apps. Google Apps is the leading service in higher education, has more than 30,000,000 business users and adds new functionality about every 2 weeks rather than every 3 years. Google Apps powers more than 3,000,000 businesses, our country's second largest city as well as the federal government's General Services Administration. Washington D.C. moved to Google Apps in 2007 under the leadership of Vivek Kundra - now the Chief Information Officer of the United States. The Chrome browser continues to add market share and now ChromeOS is being tested by consumers and businesses. The Google Apps Marketplace was one of the first business-centric App stores. Google App Engine for Business is to ramp up in 2011.

This isn't about being a "fanboy" of one firm over another. This is about the cold objectivity of economics. It is about the role of disruptive innovation and consumerization in today's marketplace. This is about knowing that tomorrow will be different from yesterday. Microsoft is sitting on $40B in cash but all the cash in the world can't change who you are at your core. It's important for individuals and companies to understand how our world has changed so we can get the most bang for our buck - the buck that matters.

Microsoft Online vs Google Apps for Businesses

Microsoft and Google are both professionally run businesses that have earned a great deal of respect from their customers. Both firms offer online services.

I was working with a Microsoft partner when Microsoft rolled out their Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS). The horrible name was actually meant to be only an internal reference but I guess it took on a life of its own and stuck, they're changing the name to Office 365 for the next version (which will run on the 2010 server products). I was with a SI partner, the SI stands for System Integrator. Our job was to come in after or before Microsoft sold a big licensing contract and wire the jigsaw puzzle of software and hardware together to create or prove out a business solution.

When we came across our first SharePoint 2007 project we didn't have any folks who had actually worked with the solution yet as it was brand new, the local Microsoft office didn't have anyone either and the online documentation was all marketing fluff. I was determined we would figure it out so I drove to the book store and bought Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Administrator's Companion by Bill English. We put together and delivered a proposal. I had mixed feelings when we won the project but was assured we could deliver by folks who had worked with SharePoint since its original launch circa 2001 - we couldn't. After being politely reprimanded by the CIO (I thought it was polite but I used to sell car insurance to people with car insurance at Enterprise Rent-a-Car so my anger meter is probably skewed) we were given a second chance, the billings to date would be credited. As our lack of resources became more acutely obvious, suggestions on how to solve the problem quickly dried up. What to do? Well, somebody wrote the book so I called Bill English, the author, and long story short we subcontracted an employee from his consulting firm, Mindsharp. The resource would be expensive so our margins wouldn't be very good but I was glad we'd be able to deliver on our commitment and didn't mind the criticism around revenue and failure to utilize internal resources.

"That's a boring story. What's your point?" My point is I was very, very excited for BPOS. Why? Because BPOS reduces the number of variables that require management in order to deliver a solution to business users. Let's stick with our SharePoint example. SharePoint requires Windows Server, SQL Server, Web Front End(s), and you have to figure out how to scale (scale to what? time for capacity planning), what about failover, what type of hardware do we have/need, are we going to virtualize, which parts, ad nauseam ... ALL that stuff and we haven't done anything with actual business requirements. This is why SharePoint projects take months, can cost hundreds of thousands, typically have to be redone and develop a love/hate relationship with actual users. Admin is a full time job, customizations require a small army ... for the customer this is wasteful and aggravating; for Microsoft, System Integrators, Hardware Vendors, and Large Account Resellers this is how you generate billions of dollars in revenue and make fat commission checks. Failure? Oh well, the software's sold and they paid their consulting bill, what's in the pipeline?

Enter BPOS. No hardware or software required, no SQL Server, no Windows Server, no load balancing, no failover, no WFE, no capacity planning, the licensing costs were determined by a couple of factors instead of a dozen chimpanzees randomly throwing darts at numbers (seriously, people always ask how they figure out licensing costs, that's it, secret's out), search was built in, etc. Apply this same reality across Exchange and Communications Server and we are talking about some serious value. 5x more functionality could be delivered to the business at a fraction of the current cost.

Three things happened after that. I started learning more about BPOS, about Microsoft's approach to their new online services, and about Google Apps.

What about BPOS? It was built on the server products and large clients would just be hosted single-tenant environments, called "Dedicated BPOS". I'm no genius but that didn't sound like cloud computing to me. The Office products wouldn't have web apps at all, they'd be run via on-premise SharePoint ... if they have on-premise SharePoint they wouldn't have BPOS. Online Communications Server actually requires on-premise Communications Server - what? Live Meeting would still suck. Seriously, Live Meeting blows. Simple pricing quickly became more and more convoluted. This type of user, that type of user, this combination of services, this goes with that on-premise agreement, etc.

What about Microsoft's approach? The last thing anyone at Microsoft wanted to talk about or pitch to customers was BPOS. It was a last resort if they couldn't talk them into anything else. They had Office 2010, SharePoint 2010, Exchange 2010, and SQL Server 2010 software to sell. Still do. Ballmer sells to analysts and Wall Street, everyone else sells software.

What about Google Apps? I had been a Gmail user for a year or so. The first time I used video chat I was sold. I didn't have to install anything. Search, oh search, I so take it for granted now. I fell in love with Gmail and started checking out the rest of the suite. The first time you're editing a spreadsheet at the same time as another team member you never want to see a xls or xlsx file format ever again. I remember being taken aback by Google Sites, anyone, and I mean anyone, can create a team site or intranet site and share videos, documents, calendars, presentations, reports etc. That's awesome! Google Calendar has been my favorite Calendar app since the first time I used it, I still don't know what it is that I like so much. It was Gmail and Google Calendar that ruined Outlook for me. I don't need feature 1,274 - I need to find the f@#king email and I need to find it on my phone, at home, at a friends house. How many different menu items can you have? No one on planet earth knows what every menu item on Outlook does. In Gmail I can create rules and filters in seconds, my Inbox is never too full ... not to mention my full chat app is always with me and my chats are searchable. My full calendar and all my docs are also always with me as well - and searchable. It's so easy. Then I learn Google has a business flavor of this suite called Google Apps they're selling. Everything is included, it's all web-based, there's no software, there's no hardware and it works on any computer, and it costs $50/user per year. Talk about reducing variables while delivering more services to business users. 100x more functionality could be delivered to the business at a fraction of the current cost.

Ultimately the reality was clear. The Google Apps suite crushed Microsoft's online offerings. There was no race, it had been over for years. The "competition" from Microsoft was marketing slicks and overpaid suits. BPOS will win many customers but lots of people watch Two and Half Men, that doesn't mean it's a good idea or smart use of resources.

The duty of the IT executive is to the business mission of the firm. The objective should be to enable the business with as many technology services as possible in as efficient manner as possible.

It's not possible to take an objective look at both platforms and determine that Microsoft provides a better value to the firm. Objectivity, however, is a rare quality. Ultimately value is driven by economics, which is coldly objective, and seemingly overnight Google Apps will have become the status quo.

Basically, what's included in each suite is below.

Microsoft Online
Exchange (email/calendar server)
spam/virus protection
SharePoint - intranet/extranet portals, doc share, collaboration
Communications - Instant Messaging, presence, voice/video chat
Live Meeting - web conferencing

*requirements
purchase of Microsoft Office for Outlook, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint
min. of 5 users
purchase/implementation of on-premise Office Communicator 2007 R2
Office Web Apps for Businesses can only be run on-premise with SharePoint Server 2010

Google
Gmail (web app and email server)
spam/virus protection
Calendar - individual work and personal, team, shared, resource, public
Docs - Documents, Spreadsheets, Presentation, Forms, Drawings
Talk - IM, presence, voice/video chat, telephone calling/texting
Groups - create and manage groups
Sites - intranet/extranet portals, doc share, collaboration
Video - secure internal video sharing (think private YouTube)
Moderator - collect and prioritize questions/opinions from employees
Blogger - blogging platform
AdWords - Advertising platform
Voice - phone/web app providing call routing, voicemail, transcription, archiving, etc.
Picasa - online web albums
Analytics - website analytics
Alerts - custom email alerts by topic
...literally dozens more.

*requirements
a willingness to learn, change, and lead.

Why can't you leave your Enterprise Agreement?

Microsoft has extracted an enormous amount of capital from
organizations of all shapes and sizes. This flow of capital from the customer to the vendor creates a good deal of friction. Microsoft's most profitable vehicle to transfer this wealth is the Enterprise Agreement (EA). A decade of profiteering has left many IT and business leaders anxiously waiting for the day when they can drop their EA.

Motorola, Ahold, Konica Minolta, Land Rover, Genetech, Lexmark, Avago, JohnsonDiversey, Valeo, The State of Wyoming, Washington DC and The City of Los Angeles have moved about a quarter of a million users to Google Apps. More than 3 million other businesses and 30 million other users have made this transition as well. Each of these firms suggests any firm can become less reliant on an Enterprise Agreement yesterday. Northwestern, Notre Dame, Brown University, University of Southern California, Arizona State University, Vanderbilt, Boise State, University of Minnesota, George Washington University, University of North Carolina, Washington University, St. Louis University, the Departments of Education for the states of New York, Maryland, Oregon, Colorado, Iowa, and more than 10 million other students using Google Apps would suggest that the incoming workforce has very different expectations about how technology should work.

We know this Enterprise Agreement really isn't working for us anymore, if it ever was, but we just can't let it go. Why not?


Denial


Subconsciously you know things have fundamentally changed. Everyone jokes that's it's no different, that technology is always changing and today's hype is the same old story. Sure someday we might use the Internet for many of our software services but that's a long way off and we'll never use it for ALL of our technology needs. Our young workers just don't understand that technology is different in the "real" world, they'll get used to it.

Fear


They say they want innovation and collaboration but really they just don't want any surprises. Office 95, 97, 2000, XP, 2003, and 2007 ... well we haven't seen any real innovation for most of the decade, maybe we'll see it in 2010, I heard they're coming out with some great stuff. I know at the end of the day Exchange Server works, Outlook works, and I think we're finally getting the hang of SharePoint. Web apps, multi-tenancy, consumerization, and new service providers? Security is an issue, our data wouldn't be safe. We'll keep an eye on these "trends" but at the end of the day we'd rather stay where we feel like we're in control.  We can do a quick review, change our user count a bit, change the date on our old EA and sign up for another 3 years. Nice and familiar.


Financial 


That Enterprise Agreement and our software product and hardware infrastructure are my bread and butter. My job is to keep our data safe and sound - even if Google could do it, I don't see why it's a good idea for us to change anything. Yes the Enterprise Agreement is expensive, but it's a cost of doing business, a necessary evil. We're already doing more with less by virtualizing. It's better to stay the course. It's the prudent financial decision. Innovation and collaboration are great in theory but they're really marketing terms.

Religion


We run our servers. I won't hand my production data over to another company. We offer high availability internally already. We've made tremendous investments in our applications and have our own state of the art infrastructure. We have made the strategic decision to continue our investment in the "private-cloud".

The Answer


The organization has to begin rapidly adopting modern cloud computing services. Ultimately this has little to do with technology and everything to do with business models. Running technology services comes at a tremendous cost to a business fundamentally organized and managed for a completely different purpose. Like all major decisions the answer is both simple and complex. We know change is possible, we know change takes action and we have more than enough experience to know what actions to take. The complexity stems from changing more than a decade of habits, taking into account a broad user group, planning for and addressing the potential impact across applications and listening to those who will inevitably dislike the disruption. But hey, that's your job. It's time to drive the organization forward. Cloud Computing enables IT and business professionals with more technology services than ever imaginable just a few years ago. This is what it's all about.

Your success in life isn't based on your ability to simply change. It is based on your ability to change faster than your competition, customers and business. — Mark Sanborn

Wanted: Services Only

As a General Purpose Technology we know Information Technology has a critical role to play in our non-profits, schools, and businesses.

Technology services are critical but 99% of the industry is still stuck in the product mindset. We assume in order to provide our organizations with critical services we need to buy products and for almost the entire history of information technology this assumption would be correct.

Products are great for vendors, especially software products. Software products have huge profit margins and cost almost nothing to duplicate. Vendors are able to sell exact copies to thousands and sometimes millions of customers. This business model created Microsoft, the world's largest software company, and Bill Gates, our world's richest man. If you wanted software services, like email, you had to buy software products.

The Internet has destroyed the software product driven business model, many of us just haven't realized it yet. We never really wanted the products in the first place. We only wanted the services.

Every technology service you can imagine is available at your finger tips right now. Google Apps, Batchbook, Freshbooks, Expensify, Squarespace, Picnik, Salesforce.com, 37signals, Amazon Web Services, The Google Apps Marketplace, Zoho, Dimdim, Box.net, Vimeo ... anything you can think of.

When we're at home we quickly find anything we need on the Internet, but then go back to work and sit through IT meetings discussing the next big product we're going to buy, setup, and support. Turns out buying products is a tough habit to break.

A lesson, The Innovator's Dilemma

Microsoft has just announced a partnership with 6 server vendors to roll out "private-cloud" offerings. "Private-cloud" is a new marketing term given on-premise technologies in order to take advantage of an industry trend towards Cloud Computing.

The "private-cloud" allows vendors to maintain the status quo. How does a customer obtain a "private-cloud"? It's very easy and it fits perfectly with their current vendor list and upgrade cycles - all the customer has to do is invest more capital in new software, hardware and professional services.

Harvard Professor Clayton Christensen wrote a great text in 1997 called the Innovator's Dilemma.

The Innovator's Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book that Will Change the Way You Do Business (Collins Business Essentials)

Clayton was trying to capture the nature of disruptive innovation and the challenges they present to incumbent vendors. A disruptive innovation is essentially a product, service, or business model that disrupts the status quo and therefore the market built on those assumptions. Classic examples include the transistor replacing the vacuum tube; the mobile phone replacing land lines; and the client/server architecture replacing mainframes/minicomputers. There are thousands of examples of disruptive innovations across every industry.

By definition disruptive innovations change their specific market. However, sometimes they change an entire planet. Electricity falls into this category as does the combustion engine and aviation. These innovations fall into an important category known as General Purpose Technologies. In short, they change everything for everyone.

The most recent General Purpose Technology is the Internet. The Internet is more than pictures of funny cats, personal email, and Facebook. It is a network of networks that connects billions of people in a system of information and services. Visualizing parts of these networks is reminiscent of the neural connections of the human brain and the universe itself.  For everything we do on the Internet today, it is still in its infancy and will continue to change our lives.

For more than a decade there have been companies who have operated under the assumption that as a culture we will leverage the Internet for our technology services both personally and professionally. We've all heard of these firms: Amazon, eBay, Facebook, Salesforce.com, Google and many more. These firms created purpose built multi-tenant architectures and business models for our Internet-enabled world.

What does the disruptive innovation of the Internet have to do with "private-cloud"? Absolutely nothing and that's really the point. Microsoft's profits, products, and business model have nothing to do with the Internet and that's their dilemma.