Microsoft in 10 Years

[Oliverspin]

What will Microsoft be in 10 years? Monopoly over the industry, ground to bits by the competition, still struggling to take hold in new markets, what? Take a guess, make a prediction. Windows 15, Lumia 5000, DecaCore....

 

[Guytronic]

This thread caused me to think about names like:
Sun Microsystems
Netscape
Yahoo
Oracle
Zenith
Hughes
IBM
RIM

 

[Oliverspin]

This is interesting, Intel's futurist talks....the future:
http://review.gemalto.com/post/imagining-the-future

 

[xandros9]

Now that I think about it.

10 years ago, Palm was on top with the anticipated Treo 650
Apple with a phone was inconceivable to some.

Vista hadn't appeared.

etc.

yeesh

 

[smoledman]

In 10 years I believe MS will be a $20 billion/year business down their core back-office stuff(Exchange, Windows Server, Active Directory). The consumer stuff is going to completely go out of business in the next 5-7 years I believe. Apple & Google are so far ahead that it's not even funny anymore.

 

[a5cent]

In 10 years I believe MS will be a $20 billion/year business down their core back-office stuff(Exchange, Windows Server, Active Directory). The consumer stuff is going to completely go out of business in the next 5-7 years I believe. Apple & Google are so far ahead that it's not even funny anymore.

It wasn't long ago that Apple was basically bankrupt. Things can change very quickly in the consumer space, and predicting the future is already hard enough without that type of almost random uncertainty.

My prediction: Anything can happen.

 

[snowmutt]

I have zero idea, except I know we will not recognize it.

I have no idea what kind of tech there will be, what enterprise will be using, just no clue. But, I still bet MS will be a part of it.

 

[dkediger]

I would anticipate nearly every standalone product will have a cloud/Azure implementation a'la Office 365, including the desktop OS. Not to say the standalone products will go away, but that there will be solid, workable licensing and management of them in the manner of O365.

A serious desktop OS is not dead - for at least one OEM. Apple ditching Aperture signals they really don't want to be in the desktop app space.

 

[xandros9]

My prediction: Anything can happen.

Breaking News! Sentient aliens have made contact and wish to share their advanced technology with us!
But only with that entity we know as "Visual Land"

 

[smoledman]

It wasn't long ago that Apple was basically bankrupt. Things can change very quickly in the consumer space, and predicting the future is already hard enough without that type of almost random uncertainty.

My prediction: Anything can happen.

No. This decline has been happening for the last 5-6 years now and accelerating. MS refuses to divulge # XBox Music subs, # Surfaces sold, #Windows 8 active users, #WP users and so on. They know the decline is happening and want to put a pretend show on(Surface Pro 3).

Where is the "wow" factor from MS like there is for Apple & Google? Google has the best search/maps and Google Glass, self-driving cars, Project Ara, Material Design and so on.

 

[a5cent]

No. This decline has been happening for the last 5-6 years now and accelerating. MS refuses to divulge # XBox Music subs, # Surfaces sold, #Windows 8 active users, #WP users and so on. They know the decline is happening and want to put a pretend show on(Surface Pro 3).

Where is the "wow" factor from MS like there is for Apple & Google? Google has the best search/maps and Google Glass, self-driving cars, Project Ara, Material Design and so on.

Do you think Apple's decline happened in a matter of days. No. That too required years. Where was Apple's wow factor back then? And where are they now?

All companies go through phases and have ups and downs. That is normal. You mentioned Google's material design, but that took almost all its inspiration from metro. Apple did something similar. The point is MS still gets a lot of stuff right.

As long as that continues, and MS remains on solid financial footing, they will eventually find success. I don't expect WP to ever become the #1 mobile platform, I think that is solidly in Android's hand now, just as Windows owns the desktop/laptop markets, but I do think WP will eventually overtake iOS.

 

[smoledman]

Do you think Apple's decline happened in a matter of days. No. That too required years. Where was Apple's wow factor back then? And where are they now?

All companies go through phases and have ups and downs. That is normal. You mentioned Google's material design, but that took almost all its inspiration from metro. Apple did something similar. The point is MS still gets a lot of stuff right.

As long as that continues, and MS remains on solid financial footing, they will eventually find success. I don't expect WP to ever become the #1 mobile platform, I think that is solidly in Android's hand now, just as Windows owns the desktop/laptop markets, but I do think WP will eventually overtake iOS.

I think you fail to understand the revulsion technology workers have for Microsoft tech. Everyone I know has switched their home computers to Macs in the last 5 years(including myself). That is just phenomenal and terrifying if you're Satya Nadella.

I don't know a single person in real life(not an MS employee) who is loves MS tech.

 

[dkediger]

I think you fail to understand the revulsion technology workers have for Microsoft tech. Everyone I know has switched their home computers to Macs in the last 5 years(including myself). That is just phenomenal and terrifying if you're Satya Nadella.

I don't know a single person in real life(not an MS employee) who is loves MS tech.

***Looks Around my house, counting Apple devices****

Nope, none here. Wonder what happened to em all? As a tech worker, I've heard recently I'm supposed to have some. Was I robbed? Does Apple have some awesome stealth tech?

Or maybe, just maybe, I don't *revile* Microsoft tech, and maybe even suspect, nay, know there's a lot of stuff they do, and do well, that Apple can't sniff.

 

[a5cent]

Everyone I know has switched their home computers to Macs in the last 5 years

I also know quite a few who have Macs, and every last one installed Windows on those machines. I think our perceptions will heavily depend on where we live. If you are in the U.S. Apple will appear to be much more important than they are overall. In most of European countries for example, Macs are still very much niche.

Claiming that technology workers have all abandoned MS is also an exaggeration. In the enterprise space, you know, where most IT professionals get paid, everything that is mission critical runs on Linux or Windows servers, not iOS or Android phones/tablets. Consumers aren't really aware of this side of the tech industry. It's largely invisible to them, but it's where most IT professionals work.

I'm a software engineer (well, kind of, ex software engineer). I currently work in the telecommunications industry... no Macs anywhere. Almost all of my colleges that I went to school with are either working in Linux or Windows based environments. iOS and Android may be replacing some of the less important client-side infrastructure, and while that is important for some on the IT support staff, it's not a big part of the pie.

 

[Ordeith]

I think you fail to understand the revulsion technology workers have for Microsoft tech. Everyone I know has switched their home computers to Macs in the last 5 years(including myself). That is just phenomenal and terrifying if you're Satya Nadella.

I don't know a single person in real life(not an MS employee) who is loves MS tech.

I think you're projecting. None of my colleagues in my local tech community revile MS. Some still revile Apple, old grudges and all, but not MS.

 

[k0de]

Devs will reunited with MSFT.
I say on top of the computing World.

 

[Editguy1900]

I think you fail to understand the revulsion technology workers have for Microsoft tech. Everyone I know has switched their home computers to Macs in the last 5 years(including myself). That is just phenomenal and terrifying if you're Satya Nadella.

I don't know a single person in real life(not an MS employee) who is loves MS tech.

I love MS tech and I've never worked at Microsoft. I'm a high school technology teacher and after being forced to deal with Mac issues (and lack of software) for years, I despise them. Sales figures don't back up your anecdotal evidence that everyone is moving to Macs.

 

[Laura Knotek]

I belong to two local Linux User Groups: Cleveland and Akron. Most of the Linux users I know also run Windows, mainly for gaming. The majority of games are for Windows PCs, not Linux or Mac OS X.

I also am a regular at my neighbourhood Starbucks. I spotted two guys with MacBook Pros one time. They were running Windows on their Macs. Why? Visio. There is no Visio for OS X.

 

[BobLobIaw]

My inner zen prevents me from properly processing and responding to this question.