Microsoft fails x3 and yet their stock goes up?

[Vdubchaos]

It's not diverging in that people now have more devices to accomplish a task, but rather converging in that each of these devices are slowly evolving towards the same end (or maybe towards 'each other').

Phones started as phones. Then they could text (aka instant message). Then they could browse the net (aka surf). And are now evolving to be able to accomplish gaming and varying levels of productivity and content creation all in one.

Tablets started as "computers you could write on" and are now expanding as a gaming, productivity and communication mediums.

Desktop computers (and more specific to this idea, laptops) are the baseline for performance and capability really, but are expanding their usage model with touch interfaces, improved portability, and smaller and more attractive chassis.

They're all slowly starting to overlap and accomplish the same tasks. Currently, a venn diagram of computing of cameras/phones/laptops/tablets/desktops/consoles would probably look like a jumbled set of olympic rings; in the future, I think it'll progress to be more like this.

I don't think we're near the point of a 'super device' just yet and I don't think it will bring obsolescence to any one type of "niche" product; I think there will always be a [smaller] place for Game Boys, DSLRs, dedicated GPS units, desktop computers and other 'specialized' devices. But I think it's quite conceivable that twenty years down the road we may all have a phone/tablet/laptop hybrid to carry around that simply docks with keyboards/TVs/controller accessories/etc as a mainstream computing device.

THese devices are nothing but a distraction to real life.

Outside of a phone for emergency, these things are great when you travel or toilet material. If you use any of these devices more than 1 hour a day, chances are....you probably need to get out more and live some life.

 

[Train]

THese devices are nothing but a distraction to real life.

Outside of a phone for emergency, these things are great when you travel or toilet material. If you use any of these devices more than 1 hour a day, chances are....you probably need to get out more and live some life.

some people actually use them in real life, for real work. One of my clients has people on the road all the time. Being able to quickly respond to stuff, look up stuff, etc, on a tablet or smartphone makes their lives so much easier.

For most people, a tablet can replace their home PC altogether.

 

[Vdubchaos]

some people actually use them in real life, for real work. One of my clients has people on the road all the time. Being able to quickly respond to stuff, look up stuff, etc, on a tablet or smartphone makes their lives so much easier.

For most people, a tablet can replace their home PC altogether.

I wasn't talking about work though.

While on the road/traveling on business these devices can be very useful.

Personally though, I don't take jobs that require travel and my "work" phone doesn't even have work Email set up on it.

Read:I don't put much emphasis on my job.

I was mostly talking LIFE.

 

[techs]

Hmm. Is Microsoft ending the 3 computer version of Office Home and Student? Its out of stock at a bunch of places and its 179 at places that still have it.

 

[Vdubchaos]

Hmm. Is Microsoft ending the 3 computer version of Office Home and Student? Its out of stock at a bunch of places and its 179 at places that still have it.

OpenOffice

 

[Train]

I wasn't talking about work though.

While on the road/traveling on business these devices can be very useful.

Personally though, I don't take jobs that require travel and my "work" phone doesn't even have work Email set up on it.

Read:I don't put much emphasis on my job.

I was mostly talking LIFE.

So if you post 6500 times on a forum from a PC, you have a life. But if you do it from a tablet, you don't?

 

[Imp]

Hmm. Is Microsoft ending the 3 computer version of Office Home and Student? Its out of stock at a bunch of places and its 179 at places that still have it.

Big story a while ago about how they're moving in the Cloud and subscription-based approach. Check out Office 365 -- I just got a banner ad pop up with that.

 

[EagleKeeper]

Windows 8, Windows RT, XBone.

I can't remember a big company screwing the pooch so badly three times in a row.

Yet over the last year MS stock went from 21 to 35?

Relative to you maybe.

It is very possible that investors and consumers do not look at a "failure" the same as you do.

 

[Patranus]

Last quarter MS had revenues of $20 billion
Business Division (office) $6.32 billion (+6% YOY)
Enterprise Division (servers/tools) $5.1 billion (+11% YOY)
Windows Division $5.7 billion (+23% YOY)
Entertainment + Device Division $2.5 billion (+33%)

So those "fails" saw the most growth though more than 50% of their revenue came from things unrelated to Windows 8/RT and the xBox

 

[Patranus]

the stock market is a giant bubble and probably should be worth half what it is right now.

tesla barely makes money and is worth 1/6th of ford etc.

linkedin is worth 20 billion dollars for the virtually nothing they do

You are the product not Linkedin.
You are correct, *they* don't do anything. You are doing all the work for Linkedin and getting none of the profits.

 

[hans007]

You are the product not Linkedin.
You are correct, *they* don't do anything. You are doing all the work for Linkedin and getting none of the profits.

linkedin's got a 690+ p/e ratio. it is a bubble stock.


ok ok sure they do SOMETHING, but not 20 billion dollar market cap worth. at some point either every person on earth has to be on linkedin and monetizeable enough for profit for enough to justify that market cap, or they are currently overvalued.

do you think they will eventaully grow into their valuation, or they are overvalued? i'm thinking the 2nd part.

 

[Cerb]

Don't forget Windows Phone 7.

Why not? WP7 was quite tolerable, compared to proper CE 6.

Anyway, MS is in trouble years from now, not right now. The integration/convergence naturally tends towards being horizontal, and many-way, but MS can only profit from it if it's vertical and moderately cohesive. But, no business in their right mind will get on board with that, and many that have learned that it was a short-term gain and a long-term drag the hard way. It is in the best interest of businesses and consumers to have a disconnect between the hardware they buy and the software that runs on it, such that they can choose each mostly separately, and keep all the functionality regardless of the choice.

That is to say, you choose a service or program that runs on multiple OSes, and networks. You can then choose your desktop, notebook, tablet, smartphone, or whatever, based on other factors. Since you need others to be able to run this thing too, quite often, vendor-only options have less value. Over time, the ones that can span/transfer between devices and networks will be more used and relied upon.

Windows 8 and RT being failures doesn't really mean anything since they are getting installed on every new unit that goes out the door (unless the customer downgrades or chooses linux).

Or, if they buy real computers, which still offer Windows 7. Go to any OEM's website, and head to the business section. Some lines don't even have 8 as an option.

 

[rockyct]

Everything MS has is pretty much based on the future direction they see things going, which is good in many ways.
Always on connected multi-purpose living room box.
Tablet focused OS.
Cloud services, both end user and business.

They are "failures" in the current environment, but move forward to v2, 3 or 4 of each, when they have been improved, and who knows.
Meanwhile they are still making lots of profits with things as they are now, as "failures".

It should be pretty obvious to most people that most MS products are forward focused right now, for once, and because of that, they aren't quite right, like the whole UMPC crapfest, or old PDAs/tablets, which were too early and pretty crappy.

If you don't believe that integration and always on and tablets/portable devices are the future, you're living in another world. MS is just doing things slightly too early compared to the maturity of their internal projects. e.g. Xbox One might be too soon, and Windows 8 wasn't close to a perfect product, although the idea makes sense.

Right, I think the company is very forward looking and that's why a lot of people are upset right now. Microsoft used to be the elephant in the tech industry and Apple used to be the innovator. Microsoft would come a little late but they'd make up for it by using their market share to bring everyone along with them. Apple hasn't really changed except ios is a bit stagnant even with ios7 but Microsoft is now willing to cut loose people who aren't going to change with them.

 

[Wyndru]

Or, if they buy real computers, which still offer Windows 7. Go to any OEM's website, and head to the business section. Some lines don't even have 8 as an option.

Even the last PO our school district placed with HP had no OS choice, it was Win8 only. Although it doesn't really matter for us since we have EES licensing for Windows 7 and 8.

I was thinking more along the lines of the bigger companies that sell majority of consumer computers like Dell, which no longer offers any OS other than Windows 8, even on their non-touch based desktops.

I'm sure you may be able to just call and still get 7, but most people probably don't bother. And I haven't seen anything but Windows 8 at stores like Best Buy and Staples in a while.

So whether people want it or not, they are likely getting Windows 8 for their home computer purchases, which in turn makes them think their Windows 7 computers at computers are outdated, which is what Microsoft wants :twisted:

I hear it all the time, why can't we have Windows 8?!!!...I have it at home.

 

[syd2oo2]

They keep piling up bad decisions, at some point it's going to catch up them. Nokia was by far the biggest cellphone maker for over a decade. Look at them now.

 

[Deeko]

They keep piling up bad decisions, at some point it's going to catch up them. Nokia wa by fr the biggest cellphone maker for over a decade. Look at them now.

Your statement insinuated that Windows Phone is the source of Nokia's woes, which everyone interested in more than just mindless Microsoft bashing knows is not the case. Read reviews for the N8 or the PureView 808 and see how glowingly people viewed Nokia's latest in-house software. Sure, there were those that liked the new UI in MeeGo but no one thought it was ready for prime time and even it were, it would suffer from the same problem Windows Phone does - no apps, except Nokia on its own lacks Microsoft's resources to try to brute force apps onto the platform.

 

[rockyct]

Your statement insinuated that Windows Phone is the source of Nokia's woes, which everyone interested in more than just mindless Microsoft bashing knows is not the case. Read reviews for the N8 or the PureView 808 and see how glowingly people viewed Nokia's latest in-house software. Sure, there were those that liked the new UI in MeeGo but no one thought it was ready for prime time and even it were, it would suffer from the same problem Windows Phone does - no apps, except Nokia on its own lacks Microsoft's resources to try to brute force apps onto the platform.

It really is a good partnership made out of desperation really, but I think it's kept both Nokia and Windows Phone alive. Nokia would not do well on Android because it's such a crowded space and they wouldn't have the money from Microsoft. Symbian/MeeGo would have already killed Nokia if they kept on that path. Without Nokia being a flagship phone maker, Windows Phone really doesn't have a solid device lineup. Samsung is still making devices, but they aren't putting much effort into and it shows, which I don't blame them. HTC can have some solid phones like the 8x, but they are really a mixed bag overall.

Maybe WP is starting to get people aware it exists, but no one cared about my HTC Trophy. I've had a Nokia 928 a month now, and I've had more people comment on it then the two years I had the Trophy. Usually it's with a positive take, like "I've heard the camera is really great on that phone" or "wow, that's actually a pretty cool UI." One friend even said today, "hey, is that the phone in Superman?" The Nokia phones do have some features that really make them stand out from Android phones. If they had gotten the cash to go to Android, they may have survived as a niche phone maker but I think they're in a much better spot with WP.

 

[MaxPayne63]

They keep piling up bad decisions, at some point it's going to catch up them.

Why do you think they were so eager to play ball with the NSA?

If there's ever a real threat to windows i'm sure there are a million different things that the feds can do to regulate it out of existence.

 

[pmv]

MS will settle in and become like IBM, still around but quiet.

Yeah, I'd bet on that as the most likely long-term development. IBM seems the best analogy - still around and doing stuff but nothing like the dominant player they once were. Just as IBM got left-behind in the switch to micro from mainframe (despite technically creating the PC), MS, I reckon, are not handling the switch from PC to mobile particularly well. But they clearly aren't going away either.

The XBox thing looks interesting, as, in contrast to the OS market where it was never going to be easy for MS (regardless of what one thinks of Win8 I think it was a difficult call for them as to how to handle the changing market), that seems an entirely unnecessary problem that MS created entirely for themselves with some dubious corporate strategy. Wonder if it actually will do as badly as it (so far) appears to deserve?

 

[Train]

Why do you think they were so eager to play ball with the NSA?

I wonder if the Gov used threat of the breakup to make MS their bitch.

 

[mugs]

Xbox One isn't out yet, so you can't really declare it a failure. Some vocal nerds are flipping out over it, but that doesn't mean it won't sell well.

 

[Jaskalas]

Windows 8, Windows RT, XBone.

I can't remember a big company screwing the pooch so badly three times in a row.

Yet over the last year MS stock went from 21 to 35?

I submit that their losses did not exceed market inflation.

As for why they even exist... legacy? They can't hold out much longer.

 

[FM2n]

Microsoft needs to reach out to EA for proper fail-etiquette.

 

[baydude]

Can someone please explain to me how dividend stocks work? How is MSFT able to consistently able to give stock holders dividend regardless of performance?

And how come their stock price is so low compared to Apple and Google? $35 vs $400-$800?

 

[Train]

Can someone please explain to me how dividend stocks work? How is MSFT able to consistently able to give stock holders dividend regardless of performance?

Regardless of what performance? MSFT consistently makes billions in profit. Even in the rare quarter where they might lose money, they literally have hundreds of billions in cash sitting in the bank.

And how come their stock price is so low compared to Apple and Google? $35 vs $400-$800?

Stock prices by themselves are pretty meaningless. This is why most people talk about % change. MSFT has 8.35 billion shares, AAPL only has 938.65 Million shares.

Valuation of the company = share price * total shares