Tag Archives: Microsoft

Microsoft’s True iPod killer

Posted on by

What you should know about me before you read this: I am a Mac user, I have a 3G iPod, and I’ve never bought a DRM’ed song from any music store.

Engadget has a picture of Microsoft’s “iPod killer” the Argo. Take a look here.

I took a look at the comments and they were mixed. There were plenty of “iPod rip-off!” comments due to the design of the Microsoft player. The MS player has a wheel interface. While Apple has used the click wheel with great success, they did not invent the wheel. Let’s face it, the Apple iPod has a fantastic interface with an ingenious physical device. The wheel is a brilliant device.

I suspect that the iPod has become the template. There is no reason to improve the interface. Apple got it right. Almost every remote control has the same interface – a keypad and maybe an LCD touchscreen. VCRs have the same physical attributes. Portable tape players had a line of buttons with play, pause, fast forward, and rewind. If the Internet was around 30 years ago, there would be forums and comment threads about how everyone is ripping off the Sony Walkman.

Give me a break. At the end of the day, marketing plays a greater role than the device. The original iMac had problems, but because it was different it succeeded. It made computers seem less scary.

Microsoft needs its XBOX division to market its new player. I fully expect the OS on the little device to be excellent. Microsoft knows operating systems. Don’t believe me? Take a look at the Palm Treo. Palm makes the competing handheld OS and even they run Microsoft’s Windows Mobile OS. A simple copy of the media center experience will function well.

There is also a rumor of Wi-Fi in the device. I don’t care how great the iPod is, it doesn’t have Wi-Fi. I have to find my special cable and sync up with my Mac. My music device should download podcasts on its own. I don’t want a docking station. Wi-Fi makes this very interesting. The next step is video. Microsoft has its Media Center. If you could transfer your shows from Media Center to Microsoft’s portable player – that’s a tremendous amount of video. Plus, if you could download trailers from your XBox 360 onto the player, that’s more content.

The iPod with video lacks higher quality video. Microsoft with its Media Center (and Front Row doesn’t come close to Media Center’s functionality) and XBox 360 has a ton of high quality video content that could easily be put onto a portable device. High quality content for cheap? That’s a great idea.

The physical dimensions of the device will also play a huge role. If it is bulky, it will fail. Either way, I think Microsoft may have a winner. They are not as irrelevant as many think. People ask, “What does Microsoft know about hardware?” Well, how many of you have Microsoft keyboards, mice, and that little thing called the XBox and the 360? If Microsoft provides a product that is different, it may succeed. If it does not differentiate itself, it will be an also ran.

Microsoft has quietly become the dominant force in online gaming. Live Anywhere will work. If Live Anywhere is a feature of “Argo” or “xPod” – it will be greatly beneficial to Microsoft. Competition is a good thing.

OQO: Ahead of its time.

Posted on by

DRM is an awful thing. It prevents the movement of data between machines. I’ve heard many a podcaster lament that iTunes locks down your music to the iPod. You cannot play songs purchased in the iTunes Music Store (“iTMS”) on any music player other than the iPod. However, you can play the file on your laptop or tablet PC. While iTunes is the only program that can play iTMS music, it runs on both PCs and Macs. You can authorize several machines to play the same music files.

That’s where the OQO comes in. This device has not received many good reviews. The machine runs too hot and its battery life is not good enough. It’s a good start though. While DRM may be limiting as to what type of accessory you may buy, DRM does not seem to pose a problem to Windows or OS X based computers. So why not carry around a computer capable of handling a number of DRM schemes? You’re never truly locked down – if the system can run iTunes, you can play your music.

At this point, I’d like to state that I have never personally purchased a song or video from the iTMS as I find it too restrictive, of low quality and prefer to purchase CD’s that allow me to control the quality and provide a decent backup when necessary.

Microsoft went ahead with its UMPC line and it has confused many people. (By the way, I have this odd feeling that if Apple came out with the UMPC product, people would think it was the best thing since sliced bread. They’d call it the “iMac Mini” or something). It seems as though the prices of these pieces of hardware are making people balk at the idea of buying them. Then again, when I had heard there was a $400 mp3 player being introduced by Apple, I thought it was kind of crazy.

The price of the UMPCs may be causing a problem. If they could drop the price below that of a laptop – around $200-$600 – then the device would not be competing with laptops. It would be competing with the PSPs, the iPods and other portable devices. I still think $400 is a crazy price for a music player. Apple refused to budge and marketed the thing as “cool.”

There’s no way UMPCs can be marketed the same way. Their coolness will not justify their price. OQO had a great idea. Forget syncing your handheld with your computer – your handheld IS your computer. UMPCs are out and are struggling to get a foothold in the market.

If they can’t lower the price just yet, there should be a new marketing scheme: on the box and in promotions market the device as “iTunes Compatible.” Market the UMPC as a device that can play your music that you bought from Apple and the videos with Microsoft DRM. Throw your TiVo shows and your iTunes on your UMPC.

I’ve thought of yet another alternative pricing scheme – the UMPC could be sold at a loss like a video game system and make their money back with software and killer apps. Pack an optical drive in there and market the device as a portable XBOX 360 or PC Gaming Platform. Microsoft could convince video game makers (or themselves with their various studios) to create UMPC optimized video games. These games could be a bonus version bundled with the true version of the game.

If people are willing to sacrifice some quality – a smaller screen and diminished quality of graphics – to get their gaming fix, this method may work. Microsoft could even capitalize on an idea Sony had. Moving your video game progress forward on your portable device and then syncing it to your main machine.

UMPCs can be a success if the makers knew what the UMPC could be. It should not be marketed as “a small computer” – it needs to be marketed as a device that can play any DRM’ed media. It needs to be marketed as a device that does not care what format your media is in. WMA? WMV? MP3? MP4? MPEG? All of them play on an UMPC. Just get some drivers or VLC and you’re good to go. It can be a mobile video game device.

Just pack a better battery (or a sleep that saves your session) or additional battery and, if possible, an optical drive. The prices of these devices are bound to drop (if not because of success and improved manufacturing methods, then it will be cheap because it will be on clearance).

Google and Microsoft

Posted on by

Google has its new Spreadsheet web-application and it’s ruffling feathers at Microsoft. People are saying that this is Google firing a shot across Microsoft’s bow (I didn’t know that they had boats, but whatever). So, Google’s got their Spreadsheet and it’s supposed to be a competitor of MS Office’s Excel (and of course Writely is a competitor to MS Word). Well, here I am (a Microsoft shareholder and former Google shareholder) giving my opinion.

In general, webapps are a great idea. You can access your programs anywhere, from any computer, from any operating system. It’s a wonderful idea – however, there is a problem. These webapps depend on online connectivity. It does not matter that these webapps are almost good enough to replace the expensive Microsoft Office. Feel free to be paranoid that your files are saved on Google’s servers. With the U.S. Government breathing down the necks of ISPs, do you really want your data on Google’s servers? You could just keep it on your local hard drive and avoid this entire problem. If the NSA wants my hard drive, they have to get MY hard drive that is in my laptop or desktop. Why make it easier for the government to grab your data?

It does not matter if Google goes ahead with their Spreadsheet. If Microsoft wants to destroy a product, they can. Case in point: Netscape. How did Microsoft destroy Netscape? Internet Explorer was free. It was the underdog – it was the rebel browser for a while. If Google has its free Spreadsheet program and it starts eating away at Microsoft’s market share, then Microsoft will make Office incredibly cheap. MS may not make it free – would you pay $2 per license for the full functioning MS Excel versus the free Google Spreadsheet that is close to (but not exactly) MS Excel? Microsoft knows how to beat their competition to death.

At worst, Microsoft and Google will become the biggest company in the world. Micro-Google could exist one day. Their market capitalization would be amazing. The fun thing about tech companies is that they are smart. Microsoft and Google could one day become ONE company. Google could own the web and Microsoft could own the desktop (save for the 5% Mac contingency – which I am a part of). Either way, these webapps cannot replace local applications just yet. So if anyone from Microsoft is reading, just relax – everything will be fine. [BTW, Microsoft’s Windows CE or Mobile or whatever it’s called – their PocketPC OS is terrific – just make it work with Macs]. If anyone from Google is reading – you have an excellent search engine – think about joining with Microsoft. There’s no need to compete if you’re part of the same company. Plus, even if you decide to stay on your own, the world appreciates that there’s a company out there that forces Microsoft to have a better product. Good luck, msft and goog.

WMP 11 Looks Good

Posted on by

Windows Media Player (“WMP”) 11 has made the rounds on the tech sites. I’ve taken a look at it and it looks good. I’m a Mac user and Microsoft has dropped WMP support with WMP 9 (which is terrible compared to 10 and 11). After seeing WMP 11 with its slick interface and organization of all kinds of files. If you haven’t seen the screenshots, WMP organizes pictures, CDs (I’m not sure about video organization) into stacks. You’ve got slideshows, music and video playlist management in a free piece of software.

I really want WMP 11 on Mac OS X. Hopefully, Mac OS X 10.6 – Leopard will have virtualization built in so I can run a Windows program on my Mac. I just haven’t found a true replacement for WMP since switching to OS X. iTunes is great for music management – it’s crap for video (it handles like 2 file formats) and iPhoto is a separate application. I would rather there was an all-in-one app for the Mac.

Video Lan Client (“VLC”) can handle everything great on any OS. But there just isn’t true playlist management like WMP. One of these days, I’m going to have to quit my complaining that VLC is not WMP by taking the open source VLC and giving it the functionality I miss. In the alternative, any one else can take my idea and feel free to implement full playlist management (maybe even smart playlist management like iTunes too while we’re at it).

Wii being endorsed by Microsoft AND Sony.

Posted on by

I’ve been following some of the E3 coverage on cnet.com and other sites. I’ve read that Microsoft has endorsed the Nintendo Wii. Microsoft says instead of getting a PS3 for around $500 or $600 get an XBOX 360 and a Nintendo Wii for the same price. Sony doesn’t have the same argument, but they think people will buy two systems – their PS3 and the Nintendo Wii.

So we’ve got 3 companies pushing Nintendo: Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo, themselves. Everybody says to get one. This is pretty interesting. I wonder if people who weren’t considering Wii are now thinking about getting one.

For a fuller story on this topic go to arstechnica.