Surprisingly, they list Steve Ballmer and Jonathan Schwartz as people who don't matter... I don't really agree with that, because Microsoft is starting to take note of all these ajax stuff... but they can't seem to get their Live.com right.
My two cents worth on Live.com:
1. The live.com products and services have such long and confusing names. The newest's product - Windows Live Mail Desktop Beta (WLM Desktop) is easily confused with another WLM (Live Messenger) and also Windows Live Mail.
2. Their Live Search looks cool, feels cool, but something is just not right. Traditionally, search engines always have page numbers below, listing an approximate 10 results for every page. Any user looking for data will have a sense of 'search', a sense of how deep he has searched. E.g. I can skip to page 10 or 15 or go back to the previous page. On the other hand, Live.com presents an unorthodox method of presenting search results - by listing results infinitely using ajax into a small portion of the window. Though innovation, this makes searching a pain in the neck. [Trivia: Search for 'microsoft' in their live image search and the
3. Firefox 2.0 when it comes out, will be better than IE 7. More and more people will use Firefox..
But of course, I agree that Linus Torvalds don't really matter... Yes, and I do back the argument that "commercial businesses like Red Hat and Novell increasingly steer its future." (i.e. the future of Linux). Admittedly, I don't see Torvalds playing a big role in desktop software for linux (like multimedia programs or even web related programs like Firefox).
Conventional wisdom says that technological companies rise and fall with the tides of innovations that lash the shores of the technological business. According to Business 2.0, the most important person is the consumer. That reflects the wisdom of the crowd.
Update: Jonathan Schwartz has replied regarding his 'award'.
No comments:
Post a Comment