Ed Bott of ZDNet recently posted an analysis of a staff letter that was publicly posted by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella. I recommend that you read this article because it is quite revealing. There are two pieces that caught my attention: the use of the words “experience” and “world”.
Microsoft’s biggest failing is in user experience. It always has been. Take an Apple iPad and an Apple TV. I bet you can stream media easily enough. Now take a Microsoft Home Server and an Xbox, or a Windows 8.1 tablet and an XBox and try the same thing. I bet you have to go googling, and even then, it works once and never again. And it’s no surprise that my article on Windows 8.x tablets auto-dimming is a big hitter for me! It’s the little things, the lack of continuity in solutions that is lacking.
Microsoft, from Redmond through to subsidiaries, has a problem: they focus on products (engineering or sales scorecards) instead of solutions. That needs to change for enterprise and consumer products.
I have been sick and tired of Microsoft releasing products/services/features for the USA or “big 7” countries only. Whether it was mobile apps, products, features … they get marketed and shoved down our throats as must haves, including by uneducated employees in non-included countries, and the damned thing might only be available in the USA, e.g. Zune. And that’s why I coined the term “The Curse of Zune” #TheCurseOfZune. The latest one to piss me off is Kinect voice control in Xbox One; the product is sold my Microsoft in Ireland, but if I follow the EULA, I cannot use voice control. I had voice control on my Xbox 360, but I can only have it on the One by violating the EULA and setting my regional settings to UK or USA. Why Microsoft voluntarily shrinks their market is beyond silliness. Apple is a smaller company will a smaller distribution channel, and they have a bigger reach than Microsoft for all their products. Stupid is as stupid does.
Hopefully Nadella will change these things.
They actually just fixed that Xbox One voice control thing. The most recent July Xbox patch has a workaround that allows you to select voice control language separately from the region setting. Totally agree with the rest of the article. Hopefully things will improve in the future with Threshold and all the recent management changes at MS.
http://support.xbox.com/en-IE/xbox-one/system/system-update-operating-system