[jukkan]

The author had worked at Microsoft for 12 years before starting the company that Google acquired. So, not only does he have a fair amount of experience from both sides, he's also worked at MS during its "lost decade" i.e. the Ballmer years.

The similarities between what MS was going through then and what Google is now facing is to me the most interesting aspect of the story. Whether you're printing money via OS or search monopoly, it seems like both the direction and timing of what's going to eventually happen to your business are almost inevitable.

MS today is quite different from what it was 10 years ago when the writer left. By getting acquired by Google in 2020, it's almost as he travelled back in time, into another Big Tech company at that same stage of the enterprise lifecycle.