[Zigurd]

Two problems with that:

Bill Gates hasn't got Steve jobs's ego,and he hasn't got anything to prove.

The days where PCs took over from minicomputers, and where Microsoft was the disruptor, are long gone. It isn't clear if Gates or anyone else can make Microsoft disruptive again.

That's too bad, because one of the few sources of truly novel work in operating systems is Microsoft Research.

[bad_user]

Oh, I really think you're underestimating Bill Gates. The days of disruption stopped for Microsoft when he left.

For example, I bet that Bill Gates would have foreseen the iPhone as a really big threat from day one and we would now be marveling at one of his famous internal angry emails that changed Microsoft's direction (leaked because of a new anti-trust suit, no doubt). Bill Gates is no Steve Jobs, but he's a heck of a strategist and even now I don't think there's anybody that wants him as an opponent.

For me, it's not sad that Bill Gates left Microsoft. They were too big, too powerful, too eager to eat the launch of other companies. The industry is better off without him at Microsoft's helm.

[4ad]

> Bill Gates would have foreseen the iPhone as a really big threat from day one and we would now be marveling at one of his famous internal angry emails that changed Microsoft's direction

Just like he foresaw the Internet as a big threat, right?

[aryastark]

As far as web applications dominating and taking over market share from the Windows ecosystem? Yes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Java_Virtual_Machine

> Sun Microsystems, the creator of Java, sued Microsoft in October 1997 for incompletely implementing the Java 1.1 standard.[2] It was also named in the United States v. Microsoft antitrust civil actions, as an implementation of Microsoft's Embrace, extend and extinguish strategy

You can bet all the money in the world that Gates would have been acutely aware of the App Store. The App Store is, after all, Apple doing to the handheld market what Microsoft did to IBM and the PC. Which is, establishing themselves as a gate-keeper for all things mobile.

[4ad]

Web applications from the last decade don't have anything to do with Java. Nothing. The web as it exists now is something Microsoft never understood; not even now.

[aryastark]

You couldn't be more wrong if you tried. Why do you think Netscape created something called Javascript (emphasis on Java)?

The answer is obvious if you lived in the late '90s. Java was a real threat to the desktop.

That doesn't mean MS was wrong. They were. But Bill Gates didn't have his head up his ass, either.

[4ad]

Javascript doesn't have anything to do with Java.

[tmzt]

It's true that Microsoft Research is working on operating systems, including something to someday maybe replace NT. But the the biggest problem they've been working on has been input, specifically voice and touch input.

Somebody has to be the leader in the voice driven interface, as always on communications in cars become the norm, users are going to run into the wall that is Siri, Google Now, Samsung S Voice, and the OEM platforms behind them. They just aren't that capable, they can't really deliver voice results to simple questions, or effectively control navigation. They can't do full queries of contacts or calendars, or integrate with other systems. They are limited by the bandwidth of the company building them. Microsoft was always about empowering developers to create software, and voice is a platform with no category killer. There are no good APIs for voice input, no good app store for delivering small pieces of functionality to expand the ability of a voice interface, and no real work is going into building one. The smartphone is seen as a device with a focus on interaction through the screen, but it is an audio-based device, a telephone, and it makes sense for the wide capabilities of it's applications to be available through a hands-free interface.

[sergiosgc]

And yet, most of that research had trouble getting into the main OS. Linux isn't bleeding edge, when measured against research, but it's basic components (process scheduler, I/O scheduler, huge table manager) are leaps and bounds better than what's in Windows today. Network-wise, BSD is better than anything Microsoft ever published.

Where's the disconnect at Microsoft that allows this to happen? They have the knowledge in-house, that's a given.