Microsoft declares end of PC era

Here is another interesting article taken from the Financial Times which I thought I’d share as it relates to the impact of the Web in general on Microsoft’s business model and therefore applies to an entire industry. The article refers to a speech given by Ray Ozzie yesterday at the analysts’ conference meeting.

Microsoft’s Ozzie declares end to PC era
Microsoft’s new top technology visionary on Thursday declared an end to the PC era as the software company made its latest attempt to deal with the threat to its traditional business from the rise of the internet.
By Richard Waters – July, 27th 2006 – (c) 2006 The Financial Times Limited.
Ray Ozzie, who took over the title of chief software architect from Bill Gates last month when the Microsoft chairman announced his plan to leave the company in 2008, laid out a vision for the company in which internet-based services, rather than PCs, lie at the centre of its worldview.

“In a previous era – in the PC era – Microsoft would naturally begin with a PC mindset,” he said at the company’s annual analyst and investor meeting. “We’re in a new era – an era in which the internet is at the centre.” While deeply impacting Microsoft, this “fundamental and transformational shift to services” was also about to “turn the technology industry on its head”, he added, forcing other companies to reconsider their businesses.

Mr Ozzie’s comments mark an attempt to accelerate the third, and most far-reaching, company-wide push by Microsoft to deal with the rise of the internet. Early victory in the Browser Wars against Netscape in the late-1990s was followed five years ago by a move to rewrite all its software to connect up over the internet under a sweeping initiative known as “Dot Net”.
However, the rise of Google, as well as successful internet-based services such as Apple’s iTunes, have forced the company to move faster. That has contributed to a jump in costs that has dented Microsoft’s share price in recent months.

While applauding the services vision outlined by Mr Ozzie, Rick Sherlund, software analyst at Goldman Sachs, added of Microsoft’s efforts: “They’re never as fast as you’d like.” However, he said online services were likely to represent a new business opportunity for Microsoft, with little immediate risk that it would cannibalise the company’s existing PC business.
Mr Ozzie’s reference to the post-PC era came at the first Microsoft annual analyst meeting that Mr Gates has not attended. The Microsoft chairman, who has always denied suggestions that the PC’s dominance of the tech industry was receding, was in Africa on a long-planned vacation, the company said. The new Microsoft software strategist laid out a plan that puts Windows Live, a new group of online services that includes its e-mail, search and other main internet-based services, at the centre of its business.
Comprised both of rebranded services that used to operate under the MSN name, as well as new services, Windows Live would become “the hub” through which Microsoft delivered all the technology-driven experiences that users valued, he added.

Meanwhile, the company said it would launch its first portable music player under the new Zune brand name in the US this year as it seeks to win back lost ground from Apple’s iTunes music service.

Acte 2 Photographies

For the Parisians among you readers, let me share a very nice gallery I have just found: Acte 2 is located in the 8th district and the photographers they work with are worth a thousand looks. Just take a peek here. Enjoy!

We’re not ready for the next Web, or are we Mr Scoble?

For those of you not yet familiar with him, let me introduce Robert Scoble.
He has been one of Microsoft’s evangelists and blog activists for quite a while and now works for PodTech. His blog can be found at http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/ and I would highly recommend you checked it out for it’s worth every second of your time (I mean you are spending time reading this, uh?)

In a recent post he claims that the next Web is going to be the ‘human Web’. It is a bit like seeing what’s next, except for its rugged edges. Essentially, he says:

“We’re not ready for the next Web. The world is still catching up to the last Web. The 2001 Web.” 

“There’s no reason to bring up OPML or Second Life or AJAX, or Trackbacks or the latest thing that WordPress or Six Apart are showing off. They are still discovering that there’s value in simply encouraging their people to talk with their customers. Until all the big companies get to the place where they understand the power in that then I guess there’s no reason to talk about anything else.”

I have to admit this comes as a surprise to me, especially from someone so versed into these things.
Earlier today I was sitting in a room with partners and people from MSN, discussing the impact botswill have on brands powerhouses. I mean, customers are already lining up to make use of these new technologies (ok, so IRC has been around for a while but we are talking mass market here, not geek land folks!) to enhance the way customers and prospects interact with their brands. Add encarta@conversagent.com to your buddy list to get an idea of what is coming at you!

I would agree that technology means nothing without usage. Now, imagine for a second what any brand can do with these.
Take Amazon. Need an idea for your mother’s birthday? Just ask your bot buddy and click your way into a hassle-free present.
Take Expedia or LastMinute. Wanna take a break next week-end? You are just one short instant conversation away from buying your week-end half-price.
And the list goes on… I feel we do have a strong case for usage here (and more on bots latter)!

Is Microsoft ready for the web?

In an interesting article, Alan Cane from the Financial Times, explains why Bill Gates’ retirement may in fact be good news for Microsoft as it tackles new challenges. 

Gates’ departure could drag Microsoft out of the 1970s
Without its curiously old-fashioned leader, the company will be freed from a timewarp and ready to unleash an explosion of software from its legions of bright programmers.
By ALAN CANE – july, 12th 2006 – (c) 2006 The Financial Times Limited.

Interviewing Steve Ballmer, Microsoft’s ebullient chief executive, some years ago, I asked whether he and the company’s founder, Bill Gates, were losing their appetite for the battle. With characteristic arm- waving, eye-rolling and table-thumping, he indicated that both were as “up for it” as ever and would be for at least 10 years: “We don’t work as hard as we used to but we still work very hard and we love it,” he said.

Now, a few years on from Ballmer’s estimate, Gates has broken that solidarity at the top, choosing to remain chairman while planning to withdraw from day-to-day management in 2008. He intends, he says, to concentrate on the charitable activities for which he and his wife Melinda have been rightly praised and which certainly have the potential to do a great deal of good in the world’s poorest countries.

But it is an open question whether his decision does not also reflect a measure of disenchantment with the state of the information technology world today and the company’s position in it. Microsoft, after all, faces more competition and potential competition than it has for many years. It is still embroiled in legal arguments with the EU over alleged antitrust activities. And, like a lightning rod, Gates seems personally to attract the often savage criticisms directed at a company whose aggressive marketing methods are legendary. Whether he has become disillusioned with the battle is a matter for him alone. But his impending departure raises the question of the effect on Microsoft of the loss of a leader who, more than any other individual, has been identified with the way people use personal computers.

Gates’ role is “chief software architect”, a role to be taken by Ray Ozzie after Gates’s departure. Ozzie is the software developer with the Lotus Notes e-mail program to his credit and his move into the top technical job may unleash a flood of creativity inside Microsoft that has been held back by what, to an outsider, looks like Gates’ curiously old-fashioned approach to computer technology.

Microsoft, in fact, seems to be a company that moves forward remorselessly on the business front, driven by its ownership of the ubiquitous Windows operating system, but suffers continuous technological set-backs from which it has to recover by paddling furiously.

• It was, for example, slow to spot the emergence of client-server computing, a development the German software house SAP was able to exploit to the full to become a leader in enterprise resource planning software with R/3. Microsoft, meanwhile, has struggled to establish a presence in the data centre as opposed to on the desktop.
• It was late to understand the importance of the internet and its subsequent efforts to establish its browser, messaging services and media player as office standards brought it into conflict with the anti-trust authorities. Even though Gates, by a tremendous effort of will, managed to turn the company on to the internet on a sixpence, as it were, it is still struggling to come to terms with Web 2.0, the latest iteration of web activity.
• It now faces perhaps its greatest threat from Google, developing outwards from search, which it dominates, into areas Microsoft might legitimately consider its own.
• And in a supreme display of 1970s ubergeekery, Microsoft missed the importance of the graphical user interface. Pioneered at Xerox in the 1960s and 1970s and popularised by Apple in the 1980s it took Microsoft several iterations to develop a saleable version and even now Windows hardly holds a candle to Apple’s OSX.
• Finally, Microsoft understood only belatedly the poor state of Windows’ security after hacking attack after hacking attack broke through its defences and caused a string of high-profile and highly embarrassing incidents for customers worldwide. The resultant patching of existing versions of Windows and the forced re-writing of the code for the next version, Vista, have caused serious delays and allowed customers to think seriously about Open Source software as an alternative.

How can it be, one could ask, that a company with the brightest software minds could have been caught on the backfoot so many times?
Now it may be ridiculous to attach too much importance to the influence of a single individual in a company as large and diverse as Microsoft, but it does seem to me the company often seems to be caught in a 1970s timewarp because Gates is psychologically attuned to the personal computing of that era: that means individual machines each running their own operating system and without much in the way of communications.
And you would not expect too much security in those innocent times: after all, what sort of evil-minded person would attempt purposely to damage a computer or cause it to fail? Furthermore, the Microsoft approach to solving software problems – throwing bodies at it – is reminiscent of the way IBM handled bugs and glitches in the 1970s and 1980s

Without Gates, Microsoft may be free to move forward. It has thousands of bright programmers and some of the best laboratories in the world – for example in Cambridge, Beijing and Bangalore. If they are given their heads, there could result an explosion of software that will move the company into a new era. And without Gates as its public face, the company might seem a more benign, if still mighty, organisation with which to deal – for customers, competitors and collaborators.

So what is this ting called… ‘Web 2.0?’

Same idea as previous post (still in French, still sorry!)

Les investisseurs séduits par de nouveaux modèles économiques
6 juillet 2006 – (c) 2006 La Tribune.

Les start-up du Web 2.0 dopent les investissements en capital-risque.

Le Web 2.0 est devenu un secteur d’investissement à part entière qui annonce de fortes marges, explique Philippe Collombel, associé du fonds d’investissements Partech International. les start-up qui le composent sont des sociétés d’automatisation de services où ce sont les internautes qui produisent le contenu.”

En 2005, aux États-Unis, les sociétés de service ont récolté 2,42 milliards de dollars d’investissement en capital-risque, selon Ernst & Young, soit 53 % de mieux qu’en 2004. Une hausse que le cabinet explique principalement par un regain d’attractivité du secteur Internet et des start-up Web 2.0. En 2006, les investissements se poursuivent. Parmi les heureux élus, Riya.com, un site communautaire d’hébergement de photos, a levé 15 millions de dollars ; Youtube.com, un autre site communautaire, spécialisé dans la vidéo en ligne, a récolté 8 millions de dollars. En Chine, le moteur de recherche de forums et de blogs Qihoo.com a levé 20 millions de dollars à peine deux cents jours après sa création !

Philippe Collombel, de Partech International, est formel : “Le Web 2.0 va correspondre à la seconde grande vague d’investissements sur Internet. Les réseaux humains développés par les sites Web 2.0 sont un extraordinaire levier d’audience, et si le Web 1.0 a connu des ratés, la réussite des leaders d’aujourd’hui montre la viabilité du modèle publicitaire sur Internet. Voilà seulement encore six mois, nous voyions mal comment allait évoluer ce marché, aujourd’hui nous sommes convaincus par le modèle 2.0.” Les fonds de capital-risque investissent avec confiance d’autant que la chute des coûts de ressources informatiques minore les besoins en capitaux de ces nouveaux venus.

Aujourd’hui, les modèles économiques de ces start-up cherchent à évoluer vers des services payants grand public, ou professionnels, et commencent à concerner le commerce en ligne. “Les ” business models” des start-up du Web 2.0 sont très novateurs en ce qui concerne la monétisation de l’audience.” La start-up française Criteo, un service de recommandation d’achats, a levé 3 millions d’euros en mars dernier. Autre français, Viaduc, un service de mise en relation professionnel sur abonnement a levé 5 millions d’euros fin mai. Il devra tenir compte de l’allemand OpenBC ou de l’américain Linkedin.com. Comme dans “l’ancienne” Net-économie, les places de leader seront chères et l’avantage donné seulement aux premiers venus.

So what is this thing called ‘Web 2.0′?

Today I thought I’d share a few articles I found explaining what Web 2.0 really is. A good introduction comes from La Tribune (in French, sorry pals) explaining the foundations of the new-new economy.

La “nouvelle nouvelle économie”
25 avril 2006 - (c) 2006 La Tribune.

Le terme Web 2.0 est né lors d’une conférence en 2004. Mais Dale Dougherty, vice-président de la société d’édition O’Reilly, qui l’a employé pour la première fois, ne se doutait pas qu’une véritable philosophie du Web 2.0 allait apparaître. Des principes détaillés dans l’article fondateur du mouvement, “Qu’est-ce que le Web 2.0″, signé par Tim O’Reilly. Mais cet article élabore avant tout un écosystème de technologies et de techniques de marketing pour les sites Web. Depuis lors, une étude de l’institut Forrester, baptisée “social computing” ou “informatique des réseaux sociaux”, étend la logique du Web 2.0 à une “nouvelle nouvelle économie”. Ce nouvel écosystème repose sur trois piliers fondamentaux.

1. L’innovation ne vient plus du “haut” mais du “bas”. Les utilisateurs du Web 2.0 proposent de plus en plus de modifications aux produits, qu’ils soient “virtuels”, tels que les outils de Google changés au fur et à mesure des retours d’expérience des internautes, ou “réels”, quand Mars laisse 10.000 clients choisir la nouvelle couleur de ses bonbons au chocolat M&M’s. En conséquence, l’UGC (User Generated Content, ou “contenu généré par l’utilisateur”) sert de source d’information aux entreprises, autant qu’elle aide les autres consommateurs à choisir un produit.
2. La valeur ne réside plus dans la possession de produits mais dans l’expérience. Toujours friands de gadgets technologiques, de vêtements à la mode et autres véhicules hybrides, les consommateurs convertis au Web 2.0, habitués à donner leur avis et à recueillir ceux de leur communauté, recherchent désormais une “expérience” liée au produit. Ainsi, Ford va créer un site Web dédié à la nouvelle fusion, avec concerts privés, musique à télécharger, etc. Dans le monde “réel”, Nike et Philips s’associent pour créer un baladeur numérique adapté à la course à pied… 
3. La notion de pouvoir passe des institutions aux communautés. Organisés en groupes selon leurs hobbies, leurs intérêts professionnels, leur formation et autres, les internautes reprennent la main sur les lieux de pouvoir traditionnels. Les soldats américains ont ainsi défié leur gouvernement en publiant leurs journaux de guerre sur Internet, tandis qu’en France le mouvement anti-contrat première embauche (CPE) a envahi la Toile de blogs et de photos des manifestations. Mais les entreprises sont, elles aussi, victimes de cette prise de pouvoir : avec la multiplication des magasins en ligne et l’absence de frontières sur Internet, les marques perdent de leur pouvoir au profit de produits plus pratiques ou moins chers.

Sorry Portugal!

I know I am not supposed to talk about football here. However, since France won yesterday against Portugal its way into the finale, I thought I’d let you know about a cool gadget that makes it possible to have real-time info on the World Cup.

The gadget can be downloaded here. Since the finale is on Sunday, hurry!

Let us tip over together, shall we?

Ok, so this is my first post in this new blog dedicated to all things web 2.0

My goal here is to share thoughts and ideas about what is now made possible with all these new technologies.

I do not intend to write on the more technical aspects, but rather to point to articles, web sites and the like that make it clear that we are standing at a tipping point.

I hope you find it interesting… your feedback is most welcome!