Ballmer is asleep at the switch
Steve Ballmer just doesn’t get it. And what he doesn’t get is that a tablet is not just another PC form factor. They aren’t supposed to work like a desktop PC, they shouldn’t have the same feature set as a desktop PC , they must have better battery life and a slew of other features that make them completely different. It’s not just a form factor issue, it’s about giving a completely different and simplified user experience.
An article I pointed out previously sums it up best – people don’t want to think about installing software and loading drivers and making sure the app they buy is compatible with their system. They have no want to worry about the underlying system, they want to just click and go, something Windows is notoriously unable to provide to people. The fact that Ballmer and his lackies keep trying to reuse and recycle Windows for every project that hits the market proves they have no idea what they’re doing. Instead of building a single device with a dedicated, built from the ground up Operating System to support that device, they keep trying to shoehorn Windows 7 into every platform they can conceive and it just doesn’t work.
It’s pretty damn clear to me Ballmer hasn’t even used a tablet! And the comment, "Apple has "done an interesting job" with the iPad" is just stupid and pathetic. Apple has done in three months for the tablet what Microsoft hasn’t been able to do in nearly a decade. Own up to it Steve.
Ballmer also states Microsoft, "needs to make things happen, like we did with nebooks". I’m sorry, what did you do for netbooks again? Aren’t you the same Ballmer who said there was no need for netbooks and there was no need to replace the PC? Now, you’ve made things happen? Damn, you sure do back pedal a lot.
Microsoft and Ballmer are just being vague because they really have no plan. Fracturing a market with confusing options is tablets simply isn’t going to work. People don’t want to make choices about processing power or the weight. They want to choose the amount of storage that’s right for them and be done with it. Until Ballmer can understand that huge difference they will never make headway in this market.
If the Kin and Courier are any indication of what Microsoft is capable of lately, the idea of a successful Microsoft tablet is dead. It just won’t happen.
Microsoft’s Ballmer: Windows 7 slates are ‘job number one’
