MicroSloth

How the mighty have fallen. Have you tried to use a Microsoft product lately? I have. I guess Microsoft is having trouble developing their own products instead of just stealing other people's.



I'll start with Windows Vista. Unfortunately, my household is subject to the tyranny of Vista. What's wrong with it? Let me count the ways:

1. It's a forced upgrade. I never really wanted Vista, but when I bought new computers for me and my fiance, I was forced to buy it. And to downgrade to XP forces me to prove that I am somehow incapacitated (such as missing an arm or leg). The fact that Vista is a crappy product apparently isn't good enough.
2. It has the most irritating security feature that anyone has ever had to pay for. How many times do I have to click the "continue" button to install and application? Let me count the ways. Once when the autoexec executable starts. Another when the setup executable starts. I need an ergonomic mouse from Microsoft just to keep up with the clicks. Of course, that adds to Microsoft's bottom line.
3. None of the features I wanted aren't there. Half-way through developing Vista, Microsoft threw away their code base (I'll get back to that later). So, all of the things that I wanted like a new file system, a search feature that worked, and an actual logical way of organizing my data were thrown out the window (pun intended).
4. It's slow. That's self-explanatory. Not to mention that it takes up a lot of memory. And why to gadgets take up 500MB? I only have the calendar, time, and currency conversion gadget running. How complicated is that?
5. I still can't find anything. The "revitalized" file system never showed up, and the search feature should still be in Beta. Enough said.
6. Vista isn't pretty. Muhammed Ali was "so pretty." Vista isn't. Ali was also champ. Vista isn't that, either. Sorry Microsoft, "big icons" don't translate into "pretty." Especially after all the hype that made me think this thing was going to look like a Van Gogh. I wonder how well-liked Vista is in Amsterdam?

How did this happen?

Midway through Vista development, Microsoft realized that they had a problem with their code base and threw away most of their development. This is the equivalent of a construction company building a mansion for four years, tearing it down six months before they let the tenants move in, and then telling everyone they can build a better house in less than two years. We all know where this leads -- leaking roofs and faulty plumbing.

And how about Office 2007? Well, Microsoft hid everything. Now I can't find anything in Office. So, I paid more money to do less because anything I want to do is hidden. Microsoft used to be known as the user interface company. Most user interface departments are fairly small in software companies, but the whole reason to buy Microsoft products used to be because they were easy to use.

On a positive note, the developers have shied away from the "Word documents recovery crutch" and have actually made a stable product in Word 2007. Though I still think the best product was Word 98. It didn't crash and ran fine. Did I mention that Office 2007 is slow?

Microsoft's Answer: We're Going to the Internet Anyway

Lately, Microsoft's answer to customers complaints has essentially been "We're Going to the Internet, Anyway." Great. We all know what a great Internet visionary Ballmer has been. Does anyone remember search? Tried to find anything with Live search lately? Enough said.

So the big brain storm was to buy Yahoo. I was going to trash Ballmer for this, but he walked away from the deal. Good job. I actually thought the bid of $31 was too high so maybe all is not lost.