May 2nd, 2000

[3:00 PM] John Dvorak Slams Microsoft Calling MS Innovation Claims A Joke by Bryan Chaffin John Dvorak is well known in the Mac community for his frequent attacks on Apple (some deserved), his call that the iMac would flop, and his coining of the term "Girlie" in reference to the iBook. Though a long time Mac fan, Mr. Dvorak turned to the Dark Side during the reigns of Michael Spindler and embraced Windows 95, declaring that Apple would soon die. He may have missed that call, but he has penned a piece for ZDNet called "Microsoft's Real Problem: No Innovation" that we not only agree with, we applaud. Mr. Dvorak's assertion is that contrary to their repeated bleating of Microsoft and their PR firms, the company has never been an innovative one. He contrasts Microsoft's path towards crushing the competition through acquisitions and suppression with Cisco's path of competing through acquisition, an excellent analogy. According to Mr. Dvorak: It's Microsoft's complete lack of vision and innovation that is killing the company. Most of its technology is bought from others and tweaked. The Microsoft marketing machine then kills off the competition, which is where the innovations came from in the first place. It's almost a reverse Catch-22. Instead of acting like Cisco Systems, buying innovators left and right and keeping them intact, Microsoft gets a hold of a technology and then lets the company that created it die. Ask Microsoft how many people are left from the Hotmail team, for example. Go ahead, ask! Cisco Systems has quickly surpassed Microsoft in market valuation (by $100 billion as of today!) because it does nothing to discourage competition. If Cisco can buy the competition, it does. It's easy! This encourages newcomers to play in the Cisco space knowing that Cisco will eventually buy them. Nortel and Lucent follow suit. It's a hot market. In Microsoft's sphere of influence, it's different. You hear the same thing over and over. "Gee, we can't even get funding if it looks like we might possibly be in the Microsoft space." Microsoft and its desire to crush the competition as it did with Borland and other serious competitors has left a scorched earth. So now what does it do? Mr. Dvorak also gives a nod to Apple, sort of: In the past, Microsoft could always steal ideas from Apple, but Apple's "innovation" is almost purely design. They make a cool-looking box. Microsoft can't copy that. Meanwhile, Microsoft's reputation is preceding it in the embedded markets and in WAP phones and elsewhere. Companies clear out of the way, hoping Microsoft won't see them. That's just the opposite of the way companies work around Cisco. In that arena, they hope to be noticed. In conclusion, Mr. Dvorak calls like it is: So now how much innovation are we getting in Microsoft's world? Nada. Zip. Zilch. Bupkis. Microsoft Word will put a squiggly line under a misspelled word, but that "innovation" took about five years to develop. There is a lot more commentary that we have not quotes, and we strongly recommend that you read it whether or not you care about Mr. Dvorak, Microsoft, or Apple. The Mac Observer Spin: Mr. Dvorak's position is similar to our own in regards to Microsoft's "innovation." We have said from the beginning that it seems as if Microsoft thinks that repeating the word "innovation" enough times will get other people to believe it, though at times it seems like they might actually believe it themselves. Mr. Dvorak's editorial really cuts to the point, especially with the Cisco comparison. If Microsoft would simply compete on the basis of their products merits, as opposed to competing on the basis of their market leverage, they would earn our approval, not that they are seeking said approval. We will state once again that we do like Microsoft's Mac offerings, a space that they do actually have to compete in. John Dvorak's Editorial