Whoa, David! Such an outsized hatred of the bespectacled one!
I've been extremely impressed with your knowledgeable posts regarding WIND's products, but I must take issue with your opinion of Mr. Gates.
I want to see billg fail as much as the next guy, but you appear to be completely blind to his enormous talents. I'm not interested in arguing whether he qualifies as a "visionary", but how in the world can you argue against his record of success? "Competent businessman"? How about "incredibly brilliant businessman"? Or "the greatest businessman that ever lived"? Well, I suppose he still has more to prove before he can justly command the latter appellation.
You cited a litany of examples where MSFT arrived at a crucial juncture late in the game. Please note that -- late or not -- they won, or are winning, every one of those battles, with the exception of Oracle. You've made the mistake of focusing on process rather than results, and in business, it's results that count.
Silicon Graphics?!? Great computers, bad business. Gates could crush that sad outfit in a split second, if ever the need arose.
It's late, and I'm worried that my tone has been unduly harsh. Please accept this post as a friendly rebuke to a fellow WIND investor for whom I have great respect, but for whose opinions of all things MSFT I will henceforth be wary.
Mitchell, regarding the following:
>>>His recent purchase of Web TV has opened the eyes of a whole new segment of the business world who now must wonder if program content is on his agenda and begin to think of defensive strategies.<<<
After MSNBC, Sidewalk, Slate, CD-ROMs, MSN "channels" like Mungo Park and the DreamWorks-SKG investment, the "wondering" has ceased. His intention to move into program content is quite clear.
In fact, this is precisely the arena where MSFT may begin to stumble. To me, it looks like "deworseification", as Peter Lynch would say.
With Sidewalk, he is in part targeting the industry I work for. From my perspective it's a product without a market. However, the problem is -- and it's the same with all of these MSFT content ventures -- nobody knows where the market will be in five years, and MSFT can afford to bear the losses that may be necessary to put itself in a position to exploit the opportunities that present themselves along the way.
The upshot of all this is that I believe that as WIND investors we should all have a healthy fear of Bill Gates' interest in the embedded systems space -- which, after all, is still part of the computer software business that is MSFT's core competency. Fortunately, for the moment he appears to be distracted by shinier objects.
Allen: My fear about the H&Q opportunity is that it will be overshadowed by larger market trends. There's a big employment report due out on Tuesday morning, and -- god forbid -- if too many people have jobs we'll all be in a heap of trouble.
By the way, where's Mark? Mark? Are you there? Oh well, I suppose we'll hear from you again if WIND retests its lows. |
