A friend of mine sent me some links earlier today that basically asked where were the Microsoft zealots?
http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2007/05/why_doesnt_micr.html
http://arstechnica.com/journals/microsoft.ars/2007/05/14/good-question-where-are-the-ms-fanboys
This is an interesting question. I think that there are several answers to this questions:
- I
don't think that these self proclaimed "experts" are looking out in the
community. I wonder how many times they visit weblogs.asp.net,
codebetter.com, dotnetkicks.com, aspnetpodcast.com (couldn't resist
that one), or some of the other sites I read every day? There is a
vibrant community out there folks. Have these people not been to a
CodeCamp or local User Group meeting?
- As much as I don't care
for being label anyone's b|tch, the reality is that I fall into the
Microsoft camp. I am more than happy to tell you the pluses and the
minuses of their technology. BTW, I still think Vista stinks and I am
hoping that SP1 resolves the problems I have. I guess that doesn't
make me a zealot because I can talk about their technology in a
realistic light, whereas a zealot would only know one thing, and that
is to blindly support someone's technology.
- I ask questions
in public forums and I get response from the MS developers that are
actually building the technology. How can you not love a company for
doing that? I guess it is kinda like when you were in high school and
you wanted to date the people that treated others crappy................
- They
ask questions to their customers and then they provide solutions
to those problems and pain points. Yeah, that is unexciting. I'd much
rather have google technology. They throw a ton of stuff against the
wall and look to see what sticks.
- Nobody
loves a winner. Thats what Microsoft is. Everyone roots for the
underdog. Microsoft isn't that. It is hard to root for them the last
10-12 years since they went upscale and corporate.
- Microsoft is no longer perceived to be "cool." Coolness left Microsoft about 1995.
- I
guess that the MS zealots are out making money and the others are
trying to figure out how to make money. I got to where the money is
and we get money from writing code on Microsoft's platforms. We see
less money in other platforms. Yeah, you can make money doing the
other platforms, but we haven't seen enough volume in our business to
change any focus.
- The one place that I think google has a
definite advantage over microsoft is in online advertising (duh). We
have had no luck trying to contact google regarding their online
advertising solutions for a customer/site. They don't take our
feedback and they don't respond to questions. We would give up on them
if they weren't the big fish in online advertising.
PS.
This is a touchy subject, but after discussions at dinner this evening,
another issue is that it is perceived by the community that Google, not
Microsoft, is hiring the brightest people. This includes hiring people
away from Microsoft. This is important not in what it does for you at
a particular moment, but it tends to point the company in a direction
for the next X number of years.