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Steve Ballmer was an underrated CEO

(danluu.com)
371 points greggyb | 8 comments | 28 Oct 24 21:48 UTC | HN request time: 0.87s | source | bottom
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addicted ◴[29 Oct 24 02:19 UTC] No.41978723[source]▶
This article doesn’t understand what was fundamentally wrong with Ballmer’s leadership and what Nadella actually changed.

The specific technologies that were successful is irrelevant. Microsoft has and continues to invest in nearly every computer related technology that may come around the corner or they got late on.

The problem with Microsoft was everything went through Windows. The entire company was designed to promote Windows.

This was the fundamental flaw with Microsoft that Nadella changed. He quickly not just made Windows just another part of Microsoft’s business, to a great extent he actively devalued it.

The fact that Ballmer invested in Azure, etc before Nadella would all be irrelevant because under Ballmer Azure would have remained a red headed step child to Windows, so it’s unlikely to have seen much success under him anyways. Same goes for pretty much everything else Microsoft is doing right now.

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archerx ◴[29 Oct 24 05:23 UTC] No.41979633[source]▶
Well since Nadella I have been using less Microsoft products and probably won’t be using Windows anymore once my Windows 10 LTSC stops working.

I keep hearing praise for Nadella but all he is doing is alienating a lot of customers with his terrible decisions.

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1. juped ◴[29 Oct 24 06:35 UTC] No.41980038[source]▶
Ballmer would never have put honest-to-God advertisements in Windows Solitaire.
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2. rightbyte ◴[29 Oct 24 09:07 UTC] No.41981139[source]▶
I always had the feeling MS was squeezing competitors and software vendors, not users directly.

The user hostility have made me move me to Linux systems.

3. spacechild1 ◴[29 Oct 24 09:36 UTC] No.41981459[source]▶
Let alone ads in the start menu!
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4. DaiPlusPlus ◴[29 Oct 24 10:22 UTC] No.41982098[source]▶
To be fair, Windows 98 came with almost-ads in the stock Active Desktop wallpaper - and promos for AOL/CompuServ/Prodigy.
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5. 1980phipsi ◴[29 Oct 24 10:46 UTC] No.41982350[source]▶
Or screw up search on the start menu
6. znpy ◴[29 Oct 24 12:08 UTC] No.41983047{3}[source]▶
AOL was stuff that people actually used however. It wasn't "random stuff".

For many people in the 90ies it was like the brand "AOL" was a synonym of "internet".

7. squarefoot ◴[29 Oct 24 12:10 UTC] No.41983062[source]▶
As a 100% Linux user with good memories of that era (flying chair, Linux==cancer, etc.) I may be the best person here to actually defend Ballmer, having for sure no hidden interests in doing that. Everything changed in those years: Google was cool, Linux desktop almost non existent, cryptocurrency not even in the head of its creator, AI was a myth and the best voice recognition could offer was the hilarious "double the killer" demonstration [1]. How can we compare CEOs actions separated by two decades? Ballmer did what was perceived as useful for its company back then just as Nadella is doing that now. Perspectives have changed, hence companies and their CEOS had to adapt. I'm 100% sure that if Ballmer were MS CEO today, he would include advertisements as well, as today putting advertisements in every free corner of the known Universe is perceived as acceptable, if not necessary, which was not the case 20 years back.

[1] context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kX8oYoYy2Gc

8. 486sx33 ◴[29 Oct 24 15:19 UTC] No.41984754[source]▶
Exactly