Re: 17 Minutes With Bill Gates

Look at the numerous posts of frustration from developers and other end
users working with Microsoft's products/tools -- that is the "we". If you
want to pretend "We love to blame" is meaningless then so be it -- but by
YOUR own logic, you've just invalidated yourself.

The Power to implement change rather than talk about change. He doesn't
have more of it any more -- the company as a whole is just too large. Bill
lives in a eutopia that is not reality and thus his persception is based on
that eutopia -- he has evolved into that Eutopia.

You guessed wrong and I don't follow your logic that I must be young.
Belong to a group?? Where did that come from?

You were able to figure out my statement so I guess it stands and is a lot
less wordy than your "more accurate" statement.

"The problem with this is that to truly make software 'simple to use,' one
must restrict its functionality." -- your thinking in the box, not out of
it. Microsoft's software can and should make far better intelligent
defaults and far fewer steps to perform the end result -- they should guide
users thru a task and then save those steps in such a way it is easy for
the user to peform the task again at a later date/time -- and the list goes
ON and ON. There are many ways Microsoft can make a very complex
application/process be "Simple to use" or at the very least easier to work
with.

VS 2005 for example, go under Tools | Options -- what do we have 9 nodes,
open up those nodes and we have more child nodes, and so on and so on.
Seeing as I am a developer in the real world, it is pretty unlikely I'm
gonna have time to explore several hundred (maybe even hit a thousand) VS
2005 options -- we have a common set of things we like to do -- this is
where Microsft fail miserably. Does it sound like a wizard, perhaps, but
something with more meaning more explanation and just more useful. There
are common defaults, common ways in which developers and/or users operate --
these are not explored by MS, they just make assumptions rather than trying
to discover the way people really work and operate.

Microsoft applications/tools are engineered for what turns out to be about
the same number of people that use MS software 20% (1 in 5 people) of the US
population -- if Microsoft want to find the other 80% they need to focus
more on software the works on a human level rather than some "visioned"
level that only 20% of the population can deal with or want to deal with.
Sure 20% still provides a nice big fat revenue stream, but the true
innovation and potential has not yet been discovered by Bill or Microsoft
because they are too consumed within -- they don't stop and ask the
questions.

And please, what is with this "you're not a developer" -- and "you're young"
crap?? If your trying to dis-credit me somehow, whether I'm a developer or
not, has little bearing on this discussion, nor whether I'm young or not.
It is pretentious of you to think that only developers have valid opinions,
and that young people should be discredited -- this is the VERY thinking
that keeps the 1 in 5 number stable -- not a good thing. Open your mind
Kevin.

Ahh, SUV's rant -- I begin to see -- you may not like what goes in the
"popular" world, but ignoring it or not understanding it doesn't make it go
away. What people do with their lives for entertainment is up to them, not
you -- otherwise you may as well start a religion. Humans like
entertainment, always have and always will -- how that entertainment is
formed is up to each individual.

"Kevin Spencer" <kevin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:esJ6HDIOGHA.3556@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I'm assuming you're a developer, someone who employs logic on a daily
basis. If so, I am puzzled by the following statements, which you assert
as "reality" -

1. He is someone we love to blame even though he has little or no power
any more

Who is "we?" Thinking people don't "love to blame" anyone for whatever it
is (not mentioned) that you say "we love to blame" him for. There is no
place for "blame" in logic, nor is there any place for loving to do so.
There is certainly the element of diagnosis and identification of the
source(s) of *specific problems*.

What is this "power" you speak of? And what makes you think he has more or
less of it?

2. His vision of reality lives a separated life

I cannot even parse this sentence. A vision does not "live a life." You
might mean that Bill Gates "lives a separate life," but you don't identify
from what it is separate, nor why it is separate. And your reference to
"His vision of reality" therefore is ambiguous at best. In fact, I would
postulate that every human being on the planet might be said to have a
"separate vision of reality." Only the young, the ignorant, and those who
are lazy in their thinking imagine that their "vision of reality" is
exactly the same as someone else's. My guess is that you are young. Young
people have a desire to "belong" to a group of some kind, with which they
can identify. This is part of the social nature of our species.

The older and wiser one becomes, the less important this sort of
distinction becomes, and as one matures, one realizes that the arbitrary
divisions we place upon people and our perception of them are just that -
arbitrary. In fact, people are like snowflakes - no 2 are exactly alike.
So, the only logical division is to divide us into 2 groups: Human beings,
and individuals. Therefore, this abbreviated utterance is meaningless,
except to yourself.

3. His vision of a better end user experience gets destroyed by "the
machine" known as Microsoft
4. Microsoft like all large organizations through out history have
become too large for their own good

Taken together, I see these 2 statements as alluding to some idea that is
more or less true. All large organizations experience the danger of
becoming beaurocratic in nature, due simply to the nature of human beings
to do that which is expedient to the individual instead of that which is
best for all. Microsoft has been struggling with this problem, and lately
there has been some evidence that they are not entirely succeeding.

However, the statement that "His vision of a better end user experience
gets destroyed" is not accurate. Perhaps a more accurate statement would
be that Bill Gates' ideas are on a conceptual scale, and often are tainted
or in danger of being tainted in the process of being filtered down to the
specific application development level, due to the size and encroaching
beaurocracy that endangers Microsoft's ability to maintain its innovative
and agile nature.

I think what Microsoft need to do is diversify - if nothing more than to
gain an education of the real world.

Here we go again with the "real world" stuff. Who among us has "an
education of the real world?" The statement is so broad and non-specific
as to be meaningless. It implies something, but you never explain what it
is supposed to imply. As to a need to diversify, that too is ambiguous,
and not explained. In what way would you recommend diversification? There
are all sorts (or perhaps "diverse" sorts would be more appropriate a
term) of "diversification."

Make money by making your products more simple, not more complex so you
can charge a "subscribed" premium.

Now, this is one of the statements that makes me believe that you are
either not a developer, or are very young. The word "simple," when applied
to software, is ambiguous at best. There are several different types of
simplicity that one may use when describing software as simple. One is
"simple to use." The problem with this is that to truly make software
"simple to use," one must restrict its functionality. A "simple to use"
calculator, for example, cannot do scientific calculations. Depending upon
how simple you wanted it to be, you might restrict it to addition,
subtraction, multiplication, and division. But how would you handle
rational numbers? Where does one draw the line at what is "simple to use"
and what is not?

In "the real world" people want their software to do every possible thing
they can imagine with it. This is because they are ignorant of the
consequences of this extended functionality. First, it means that the
software must have a user interface that accomdates all of these features.
How is that supposed to be "simple to use?" Second, it means that the
software itself must contain a huge amount of code to perform all of these
various operations, in a variety of configurations. And that costs a lot
of money, and take s alot of time, to produce.

The second type of "simple" is "simple in functionality" and this means
less features. Again, you're talking about a Catch-22 situation. Microsoft
actually has aimed at solutions for these problems, by releasing various
different versions of software for differing purposes. There are a
half-dozen different versions of Visual Studio.Net available, and some of
them are free. Now, how would you solve these problems? It is well and
good to identify problems, but to criticize the solutions of others
without offering your own is hypocritical.

I don't have the time to critique the rest of your post, but let me just
say in conclusion that if you want to be a success as a developer, you're
going to have to discipline your thinking process. The thoughts expressed
in this post (1) are not well-thougt-out, from a logical standpoint, (2)
are therefore not convincing, except perhaps to the ignorant, the
undisciplined, and the weak-minded, and (3) are hypocritical, as you do
not offer any well-explained, well-thought-out, realistic, or viable
solutions.

It may be popular to put Bill Gates down, but is popularity all its
cracked up to be? I still see an awful lot of SUVs on the road in America
these days, and for the life of me, I can't figure out the thought process
that spawned them. They are apparently some kind of "status symbol," but
the only status I see is that of an unthinking person with the wrong sense
of priorities, who is apparently wanting to impress other unthinking
people with wrong senses of priorities. That's popularity for you.

--
HTH,

Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
.Net Developer
To a tea you esteem
a hurting back as a wallet.


"Rob R. Ainscough" <robains@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:u7Is1E$NGHA.2884@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I'm sure Bill does have grand plans of where software will go and his
commitment to make computers work for the end user ... BUT the reality
is:

1. He is someone we love to blame even though he has little or no power
any more
2. His vision of reality lives a separated life
3. His vision of a better end user experience gets destroyed by "the
machine" known as Microsoft
4. Microsoft like all large organizations through out history have
become too large for their own good

I think what Microsoft need to do is diversify - if nothing more than to
gain an education of the real world.

What I would like to see from Bill and Microsoft, is someone that
understands what we need by recognizing their flaws and stop blaming end
users & developers. Do not elevate a vision that just happens to
incorporate a highly profitable business model that provides "just
enough" of what we need at a premium cost. Make money by making your
products more simple, not more complex so you can charge a "subscribed"
premium.

1 in 5 people have computers and actually use the Internet - if Bill
needs to do something, he needs to realize something went wrong along the
way and ask the question why do only 1 in 5 people have computers 28
years after they were introduced to the masses? If he wants to grade how
well he's done, this is a failed score IMHO.

"John Bailo" <jabailo@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:JJGdnaMhtPImFGbe4p2dnA@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

What does he do all day?

Find out here:

http://channel9.msdn.com/Showpost.aspx?postid=163166









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