If you want to see what a good old-fashioned internet rant looks and sounds like, Joel Spolsky unloads it for you.
He's talking about Microsoft, Ray Ozzie and Live Mesh. It's important to note that Joel used to work at Microsoft, and contributed to what I consider the single greatest app of the PC era: Microsoft Excel.
As you read through the crescendo of angst at Microsoft's over-engineered cluelessness, be sure to note the tell-tale long sentences at peak rantage. You can feel the pounding that the keyboard took when this was typed:
It's a whole goddamned architecture, with an API and developer tools and in insane diagram showing all the nifty layers of acronyms, and it seems like the chief astronauts at Microsoft literally expect this to be their gigantic platform in the sky which will take over when Windows becomes irrelevant on the desktop.
And later, more unimpeded flux from the keyboard:
It sort of bothers me, intellectually, that there are these people running around acting like they're building the next great thing who keep serving us the same exact TV dinner that I didn't want on Sunday night, and I didn't want it when you tried to serve it again Monday night, and you crunched it up and mixed in some cheese and I didn't eat that Tuesday night, and here it is Wednesday and you've rebuilt the whole goddamn TV dinner industry from the ground up and you're giving me 1955 salisbury steak that I just DON'T WANT.
Good stuff!
Stick around for the end, cause Joel gives bonus ranting, and targets Google...
¶ 5/08/2008
There's a lot of press out there predicting that the incipient Microsoft takeover of Yahoo is doomed to fail. It's the dominant meme.
However, one set of potential users is rooting for it: People who buy search ads.
Andrew Goodman estimates at the London SES conference, attendees are for the merger at a 7-to-1 ratio.
When you look at it, it makes sense, and I've highlighted the key reason before:
Google market share in search is something like 60-65%, and in Europe, it's higher.
Yahoo's share is currently around 25%, and Microsoft is about 10%.
Put together Microsoft and Yahoo, and you have a decent #2 at 35% share.
Simply put, PPC buyers want to go to fewer places, and want a more viable alternative to Google.
Microsoft could throw away most of Yahoo, except Mail and the front page, and have hopes to turn this acquisition into something useful - simply because search is where the money is! Sure it's expensive just to compete with Google in search, but when you are Microsoft, you need to protect your cash cows from incursion by Google.
I think Ballmer's best option and natural tendency is to go after Google's cash cow. Yahoo's really the only way to do that.
I'm still pretty sure Microsoft's current management isn't the team to do it, but at least you can understand why it makes sense from a PPC buyer point of view.
Labels: microhoo, microsoft, yahoo
¶ 2/20/2008
Henry Blodget has been en fuego with his coverage of the Microsoft / Yahoo deal. Today he adds this little nugget:
Because of the overlap of Yahoo and Microsoft shareholders, many of Yahoo's largest shareholders also own even larger stakes in Microsoft. It is in the economic interest of these shareholders to have Microsoft keep its bid exactly where it is. Their interpretation of what is "best for Yahoo shareholders," therefore, may be different than that of shareholders who don't also own huge stakes in Microsoft.
You aren't reading that kind of stuff anywhere else.
¶ 2/11/2008
Even though Yahoo's board may try to reject the Microsoft takeover, there is no resisting the borg. Microsoft will buy Yahoo.
If you haven't tried Microsoft adCenter, they have a great promotion for US customers: they give $50 in free clicks when you sign up for a Microsoft adCenter Account.
I've griped about usability in the past, but for many of my campaigns, AdCenter has the highest conversion rates, more than Google AdWords or Yahoo Panama. The problem is low volume.
In all likelihood, Microsoft will buy Yahoo, and AdCenter will eventually have 35%+ search market share.
So get ahead of the game, and get started learning adCenter today.
Labels: adcenter, coupon, microsoft, yahoo
¶ 2/09/2008
I just woke up from a dream where I met with Steve Ballmer. I told him how to make PPC search advertising much more profitable once the Yahoo deal closes.
In my dream I kept my sentences short and to the point. I pounded the table a few times. I speak Ballmer-ese, at least in my dream.
Here's what I said:
Me: Steve. You can make your $53B acquisition of Yahoo work!
SB: It's $44.6B, actually.
Me: It'll end up at 53 when all is said and done.
SB: OK.
Me: Here's what you do.
Me: 1. Focus on search monetization. That's where the profit is. That's where you can attack Google.
SB. I'm listening.
Me: 2. Throw away the Yahoo search marketing interface
SB: Good.
Me: 3. Build a fat client interface for advertisers.
SB: I like that... on top of .Net!
Me: No! - it can't be on top of .Net!
SB: Why not?
Me: It has to run on Macs, too.
SB: Crap.
Me: OK - focus, here's the important part.
Me: It must look and feel like Google's AdWords editor.
SB: OK, we know how to copy look and feel.
Me: Right. And it must export data into Yahoo Panama and AdCenter.
SB: Why?
Me: That way people can instantly buy on both from one interface.
SB: What about the web UI?
Me: Well, once you have the fat client it won't matter much, but you should just copy (and I mean exactly copy) Google's.
SB: I kinda like this.
It went on from there. I told Steve that Google is pissing off advertisers left and right with all of their quality score BS. I told him that Microsoft could write the AdWords Editor equivalent right now, and people would love it.
I also gave Steve the names of projects he should cancel at Yahoo - he really liked that. Integrating display and search is a waste of time. Just sell, sell, sell. He ate that up.
But then I went too far - I told him that he's ruining MSFT with his army of non-technical bureaucrat VPs, and he just got up and left (taking his chair with him). I don't think he's gonna follow any of my advice now.
Oh well. I, for one, welcome our new Google masters.
Labels: ballmer, microsoft, yahoo
¶ 2/04/2008
Microsoft's buying Yahoo. A ton of early reactions. Here's what comes to my mind:
Ah, love, let us be true To one another! for the world, which seems To lie before us like a land of dreams, So various, so beautiful, so new, Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain; And we are here as on a darkling plain Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight, Where ignorant armies clash by night.
Labels: matthew arnold, microsoft, yahoo
¶ 2/01/2008
If you want to understand Steve Jobs (pay attention Paul Kedrosky), you must read Bob Cringely's opus to Jobs ego this week.
Cringely opens with a great anecdote. Cringely was going to interview Bill Gates and Steve Jobs about their relationship for a Vanity Fair article. Jobs says "OK - as long as you interview Bill first." So after a month of scheduling, Cringely gets an hour with Gates, just on Jobs. Now it's time to talk to Steve.
The promised interview with Jobs never happened. His excuse was that the antitrust case against Microsoft had reached a point where it would have been imprudent for Jobs to comment on Gates. Come back when the case is over (or Hell freezes, whichever comes first).While I suppose there may have been some legal reason not to talk, I really doubt that was the issue. Rather, Steve Jobs just liked snubbing the world’s richest man. It was classic Jobs, and I should have seen it coming. We both should have. So the Vanity Fair story never happened.
Cringely then turns to the iPhone pricing incident, his thesis being that Jobs knew exactly what he was doing: "So Steve does things like this because he can. It reaffirms his iron grip over both Apple and Apple’s customers. It’s a lot about ego and a little about business, though with Steve Jobs they are hard to differentiate."
And then, in the brillant summary bit that made me laugh out loud:
So Steve slapped his customers around a bit and what happened? Apple got free publicity worth tens of millions and the iPhone, which was already the top-selling smartphone in the world, will now sell two million units by the end of the year, up from an estimated one million. And Steve, having deliberately alienated his best customers, now gets a chance to woo them back. He has finally placed millions of people in the role of every key Apple employee — being alternately seduced and tormented.
In the end, Cringely's psycho-analysis of Jobs says that everything he does is a reaction to being fired by Apple back in 1985.
In the 22 years since that humiliation, Jobs has devoted himself to proving: 1) that he can deliver the numbers (and does he — Apple is the best-managed computer company on Earth), and; 2) that he is a better marketer than Sculley, the supposed marketing genius. The product vision part is easy. Not only does Jobs push these products out without apparent effort, he couldn’t make himself not do it if he tried. It’s an obsession. So he puts the real sweat into managing and marketing and occasionally beating up on anyone who gets too close.And that 1999 quote from Bill Gates [from the interview, Gates wondering why Jobs would go back to Apple] about Jobs: “He has to know that he can never win."
The ironic part, and perhaps with a bit of foreshadowing is that Gates is now the one lost in the wilderness while his company is run into the ground by pretenders without a technology vision.
Labels: apple, cringely, gates, jobs, microsoft
¶ 9/08/2007
Google would be Hawkeye.
Yahoo would be B.J. Honeycutt.
MSN Live would be Frank Burns.
Labels: google, microsoft, randomness, yahoo
¶ 5/21/2007
OK, yes, things are frothy and bubbly in the online ad business.
But 14X revenue for an ad agency? Agencies aren't exactly known for pristine revenue reporting either...
There's a ton of reporting on Microsoft paying $6B for what is essentially an ad agency.
I'm shocked that no one is pointing out that AQNT has profit margins of about 12%. Microsoft other businesses average around 28%. Microsoft may be saying that Aquantive is an "ad network", but it's really a service business. Ad agencies are tremendously cyclical, hiring when times are good, and firing when times are bad. Times are good right now. So that 12% profit margin IS THE BEST margin they are gonna do.
Microsoft probably hopes that Ave.A/Razorfish clients will now be directing a lot of spend towards MSN and Office Live. Meanwhile, Aquantive's big technology piece, Atlas, doesn't even work with MSN adcenter at this point
If I was an Aquantive client, I'd be shopping for a new agency right now...
Labels: microsoft
¶ 5/18/2007
Here's some WSJ coverage of Microsoft's and Yahoo's "recent talks". Feel free to refer back to this the next time you need to judge how well major newspapers understand Silicon Valley.
Still, Microsoft has technical expertise that might benefit Yahoo. Under one possible scenario, Microsoft could manage the technical platform and infrastructure of the companies' combined Internet activities, while Yahoo's current staff could oversee the consumer parts of the businesses..
That's absurdly funny. Microsoft has no technical skills "that might benefit Yahoo." They've spent billions of their cash on their own infrastructure - and are way behind Google AND Yahoo - is that the skill?
While Yahoo is facing increased competition to sell advertisers the graphical-display ads, such as banners, that have been its bread and butter, the company recently has shown signs of momentum
Really? Apparently the last two consecutive quarters of serious under-performance counts as momentum to the WSJ?
Panama is now running, and Yahoo said recently that it expects the system to contribute to its revenue, starting this quarter.
Even this basic statement is grossly incorrect. Panama is of course, already contributing to revenue. It's revenue growth that's the problem.
Just remember that everything you read in the press is generally wrong in some important way. And it's doubly true for coverage of technical issues.
¶ 5/04/2007
Microsoft's adCenter has really gone downhill in performance lately. Along with declines in traffic, my accounts have seen big decreases in conversion and ROI.
On April 29, adCenter sent out a notice to advertisers changing their terms of use:
We're writing to notify you that your Microsoft adCenter Terms and Conditions are updated. The changes take effect on April 30, 2007.Some of the key adjustments to your Terms and Conditions include:
- Microsoft may use matching criteria other than keyword searches to display your advertisements.
- Microsoft may display your advertisements on its network of advertising channels operated by the Microsoft network of participating websites and other distribution outlets.
Basically, they are saying that your ads can now show up for any reason on any of their partners sites. So much for targeting search keywords!
Microsoft has already announced that they are testing an AdSense competitor, so this change certainly enables them to show your ads on content sites with some type of contextual matching.
However, Melissa M. from the SEM2 discussion group also points out that she's seen Microsoft buying IntelliTXT ads, and routing the clicks to a landing page of adCenter advertiser ads.
MSN is actually running Intellitext ads on content sites, sending visitors to a Live search page with adCenter ads on it. We saw a spike in clicks on a handful of keywords on 4/30, with no resultant increase in conversions, and I attribute it to this garbitrage by MSN.
She calls that Garbitrage. Which captures it perfectly. Check this thread for more details.
So I see a few big credibility problems for Microsoft stemming from this:
- A major TOS change with basically no notice. You could almost call it a "zero-day exploit".
- Funnelling low-quality untargeted traffic to search ad customers campaigns.
- Overall desperation and drop in traffic and performance.
It's hard to believe how bad Microsoft is at this whole thing... but they are, and I expect them to lose even more accounts as people see this junk get reflected in their stats.
¶ 5/02/2007
You how Calacanis singlehandedly created the FatBloggin' meme? Well, he did.
My meme is the Live Search DeathWatch™ That's shorthand for when Microsoft kills it's search engine branding, and replaces it with something else (like, Yahoo, for example).
The patron saint of all Microsoft watches is Mary Jo Foley, and she reports on yet another executive departure: Dane Glasgow, general manager for Live Search, is leaving Microsoft. Ho hum.
I'll just use this opportunity to re-iterate my take on Live's recent re-org:
Summary: a red-shirted* VP named Satya Nadella is now in charge of Live search engineering. Good luck buddy.My initial cynical reaction: "GREAT - let's give the guy who produced that incredible Microsoft CRM product that everyone uses the SEARCH AND AD PLATFORM"
*Red-shirted in the Star Trek sense
Glasgow was to report to Nadella, but apparently he didn't care much for his new red-shirted boss.
Crazy idea to get a ton of digg links: Come up with a "Deck of Cards" for Microsoft execs, like they had for Iraq back in 2003. Ballmer would be Saddam (Ace of Spades). Berkowitz would probably be the Jack of Spades... hmmm...
Labels: live deathwatch, microsoft
¶ 4/25/2007
Here are a few odd notions I have about Google's purchase of DoubleClick:
- Obvious Big Loser: Microsoft
- Potential Winner: Yahoo
- The World benefits from a Google v Yahoo internet.
Obviously Microsoft must be crying in their soup over this. Angry incompetent people crying in their soup. Paul Kedrosky is right when he says this will probably push Microsoft to try and buy Yahoo. That's their brand of flailing.
Yahoo, on the other hand, could be a more solid #2 option if they had more inventory. They already lead in brand ads, display ads and behavioural targeting. I hope Yahoo rebuffs Microsoft somehow, yet manages to convince Gates that Yahoo should run Microsoft's online business.
If Yahoo had Microsoft search inventory back, and they got some good chunk of MSN properties, they'd be a place to spend a good chunk of money no matter what Google did.
The advertising world craves an alternative to Google. Microsoft cannot fulfill an anti-monopolistic craving. Yahoo could be it, but Yahoo and Microsoft alone are not going to beat Google standing separately, and as I said years ago, the only winner when their inventory is split up is Google.
Since Microsoft is incompetent at all things internet and ad related, it would be a DISASTER if they bought Yahoo. However, there's no reason for them not to let Yahoo run their online ad world. (Save for the ego aspect - which hopefully goes away when Ballmer is fired.)
Therefore, the ONLY HOPE for Microsoft is:
- Steve Ballmer is fired
- Microsoft fails to buy Yahoo
- Yahoo runs and rep almost all MSFT inventory online.
Sounds crazy, and it will never happen, right? But it makes a lot of sense. Microsoft is a miserable failure at all things internet. It's losing share and relevance minute-by-minute. It's desperate.
That's my optimistic hope - somehow Yahoo emerges with Microsoft's inventory. And NOT as a subsidiary of Microsoft.
More about DoubleClick
The blogs and internet journalists haven't really broken down DoubleClick and detailed exactly what Google is getting here. The most important thing that people aren't talking about is the DoubleClick Advertising Exchange (adx).
- Unlike RightMedia, the exchange has payment included.
Buyers / sellers don't have to worry about payment from the other side of the transaction (DoubleClick guarantees payments for inventory sold through the system.) This is a huge advantage, and fits great with Google's ability to get AdWords users to participate by offering free imperial credits (a la Google Checkout) to AdWords customers.
Along with the overall display advertising market share, it's the exchange which dovetails so nicely with Google. It's something they need, and Google's eco-system and technology will enhance it. (BTW, someone's now got to buy RightMedia - though Yahoo owns a chunk (~10%) already...)
PS. Another point that few people seem to have remarked on:
Google and DoubleClick are in essentially the same building in NYC. Good for integration until the closing in December (!), n'est ce pas?
Labels: doubleclick, google, microsoft, yahoo
¶ 4/16/2007
Maybe I'm too jaded to blog these days. The only thing that gets me writing is more bad news from Microsoft. Paul Graham jumps in with a proclamation of the obvious: "Microsoft is Dead."
Much more delicious is the long, angry analysis from Roger on how MSFT was stuffing the channel with Xbox 360s in order to make their numbers look better. Here's the bitter summation that makes me smile:
There is something seriously, institutionally wrong with Microsoft. This is not the company I knew in the late 1990s. Get back to basics, boys. Because accounting tricks neither fool Mr. Market nor your customers forever.
Yes, I know it. Microsoft Schadenfreude is the Advil of my blogging...
Labels: microsoft
¶ 4/10/2007
Randall Stross
IF Microsoft has determined that it is futile to compete with Google head-to-head, and if, as seems to be the case, it is willing to cast dignity aside and adopt marketing gimmicks in an attempt to gain market share, why stop at half measures?
Microsoft is so desperate and incompetent here, that one could almost start to feel sorry for them.
Not really.
Labels: live, microsoft, sucks
¶ 4/04/2007
Mary Jo Foley details the shuffling of deck chairs on the titanic that is Microsoft Live search.
Summary: a red-shirted* VP named Satya Nadella is now in charge of Live search engineering. Good luck buddy.
My initial cynical reaction: "GREAT - let's give the guy who produced that incredible Microsoft CRM product that everyone uses the SEARCH AND AD PLATFORM"
Marketing and branding seem unaffected - but for how long?
* (in the Star Trek sense)
via EZ-E
Labels: live, microsoft, titanic
¶ 3/22/2007
Do you advertise on MSN AdCenter?
Do you like your ROI?
Do you want to keep your hard-earned money?
Then PAY ATTENTION to Microsoft's upcoming launch of Content Ads.
Microsoft is sending out beta announcements about their launch of contextual ads (i.e. MSN's version of AdSense for Content). Buried in the details is this text:
This week, some of our U.S. advertisers will receive an e-mail notification that their accounts will be upgraded as part of the adCenter Content Ads pilot program. If you receive this notice, your campaigns will automatically be upgraded to include distribution on content pages within the Microsoft network.
AdCenter will set your existing campaigns to run on Content Ads BY DEFAULT!
That's a good way for you to lose a lot of money fast... so make sure you read how to disable Content Ads.
¶ 3/13/2007
The prospects of Microsoft dropping the Live.com branding for what once was MSN search are getting brighter.
Greg Linden points to this Seattle PI article on executive reshuffling at Microsoft search. Chris Payne, who originally convinced Bill Gates that he could lead the effort to build a "Google-Killer" is leaving.
The Microsoft Corp. executive who led the company's challenge to Google is leaving the company.Christopher Payne, the corporate vice president for Microsoft's Live Search initiative, plans to launch a Seattle-based technology firm unrelated to the search business
...
The company on Wednesday announced an executive reshuffling that includes bringing Brad Goldberg, a marketing general manager from the Windows division, into the Windows Live group. Earlier this week, Blake Irving, another Windows Live corporate vice president, told others at the company that he plans to retire later this year.
Linden, in the understatement-of-the-year so far, calls Payne's efforts to build a Google Killer: "largely unsuccessful".
PS. Be sure to put your vote in my death pool on the Live.com name.
Labels: microsoft
¶ 3/08/2007
I'll pay $50 (via Amazon Gift Certificate) to any person who can parse the following. All you have to do is tell me, in clear, concise terms:What the hell is Microsoft thinking with this Windows Live branding?
Here's Gord Hotchkiss interviewing Microsoft Live Search's Justin Osmer - and I'm italicizing all the cliches that come from muddled thinking:
Q: Why the move in branding from MSN Search to Live Search? What was the thinking behind that?The thinking behind Windows Live in general is that it's a suite of services that are available across the Microsoft platform of products. So MSN has the ability to give you your email, get to search and so on, but those things are Windows Live branded experiences and services. MSN still has search today, but it's powered by Windows Live Search. Same as if you go to Microsoft.com today, it's powered by Windows Live Search. So, it's somewhat intentional in setting up in Windows Live a collection of things to allow people to get all the information they care about in one spot. With one log in you get your contact list, a melding of your IM contacts and your mail contacts, you've got your Windows Live personalized page that you can set up to get your own RSS feeds, you've got your search results there, you can build in your search macros, you've got all sorts of things that you can do to make it even that much more uniquely yours.
MSN continues to be a very strong brand and a place where people love to go get content, read content, review content and get immersed in that content. Windows Live is more about you cherry picking what's important to you, pulling that down and having that in one spot. And then the services that underlie Windows Live will then power the experiences on these other properties.
Was that answer supposed to make things clearer? Strunk & White
I'm not sure why normal people would need to log in, build search macros, or want to meld their contacts? Do real users think : "I'm going to MSN to get some content"?
Moreover, if MSN "continues to be a very strong brand", then why dilute it with Windows Live? From that answer, the best I can infer is that Windows Live is about cherry picking and personalization?
As Tom Hanks said in BIG! - I don't get it... and neither, apparently, does anyone at Microsoft!?!
¶ 2/12/2007
In a "dog bites man" story, and continuing my theme of dumping on Microsoft as of late, CNet reports on Microsoft's Live branding, rounding up a bunch of comments from analysts and some data from the recent quarter. The obvious upshot: the Live brand is going nowhere and hurting Microsoft in the search battle.
"Microsoft's Live branding has been tremendously confusing and has hurt the company, and it is very likely contributing to the situation they are in right now," said David Smith, an analyst at Gartner. "They've created another brand and have not differentiated it."
As I wrote last month, new MSN honcho Steve Berkowitz is not enamoured of the "Live" name, and I'd predict that the branding is not gonna stick past this year.
Another aspect that could be contributing to Microsoft's share decline is the different look and feel of Microsoft Live. The slate blue color scheme and non-Googly layout - what I call the "Neptune Morose" skin, might not be as cool as people think.
My sense is that the brand, the look and feel, and the lower relevancy are all hurting Microsoft's search efforts. Once you add in the biggest off-screen factor - Microsoft's inability to get any serious inventory deals done, you've got a real miserable failure on your hands.
Labels: microsoft
¶ 1/27/2007
