"Lead, follow or get out of the way." - Thomas Paine
Microsoft chooses "follow." As Microsoft and Yahoo announce their 10-year search deal, we are reminded again of the reactive, not innovative culture of Microsoft.
Lead by a the uninspiring Steve Ballmer, the company achieves second place once again. Sometimes, they seem to shoot for third.
They missed Search the first and second time around opening the door for Google and Yahoo. They copied the iPod five years to the month after it was introduced by Apple with Zune. They purchased Razorfish and droves of the Web's best minds fled that company. (Now it's up for sale.) X Box is not leading although they briefly benefited when competitors couldn't deliver more popular game systems to the market. And let's not talk about wistful Vista.
I guess the mistake is to assume that Microsoft wants to lead. Clearly, they don't. If you were Google would you be shaking in your shoes? Probably not.
So, to remind myself of their firm commitment to refrain from innovation, I shall apply that lower case style of so many digitally savvy folks and spell their name microsoft. Shh. Whisper it from now on.
