Why Microsoft Will Never Win (they blew their lead on web apps)

If MS had introduced their customers to web apps in the early 00's, they would have both shot themselves in the foot and allowed competitors to have a go at the other foot.

By killing NetDocs the average business person stayed ignorant to the possibilities of applications online, therefore extending MS's cash cow several/many years longer.

Beyond the IT savvy I don't see anyone using Google Docs or Zoho, and pretty much every client I interact with still relies heavily on MS Office (I have a hard time even recommending OOO as people are so used to their old tools). I'd say MS's strategy is still working quite well.

Microsoft still dominates the Desktop, both in OS and productivity office programs. When they do decide to go 'online' they will just ad it into the existing offerings - example:"Office 2010, now comes with free online office as well.. including powerpoint, word, excel... with 30 gigs of free online secure storage" - also a double save feature if your connected to the net, when you save a document local it will ask if you wanted to save to the 'cloud' -

- MS is more trusted for the average business than zoho or even google, and already has a built in market.

My 2 cents:

Scott Gu, Silverlight, Mesh, MVC, the DLR - if MS can get wide developer adoption (I don't see any reason why they won't..all are quite compelling technologies) they will still be a force to be reckon with.

MS's problem is they are battling on soo many fronts - it's all about market share these days since the web game is moving towards a commodity play now and will be with the "cloud" services in the next few years.

What will happen is the classic coke vs pepsi, molson vs labatt battles we've seen - each just fighting for a few percantage of market share more (which translates into billions).

MS will never die, neither will IBM. They will continue to morph in new ways to increase shareholder value. Google will face the same challenges once the web advertising game slows down (which won't happen for at least 5 years IMO but there is still weakness).

Pick your poison, MS has a massive warchest of cash and is dying to spend it, they if anything, will be a major disruptor in the web game.

"But just think about how much further along that understanding curve the company would be now, instead of letting the fear of cannibalization push it away. At some point, the company will have to grab that nettle firmly, and it’s not going to get any easier — if anything, it’s only going to get harder."

I don't think Microsoft CAN catch up.

The mistake people make is thinking that Microsoft needs to be the dominant player in a market to make their participation in it worthwhile. They're perfectly happy to have their hand in any cookie jar that poses massive future revenue, even if they're late to the party (as they generally are).

Virtual Earth and Photosynth prove that Microsoft can make great web apps if they want to.

Doesn't it seem likely that MS created Silverlight so they could build web based versions of their applications that don't suck? I wouldn't be surprised to see Office 14 really blur the lines between desktop and web based software.

That being said, Microsoft will probably continue to flounder until they commit to a new BHAG.

If microsoft is dying, when will it start paying stockholders dividends?