Microsoft loses three more cloud-savvy heavy hitters

[Renew Deal]

Keeping track of the revolving doors to Redmond's executive washrooms is turning into a full-time pursuit.

Cloud visionary Ray Ozzie announced his departure in October (see "Ray Ozzie's leaving Microsoft: What took him so long?"). Cloud-savvy Bob Muglia announced his retirement as president of the Server and Tools Division -- including the Azure effort -- a couple of weeks ago (see "With Muglia gone, who will succeed Ballmer?"). Last May, Robbie Bach left as president of the Entertainment Division. Xbox and Zune tech luminary J Allard left at the same time. Last September, Stephen Elop left as president of the Business Division, including Office. Brad Brooks, the head of Windows marketing to consumers, left last week.

Now in the past 24 hours we've seen details about the defections of three more heavy hitters.

First came news that Microsoft filed a lawsuit, then sought and received a restraining order, against Matt Miszewski. He's the former general manager of worldwide government in the Microsoft Dynamics group, where he guided "the business, technical, and architectural structure of Microsoft's offerings in the government industry." He left Microsoft at the end of December.
<snip>

With 90,000 employees or so, Microsoft's loss of a handful of executives and techies isn't statistically significant. But the turnover among cloud-savvy senior executives -- Ozzie, Muglia, arguably Brooks, notably Thompson -- has to hurt.

http://www.infoworld.com/t/misadventures/microsoft-loses-three-more-cloud-savvy-heavy-hitters-615

Ignore the cloud jargon. The point is a lot of big players at MS have left almost all at once.

[phantom power]

1. The cloud angle is pretty important (if you're in SW, anyway).

Cloud is shaping up to be the Next Big Thing. Not exactly an auspicious start to Microsoft's usual plans of Next-Big-Thing-Domination.

Not that I mind.
:evilgrin:

[ellenfl]

2. cloud? describes your point. explain please? eom

[Renew Deal]

3. Cloud is a friendly term for outsourcing.

It essentially means hosted computer services. In theory, DU is in the cloud.

[Jim__]

5. Newsweek had a pretty good article on Cloud Computing.

...

If you thought Amazon sold only books, you probably think Google is just a search engine. Both Amazon and Google—along with Microsoft, IBM, Dell, Yahoo and other small players—have just started rolling out cloud computing services. Get used to hearing that expression. In April, Gartner Research dubbed it "the biggest buzz phrase of 2008, little understood until 2009." At its most basic, cloud computing is the ability to use software and data on the Internet (a.k.a., the cloud) instead of on your hard drive.

Ten years ago if you wanted to do something with your PC you needed to buy software and install it. The ascent of Web 2.0—to deploy an older buzz phrase—is making that practice obsolete. "Suddenly, what cloud computing allows is for businesses and individuals to use it as if it were their own. It makes computing a heck of a lot less expensive," says tech journalist Nicholas Carr, author of "The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, From Edison to Google."

more ...

Wikipedia has an article on it too, but it contains a lot of jargon.

[jtuck004]

4. Maybe cloud is so 90's (which sounds better than 10's) that they have moved on?

I wonder if tech support on the "robot internet" sucks as much as tech support everywhere?

[snot]

6. RW'ers want us to be dependent on the Cloud bec. it centralizes control.

When computing is distributed, i.e. relying on a network of desktops, the network can "wire around" disruptions that might otherwise occur when individual desktops cease to function.

When everyone's reliant on the Cloud, it's MUCH easier to globally shut the network down, or globally delete or edit data (via the semantic Web), or spy on communications, etc. etc. Or, less venal but certainly obnoxious, simply force users to pay exorbitant fees for use and/or "upgrades" they don't need or want.

The more centralized things are, the easier it is for the obligarchs to hijack and control them.

There may be advantages to centralizing certain aspects in certain ways, but it's critical to understand the risks and trade-offs.

AND I'd propose that any such centralized facilities should be OWNED BY THE USERS, as in a credit union -- but that's definitely NOT what the companies pushing the Cloud have in mind.

[dixiegrrrrl]

7. Thank you for that explanation.

For me, it was enough to know that Microsoft was for it.

Centralization and consolidation are mechanisms for control in most systems, yes.

[westerebus]

8. I like the term 'Skynet' myself.

That uber-human droid quality one so seldom encounters among the sheeple's meta-media.

Then again I'm a hopeless romantic.