Customer Reviews

Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era

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Mary Jo Foley has made a valuable contribution to investors and stock analysts. This books makes it easier to understand Microsoft's background, which kinds of business models does Microsoft employ to make money, and the future evolution of these models. This book is helpful if you are going to estimate future cash flows and calculate the intrinsic value of the company. Whichever tools do you have to your disposition as an analyst, this one is a worthy addition.

The author has done great job summarizing miscellaneous (and sporadic) sources of information like various speeches, blogs, and articles. She has also used Microsoft's SEC filings like annual and quarterly reports.

First, she introduces the reader to terms used by Microsoft, e.g. what is "eXperience", "S+S", "Office Live" and so on. Rather than copying vague definitions from the website, she really makes the reader to understand what lies behind these terms in a neutral manner.

Then, she focuses on key people of Microsoft, near-term products of Microsoft, and then devotes the most of the book to the business models. She is not a Microsoft insider and didn't have support from Microsoft key people while writing this book, thus she uses neither overly optimistic nor pessimistic voice: she is quite neutral. The fact that she is not an insider is also good because she doesn't have to do any promises that she have to keep.

There is a useful "annotated reading list", which list blogs which you might want to read to keep in touch with Microsoft. This section also lists some books, but they are quite old and are interesting only in historical perspective.

The only disadvantage of this book is that is somewhat small: more analyses and figures would have been useful for better understanding of the business models of Microsoft.

After reading Microsoft 2.0, here are my thoughts:

If you are a geek that reads Slashdot, Digg, and other technology news sites, it is most likely that this book is going to bore you to death. It's filled with information you most likely already know. I usually enjoy reading tech-related books, but this was the first time I was completely bored reading. I don't blame the author, she could only work with so much.

This book seems targeted at people that don't keep up with the tech industry.

Also, the author lacks the knowledge of Microsoft's gaming division and their XBox Live efforts. One could tell from reading her thoughts on XBox Live that she truly didn't understand the service. However, Microsoft is a big company, and it will be difficult for a person to be knowledgeable in all areas.

This is a book I've been looking forward to for some time... Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era by Mary Jo Foley. Given her long track record in covering Microsoft in tech media, I was interested to know how she perceived the behemoth as they come to a critical juncture in their leadership. I personally think she did a very good job in touching on and analyzing all the different facets that make up Microsoft's efforts to stay relevant. Only a minor deduction for an assumption she had to make late in the game that didn't play out as many expected... :)

Contents:
Forward - The Microsoft 2.0 World (According to Mini-Microsoft)
Acknowledgments
Introduction - Microsoft 2.0 - Welcome to the New (Post-Gatesian) Microsoft
Microsoft 1.0 - It Was All about Bill
Microsoft 2.0 - The Buzzwords
Microsoft 2.0 - The People
Microsoft 2.0 - Products on the Near-Term Radar Screen
Microsoft 2.0 - Big-Bet Products
Microsoft 2.0 - Tried and True Business Models
Microsoft 2.0 - Untried but Unavoidable Business Models
Conclusion - On to Microsoft 3.0
Memos, Letters, and E-mails
Annotated Reading List
Index

When you're trying to analyze a company as large as Microsoft *as it is still moving*, it's a difficult chore to commit words to page without having those same words become irrelevant (or even wrong) before the book sees the light of day. Many of the previous books on Microsoft try to tell the story of some past event, and at least have the ability to know that the story isn't going to change much. Foley had to look at the not-so-distant past, mix in the ever-changing present, and try to figure out what it all means for Microsoft once Bill Gates steps away from the company on July 1st, 2008. Given that nearly impossible task in book form, I think she accomplished what she set out to do. She's realistic in where Microsoft has succeeded and failed, without portraying an overwhelming bias as a fan-boy or hater of the company. Although the company would not grant her access to officials for this book, she has plenty of other sources to reveal little-known projects, plans, and experiments designed to keep Microsoft from constant reliance on the cash cows of Windows and Office. But it's painfully clear that Microsoft still continues (and will for the foreseeable future) to rely heavily on those two products to keep the ledger sheet green and to allow them to sink/waste vast amounts of money on other projects that still haven't panned out over time (like IPTV). After reading this book, you realize that Microsoft isn't dead, isn't irrelevant, and isn't going to go away overnight. However, they are at a critical point in their existence, where leadership, technology, and market forces are all combining to make the stakes higher than they've ever been.

To Foley's credit, she doesn't come out and "predict" Microsoft's future. Far too many industry analysts attempt to do that on a daily basis, and continually fail. What she does do is lay out the challenges and offer some insight as to where they *might* go given their track record and past history. That's incredibly useful, and also allows you to go back a couple years later to see how those forces actually played out. The only nit I had about the book surrounds the Microsoft-Yahoo proposed merger. Obviously, that event happened *very* late in the writing of the manuscript. An event of that magnitude could not be ignored without the book looking dated before it was even printed. However, the outcome of that event seemed to have different treatments as the book went along. Earlier in the book, she apparently made the decision to assume the merger would transpire and wrote as if it had. Later on, it was more of an "if the proposed merger occurs" stance. I understand she had to do something with it... It just so happens that it didn't play out as most everyone expected it to. It still doesn't negate or lessen the value of all her other insights and analysis.

You can quibble over whether she's right or wrong as much as you'd like. That's life in the tech world, as we all have our own "expert" opinions on how technology will absolutely play out. What I don't think you can argue over is whether she did her homework on this book and delivered on what she set out to do. She did... Nice job.

I have mixed impressions of Microsoft 2.0 by Mary Jo Foley. I love Foley's blog. But not this book.

This book is written by Mary Jo Foley, who maintains a wonderful blog about the software company from Redmond. Mary often receives leaks (seemingly officially) from Microsoft insiders that outline future product directions and organizational changes. For anyone who is interested in what Microsoft is actually up to, Mary's blog is a must read.

Microsoft 2.0 is basically the same material one would have found on her blog, distilled, and current as of early 2008. As such the book is not a necessary read for anyone, as those "predictions" or "leaks" that are in the book have since been taken over by events. Unlike at the time of writing, Vista is now recognized for the disaster it was, Windows Mobile 7 was killed and replaced by Windows Phone 7, and "software + services" seems to be as important as ever.

If you are interested in this sort of material, then definitely read the blog. But skip the book.

First, if any analyst used this book as a reference I'd be afraid, very afraid. The statement about Microsoft buying Yahoo in the first chapter was very annoying since it didn't happen.

I read a lot of tech specific content and, as one reviewer mentioned, perhaps that is why I did not like the book. Personally, I was hoping for a true look at Microsoft within the context of current technological and cultural shifts. This book reads more like the diary of a girl with a crush on the high school quarterback. Microsoft has before it one of the most difficult challenges any firm can face. History has shown for a firm to move from dominating one paradigm (client/server in this case) to another (cloud - IaaS, PaaS, SaaS) is incredibly difficult. Microsoft actually has a real chance of pulling it off rather successfully, but that would actually require a PLAN or at least some vain attempt to offer suggestions for the future of the lumbering giant rather than biting on lame marketing attempts to milk their current products with terms like S+S.

Microsoft needs to re-architect their entire enterprise - both what and how they sell. How about leveraging Android and putting a MSFT face on it - the firm has always been better at marketing than technology anyway. Windows Mobile is horribly irrelevant. They should have bought Sun before Oracle did - that would have been a cool MSFT 2.0 - they desperately need to embrace open source, a play out of IBM's book.

For a Microsoft 2.0 to be successful MSFT needs to look out - perhaps that's my biggest problem with this book, all it does is look in.

"The Microsoft Culture of Today and Tomorrow" or something like that would have been legit. "Microsoft 2.0" not so much.

Do you work at Microsoft, at one of their partners, or competitors? Own their stock? Then this book is for you. Most people count Microsoft out in the age of Google and the Web, but not Mary Jo Foley. She writes an honest, fair, and balanced book on where Microsoft is headed based on their current trajectory and her knowledge from covering the company for 20 years. Mary Jo takes you on a tour of who the new players are in the post Bill era (and there are some surprises) as well as gives detail on the current product line and what they mean in the "Web 2.0" era. Then she focuses her attention on products and services under development and how they fit into the new era. She has done a great job peering into the future with her predictions on future directions and business models for Microsoft.
This is a great read and an important book for anyone who deals with Microsoft, friend of foe. (Tip, read the footnotes, there are great nuggets of information in them!)

Foley's writing is crisp and clear (as always). Surprisingly, the book is HEAVILY footnoted with extensive net references for details, making the book smaller (and better) than if it contained the full cited texts. All in all, it reads like a very tight, coherent and focused extended blog, but unlike any blog you'd find on the net. The pace of material was tight without being too dense, making it an easy read and easy to pick up and put down to read in snatches. Recommended.

Few people have covered Microsoft longer and more consistently than Mary Jo Foley (besides maybe Ed Bott). A couple of weeks ago, MJ sent me a copy of her new book Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft Plans to Stay Relevant in the Post-Gates Era (PS, thanks for the mention in the Acknowledgements, MJ), and I thought it would be appropriate to get my review online this week, before BillG finishes cleaning out his desk.

Microsoft 2.0 is a look deep inside the bowels of the Beast, from a perspective that only Mary Jo can provide. But don't expect a sweeping fictional narrative of Microsoft's future, this is a fact-based, thorough (though at times a tad dry) walkthrough of virtually every aspect of Microsoft's business. Foley leaves no stone unturned, and no business model unexplored.

Aside from some brief parts about the on again-off again-on again-off again-on again Microhoo nonsense saga (which she later explained in a blog post), MJ does very little prognostication. Most of that is because Microsoft made the extremely unwise decision to instruct MS employees not to cooperate with her interview requests. Its really too bad, because they could have had the opportunity to inject a lot of insight to a book that is getting a lot of coverage in the wake of Gates' departure this week. But I guess if Microsoft was able to clearly define their strategy to the public, there would be less of a need for this book to fill in the gaps, so I guess it is a Catch-22.

But, this is the real reason for her approach, in her own words:

[Some of my colleagues] wanted e to make the case that Microsoft has lost its Evil Empire crown and soon will become nothing more than a footnote in the tech industry. And they wanted me to go to the trite "narrative nonfiction" route, putting "likely" dialog in 'Softies mouths, to do so.

I can't do it. I find that style of writing affected and offensive, for one. But more importantly,that's not how I see things evolving. Yes, Microsoft is at a crossroads. But to me, crossroads isn't synonymous with dead. I know not everyone agrees.

Just when you think its over, MJ pulls out some cards she must have kept in the vest for a very long time: never-before-published memos outlining among other things, Windows Live "Wave 3" planning, Steven Sinofsky's reasons for not involving customers earlier in the development process, and Kevin Johnson's Reorg memo.

Where most tech reporters have a cursory understanding of the practices and technologies that make up Microsoft's business, she shows that even standing from the front gates, she can still dig into the truth. Just think what she could have done with Microsoft's backing... she could have done a better job articulating Microsoft's strategy than Microsoft has been able to do for the past 2 years.

The bottom line is, you can pay fifteen hundred bucks for a subscription to Directions on Microsoft, or you can spend fifteen bucks and buy Microsoft 2.0. IMO, the latter will get you the best value. MJ can hold her own better than any so-called "analyst", and this book provides the breadth and depth of business information that one would expect to find only in the Harvard Business Review. This is a must-read for anyone that considers themselves a "Microsoft Watcher".

Robert McLaws
Chief Blogger, Windows-Now dot com

Mary Jo Foley did a great job of explaining the depth and the breadth of challenges that face Microsoft as they plan for the future. I believe the analysis and insights were very objective and thorough. It makes you realize just how many different fronts Microsoft is involved in. I think what makes this book so fun to read is that it looks at Microsoft from so many different angles and helps you to realize just how big, important, and how multi-faceted Microsoft really is. I also really enjoyed the insight into the Microsoft culture and into the different key individuals at Microsoft.

I just finished reading MJF's book last night. Microsoft 2.0 is a fascinating and exceptionally well written read. It provides remarkable insight especially given that it's written from the outside looking in. Possibly the most interesting section is the part that discusses the next generation leadership and their projects. A book like this had to have been very difficult to write in that its forward looking and the winds of technology change constantly (i.e., Yahoo deal). I came away from reading this book with a better understanding of the direction MSFT is trying to go.