‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax on businesses

Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by _bxg1 on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:02PM (#19505377)

> I don’t know what’s gotten into Microsoft lately. Remember when it was the Death Star, monopolistically glowering over technopolis and threatening to cut off the air supply of competitors and regulators alike?

Microsoft is a relative underdog now (among the tech giants). Underdogs tend to benefit more, personally, from the greater good, and also have less clout with which to push others around. This makes them come off as being more humble, and if they're smart they lean into that image in their public relations. Just look at AMD and T-Mobile.

With this move Microsoft is trying to fertilize a shared resource, investing some of its own money but also hoping to pressure Amazon - the company it's trying to get a leg up on - to invest alongside it. Amazon has less need for the shared resource and would have to contribute a greater amount to it. On top of that, Microsoft gets some positive PR. It's a smart move.

Edit: I've been informed that Microsoft is currently #1 in market cap, so not an underdog overall. They feel like an underdog in most isolated product categories, but maybe this really is purely a PR move.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by rlanday on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:09PM (#19505456)

> Microsoft is a relative underdog now (among the tech giants).

Microsoft is currently the largest company in the world by market cap.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by _bxg1 on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:14PM (#19505518)

Hmm, that's surprising. It has a dodgy foothold in mobile, Amazon (and possibly also Google?) has it beat in cloud services, Google Docs has taken a chunk of Office's territory, Chrome OS is overtaking Windows in education, Mobile+Apple+Chrome OS are swallowing it in personal computing and (I believe) gaining some ground even in enterprise. It doesn't seem like Microsoft has dominance in anything but desktop OS right now.

It's just a general perception, as a casual observer, that Microsoft has been ceding lots of territory lately and not really gaining much.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by polyomino on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:19PM (#19505580)

Microsoft used to be a boxed software business, now they're transitioning to saas. It's really that simple.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by _bxg1 on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:21PM (#19505605)

Right, but Amazon and Google are arguably better than them at SaaS. AWS is second to none for cloud hosting, and Google is second to none for AI.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by cwyers on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:26PM (#19505659)

Only if you ignore the categories of software where Microsoft leads -- Active Directory and Office 365 are SaaS offerings that Microsoft has that are seeing massive adoption, and Microsoft is using that to leverage businesses onto their other cloud offerings.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by gamblor956 on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:50PM (#19505892)

Google is second to none for AI.

Definitely going to disagree there. While Google has done more work on commercializing piss-poor AI, MS Research has been at the forefront of AI research since before Google learned how to make money. Google is definitely the second fiddle when it comes to AI research, and it's not even close.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by bulldoa on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @06:02PM (#19506581)

What metric are we basing on here?

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by gamblor956 on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @06:44PM (#19506958)

Since I'm arguing from the research standpoint, published research or citations by other research.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by MagicPropmaker on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:52PM (#19505910)

Really? Try Office 365 vs Google Docs and get back to me! There's no comparison. Microsoft is better.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by kerng on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @07:30PM (#19507365)

I think Microsoft is the best SaaS provider overall. Google has some quirky offerings with GSuites that honestly arent comparable to other enterprise offerings from a quality perspective- especially if you are used to Office, Outlook and AD. And when it comes to cloud computing Google is a distant third.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by barry-cotter on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @08:17PM (#19507725)

Microsoft understands customer service though, and Google refuses to learn. Surely that’s relevant to SaaS.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by kthejoker2 on Thursday March 28, 2019 @06:13AM (#19510783)

Cloud hosting isn't SaaS. Think productivity, CRM, business apps ...

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by _bxg1 on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:21PM (#19505596)

Maybe it's just better diversified than its competitors, and it's only an underdog in each individual product category (except desktop OS, for now at least), and not as a whole.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by maxxxxx on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @06:28PM (#19506815)

They have shown a remarkable ability to survive complete paradigm changes, keep growing and stay profitable. The FAANGs still have to prove that.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by throwaway_9168 on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @11:52PM (#19509084)

I think of them as the trust fund babies among the tech giants. A lot of people who have actually worked on both Azure and AWS/Google Cloud remark that Azure is awful in comparison, but its their only option because (some reason which ties back to Microsoft's dominance 15+ years ago). In search, after MSN Search, Windows Live Search, Bing Rewards and what not, Microsoft still didn't really put a dent into Google's marketshare. In mobile, they are an also ran. They had to do a 180 on their open source policy to come back to relevance. In other words, if you took away their OS/Office stronghold, it is hard to see them actually competing and winning in any business which has strong competitors.

Which reminds me. I knew some folks who worked at Microsoft who used to talk about open source as if it was cancer - in 2005. Now they display equal enthusiasm for the opposite view. If you have actually seen it, it looks quite like a comedy scene from one of those movies which spoof corporate life, where all employees act gung-ho no matter what.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by kthejoker2 on Thursday March 28, 2019 @06:09AM (#19510760)

I'll just provide.an anecdotal counterpoint in that I've used GCP, AWS, and Oracle cloud, and Azure is night and day a better experience.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by anth_anm on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @05:48PM (#19506438)

It's not surprising if you pay attention.

> Amazon (and possibly also Google?) has it beat in cloud services

No, not google.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by Jach on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @11:56PM (#19509105)

Where are your casually observing eyes focused? If Hacker News is your main internet watering hole, maybe expansion is called for...

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by jeromebaek on Thursday March 28, 2019 @11:17AM (#19513010)

I just... I miss the old Hacker news... This isn't reddit...

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by mallocfree on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @05:51PM (#19506461)

>Microsoft is a relative underdog now (among the tech giants).

How do you define a Tech giant?

By Market cap they are #1. Here are top 5.

1. Microsoft $895B 2. Apple $888B 3. Amazon $867B 4. Google $816B 5. Facebook $473B

They have been in top 3 for last 30 years with a robust business model. They missed on Mobile and search but hey it would be hard for any tech company to top in each market.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by anth_anm on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @07:14PM (#19507224)

Settling for #2 in search and cloud isn't exactly a bad consolation prize.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by jermaustin1 on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:10PM (#19505466)

> Microsoft is a relative underdog now

How so? According to NASDAQ, MSFT is valued higher than all of the FAANG companies. It's north of $900B right now.

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by MagicPropmaker on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:19PM (#19505573)

If that's what people believe, it's brilliant! Part of the strategy of Apple's resurrection was making people think they were the little guy; the hip, cool alternative for people who "think different." Now Microsoft can play the same game.

As of right now, MSFT market cap is $895B and AAPL is $888B. Some underdog!

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by CPLX on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @04:18PM (#19505568)

> Microsoft is a relative underdog now (among the tech giants)

lol

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Re:‘Making Amazon look bad’: Microsoft supports a state tax ... by kerng on Wednesday March 27, 2019 @07:19PM (#19507275)

Underdog? It's the largest company by market cap in the world. That can be viewed as being the most successful company there is (over time).

They sure do a lot of things right lately though.

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