Re:Back to Windows after twenty years
by ncmncm on Monday November 04, 2019 @11:43PM
(#21449671)
At Microsoft, they know that no matter how bad it gets, you won't leave. Just about everyone who might leave already did. Likewise, for Apple.
Having a customer base that will tolerate any abuse, no matter how bad, is worth way more to Apple and Microsoft than a base that is incrementally larger, but more demanding.
People who expect things to work well are what MBAs call a "cost center". Business school taught them that cost centers are to be shed, to the maximum degree possible. People who tolerate bad products and services are what the Business School professors call "cash cows", to be milked forever. (No, literally. It's there in the textbooks. There is no shame in Business School!)
Apple and Microsoft each have countless $billions in cash, a very small bit of which (1%? 3%?) would be plenty to make things work well, and keep them working well. But that would attract demanding customers, who would just expect better, all the time. Cost center!
Clearly, the status quo is what keeps the cash pouring in. Upsetting that flow would be a huge mistake: the most likely outcome, just from basic thermodynamics, would be less cash to divert into holdings. Nobody wants that. Anyway, nobody who matters.
So in answer to the question, "Whose problem is Microsoft solving?": Microsoft is solving Microsoft's problem, quite deftly, just as Apple is deftly solving Apple's problem. Apple is doing it better: they have people paying $1200 for a $300 phone, again and again.
Apple and Microsoft have only one remaining problem, Fafnir's: nothing on Earth is worth as much to them as their respective cash hoards.
Meanwhile, Google has picked up the strays. Their huge advantage is that you aren't even a customer; you're the product! Anyway your eyeballs are. The actual customers are more demanding, in principle, but much, much fewer. Google has to keep your eyeballs pointed at their screens, but they know everything about you, so they can automate a lot of that, and they don't even have to pretend to be trying to keep you happy; just attentive.
Moo.
If you notice a similarity to Spammers, give yourself a thumbs up. Spammers have to be extremely picky about their customers. Spammers need you to give them all your money in exchange for nothing at all. That is a very special customer, and they need to sift through millions to find each. If you are bothered by bad spelling or grammar, they know not to waste time on you -- you reject yourself! No, they want only the least discerning customers. Anyone capable of doubt has to be driven away in absolutely the most automated way possible. If a hundred people per million took up any time, they would need to find something else to do.
The difference between the spammer and anyone who sheds discerning customers is only degree, not kind.
Having a customer base that will tolerate any abuse, no matter how bad, is worth way more to Apple and Microsoft than a base that is incrementally larger, but more demanding.
People who expect things to work well are what MBAs call a "cost center". Business school taught them that cost centers are to be shed, to the maximum degree possible. People who tolerate bad products and services are what the Business School professors call "cash cows", to be milked forever. (No, literally. It's there in the textbooks. There is no shame in Business School!)
Apple and Microsoft each have countless $billions in cash, a very small bit of which (1%? 3%?) would be plenty to make things work well, and keep them working well. But that would attract demanding customers, who would just expect better, all the time. Cost center!
Clearly, the status quo is what keeps the cash pouring in. Upsetting that flow would be a huge mistake: the most likely outcome, just from basic thermodynamics, would be less cash to divert into holdings. Nobody wants that. Anyway, nobody who matters.
So in answer to the question, "Whose problem is Microsoft solving?": Microsoft is solving Microsoft's problem, quite deftly, just as Apple is deftly solving Apple's problem. Apple is doing it better: they have people paying $1200 for a $300 phone, again and again.
Apple and Microsoft have only one remaining problem, Fafnir's: nothing on Earth is worth as much to them as their respective cash hoards.
Meanwhile, Google has picked up the strays. Their huge advantage is that you aren't even a customer; you're the product! Anyway your eyeballs are. The actual customers are more demanding, in principle, but much, much fewer. Google has to keep your eyeballs pointed at their screens, but they know everything about you, so they can automate a lot of that, and they don't even have to pretend to be trying to keep you happy; just attentive.
Moo.
If you notice a similarity to Spammers, give yourself a thumbs up. Spammers have to be extremely picky about their customers. Spammers need you to give them all your money in exchange for nothing at all. That is a very special customer, and they need to sift through millions to find each. If you are bothered by bad spelling or grammar, they know not to waste time on you -- you reject yourself! No, they want only the least discerning customers. Anyone capable of doubt has to be driven away in absolutely the most automated way possible. If a hundred people per million took up any time, they would need to find something else to do.
The difference between the spammer and anyone who sheds discerning customers is only degree, not kind.