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Fuzzy
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10 Dec 2009, 8:10 am

I get the impression from them that MS is subtly reinventing themselves into being a hardware company.

The latest I saw as a lady playing with a touch screen. At the end, she says "I'm a pc and the touch screen was my idea."

They have even been moving for a number of years into the web camera and mouse/keyboard market.

Any thoughts on the matter? Do you see what I am seeing?


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lau
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10 Dec 2009, 10:01 am

I loathe the "I'm a PC" idea. I have no idea what it actually means. The best I can manage is that it is stating that the "people" uttering it are very simple AI constructs that run adequately well on a personal computer?


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Fuzzy
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10 Dec 2009, 10:17 am

lau wrote:
I loathe the "I'm a PC" idea. I have no idea what it actually means. The best I can manage is that it is stating that the "people" uttering it are very simple AI constructs that run adequately well on a personal computer?


No they are models paid to say it. I wont comment on the simplicity of their design however!

However, I have encountered a regular person that parroted the line as badge of pride in his choice of operating systems. I wont comment on the simplicity of his design either.

Anyway. That is moot.

Is MS moving towards hardware marketing? I think so. It would be an interesting way to bank against slumping software sales.


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Keith
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10 Dec 2009, 11:14 am

It's like they are saying "PC = Windows ONLY" but that's not true. The Macs run on PC architecture thanks to the Intel processor!! !

I hate those adverts. "I'm a PC" "Windows was my idea" - like f**k it was... They just steal from other companies and implement it into their own releasing it as "theirs"



Willard
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10 Dec 2009, 2:13 pm

Keith wrote:
It's like they are saying "PC = Windows ONLY" but that's not true. The Macs run on PC architecture thanks to the Intel processor!! !

I hate those adverts. "I'm a PC" "Windows was my idea" - like f**k it was... They just steal from other companies and implement it into their own releasing it as "theirs"


Microsoft's business model is based on stealing - Windows was ripped off from the Mac OS from day one. Unfortunately for the entire planet, it's architecture is based on a less stable Kernel, thus it crashes many times more frequently than Mac or Linux - and always will.

But for all their money, Microsoft's production standards remain at the Dollar Store Chinese import level. For several weeks now I've been diddling with a brand new iPod using iTunes software for Windows, and simultaneously reconfiguring an older Creative Zen mp3 player using Microsoft PlaysForSure (LOL!! !) firmware and Windows Media Player 11. Without writing a book about the WMP11 nightmares, suffice to say that while a few things about iTunes I might change, the comparison between the two is the difference between a Porsche 911 and a Ford Fiesta.

Guess which one is which? :evil:



Keith
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10 Dec 2009, 3:09 pm

I've had a Fiesta ;) When I finished with it, that thing would start on cold mornings with a couple rotations or not even a single rotation completed, it would run. So, I would side with the Fiesta :)

- am serious with that one...



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10 Dec 2009, 3:28 pm

Fuzzy wrote:
lau wrote:
I loathe the "I'm a PC" idea. I have no idea what it actually means. The best I can manage is that it is stating that the "people" uttering it are very simple AI constructs that run adequately well on a personal computer?


No they are models paid to say it. I wont comment on the simplicity of their design however!

However, I have encountered a regular person that parroted the line as badge of pride in his choice of operating systems. I wont comment on the simplicity of his design either.

Anyway. That is moot.

Is MS moving towards hardware marketing? I think so. It would be an interesting way to bank against slumping software sales.



Much like the pc and mac models are paid to say their lines in the mac comercials. I love the I'm A Pc comercials, showing that theres is noPC because they are as varied as the people taht use them.


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scubasteve
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20 Dec 2009, 11:37 am

Microsoft already has their hands in everything technology related, software, hardware, all of it. The only reason they don't build their own computers is they make so much money from licensing their software to third-party manufacturers that it wouldn't be worth it. They've been making peripherals like mice, keyboards and game controllers for many, many years. Right now their main target appears to be the search engine market.

"I'm a PC and I use Linux."



Fuzzy
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20 Dec 2009, 5:17 pm

scubasteve wrote:
The only reason they don't build their own computers is they make so much money from licensing their software to third-party manufacturers that it wouldn't be worth it.


Used to be. Windows and MSoffice are becoming an increasingly big portion of the falling cost of modern computers. Netbooks, for instance, hurt MS badly. You know they had losses a few quarters ago? First time ever.


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Meta
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21 Dec 2009, 2:50 am

The Get a Mac commercials at least make sense, the two actors are playing (anthropomorphically) a (MS Windows) PC and a Mac, so it make perfect sense when they say "I'm a Mac" or "I'm a PC".

The Microsoft "I'm a PC" doesn't make any sense: They let [b]users[/i] say that they are a PC?. I want to scream "No, you're not!" every time I hear it. Apple seems to have noticed this as well because in Elimination, at the end: After Mac's: "I'm a Mac", the user replies "I'm a Megan".

I think that Microsoft is in a very hard place. Apple has a smaller market share (when expressed in unit sales) but its almost all of the high-end, low-volume part of the market. Apple's revenue share (market share expressed in US$) is more then 25%. All the PC makers have effectively given up on the high-end market and are now concentrating on the low-end, high volume sales. It becomes increasingly difficult for MS to hide the price tab in the system price: Its easier to hide $100 Windows in a $700 PC then in a $200 PC. People already have a problem with buying software (They don't see the value of software, Windows was "free" with every new PC remember?).

I think Microsoft should, if it does not want to be become irrelevant, learn from Apple and become an integrated system company, developing both their own hardware and software. Take on Apple in the high-end market, make WinBox something people actually want to buy, and when you then want Windows you need to buy a WinBox from the Microsoft store. This would enable them to focus on developing a great user interface on hardware they picked out without having to support the most obscure stuff out there.

Let Asus, Dell, etc develop their own OSes (free advice: Use FreeBSD, not Linux, as basis; Include a webkit browser with a flash-blocker).



Fuzzy
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21 Dec 2009, 11:19 am

Meta I think your idea is bang on.

I never really thought about the idea that MS taught people to hold less value in software. I think you are right.

Moving to an integrated high end system would be the way to go.. but they have so much market share that even that would be a massive financial loss.

They certainly have a history of being their own worst enemy, dont they?


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Asp-Z
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21 Dec 2009, 11:45 am

I'm a Mac and Windows 7 was my idea.



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21 Dec 2009, 12:55 pm

I'm a Penguin.
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