I’m no Microsoft “fanboy,” but have you ever noticed that when they release some half baked project with a promising future (Microsoft’s “Unified Communications Products”) they get a lot of grief (“Microsoft’s Phone Ambitions Face A Winding Road,” but when Google comes out with a half baked product with a promising future (Google’s “Presentations”), the media thinks it’s cool and they focus on the future potential (“Google Presentations…one more step in the right direction“).
Rain City Guide
Your Guide to the Seattle Real Estate Market
Google is in Seattle (and Microsoft is in California):
http://www.google.com/support/jobs/bin/static.py?page=why-wa-ki.html
Good point Joe, although Microsoft has been a lot slower to spread to other areas than Google and I’d say that Google’s “real” home is still in California.
I don’t think the difference is Seattle per se, but rather that Microsoft is seen as big and lumbering and Google is still the new kid on the block. I buy into it; I’m using Google Docs, but I’m certainly not using Microsoft “Unified Communications.”
Also, Google http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/10/google-tip-of-day-gadget.html is just plain cool. Whatnot with Gmail, and iGoogle and Google Earth, among the countless other projects they area always working on. They seem to gear themselves toward the being laid back and fun while still getting the job done (kind of like what we do here at Zolve). After all, have you seen the Googleplex? http://www.google.com/intl/en/corporate/culture.html
Another under-rated company in my opinion is http://www.point2agent.com. Canadian companies are frequently under-rated relative to their U.S. counterparts due to their cultural tendency to avoid self-promotion. Point2 is constantly leading and innovating in the real estate industry, and they are resonsible for great blogs like this one http://www.reliberation.com/blogs/howarda5/archive/2007/10/18/p2-owns-reliberation.aspx
Hey,
That could be because Google has never been out to take over the world and MAKE everyone use it’s monopoly produces. It may also be that Google does not have a very long history of sending produces to market half-baked at best, and following it with just as lame patches.
This has nothing to do with the fact that the evil war lord Bill runns his opperation from Seattle real estate.
It may have something to do with Google being founded on good deeds, as well as, profit as opposed to Billy who is only concerned with profit, profit, profit.
Comparing Microsoft to Google is like comparing the Yankees (MSFT) to the Red Sox (GOOG). They both have rich owners, with a lot of talented players, and they both want to win the World Series. The only real difference is that Microsoft has been a dominant player in the industry for about 15 years (while Google has only been a dominant for about 5 years). Besides, Microsoft & Yankees are used to higher standards people hold them to.
What’s really interesting to me is that the coverage on Slashdot seems to have gotten more balanced / Microsoft neutral in the past 2 years and people now view Google with a lot more skepticism & F.U.D. than in years past.
Robbie! You’re alive and posting!
I like the analogy.
It’s more amusing that a company with $40B in cash is pouring resources into half baked products that end up ababdoned after much fanfare. It’s almost unbelievable that a company with this kind of bank and standing in the industry still produces so much vaporware, year after year. Maybe it’s just that management can’t agree on a direction, so programs end up getting killed. Whatever the cause, they lack direction on providing innovative products while riding out the wave of their past success.