Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer Takes Control Of Xbox Division

[Vivi22]

I can't think of a better person to put the final nails in the Xbone coffin.

 

[QUINTIX]

If all you know about Ballmer is a handful of out-there quotes, "DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS!," that alleged chair incident, and the Windows 1.0 parody commercial ala Tim & Eric's Awesome Show:

I suggest watching and reading an interview or three. He's brighter and far more, ahem, sober than many naysayers allege.

think about what MS has done since windows 95 (which was their last real entirely indigenous "big hit" as a company)
everything it has done.
eve-ry-thing.

Meanwhile, WinMoPho has taken 3rd place from Blackbery, so there's that.

 

[faefrost]

That was funny but I don't fully comprehend this.

Exactly how bad is Ballmer anyway? I figure from what people are saying that he's responsible for what M$ is today but can someone clarify what exactly defined him as a "Bad tech CEO", this is kind of the first time I've heard of his name before.

I've met the man. I sat in a small meeting with him and my bosses back in the 90's. (part of the Windows 95 rollout of all things, so I'm showing my age). He's a bad tech CEO, because he quite frankly isn't in any way shape or form a futurist. He has no actual vision. He's a used car salesman who hit it big, but has no concept of what the actual product is beyond how much margin it can bring. Gates was a dreamer. He could look at something and see it's place in the future. Balmer looks at something, asks if it has enough (pointless) bells and whistles to justify the price, stuffs it in a box, and ships it. The XBox 180 is almost a perfect representation of Balmers vision or lack thereof.

 

[Saulkar]

Hey! I think I recognise that nut.


Either way I think he would fit the part, now we just need to see how much he screws this up as I doubt the hole of shit the Xbone dug itself in is already too deep to dig its way out of.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

This must be a plot to drive everyone to PC gaming so they can actually boost Windows 8 Sales.

This could be the case, after all Project Spark is supposedly Windows 8 only but they've already tried this with Vista and Halo 2 and that failed miserably.

And taking into account Valve and other devs pushing Linux distros I can't really see it taking off all that much.

 

[Callate]

"Thank you, Don, for setting us on a path to completely redefine the entertainment industry. A path from which we almost immediately had to swerve, rather like a wasp's nest burst inside of our vehicle just as a semi truck jack-knifed into our lane while we were tripping on peyote, but a path none the less."

I guess the only real question is whether Mattrick was actually forced out or if things had become so unpleasant for him at Microsoft that taking the helm of a a money-hemorrhaging company that's become the poster boy for everything going wrong with social gaming actually sounded like the better option.

 

[Mr. Q]

So they pick a demented looking clone of Peter Boyle to be their temporary CEO? O_O

Fuck, Microsoft. You might as well hose the entire building down with kerosine and strike a road flare at this point.

 

[Evil Smurf]

It's stuff like this that keeps me an apple fanatic. They don't listen to consumers either, but at least they make things smooth and sexy. Also great Sony PR guys.

 

[Fox12]

"...most importantly, we expanded Xbox to go beyond great gaming to deliver all the entertainment people want - sports, music, movies, live television and much more."

Nice to see they have their priorities in order. I was worried the Xbox 1 was going to be a gaming console.

"The consoles are incredible all-in-one devices with built-in services that consumers love, including Bing, Xbox Live, Internet Explorer, SkyDrive and Skype."

Yes, because tech savvy consumers love internet Explorer. Almost as much as we love DRM, used game restrictions, and creepy spy cameras. Thank you for "redefining the game industry," Don Mattrick, we've truly lost a visionary.

 

[synobal]

This must be a plot to drive everyone to PC gaming so they can actually boost Windows 8 Sales.

Guess you read today's extra punctuation [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/extra-punctuation/10460-The-Tale-of-M-and-S] as well, huh?

No actually I hadn't, that is pretty funny. Honestly though I'm just being overly paranoid, MS just doesn't know how to make good business decisions.

 

[Xeorm]

here's a pretty good mainstream piece on what is wrong with Microsoft from my bookmarks: http://www.vanityfair.com/business/2012/08/microsoft-lost-mojo-steve-ballmer

it's well worth a read.

Huh, thanks for that. It was a very good read.

As to the topic, doesn't seem like it will change much. Xbone is a little too far gone to make signficant changes by now.

 

[Gxas]

Well, at least we know that the Xbox One will be focusing a lot on developers developers developers developers.

 

[Reincarnatedwolfgod]

...
so a man who either crazy, on drugs, or both will be replacing Don Mattrick. well this should be quite interesting.

 

[Monsterfurby]

"Services that consumers love, including Bing, Xbox Live, Internet Explorer..."

Hah! The man certainly has a sense for sarcasm!

Wait... you mean he's serious?

Oh dear...

[Obviously I know it's marketing speak, but come on, he's laying it on way too thick...]

 

[bat32391]

Wow! Right when I thought when I thought they couldn't fuck themselves anymore, they decide to whip out the dragon dildo and fuck themselves even harder. Well I hope they enjoy having a drugged up nutjob as a CEO, because I certainly will.

 

[Infernal Lawyer]

Am I the ONLY one who's noticed that the picture is quite clearly photo-shopped? Just saying...

OT: I feel rather ignorant, seeing as the comments here are calling this guy an idiot and a stoner and whatnot, since I've never heard of this guy, but if you guys think he's gonna fuck everything up, I'm not gonna say otherwise... After all, the 'third console curse' has finally reached Microsoft, and every time we thought the show was over someone else said something stupid...

"...most importantly, we expanded Xbox to go beyond great gaming to deliver all the entertainment people want - sports, music, movies, live television and much more."

Nice to see they have their priorities in order. I was worried the Xbox 1 was going to be a gaming console.

I think it's been long since established that games were designed as an afterthought...

"The consoles are incredible all-in-one devices with built-in services that consumers love, including Bing, Xbox Live, Internet Explorer, SkyDrive and Skype."

Yes, because tech savvy consumers love internet Explorer. Almost as much as we love DRM, used game restrictions, and creepy spy cameras. Thank you for "redefining the game industry," Don Mattrick, we've truly lost a visionary.

It's not the customer's job to decide what they want, but the businessman's job to tell them!

 

[Strazdas]

that picture.... brilliant.

Yeah, his anger management story is quite intruging and remidns me of another one. but in a sense of Xbone this means nothing realyl changed, one idiot was replaced by another.

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

Well, insert the typical response and interpretation of the photo here, but also - Don Mattrick didn't single-handedly design and market the Xbone. This is the product of a large number of people who thought all features were a good idea, or at the very least that they could sell them without people particularly noticing. This will probably not change anything in regards to the stupidity of their approach.

 

[irok]

Share holders were concerned? really? they aren't celebrating? cant even fathom why they think he was doing a good job when most of the internet thinks he's the devil incarnate.