Microsoft's Steve Ballmer To Retire In 12 Months

[Slash2x]

Is his head photoshopped onto that body? The skin color is wrong in like a perfect straight line. It's weird.

Eh, you could do a lot worse than Ballmer. I've enjoyed Microsoft's recent trend toward innovation, good or bad.

It's a shadow, cast by a lamp behind his right shoulder, quite likely the light generated by whatever slide show is up on the screen. You'll notice his ear and cheek are also noticeably lighter than his face.

Am curious though, whether he's retiring, or that the disastrous Xbone announcement was cause for the board to go head-hunting.

I am thinking given the bulging neck muscles and visible veins... He is just REALLY EXCITED or angry and that is making his face flush....

 

[Kargathia]

Is his head photoshopped onto that body? The skin color is wrong in like a perfect straight line. It's weird.

Eh, you could do a lot worse than Ballmer. I've enjoyed Microsoft's recent trend toward innovation, good or bad.

It's a shadow, cast by a lamp behind his right shoulder, quite likely the light generated by whatever slide show is up on the screen. You'll notice his ear and cheek are also noticeably lighter than his face.

Am curious though, whether he's retiring, or that the disastrous Xbone announcement was cause for the board to go head-hunting.

I am thinking given the bulging neck muscles and visible veins... He is just REALLY EXCITED or angry and that is making his face flush....

The heavy lighting alone would account for his face being flush, but do keep in mind that the skin above the neck arteries would be the first to redden up when flushed.

 

[Vivid Kazumi]

Gotta love the mandatory "sinking ship"comments.Mostly because the outcomes tend to be the opposite.

ot:Not really surprising,all cosidering the talks of balmer retiring way before the x1 was annouced.

 

[SomebodyNowhere]

Every time I hear his name, I either think of that old commercial or this...

only thing I think of is how fond he was of Developers

 

[neppakyo]

Good riddance.

Doubt he'll pick someone who knows what they're doing, atleast his damage is limited to the next 12 months. He's certainly did his best to wreck MS. To think, a decade ago they were #1 with 500+ billion, now surpased by Apple, google, and facebook, and worth roughly 200 billion or so.

 

[Vie]

Is it bad that my first thought upon reading this earlier today was to get this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHQLQ1Rc_Js

You know, just to be ready for when the day finally comes.

The man has been nothing but a disaster for MS, and by extension for the tech industry as a whole. With fiasco after disaster, from Zune, to Kin, Surface to Metro and Office 365. The sooner he's gone, the better off we all are.

 

[Shamanic Rhythm]

Thank Christ. The man is regularly cited as one of the worst CEOs in the business.

 

[faefrost]

Is his head photoshopped onto that body? The skin color is wrong in like a perfect straight line. It's weird.

Eh, you could do a lot worse than Ballmer. I've enjoyed Microsoft's recent trend toward innovation, good or bad.

It's a shadow, cast by a lamp behind his right shoulder, quite likely the light generated by whatever slide show is up on the screen. You'll notice his ear and cheek are also noticeably lighter than his face.

Am curious though, whether he's retiring, or that the disastrous Xbone announcement was cause for the board to go head-hunting.

The XBone was more the icing on the cake. The near billion $ loss on Surface and the probably even worse losses on Windows 8 are the key issues. MS has made less on the entire XBox project from day one, than they lost in a few months on the Surface. The board is also getting nervous that MS's sudden push towards consumer products is driving away their otherwised more locked in business and enterprise customers, who form the bulk of MS's profits.

 

[Roxas1359]

It's like my prayers have been answered all in one news announcement.
Seriously, Steve Ballmer has been running Microsoft to the ground for awhile now and not even his board really likes him. Heck he has a 53% approval rating from his own employees. Let's hope that whoever takes over can start to try and get MS on a better path again.

 

[DiamanteGeeza]

Every time I hear his name, I either think of that old commercial or this...

This still makes me not know whether to laugh or be speechless.

And I mean, for crying out loud, if you're going to leap around like a maniac for a minute, at least make sure you're fit enough to do so without looking and sounding like you're about to have a heart attack when you stop.

 

[RA92]

Eh, XBox might fail, Windows 8 might fail, Surface might fail, it really doesn't matter at the end of the day. MS has its majority of revenue coming in from Office, the OS used in workplaces (still most running on XP) and Server and Tools. All of these because of the monopoly that Gates created decades ago. All these divisions are still profitable because of backward compatibility, because it's tough retraining employees to use a new interface. MS is still going strong because of its past, not because of any new direction Ballmer has tried (and failed) to take it (even the XBox360 revenues are nascent compared to the Office revenues). MS is profitable in spite of its CEO, not because of him, and any other tech company with no steady revenues to fall back on would have been sunk by these missteps years ago.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

Eh, XBox might fail, Windows 8 might fail, Surface might fail, it really doesn't matter at the end of the day. MS has its majority of revenue coming in from Office, the OS used in workplaces (still most running on XP) and Server and Tools. All of these because of the monopoly that Gates created decades ago. All these divisions are still profitable because of backward compatibility, because it's tough retraining employees to use a new interface. MS is still going strong because of its past, not because of any new direction Ballmer has tried (and failed) to take it (even the XBox360 revenues are nascent compared to the Office revenues). MS is profitable in spite of its CEO, not because of him, and any other tech company with no steady revenues to fall back on would have been sunk by these missteps years ago.

I don't know about those last two products remaining profitable. MS are trying to pull the 'you're renting our software' with on of the latest versions of Office and this is the latest version of Windows Server

That's right, they decided it would be a good idea to stick a touch-screen interface onto software for servers.

"The interface formally known as Metro" isn't a bad tablet interface, its just that desktops are the primary userbase for Windows.

 

[Strazdas]

I don't know about those last two products remaining profitable.

That's right, they decided it would be a good idea to stick a touch-screen interface onto software for servers.

"The interface formally known as Metro" isn't a bad tablet interface, its just that desktops are the primary userbase for Windows.

And the new office (365?) is an always-online deal to boot. Microsoft has kind of signed its own death warrant, and Ballmer knows it. so hes leaving the ship before it started sinking.

 

[Vhite]

NOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Go down with the ship you bastard!! You can't do this to the world, you both have to drown...

*sigh* Now you'll both just suffer longer apart.

Pirates don't do that. They hop on the ship, make some gimmicky decisions to gain quick money and loose reputation in long run (a.k.a. plunder) and then they swim off.

Good bye sweat man, you made me thoroughly dislike Microsoft.