This piece seems pretty spot-on all around. That said, I don't know anything about Mr. Nadella, but I have spent a significant chunk of time trying to use the Bing API from the Azure market, as well as competing products from Yahoo and Google. I found the Microsoft API to be significantly behind both competitors in features, performance, documentation, terms of use, and price. Even with Yahoo BOSS using Bing's index, it manages to offer significantly better search features, a lower price, and less restrictive terms. (You can't use the paid Bing search API if you run any ads other than the Bing network!) And neither one holds a candle to Google in most cases.
Anyway, but experience with Azure was deep rather than broad, but it was enough to give me a strong belief that if this represents the great hope for Microsoft's future, things aren't looking so bright.
I think it is spot-on right up to the conclusion, which I disagree with.
> The next ubiquity isn’t running on every device, it’s talking to every device.
I don't see how Gruber can come to this conclusion unless he has suddenly changed position and thinks the open web will eventually win out over native apps.
The problem, of course, is that for a company that wants to be Microsofts size, they _need_ to own the platform, because the platform owners have an incentive to limit their dependence on you and make sure that their cloud services work better on their platform. iMessage and Hangouts? Integrated. Skype? Not so.
The only way to "own" the platform owners is to have an essential, popular product that customers demand. As much as Microsoft would want to, they don't have such a product (perhaps Office in the business market, but that's about it).
> I don't see how Gruber can come to this conclusion unless he has suddenly changed position and thinks the open web will eventually win out over native apps.
How does his statement have anything to do with 'open web' vs. native apps? How many native apps do you use that have no 'cloud' component whatsoever?
Gruber isn't talking about Microsoft making a bunch of web applications, he's talking about them becoming a key player in the data services arena, i.e. offering a platform for providing data to both web applications and native applications alike.
I know he's not talking about web apps. But how is Microsoft going to be a dominant player providing services to apps running on platforms that are controlled by others?
Both Apple and Google want to control their own cloud platform, and they can make sure that their cloud solution is better integrated than Microsofts offerings on their own platforms. And at least Google knows how to do this kind of thing really, really well.
So my point is, unless one expects platforms / operating systems to overall become irrelevant (which some web proponents believe), I can't see how he can draw this conclusion in earnest. It's exactly the same argument he's criticized others for making time and time again with Apple, the only difference being that "Apple should give up their operating system, bundle Windows and only focus on hardware". Of course it's obvious today why that would have been a terrible idea.
All I can add is that, from a fairly n00by point of view, Windows Azure is easy to use and clear, AWS is messy and difficult. Also the free trial of Azure is brilliant, the AWS is so crippled it makes it feel like their whole service is lame.
Nail on the head. I eveluated both of them a month ago, and while functionality-wise thay seemed pretty much alike, usability-wise Azure kinda owned AWS all over the place.
Anyway, but experience with Azure was deep rather than broad, but it was enough to give me a strong belief that if this represents the great hope for Microsoft's future, things aren't looking so bright.