Run XP on a Mac? Cool!

John C. Welch, MacBU’s target audience is primarily the home user, which is why it was placed in the “*Home* and Entertainment” division (along with Xbox, PC games, MSN, and some other stuff). Maybe that division was renamed “Entertainment and Devices” after a reorg, but that division always had more stuff than “games”.

And the Office developers conference that you cite was about Windows Office 2007, VSTO, SharePoint and the like. It wasn’t about Mac Office, so what do you expect to be said about it other than what was said?

BTW, do you ever get tired of trolling here? Your routine is sooo tired.

Molly,

I’m well aware of the Mac BU’s primary audience. I’m well aware, better than you think, evidently, of why, and while there are some PR issues with the division it’s in, it’s not a totally bad choice.

You however, show absolutely no clue about where people use Office. if you think it’s a home product, think again. What use do Home users have for Exchange compatibility? None. None whatsoever. That’s a BUSINESS feature, in case you hadn’t heard. Luckily, over time, the Mac BU has realized that the whole “Macs don’t use Office in a business setting” is the codswaddle everyone has know it is for years.

Maybe you think that the only users of Office are in the home, but your perceptions do not in fact, define reality. I can point to quite a few large businesses and government installations with thousands of Office:Mac seats. Maybe you should do a little research on the users of Mac:Office before you tell someone intimately familiar with that product and its users who they are. And if you work for Microsoft, then your ignorance on the subject is, quite frankly, shameful, and you should be embarrassed to parade it about in such a way.

I understand what that Office conference was for. Obviously there was no place for Mac:Office there, other than Macworld, Microsoft senior leadership ignores the hell out of the Mac BU every chance they get. If you look at any time, outside of Macworld, that the Mac BU gets brought up to Microsoft Senior leadership, you get the same answer that Bill gave, or better yet, some prat in the Windows Mobile division goes off on a “We’ll kick the iPod’s ass any day now” rant. Even when it’s someone who works for Microsoft asking them about it. When was the last time you saw Microsoft senior leadership in public stand there and talk about the Mac BU in a way that shows they have a clue about the work that team does? I bet not since Bill was on the screen during the keynote in Macworld Boston in the late 90s.

As far as my trolling, I’m sorry, is there someone forcing you to read my comments? It’s certainly not me, I don’t really care. But just because you don’t like the reality of how Microsoft senior leadership acts when the Mac BU gets brought up, doesn’t mean it’s a good way to deal with it.

I think Apple finally got it and realizes that proprietary OSes are doomed. There is simply too much creativity loose in the world today to allow a single company to act as the enabler to what is possible with computers.

They have just recognized that and said “We’re out of here” to the OS space. I’m interested to see where they turn their focus.

Mirror-posted to my blog, with helpful illustration

Molly, I had to refrain from laughing out loud at your totally ridiculous post. You start prattling off Microsoft divisions like they actually mean something. Everyone in the company knows that each division is a veritable clusterfuck, so your distinctions are moot.

Stop getting pissy because Mac Office routinely trumps the Windows version (when Microsoft isn’t tieing its hands behind its back) and that the MacBU is probably one of the top 5 units working at Microsoft.

Man, the fucking ego on some of you Microsofties is obnoxious.

Durr, Molly’s a busy girl. She’s on a mission to ensure that we all know that Microsoft r00lz, everyone else droolz. Google:

“Molly C” Microsoft

and you’ll get the idea. Because when she trolls, it’s just being “Up with People!”, so it’s okay I guess. Whatever.

farlane.. off base.. this is a trojan horse..

if you think people won’t prefer os x to win xp, … then you must also think people won’t prefer Vista to XP..

which is lunacy.

Do you think boot camp will still work in August when Leopard will be in competition with Vista? Everything else being the same, Vista will have an advantage because it can run on the faster ‘cooler’ AMD chips.

http://techmba.blog.asu.edu

Cringely agrees with you, Mike. I’m still undecided but I can see a compelling case for the Trojan Horse argument.

I feel that non-gaming computer users would probably prefer OS X to XP, given the choice. As to Vista/XP, I would imagine that the newer OS would be preferable but I hardly care. Croquet!

@79 If the MacBU relied primarily on the home user for its revenue base, I’m quite certain MS would have put a bullet in that group’s head years ago.

Being a life long Microsofty I just bought my son a Macbook for college.

I investigated it after my home XP box crashed and I couldn’t get my licensed version of Office to re-install after re-building the computer. You’d think M$ would have come up with something better by now. It seems like everyone else is. I even install UBUNTU and Open Office and my kids couldn’t tell the difference.

I think it is cheaper than comparably equiped PCs which surprised me. The other big surprise it that it really did work right out of the box and is a blast to use.

BTW, the University requires windows machines to run their security related software and allows Mac’s to just plug in.

Buon luogo, congratulazioni, il mio amico!