Is tomorrow’s event one of Microsoft’s last “big launches?”

November 6, 2005 By

There’s changes afoot inside Microsoft. Bill and Steve have been repeating in the press that Microsoft needs to ship software faster. At Mind Camp this weekend a couple of people asked me what that meant. To me it means “don’t take big dependencies.”

See, SQL Server hasn’t shipped in several years. Why not? Because they added the .NET Framework deep inside SQL Server. Now, these aren’t two small teams that met once over pizza and beer and decided to do this. No, these are two HUGE businesses. It’d be like if GM and Toyota got together and decided to do a new project together with each other’s technology.

It is that sizeable and that important.

So, is this one of Microsoft’s last “big launches?” Looks like it will be for quite a while.

That said, tomorrow’s events will be on video on either the Launch Tour 2005 Knowledge Center or the Microsoft Speeches and Keynotes page.

Filed Under: development, Geeks, Microsoft Office
  • http://www.spaces.msn.com/topsunlimited alijah

    sorry to get off the subject but look at this is a hugh spot missing out off the earth. http://virtualearth.msn.com/default.aspx?cp=40.670355|-83.656868&style=h&lvl=10&v=1

  • http://www.spaces.msn.com/topsunlimited alijah

    sorry to get off the subject but look at this is a hugh spot missing out off the earth. http://virtualearth.msn.com/default.aspx?cp=40.670355|-83.656868&style=h&lvl=10&v=1

  • http://patrick.geek.nz/ Patrick Q-G

    Will Vista not be just as big? We’ve been waiting almost as long…

    At least there have been betas out in the real world of SQL Server 2005 for what, the last 3 years? Progress on this product has been far more obvious, and one of the few Microsoft products I’ve been really waiting for.

  • http://patrick.geek.nz/ Patrick Q-G

    Will Vista not be just as big? We’ve been waiting almost as long…

    At least there have been betas out in the real world of SQL Server 2005 for what, the last 3 years? Progress on this product has been far more obvious, and one of the few Microsoft products I’ve been really waiting for.

  • http://peterdawson.typepad.com/ /pd

    Methinks MSFT is on the cusp of upsetting the apple cart !!

    Scobles, its not the last- its the beginning of a new paradigm.

    After the DOJ situtation MSFT did a reboot. However, I think that there was stealth statergy ingrained into the vision.

    Platform 12, code magneto , live.com are just psudo paradigm for what’s yet to come !! … And there cario and other foo which is yet to be evaluated.

    Scobles , if I may- I would like to call you on this round !! After all, you should be (knowing) what is the roadmaps of projEcts and @launches@ , so what’s coming between Q1/06 and Q4/08 ??

    Let the community benchmark (your) insight to actual deliverable of MSFT.

  • http://peterdawson.typepad.com /pd

    Methinks MSFT is on the cusp of upsetting the apple cart !!

    Scobles, its not the last- its the beginning of a new paradigm.

    After the DOJ situtation MSFT did a reboot. However, I think that there was stealth statergy ingrained into the vision.

    Platform 12, code magneto , live.com are just psudo paradigm for what’s yet to come !! … And there cario and other foo which is yet to be evaluated.

    Scobles , if I may- I would like to call you on this round !! After all, you should be (knowing) what is the roadmaps of projEcts and @launches@ , so what’s coming between Q1/06 and Q4/08 ??

    Let the community benchmark (your) insight to actual deliverable of MSFT.

  • http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/ scobleizer

    That’s why I’ve said “one of.”

  • http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/ scobleizer

    /pd: I learned with Longhorn never to try to predict when software is coming out.

  • http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/ scobleizer

    That’s why I’ve said “one of.”

  • http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/ scobleizer

    /pd: I learned with Longhorn never to try to predict when software is coming out.

  • http://edico.blogspot.com/ Stefan Constantinescu

    Yes I too am confused, I thought the Vista launch was going to monumental.

  • http://edico.blogspot.com/ Stefan Constantinescu

    Yes I too am confused, I thought the Vista launch was going to monumental.

  • Stan

    You’re forgetting two key reasons why it took SQL so long to ship. First, the same guys who built SQL were tasked with building the new file system for Windows (the one NOT in Vista) and that caused no end of internal conflict within that team. Second, during that time there was a clear and visible lack of leadership. So the conflict went on too long, and the product schedule paid the price. But I’m glad that the product is shipping now.

    Btw, I agree with those who say Vista will be a huge launch event as well. Can’t imagine a release that significant passing quietly into the market.

  • Stan

    You’re forgetting two key reasons why it took SQL so long to ship. First, the same guys who built SQL were tasked with building the new file system for Windows (the one NOT in Vista) and that caused no end of internal conflict within that team. Second, during that time there was a clear and visible lack of leadership. So the conflict went on too long, and the product schedule paid the price. But I’m glad that the product is shipping now.

    Btw, I agree with those who say Vista will be a huge launch event as well. Can’t imagine a release that significant passing quietly into the market.

  • http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/ scobleizer

    Stefan: you guys aren’t careful readers. I said “one of.”

    That means there is probably another large launch coming. :-)

  • http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/ scobleizer

    Stefan: you guys aren’t careful readers. I said “one of.”

    That means there is probably another large launch coming. :-)

  • http://www.nslg.net/blog Adam Carstens

    Hey, off topic but interesting nonetheless: tomorrow’s WSJ: “DUBLIN — A law firm’s office on a quiet downtown street here houses an obscure subsidiary of Microsoft Corp. that helps the computer giant shave at least $500 million from its annual tax bill.

    The four-year-old subsidiary, Round Island One Ltd., has a thin roster of employees but controls more than $16 billion in Microsoft assets. Virtually unknown in Ireland, on paper it has quickly become one of the country’s biggest companies, with gross profits of nearly $9 billion in 2004.”

    Interesting maneuver, Microsoft.

  • http://www.nslg.net/blog Adam Carstens

    Hey, off topic but interesting nonetheless: tomorrow’s WSJ: “DUBLIN — A law firm’s office on a quiet downtown street here houses an obscure subsidiary of Microsoft Corp. that helps the computer giant shave at least $500 million from its annual tax bill.

    The four-year-old subsidiary, Round Island One Ltd., has a thin roster of employees but controls more than $16 billion in Microsoft assets. Virtually unknown in Ireland, on paper it has quickly become one of the country’s biggest companies, with gross profits of nearly $9 billion in 2004.”

    Interesting maneuver, Microsoft.

  • http://edico.blogspot.com/ Stefan Constantinescu

    Robert: whoops, this is why you shouldn’t stay up till 2 AM studying for american history :(

    I hope the ad campaign for this OS will be huge! you need something catchy like centrino.

  • http://edico.blogspot.com/ Stefan Constantinescu

    Robert: whoops, this is why you shouldn’t stay up till 2 AM studying for american history :(

    I hope the ad campaign for this OS will be huge! you need something catchy like centrino.

  • Christopher Coulter

    It’s hardly a BIG launch….SQL, no great rush yet. VS and BizTalk, isolated markets, “big” but niche. They had to cluster them just to get someone to pay much attention. And you forgetting the Xbox 360 launch?

  • Christopher Coulter

    It’s hardly a BIG launch….SQL, no great rush yet. VS and BizTalk, isolated markets, “big” but niche. They had to cluster them just to get someone to pay much attention. And you forgetting the Xbox 360 launch?

  • Christopher Coulter

    Can I predict the rallying cry for tomorrow? “Wait till Orca”, “MySQL 5.0 for free”. ;)

  • Christopher Coulter

    Can I predict the rallying cry for tomorrow? “Wait till Orca”, “MySQL 5.0 for free”. ;)

  • http://hunterstrat.com/news/?p=326 Microsoft News Tracker » Blog Archive » Today’s the big day for VS 2005, SQL Server 2005, BizTalk 2006 and more

    [...] Robert Scoble has a puzzling post asking if this is one of Microsoft’s last big launches since the new mantra is more agile development. The basic point is fine, but I’d be very surprised if next year’s planned Vista launch wasn’t huge. Finally, I doubt we’ll hear about the VS 2005 quality complaints.   [Permalink] [...]

  • http://little.xmtp.net/blog/ Jay R. Wren

    Funny example. GM and Toyota DID do a joint project with shared technology. The Toyota Matrix and Pontiac Vibe are the same car using a mix of technology from the two companies. I can’t say for sure, but I think the designed and brought to market the product in less than five years.

    To Microsoft’s credit, most of its software offerings are far more complex systems than an automobile.

  • http://little.xmtp.net/blog/ Jay R. Wren

    Funny example. GM and Toyota DID do a joint project with shared technology. The Toyota Matrix and Pontiac Vibe are the same car using a mix of technology from the two companies. I can’t say for sure, but I think the designed and brought to market the product in less than five years.

    To Microsoft’s credit, most of its software offerings are far more complex systems than an automobile.

  • Christopher Coulter

    Well, never mind on the 360…BIG launch, BIG Marketing, yes. Product? No. Of course the fanboys are going “engineered conspiracy”, when it just the usual Microsoft Launch trainwreck.

    http://www.ferrago.com/story/6834

    “Gamespot are today reporting that with Microsoft already admitting publicly that they underestimated the challenge of the worldwide launch shortly to be attempted by the new Xbox 360 console, numerous unit shortages and supply problems are already being predicted, and more. The system is out on November 22nd in North America, December 2nd in Europe, and December 10th in Japan. Senior Xbox chiefs have also admitted they might not have opted for a worldwide debut had they known the supply issues they would be faced with, especially given the amount of marketing the launch will be accompanied by.”

  • Christopher Coulter

    Well, never mind on the 360…BIG launch, BIG Marketing, yes. Product? No. Of course the fanboys are going “engineered conspiracy”, when it just the usual Microsoft Launch trainwreck.

    http://www.ferrago.com/story/6834

    “Gamespot are today reporting that with Microsoft already admitting publicly that they underestimated the challenge of the worldwide launch shortly to be attempted by the new Xbox 360 console, numerous unit shortages and supply problems are already being predicted, and more. The system is out on November 22nd in North America, December 2nd in Europe, and December 10th in Japan. Senior Xbox chiefs have also admitted they might not have opted for a worldwide debut had they known the supply issues they would be faced with, especially given the amount of marketing the launch will be accompanied by.”

  • Peter Dampier

    MS has been shipping software fast… The team I’m in ‘eHome’ has released four releases of Windows XP Media Center Edition in 4 years… Even OS X isn’t released as frequently as that.

  • Peter Dampier

    MS has been shipping software fast… The team I’m in ‘eHome’ has released four releases of Windows XP Media Center Edition in 4 years… Even OS X isn’t released as frequently as that.

  • http://lazycoder.com/ Scott

    “To Microsoft’s credit, most of its software offerings are far more complex systems than an automobile.”

    Oh yeah? Ever kill a child because you made an ugly UI for your application? Comparing a software development company to an automobile company is like comparing your local little league team to the World series champs.

    Think about someone you know who doesn’t own a computer, or who doesn’t own one less than 5 years old. Do they own a car? Multiple cars?

    As far as complexity, todays cars are much more sophisticated than todays computers or applications. When you are writing applications to take advantage of the airflow through your computer, you’ll be approaching the complexity of a car.

  • http://lazycoder.com Scott

    “To Microsoft’s credit, most of its software offerings are far more complex systems than an automobile.”

    Oh yeah? Ever kill a child because you made an ugly UI for your application? Comparing a software development company to an automobile company is like comparing your local little league team to the World series champs.

    Think about someone you know who doesn’t own a computer, or who doesn’t own one less than 5 years old. Do they own a car? Multiple cars?

    As far as complexity, todays cars are much more sophisticated than todays computers or applications. When you are writing applications to take advantage of the airflow through your computer, you’ll be approaching the complexity of a car.

  • Goebbels

    “Stefan: you guys aren’t careful readers. I said “one of.”

    That means there is probably another large launch coming.”

    Actually, Scoble, you are missing your own: “Looks like it will be for quite a while.”

    So… either (1) you have no idea what’s coming out, (2) subsequent releases will not be “big”, or (3) any big launches will not occur for quite a while.

    According to your own words.

  • Goebbels

    “Stefan: you guys aren’t careful readers. I said “one of.”

    That means there is probably another large launch coming.”

    Actually, Scoble, you are missing your own: “Looks like it will be for quite a while.”

    So… either (1) you have no idea what’s coming out, (2) subsequent releases will not be “big”, or (3) any big launches will not occur for quite a while.

    According to your own words.

  • PatriotB

    Kudos for MS for finally shipping VS 2005.

    Unfortunately I won’t be upgrading. 64-bit support is curiously limited to Professional+ editions, not Standard. (What marketing moron decided that mobile development, available in Standard edition, is more important than 64-bit development?! And people wonder why there aren’t more apps for Windows x64…)

    So I’ll stick with Visual C++ 6 and the Platform SDK’s free 64-bit compiler. Amazing that the $50 product I paid for back in 1999 is still my primary development tool and still working fine.

  • PatriotB

    Kudos for MS for finally shipping VS 2005.

    Unfortunately I won’t be upgrading. 64-bit support is curiously limited to Professional+ editions, not Standard. (What marketing moron decided that mobile development, available in Standard edition, is more important than 64-bit development?! And people wonder why there aren’t more apps for Windows x64…)

    So I’ll stick with Visual C++ 6 and the Platform SDK’s free 64-bit compiler. Amazing that the $50 product I paid for back in 1999 is still my primary development tool and still working fine.

  • Robertus

    ““To Microsoft’s credit, most of its software offerings are far more complex systems than an automobile.”

    Oh yeah? Ever kill a child because you made an ugly UI for your application? Comparing a software development company to an automobile company is like comparing your local little league team to the World series champs.”

    Ever had to reboot your car while traveling at 70MPH-with a tractor trailer tailgating??? I don’t want MS anywhere near my car, my dishwasher, and most other devices in my life. “Jack of all trades & Master of none”….I’d prefer to buy the best from specialists in each area… At least then I’d have less fear of resource/priority conflicts within a single vendor causing me to suffer version #.0 issues throughout every facet of my daily life!

  • Robertus

    ““To Microsoft’s credit, most of its software offerings are far more complex systems than an automobile.”

    Oh yeah? Ever kill a child because you made an ugly UI for your application? Comparing a software development company to an automobile company is like comparing your local little league team to the World series champs.”

    Ever had to reboot your car while traveling at 70MPH-with a tractor trailer tailgating??? I don’t want MS anywhere near my car, my dishwasher, and most other devices in my life. “Jack of all trades & Master of none”….I’d prefer to buy the best from specialists in each area… At least then I’d have less fear of resource/priority conflicts within a single vendor causing me to suffer version #.0 issues throughout every facet of my daily life!

  • http://oakleafblog.blogspot.com/ Roger Jennings

    The joint venture between GM and Toyota is New United Motors, Inc. (NUMMI, http://www.nummi.com/) and is located at the south end of Fremont on I-880 and Fremont Blvd.

    -rj

  • http://oakleafblog.blogspot.com/ Roger Jennings

    The joint venture between GM and Toyota is New United Motors, Inc. (NUMMI, http://www.nummi.com/) and is located at the south end of Fremont on I-880 and Fremont Blvd.

    -rj

  • Hottestbrain

    robertus & scott
    MS is already in several cars, and since we’re comparing things like this: Cars crash due to human errors, so do computers. If you’re so stupid that you’re not able to get a system working perfectly on windows XP you shouldn’t be watching all those porn sites… Off course windows 95&98&ME are disasters, but hey, 2K and XP rule… so does MS. don’t get me wrong, I hate their scandalous money hungry attitude, but the sofware they make is f**k*ng good…

    (Sorry ’bout my English, I’m European…

  • Hottestbrain

    robertus & scott
    MS is already in several cars, and since we’re comparing things like this: Cars crash due to human errors, so do computers. If you’re so stupid that you’re not able to get a system working perfectly on windows XP you shouldn’t be watching all those porn sites… Off course windows 95&98&ME are disasters, but hey, 2K and XP rule… so does MS. don’t get me wrong, I hate their scandalous money hungry attitude, but the sofware they make is f**k*ng good…

    (Sorry ’bout my English, I’m European…

  • Christopher Coulter

    That was a launch? Zero news impact.

  • Christopher Coulter

    That was a launch? Zero news impact.