MS makes money with windows. but they are going to have to cut their profit margins on each copy sold moving forward. with competitors beating them with price and software, people are wising up at a faster rate than ever.
Mobile is huge. though MS seems to have failed to grasp a major share of the market, what they have now is an indicator that they stand to profit in the coming days and years.
Surface is a confused product. doesn't know if it's a poorly designed laptop or a poorly designed tablet. Tries to do everything decently and ends up doing nothing great. Kill it.
Windows Phone and other devices (even tablets) that use this OS are viable. It's all in the execution. Hopefully the new CEO hires some hot shot engineers and designers who are risk takers, because he himself is no visionary (though you'll often find him holding his hands up in a mystical way while starting blankly ahead...).
Xbox is actually a core MS product and service now. Even on PCs and phones you'll find Xbox Music, Xbox Video, Xbox Live. It's a value add that will significantly hurt it's other offerings if stripped away. Not to mentioned the business as a whole actually is a decent contributor to Microsofts bottom line.
And then there is bing. you know why MS has bing? For one, the value add a as a service. But the real value is in advertising. MS makes good money off of the ads. Thats the same Model Google uses and it has serves them well. so well that they can afford to offer a bunch of half baked me-too services for free (if you call paying with your privacy free).
That brings us to Outlook.com. Tremendous service. One of the best email/PIM services out there right now. Value add and sort of a "halo" product. Not as robust as all the google services combined, but more clean, fast, and easy to use. Also without forcing you to sign your right to privacy away as a term of use (though the NSA and DHS probably make that a moot point with PRISM).
Elop is a pretty bad guy for the job. He presided over the sinking of Nokia simply because he made the mistake novices do - he saw the immediate in-your-face suitcase full of cash rather than thinking long-term implications and residuals. Now, we have major weird decisions on the Xbox side. not sure if he is responsible for it, but Titanfall shows a LOT of purchase intent by consumers. 2/3rds of the install base played the beta. Beyond that, there are lots of folks all over teh internetz simply waiting for this one game to buy the x1. the game would sell consoles. If the sales slowed too early, then go for it. but this preemptive strike seems either desperate or he's trying so hard that he misses the details.
i'm a fan of all the systems. And it would be sad to see the Xbox legacy go down because of some dope. The first Xbox was kind lame, but had decent graphics. The 360 was the most powerful and in my opinion, best console of its generation. And the X1 is pretty great too.
I have only one hope if somehow the Xbox becomes no more...
Dreamcast 2...
