Posted on 07/19/2013 7:38:31 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Microsoft is down 8.6% this morning. The stock has been doing worse and worse since the company released earnings. Initial reaction to the release sent the stock down 2.5%. Then it was 5%, then 6% ... and now it's down over 8%.
Microsoft's Windows business is finally feeling the effect of the collapse of the PC industry, and the failure of Windows 8 to slow the iPad.
The Windows division's operating income was down 55% on a year-over-year basis, which dragged down the company's EPS. It also took a $900 million charge on the Surface RT, its iPad-wannabe tablet.
After posting earnings, Microsoft CFO Amy Hood told Dina Bass at Bloomberg, "it will take a long time" for Microsoft to make enough off tablets to erase the losses in the traditional PC market.
Microsoft's enterprise businesses remain strong, but that's not enough to keep investors happy.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
XP and Windows 7 are still “good enough”.
Coworker of mine bought a Surface. Really nice tablet, but just doesn’t have the app availability of the iPad. If I had money to burn, I’d own one.
Well, when they put out a crap product like WIndows 8, there will be a reckoning...
Didn’t know about the NSA thing. That pisses me off. However, I agree with above poster that Windows won’t be going away any time soon.
Easy win.
Unfortunately I had to go back to (and switch all my family’s computers back to) IE10
The New Version Of Firefox 22 can’t size webpages correctly (the way too big) and Opera for some God only knows reason removed the drop down button from the address bar so common recent websites have to be typed in.
The fixes in Config don’t work and are too complicated for my family to be playing around with
I won’t use anything by Google
So I am stuck with IE10
I find it odd that you used an apostrophe to indicate pluralization most people would use -es... though the correct plural of virus is virii.
I purchased an Apple MacBook in 2008 and never looked back. Screw Microsoft! Apple all the way.
Um, Apple is involved in the NSA spying too. Just as Google is.
Well that is if you would rather spend your time getting your work done rather then having to deal with the numerous virus’ that you get from Microsoft products.
Actually I've only had a few virus infections (maybe 3 in the past decade; all exactly due to my actions), seriously not enough time wasted to say that it impairs the ability to work. The fragility of Unix/Linux (esp file permission/ownership) is far more of a work-stopping irritant.
Aside from my personal feelings about Microsoft the evil borg...
* Their shares yield 2.8% at the current price
* Their payout ratio is in the 35% area
* They have bucketfuls of cash
* They made bucketfuls of money last quarter (just not as much as the analysts expected)
* They have some “issues” to work out, but it’s far from clear they don’t have the corporate resources to work ‘em out
* Their return on equity, return on assets, and return on investment are all three in the stratosphere... a sign of a company that knows what to do with its resources
I think I’m gonna pick up a hundred or so at this price. It’s been a long time since I have traded MSFT.
lol I know right! We just finished our yearly MS licensing true-up and I wonder how their stock could dropped after that lol. We pay that company seven figures a year...
But they are not furious at google or FB or others?
>> Well, when they put out a crap product like WIndows 8, there will be a reckoning...
Yeah, and it’s called “Windows 8.5”. :-)
I like mine. Still getting used to changes but so far I like it...and I don’t do “change” well.
I think that’s exactly it. Not to mention that Win 7 is really a very good operating system - why upgrade anything?
Unfortunately, I will have to upgrade my desktop as they are stopping all XP support as of April 2014.
Meh. Analysts are manipulators and the stock market is prone to overreaction when their own ridiculous estimates (based on listening to analysts) don’t pan out.
Microsoft isn’t going anywhere any time soon - certainly not in the enterprise. They may not hold as dominant of a position in the consumer market as they used to, and that will affect the bottom line, but it’s nonsense to say that Microsoft is “collapsing”.
“Actually I’ve only had a few virus infections (maybe 3 in the past decade; all exactly due to my actions), seriously not enough time wasted to say that it impairs the ability to work.”
Yep. I do IT support for a pretty much windows-only environment, and let me tell you, the same users get the viruses over and over, while everyone else rarely if ever gets infected. So, maybe for one of those users who just can’t resist clicking every link, opening every questionable email, and installing worthless “free” software, Mac is a good option. Call it “idiot proof”.
There’s another option: just rollback to IE9. Works for me and my business. In fact, we can’t use IE10, because our main web interface for our ASP-hosted application doesn’t work on IE10.
That statement may be why Microsoft stock if off 10%. Like Vista, Windows 8 is another unpopular version of Windows. Instead of focusing on what PC users want, Microsoft was distracted by what tablet users want, and tried to appease them with an operating system that seemed, to its product managers at least, to combine the features of a typical tablet OS and user interface with a desktop or notebook OS.
The fact new PCs with downgrade rights to Windows 7 are widely available in the market speaks volumes about how much users want Windows 8. As does your comment, and the choices of thousands of IT professionals.
The PC market would be much stronger if Microsoft was as innovative in PC oriented OS features as the vendors of tablet OS software are. Simply adopting tablet OS features, gluing them on top of a desktop OS, and calling in Windows 8 isn't enough.
Running around clicking everything that says Run Me
is indeed a stupid modus operandi — in my cases it was usually trying to get cracks to now-defunct software whose documentation/SNs disappeared.
The market is reaching saturation with satisfied customers. There are a LOT of good, used computers on the market, and Windows 7 made many of us happy with what we’ve got. This translates to what has happened in the marketplace: fewer new computer sales.
I have a MacbookPro for my travels, and I have a dual monitor screaming PC for my desktop. I like the security of the Mac, and the open, wild multi-programs on my PC. I’m living the best of both worlds.
Apple is reaching the same point, iPads, iPhones and MacBooks from 3 or 4 years ago are still ‘good enough.’
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