Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Microsoft throws a ton of money at search engines, loses ground to Google.
- Thread starter joepunk
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I am think it is because of google. Right now everyone wants to unseat google. Yahoo and MS joined forces to try to work on it.
I would say look at google control over the same time span.
Doing a quick google search on the net for the stats on it in the past year. MSN as gone down around 3.2% and google as gone up 6.6%
hell pretty much everyone BUT google lost ground.
I would say look at google control over the same time span.
Doing a quick google search on the net for the stats on it in the past year. MSN as gone down around 3.2% and google as gone up 6.6%
hell pretty much everyone BUT google lost ground.
I dunno...a lot of words have been taken to that extent and just lost:
e.g. how many times when we say 'hoover' do we mean that we want to use a vacuum cleaner of the hoover brand?
No software I have ever seen from microstink has been all that, their search is no different. Google works.
As an American, I can assure you that I've never said I'm going to go 'Hoover' anything. Asking for a Kleenex, on the other hand...
Huh? Microsoft threw crazy money at something and it was a colossal failure? Say it ain't so!
Oh, wait...
http://www.zune.net:80/en-US/
http://www.xbox.com:80/en-US/
Oh, wait...
http://www.zune.net:80/en-US/
http://www.xbox.com:80/en-US/
Huh? Microsoft threw crazy money at something and it was a colossal failure? Say it ain't so!
Oh, wait...
http://www.zune.net:80/en-US/
http://www.xbox.com:80/en-US/
OK the Zune I agree with, but XBOX?
OK the Zune I agree with, but XBOX?
It lost a lot of money and its market share was about the same as the Gamecube at the end of the day. So yeah, it wasn't as large of a success as many people would like to remember.
i wasn't judging its quality, I was just mentioning from a financial standpoint that the Xbox didn't make a dime in its lifespan. I've never had either an Xbox nor a 360 so I can't make any judgements about whether or not it was/is a quality product.
Well at least the Xbox wasn't a peice of crap
The xbox set up the Xbox 360 so it COULD make a profit. As far as I know, the Xbox 360 is or soon will be making a profit.
OK the Zune I agree with, but XBOX?
Xbox is not profitable. Microsoft turns a profit only on Windows and software.
M$ never intended to even break even on the Xbox/360 project for at least 8 years and more than likely longer. M$ new it was going to be spending a lot of money to get into that market and m$ knew that they had to be willing to spend a ton of cash to even hope to stand up against Sony and Nintendo. M$ goal was to grab up some a good chunk of the market share and they did do that.
Making no profit on either the Xbox or the 360 does not mean that it was a failure. That goes double if they never intended to. They Xbox and the 360 are a successes in M$ eyes. They did exactly what they intended it to do and it complete the goals they set for it. M$ never intended to make a penny off of the Xbox or the 360 so because they lost money on them does not mean they are a failure.
The bottomline is that the Xbox and the Xbox 360 still lose money. And the bottomline is still the bottomline.
As for the Microsoft's silly attempt to "compete" with the Google search engine, have you actually tried to use its creation. It is a straight copy of the Google interface. However, it returns fewer hits on the items you search for--a lot fewer.
yes you still miss the entire point. The bottom line of the Xbox and 360 is they where intended to get M$ foot in the door of the market and give them a good foot hold which they both did.
If you think the only way for something to good is to make money then your understanding of business is pretty poor. A lot of things theses days are sold at a loss to either get some one in the door or plan on making more money later.
M$ planed on making money off of the Xbox project in the long term. Short term yeah it has not made many money yet but it short term. M$ made it crystal clear they are in it for the long haul so they will make money further down the road. The Xbox project right now is still considered a success to M$ because it still completely the goal M$ laid down for it and right now none of those goals are about making profit short term. So it rather hard for it to make money if they have no intention in the short term to do it. That is the bottom line. The Xbox project is a long term project.
I'll throw in my two cents here:
I think that any search engine that tries to go up against google is going to come out as the loser. Google has such a large market share, such a large fan base, such a great research departement, and such a great set of internet apps, that anyone who challanges it might as well be punching a brick wall.
As of right now, no one, (at least no one I have seen) has a better deal going then google. Granted the internet searching part is nominally different from engine to engine, but the software suite that google has just blows everything else out of the water.
I think that any search engine that tries to go up against google is going to come out as the loser. Google has such a large market share, such a large fan base, such a great research departement, and such a great set of internet apps, that anyone who challanges it might as well be punching a brick wall.
As of right now, no one, (at least no one I have seen) has a better deal going then google. Granted the internet searching part is nominally different from engine to engine, but the software suite that google has just blows everything else out of the water.
Can you imagine Apple selling iPods for five years without any "plan" for making money on the product? They'd be massacred by the critics and the markets. They'd be counted out for dead, and they'd deserve it. The astonishing fact remains that Microsoft has not developed a single, new profitable product since Windows and Office -- and not for want of trying. Microsoft's ineptitude is becoming legendary, and no amount of labeling perennially unprofitable products "a success" is going to change that.
I thought that the 360's were suppose to start making a profit after a year or so. Maybe I was wrong?
You might be correct, and I believe Microsoft's Xbox division may have made a modest profit during the last Christmas season. But that is still a negative for the year and follows years of huge losses.
Oh my! I think I opened up a whole can of worms I never meant to. But I'd have to agree with IJ Reilly- other companies that attempt to make products, which are not intended to make a profit, would suffer a storm of riducule, stocks dropping like the Hindenburg, and a perpetual guilotine for all the execs that stood behind this product. Microsoft, on the other hand, has the advantage of having deep enough pockets, where they truly don't give a crap whether or not their products succeed- if it's a success, Great! More money in the coffers, if not, then F-it, at least we tried.
The original X-Box was a financial failure, but the fact that it was never meant to be a success somehow justifies it now....
I think few would argue that the dominant (and likely "better product") from the last generation of consoles was the PS2. Likewise, the Wii seems to be cleaning the house this go-around, despite what Sony execs say (I want my $8000, Mr. Tretton!). The Zune... well, no comment.
While I wouldn't argue with all the die-hard X-box game enthusiasts (it's a pointless debate, really, with no clear answer as to which is the "superior" console), and that was never the intention of my original post, I did want to point out that this seems to be ongoing trend at M$- poor money down a pipe dream, and hope it makes a dent.
The original X-Box was a financial failure, but the fact that it was never meant to be a success somehow justifies it now....
I think few would argue that the dominant (and likely "better product") from the last generation of consoles was the PS2. Likewise, the Wii seems to be cleaning the house this go-around, despite what Sony execs say (I want my $8000, Mr. Tretton!). The Zune... well, no comment.
While I wouldn't argue with all the die-hard X-box game enthusiasts (it's a pointless debate, really, with no clear answer as to which is the "superior" console), and that was never the intention of my original post, I did want to point out that this seems to be ongoing trend at M$- poor money down a pipe dream, and hope it makes a dent.
depends. Apple did not exactly have money to burn with the iPod. Plus if apple had a long term plan in place critics would of let them. Clearly critic did not rip into M$ for losing money on the Xbox. As some one pointed out the 360 made money over Christmas which means the xbox project is now working in it long term goals as a long term money maker. Plus the money M$ burned into was pocket change and they did not really care about it.
You know the PS2 was at a loss for quite a while after it was released. It took it over a year to even break even and in the end was making money for Sony. I would not be surprised if it was not until the PS2 that Sony even broken even on the PlayStation.
M$ clearly was thinking 8-9 year down the road and saw the consul where gaming was heading and intended to be part of that when there was an opening and they clearly did that. The original Xbox entire point was to get a good foot hold in the market and M$ went about it the quickest and easiest way to do it and that was pretty much burn quite a bit of money to lock up part of the market.
A lot of companies will loss money on a product knowingly to gain it back in the end and then some. To m$ all that money sent on the Xbox project was an investment in the future. Microsoft gaming division is pulling in money. They have been for years.
M$ has made a lot of profitable products though it companies. Quite of a few of them computer games.
Sorry, but I can't make much sense of this reasoning. First, Apple did have a lot of money to burn on the iPod -- billions, in fact, if they'd wanted to. Second, if Apple had lost money on the product for years, the losses would show up on the company's bottom line, which the markets do not forgive. The markets don't much care what any company says about their future plans, especially years down the road -- it's results that matter.
Microsoft has two profitable divisions: Windows and Software. That's it. Everything else to date represents red ink. If not for the bags of cash they rake in on Windows and Software, they could not dump huge sums into fiscal black holes like the Xbox, Zune, MSN, etc.