OpenIDQuestioning Steve Ballmer
This morning I attended a half day briefing at Microsoft UK entitled “The Online Opportunity—What Makes a Successful Web 2.0 Start-Up?”. Despite the buzzword laden title the event was well worth the trip up from Brighton, mainly due to the Q&A with Steve Ballmer (a pretty rare opportunity).
Of the other speakers my favourite was Brent Hoberman of lastminute.com and more recently mydeco.com. He presented without slides, choosing instead to simply blasting through dozens of lessons he learnt working on lastminute.com, both when it was a plucky startup and once it had morphed in to a large public company. Thankfully Jeremy took copious notes.
I was lucky enough to get the opportunity to throw a question at Steve. I considered asking how he planned to lure open source developers (used to controlling their entire stack) back to Microsoft tools, but another question had touched on patents so instead I asked the following (paraphrased):
This event is all about encouraging startups—but one of the biggest problems a startup faces is that it’s almost impossible to invent anything without violating someone’s patent. Big companies can use their patent portfolios to defend themselves, but small companies have no way to fight back. It’s kind of like the Cold War.
Here are the points I can remember from Steve’s answer:
- The patent system (in the US) was designed for the industrial revolution and altered once to deal with the pharmaceutical industry. It hasn’t yet been updated for software, but some kind of change is obviously needed. That said, we shouldn’t throw the baby out with the bath water—patents are still needed to encourage innovation in both large and small companies.
- At the moment, it’s hard to say if small or big companies benefit most. Steve thinks it’s actually the smaller companies—it’s rare for a big company to crush a small company with a patent, but you often hear about small companies with a patent and nothing to lose going after the big guys.
- Microsoft are lobbying for patent reform both in the US and the European Union.
About half way through Steve’s talk the current favourite Microsoft demos got an airing: Popfly (a mashup editor written in Silverlight, reminiscent of Yahoo! Pipes), Seadragon and the awesome Photosynth. I hadn’t realised Photosynth was actually available for regular people to play with, although my attempts at getting it working with Parallels on my Mac have sadly failed.
I wouldn't get too excited about Photosynth - according to Scoble (http://scobleizer.com/2007/09/23/why-doesnt-micros oft-get-the-love/ )
"Yeah, Microsoft brought us the “Demo of the Year” last year: Photosynth. But what you didn’t read on TechCrunch is that it takes up to nine hours to process one set of images"
Ross - 2nd October 2007 12:35 - #
I'd be quite happy to set it running overnight on a set of images I'd taken if the results were even a tenth as cool as the demo.
Smaller companies don't benefit more from patents -- it's just that it's news when a five-man LLC gets to push around Microsoft; the reverse is unremarkable business as usual.
What, you mean he didn't say "a software patent is a cancer, that attaches itself, in an intellectual property sense, to anything it touches"?
Actually Microsoft is sincerely interested in patent reform. For example, in Microsoft v. AT&T, the Software Freedom Law Center filed an amicus brief on Microsoft's behalf.
Pushing for patent reform is in Microsoft's best interests -- billion dollar judgments are forcing them re-evaluate their stance. While they will not be calling for an abolishment of software patents, they are, strangely, an ally for reform.
Justin Bronn - 19th October 2007 13:00 - #
Loke to
Jake - 5th November 2007 06:58 - #
The hardest bit is the interface between business and technology, getting those people to talk to each other. You can’t just write down an idea and hand it over to the tech guys and get them to give you an estimate. Break it down and find out where the bottlenecks are and take them out. In small companies, you can have that dialogue. But big companies have so many layers that it’s hard to communicate.
Proflogistics - 7th November 2007 11:35 - #
Brilliant idea. Thanks for very interesting article. btw. I really enjoyed reading all of your articles. Its interesting to read ideas, and observations from someone elses point of view makes you think more. Greetings
Aukcje - 8th December 2007 12:01 - #
What, you mean he didn't say "a software patent is a cancer, that attaches itself, in an intellectual property sense, to anything it touches"????
aşk şiirleri - 14th February 2008 15:43 - #
What, you mean he didn't say "a software patent is a cancer, that attaches itself, in an intellectual property sense, to anything it touches"?
oyun - 14th February 2008 18:16 - #
Loke too..
Radyo Dinle - 15th February 2008 12:12 - #
thnks
Radyo Dinle - 15th February 2008 12:13 - #
very good site
Mike - 25th February 2008 21:41 - #
that looks really great :)
Ośrodki Wypoczynkowe - 27th February 2008 14:06 - #
I like it.
Przepisy - 27th February 2008 15:56 - #
Thanks Good stuf Thanks and greetings
Steve - 28th February 2008 09:27 - #
Hello, i think it's nice website. I found so many important things in here. Greetings, see you later :)
Frazeologizmy - 28th February 2008 15:36 - #
I have added to my bookmarks. Liked it. Thanks...
dantel - 12th April 2008 23:10 - #
thank you.
video izle - 29th April 2008 08:10 - #