Grossman family west

As the school year winds down and my sectionmates disperse for the summer, we’re experimenting with a Section Blog. The idea is that it’s a way for everyone to keep in touch with each other over the summer and after we graduate.

It will be interesting to see what becomes of this blog: it sort of flips the blog model on its head (in the blogs I read, one person has the conch and everyone else can only comment). This new model is more of a “blog as a newsgroup.” We can still comment, but we might also just talk past each other.

We’ll see.

joel

OK, I can’t prove that it was because I blogged about it, but you can’t prove that it didn’t have to do with my blog…

Microsoft has officially reversed its decision and now publicly supports the WA state Gay Rights Bill.

Now I can wear all those morale t-shirts again. A small step forward for Microsoft, a giant leap backwards for my sense of fashion.

joel

Steve Ballmer’s recent memo to Microsoft employees explaining the policy reversal on support of the antidiscrimination bill for gay people is a failure of corporate leadership and accountability.
(If you’re not familiar with the issue, here’s an NYTimes article.)

This is not a black and white issue. Every CEO has a very real obligation to stockholders to maximize firm value in a responsible way. And admittedly, there are likely to be Microsoft employees among the 35,000 rank and file who oppose the passage of this bill. However, there are plenty more who are in favor of its passage. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that the proposed boycott of software by the Christian Right would have a huge economic impact on Microsoft.

It is absolutely the responsibility of business to promote the social progress of the society in which it does business. To hide your head in the sand and say “Not My Problem” is morally reprehensible on a corporate level as much as it is on a personal level. Maybe more. How are we to feel about the businesses that leveraged the Nazi machine to remove Jewish business leaders from Boards or Executive positions? Or those that happily watched as Jewish competitors were closed down? Today, do we consider it acceptable that those social issues were “not the problem of businesses”?

Let’s be clear here. This proposed law simply extends protection against discrimination in employment, housing, etc, based on sexual orientation. As a society, we have accepted that it is illegal to discriminate based on race, color, religion, sex, familial status, handicap or national origin. Be refusing to support this bill, we are saying that it’s OK to discriminate based on sexual orientation. Steve Ballmer and Microsoft are saying that they can’t support a law which would forbid discrimination.

Microsoft is a world leader in business and with that leadership position comes responsibility. It IS Microsoft’s responsibility to take a stand on social issues and to speak out against injustice. As a Microsoft employee, I was reviewed against my “confidence”, my willingness to take a stand in difficult issues. Seems hypocritical, to say the least.

Leaders take stands in difficult times (Peter Drucker famously said that Leadership WAS Responsibility). They look within themselves and do the right thing for their company, for the people who work for them, and for society. Management must take a long-term when assessing their strategies (something Microsoft is historically good at). For Ballmer and Bill Gates to say that they personally support the bill but won’t do it on behalf of the company is a feeble inaction for which they will someday be ashamed.

As a once-proud employee, I know I am.

joel

Just a quick one tonight: my Hotmail is talking to my Outlook again. It’s really a beautiful thing.

Apparently Microsoft’s new policy was supposed to prevent NEW accounts from using Outlook to access Hotmail. My account should have been “grandfathered” in but was erroneously misconfigured. The folks at Microsoft have fixed it. See? I told you that they were good people.

Special thanks to Omar and Oliver for helping me out on this one.

joel

This is the coolest use of free Web Services that I have seen in a while. Check out Paul Rademacher’s combination of Craigslist and Google Maps. I’m looking for a new apartment and this is just a killer app.

I’m not sure if he’s taking requests, but I’d love to filter at the neighborood level 🙂

Discussion point: when does an app become so compelling that people can charge for it? And who claims value? Google and Craigslist? Paul Rademacher?

joel

An artist in Maryland started a project that he calls “Post Secret” in which he invites anyone to mail in a 4″x6″ postcard with an anonymous private secret. He scans in the secrets and posts them online.

I started reading some and I couldn’t stop. Some are frightening, some depressing, some adorable, others beautiful. What is it about secrets that we find so fascinating, even when they are no longer secrets?

It’s that break from norms. They let our minds wander about lives and situations unlike our own. On the surface, we’re too much the same. It’s in the secrets that we’re different…

Maybe that’s too bad.

Or maybe the secrets help us feel more normal.

joel

I was appalled when I returned from a trip this weekend and found out the hard way that Microsoft had turned off access to MSN Hotmail via Outlook. When I tried to sync my Hotmail in Outlook, I got an error encouraging me to upgrade (i.e. pay MSN a yearly fee).

Why would Microsoft turn off Outlook/OE access to free Hotmail users?
It costs money for Hotmail to support Outlook and Outlook Express users. In addition to large development costs (there are different code paths for web access and POP access), Outlook/OE users make a significantly higher number of connections to the servers than web users do. This translates into real dollars.

After the bubble burst, most companies learned that “Free” isn’t a great business model. Indeed, when I was working on Windows XP there was discussion about turning off Outlook Express access to Hotmail (Outlook Express is the free mail client that comes with Windows). At that time, upper management refused to allow this because it would cause a bad user experience and they needed a “free” email solution in the box for new Windows users (a perceived requirement). There are literally tens of millions of OE users and MSFT didn’t have a good way to charge them for Hotmail access.

What has changed since then?
A few things:
1) Hotmail now offers a premium service. There is a way to charge users.
2) There has been an explosion of other free email services.
3) In my opinion, Hotmail has gone from being the gem of Microsoft’s internet strategy to being a thorn in its side that is only a cost center (and quickly becoming an unnecessary one at that).

So what’s my beef? Is this legal?
I paid for Outlook. Sure, I got the student version, but I still paid for it. As part of the deal, I understood that I got Hotmail access via POP. Microsoft has taken my money and then DEFEATURED the software that I purchased from them. I’m irate. This should absolutely be illegal (if it isn’t already). In fact, I think I’m going to file with the Better Business Bureau and I’ve already filled out the MSN Hotmail feedback form. You should do the same.

I’m further annoyed that this is just a bookkeeping problem for Microsoft: the Office P/L should pay the Hotmail P/L for my access if that’s the problem. This is a horrible example of a giant company taking advantage of consumers.

To be honest, the user experience is awful. If they wanted to scale back, Microsoft could have stopped allowing NEW users to move to OE + Hotmail or Outlook + Hotmail. With this implementation, they are alienating faithful customers (and former employees!) and further sullying their already-dirty image.

GMail: my new lead dog.
I have a GMail account that I was using mostly for fun (to see how it worked, etc). However, GMail has full POP access. I was a faithful Hotmail user until yesterday. From now on, it will become my SPAM account and GMail is my new lead dog. If we assume, though, that GMail will eventually support itself via the relevant-ad model (as Google does), I wonder if it will continue to accept Outlook access in the long term (since ads won’t show in the Outlook user interface and so the revenue model disappears).

Implications for Hotmail?
At this point, I can only assume that Hotmail is dying a slow death. I can’t imagine that anyone would pony up a yearly fee to continue to get what she used to get for free (especially considering other options still exist–see below). I have no idea how many people pay for Hotmail Premium, but I can’t imagine that it’s very many. Remember that the Hotmail acquisition was primarily a way to bootstrap the now-dying Passport service.

Anything else you want to say?
Yah, a disclaimer: I don’t work at Microsoft any more and even when I did, I was not privy to executive discussions. My statements here are purely based on my own reasoning and information that is publicly available. 🙂

joel

I caught last week’s Arrested Development on my TiVo yesterday and was rolling on the floor when Gob accidentally showed a student-government campaign video to the school of George Michael clearly impersonating the Star Wars Kid (episode 214: Immaculate Election).

Kudos to the writers of this brilliant show for working this storyline into their plot in an understated but riotously funny way. It continues to be a favorite of mine.

joel

All of the recent publicity about the Numa Numa dancer (including a recent article in the New York Times) has drudged up memories of the infamous Star Wars Kid.

That’s all fine and good and other people can debate the impact that the Internet is having on “fame”, “talent”, and “privacy”. I want spend a single moment decrying the lame attempt to commercialize the grassroots “fame” of the Star Wars Kid: apparently, the new Tony Hawk game has a Star Wars Kid easter egg. Check out the video on the Waxy blog.

My beef? It’s poorly done. In theory, it could have worked, but it’s too late and poorly done. Shame on the Tony Hawk team. The Star Wars Kid deserves better.

joel

In the stock market, you can prove, mathematically, that you are always better off diversifying your portfolio of stocks than picking one: you can earn the same return with much lower risk (to optimize, you pick stocks that have as little correlation as possible).

Could the same thing work in life? That is, I THINK that I want to be an entrepreneur after I graduate. Of course, though, there are real risks: I could earn a comfortable living working for someone else as part of a large corporation. The entrepreneur lifestyle choice is potentially one of high risk and high reward.

Let’s say I have a friend who is very happy working for someone else and earning a comfortable living, but he/she has a little bit of risk tolerance and likes the idea of a gamble, to some extent.

Wouldn’t we both be better off if we teamed up? We could agree to split our salaries forever, for richer or poorer, ’til death do us part. We would both share in the gains and losses of the other. If I fall on my face, (s)he carries me a bit. If I start a company that is wildly successful, (s)he shares in the rewards.

Would you do it? With whom? What are the implications to capitalism? Government?

joel