Ask HN: Any Microsoft employees/devs here? What's happening to Microsoft?
88 comments
Broken incentives, clueless trend-following leaders.
For the last year or so all orders from leadership have been "build more AI, show AI usage" even above things like stability and reliability.
There was no recognition from leadership over what use cases worked or not, and they appeared to believe their own hype.
To complement this, there is near to no long-term accountability for upper leadership for failure, so even as features underperform and strategy turns out to be a flop, they will continue to make millions a year, having layoffs every 6 months, and then acting surprised pikachu when morale is down and top engineers are looking to the door, since salary is barely competitive even if you are a top performer getting special stock awards.
For the last year or so all orders from leadership have been "build more AI, show AI usage" even above things like stability and reliability.
There was no recognition from leadership over what use cases worked or not, and they appeared to believe their own hype.
To complement this, there is near to no long-term accountability for upper leadership for failure, so even as features underperform and strategy turns out to be a flop, they will continue to make millions a year, having layoffs every 6 months, and then acting surprised pikachu when morale is down and top engineers are looking to the door, since salary is barely competitive even if you are a top performer getting special stock awards.
From what I remember, Microsoft almost missed the Internet, then Gates turned the whole company to focus on it until they dominate in that space. They have since lost this dominance to Google, to the point of using Chromium for their own browser.
When Mobile came along, Microsoft completely missed. Ballmer laughed at the iPhone when it was released and didn’t take it seriously. By the time they started trying to make moves it was too little, too late. Mobile has shifted how people use computers and other than have a few apps and enterprise management, Microsoft is largely absent.
How much of this push behind AI is a desperate attempt not to miss another transformative shifts in the industry?
When Mobile came along, Microsoft completely missed. Ballmer laughed at the iPhone when it was released and didn’t take it seriously. By the time they started trying to make moves it was too little, too late. Mobile has shifted how people use computers and other than have a few apps and enterprise management, Microsoft is largely absent.
How much of this push behind AI is a desperate attempt not to miss another transformative shifts in the industry?
They didn't miss the internet they actively tried to stifle it
I suspect there's some truth in that, but I suspect it's very banal. Current leadership does not have the "political leeway" nor technical conviction or strategic insight to buck trends on instinct as past leadership did, and thus will err hard on trend following, especially given the foaming at the mouth the investing and thought leader population was doing around AI over the last few years.
> "They have since lost this dominance to Google"
A lot of which had to do with being under a consent decree.
> "When Mobile came along, Microsoft completely missed."
By "missed" you mean that MS was at the top of the mobile phone heap after defeating Palm Computing when the iPhone came out and swept Windows Mobile, Palm, Research In Motion and everyone else away.
A lot of which had to do with being under a consent decree.
> "When Mobile came along, Microsoft completely missed."
By "missed" you mean that MS was at the top of the mobile phone heap after defeating Palm Computing when the iPhone came out and swept Windows Mobile, Palm, Research In Motion and everyone else away.
I expect the GP was referring to missing the boat in responding to the iPhone after it swept away Windows Mobile.
Microsoft was late to respond, eventually bought Danger and released the Kin phone before cancelling it within weeks, and only released Windows Phone in 2010 a solid 3 years after the iPhone release.
Windows Phone was actually pretty nice to use, but they were already too late to the scene and didn't have a chance to steal ground from iPhone or android who already had solid app ecosystems.
Microsoft was late to respond, eventually bought Danger and released the Kin phone before cancelling it within weeks, and only released Windows Phone in 2010 a solid 3 years after the iPhone release.
Windows Phone was actually pretty nice to use, but they were already too late to the scene and didn't have a chance to steal ground from iPhone or android who already had solid app ecosystems.
That still isn't missing the boat. The pivot to the improved UI in Windows Mobile 6.5, the last of the old school Windows CE based releases, and skins by OEMs like HTC was IIRC in response to the iPhone's successful UI innovations.
And let's not forget that Google specifically interfered with access to their services on Windows Phone to hamstring it.
And let's not forget that Google specifically interfered with access to their services on Windows Phone to hamstring it.
Huh? MS did ok in the nascent consumer market. RIM owned commercial, completely.
I had an iPaq in 2004 when we got married. It was like living in the future, where the future was a scaled down Windows 98 box. We took a one month road trip and was able to Priceline hotels on the road as we explored. Amazing device but not an iPhone.
Ballmer was so butthurt about iPhone he would berate people who appeared before him with one. As a customer, my boss and I were invited to a meeting with high level Microsoft people and asked to not carry iPhones out of respect.
I had an iPaq in 2004 when we got married. It was like living in the future, where the future was a scaled down Windows 98 box. We took a one month road trip and was able to Priceline hotels on the road as we explored. Amazing device but not an iPhone.
Ballmer was so butthurt about iPhone he would berate people who appeared before him with one. As a customer, my boss and I were invited to a meeting with high level Microsoft people and asked to not carry iPhones out of respect.
>>since salary is barely competitive even if you are a top performer getting special stock awards
People sitting outside FANG/NAMAMA still drool over those barely competitive salaries you speak of.
People sitting outside FANG/NAMAMA still drool over those barely competitive salaries you speak of.
My reason for saying that was not to say the employees are not well-paid in an absolute sense. It's that the reality is that caliber of employee has options, and Microsoft does not work to retain them, which results in undesirable (from the company's perspective) attrition.
Thanks for sharing. How long have these leaders stayed in MSFT? Were they strong engineers or PMs?
This is a hard question since there are a few patterns I've seen. Often they're long-term microsoft, more often PM than engineering, sometimes external. But I suspect that's not the dominating consistency, with a similar statement to technical skill. People who get to a high level here get there for the same incentives I mentioned above. They are risk averse, political, cowtow to their leadership, and know how to play the game.
Thanks for sharing. Guess the 80s-90s hungry MSFT was long gone?
My elderly dad is suffering from cognitive decline but likes to play computer games.
I realize he can't even open Steam without getting bombarded by ads from MSN in the start menu.
I'm angry at Microsoft for this. Instead of being good stewards of "computing", they provide an environment that's poorly designed and exploitative.
Shame on the people at Microsoft responsible.
I realize he can't even open Steam without getting bombarded by ads from MSN in the start menu.
I'm angry at Microsoft for this. Instead of being good stewards of "computing", they provide an environment that's poorly designed and exploitative.
Shame on the people at Microsoft responsible.
I happened to take a look at your HN profile and realized you don't post much, which leads me to believe this is REALLY bothering you.
I can relate. My grandfather, who had been a math teacher and actually got me into computing way back in the beige toaster Macintosh days, religiously checked his email and practiced his Spanish on Rosetta Stone for decades. I had to update from Win 7 to 10 for the desktop I built for him, and that was a big struggle for him. That would probably be many times harder now considering the sad shape of Windows. It was heartbreaking watching him struggle with one of the few simple joys he had left towards the end of his life.
I'm very sorry you're having to deal with that and your anger is warranted.
I can relate. My grandfather, who had been a math teacher and actually got me into computing way back in the beige toaster Macintosh days, religiously checked his email and practiced his Spanish on Rosetta Stone for decades. I had to update from Win 7 to 10 for the desktop I built for him, and that was a big struggle for him. That would probably be many times harder now considering the sad shape of Windows. It was heartbreaking watching him struggle with one of the few simple joys he had left towards the end of his life.
I'm very sorry you're having to deal with that and your anger is warranted.
To chime in, arranging things in fixed locations on the desktop has proven to be quite helpful for elderly people when doing support ime. It is easier to remember/tell "the globe icon in the top right" than "Type 'Firefox' in the search bar".
Also has the nice side-effect of avoiding MSN news on Windows.
Also has the nice side-effect of avoiding MSN news on Windows.
If the games run on Linux maybe you can try that. Windows is a bit tricky to navigate nowadays.
If you insist on staying in the abusive relationship,
try Windows Server.
try Windows Server.
I heard LTSC is also good. If I ever go back to that abusive relationship I might try that out. But for the meantime I'll deal with Linux' issues.
I almost agreed to let Onedrive manage my Samsung phone. Thankfully I knew Onedrive is from MS and I'm asked to agree to a one sided deal.
Its 2014 levels of total distrust inside the company. Morale has been on the floor since end of 24, due to closing offices, laying off people. Contractors are being left in limbo more and more often.
Half of the people are just talking about layoffs and other are keeping thier mouth shut. There is sense that execs are making one bad decision after another. Xbox division knows this very well, the trust in that division is near zero, but now it has spread to even the orgs which were doing decently well.
Product quality is also completely dogshit/dogslop, we have done nothing in last 2 years except making our products worse. We do hear reports of boomer companies moving to Apple every now and then, and these rumours are increasing. Windows 11 is a disaster, Copilot is an convenience no one asked for. Users are contacting support every day asking how to disable all these features but execs keep ignoring users. The consensus among top guys is that customer is wrong and we need to teach them.
Trusting stock market more than the customers is now the industry standard.
Half of the people are just talking about layoffs and other are keeping thier mouth shut. There is sense that execs are making one bad decision after another. Xbox division knows this very well, the trust in that division is near zero, but now it has spread to even the orgs which were doing decently well.
Product quality is also completely dogshit/dogslop, we have done nothing in last 2 years except making our products worse. We do hear reports of boomer companies moving to Apple every now and then, and these rumours are increasing. Windows 11 is a disaster, Copilot is an convenience no one asked for. Users are contacting support every day asking how to disable all these features but execs keep ignoring users. The consensus among top guys is that customer is wrong and we need to teach them.
Trusting stock market more than the customers is now the industry standard.
Regarding the last paragraph, users are now unpaid beta testers and products instead of … users. But again maybe it makes sense when a company is not making money in the retail market.
One of my teams runs a Microsoft product that’s been in place for a long time and has been an amazing product falling on hard times.
We had a service impacting issue and went through the typical Premier/Unified support gaslighting exercise. We finally escalated it to a batshit level and got to a real engineer. The dude was about the retire, was fed up, and knew exactly what was wrong. He claimed to have a fix pending approval that had been held up by his chain. We ended up getting a hot fix after a lot of drama with account leadership.
I was grateful to the guy, but kind of shocked that morale in that group was so bad. I used to be acquainted with a few people there over the years and every single one of them was either laid off or left. I never heard of anything like that at Microsoft at all, especially as a customer.
We had a service impacting issue and went through the typical Premier/Unified support gaslighting exercise. We finally escalated it to a batshit level and got to a real engineer. The dude was about the retire, was fed up, and knew exactly what was wrong. He claimed to have a fix pending approval that had been held up by his chain. We ended up getting a hot fix after a lot of drama with account leadership.
I was grateful to the guy, but kind of shocked that morale in that group was so bad. I used to be acquainted with a few people there over the years and every single one of them was either laid off or left. I never heard of anything like that at Microsoft at all, especially as a customer.
A classic cafe of enshittification. We’re not the customer anymore, we are the product.
After reading Nadella's Hit Refresh on how he revived Microsoft, what's happening now is a 180 degree turn from that. I have no idea what's going on.
Just FYI, "Microsoft Office" wasn't renamed, it was "Microsoft 365" that was renamed. You can still download the Office suite and it's still called Office.
What Microsoft did do was make is super-confusing to people about what they changed and what is called what.
See: https://www.theverge.com/tech/856149/microsoft-365-office-re...
What Microsoft did do was make is super-confusing to people about what they changed and what is called what.
See: https://www.theverge.com/tech/856149/microsoft-365-office-re...
I got so pissed when office.com redirected to copilot. It doesn’t even do what the old office.com did.
I'm more interested in knowing the status of the kernel team. Is there any chance that there is an outflow of talents so they are OK to hire people who are not exactly qualified 100% for professional kernel development? So that I might get a chance to snug in...:P
If your professional goal is to train an AI to replace yourself as a kernel developer, put that on your cover page!
I can put over 30 years of kernel dev experience on my resume since my AI subscriptions were trained on 30 years of kernel development code.
My professional goal is to get into a paying low level system programming job with a salary of 90K+ CAD. My current job is too high level to make a one shot transition so I'm considering making multiple hops. I did work on some low level system programming projects but I feel I could never compete with college graduates who have a ton of time to grind on the Linux source code. I have 2 hours at best every day. Maybe it is an unrealistic objective but I'm willing to give it a go.
Sounds like you’d be better off applying to real companies. You sound very smart, or at least capable of people skills and learning. Don’t waste yourself at Microsoft
If youre able to do some networking and tell people verbatim what you just wrote. I think that will help a lot more than grinding kernel logic or whatever.
If youre not considering it, I would reccomend trying to find a local hacker club like defcon or 2600. There are usually a few embedded folks who go or are affiliated with those.
If youre not considering it, I would reccomend trying to find a local hacker club like defcon or 2600. There are usually a few embedded folks who go or are affiliated with those.
Nobody wants to use Copilot voluntarily, therefore it's going to be pushed down deep into Microsoft customers' throats.
Loosing them in the process.
Office 365 app suddenly is not called that. It's called copilot. When you open it it just shows chat. No files, no word, no documents. You have to try hard to find your files back.
So suddenly an app that you used to edit word documents and print PDFs is completely gone with no warning. Word doesn't exist. Even Office doesn't exist :D How are clients supposed to navigate that shitshow?
Office 365 app suddenly is not called that. It's called copilot. When you open it it just shows chat. No files, no word, no documents. You have to try hard to find your files back.
So suddenly an app that you used to edit word documents and print PDFs is completely gone with no warning. Word doesn't exist. Even Office doesn't exist :D How are clients supposed to navigate that shitshow?
That's nuts.
I wonder if all this shoving of AI down peoples throats could trigger a bit of a backlash around vendor software updates / proprietary software in general. There's this huge infrastructure of Windows Update, chrome auto-updates, app stores and SaaS that predated and enabled all this... and people accepted it when they were getting bugfixes and security updates out of it, but now it's getting used to take away the features they wanted and replace them with worse and worse versions of crapware.
All of a sudden... the free software world of updating when _you_ want the new version, and being able to fork the old version if you want, starts to look pretty great.
I wonder if all this shoving of AI down peoples throats could trigger a bit of a backlash around vendor software updates / proprietary software in general. There's this huge infrastructure of Windows Update, chrome auto-updates, app stores and SaaS that predated and enabled all this... and people accepted it when they were getting bugfixes and security updates out of it, but now it's getting used to take away the features they wanted and replace them with worse and worse versions of crapware.
All of a sudden... the free software world of updating when _you_ want the new version, and being able to fork the old version if you want, starts to look pretty great.
I'm trying to understand why they think 30 years of brand building should be discarded.
It's over 40 years now.
I just found that it's called "myopia" in English, while trying to find how short-sightedness is spelled.
Multiple generations knew what Word and Office was. That beats even twitter rename fiasco.
I just found that it's called "myopia" in English, while trying to find how short-sightedness is spelled.
Multiple generations knew what Word and Office was. That beats even twitter rename fiasco.
Also Excel is now called Incel (per Reddit, ymmv).
Did you forget to include the punchline "often interprets something else as dates"?
They're supposed to chat, not navigate, no?
I was at Microsoft in 2007. We were told to say "Bing it" but everyone was using Google to look stuff up for work.
Our company at the time forced us to use Bing as the default search engine, so people started searching “google” on Bing to just to get back to Google. We were told “they’re both search engines, just use this one”, just like a person who bought an iPhone from a dollar store.
Since more than a year no images available. Now the page gone completely: https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/downloads/virt...
It's a disarmingly simple sillygism actually:
1. Saying "AI" makes stock price go up
2. Make all things AI
3. Stock price will go even more up
As for everything else, subordinated to the aforementioned.
1. Saying "AI" makes stock price go up
2. Make all things AI
3. Stock price will go even more up
As for everything else, subordinated to the aforementioned.
Well, this year might not be the Linux's desktop but it definitely will be Windows' non desktop.
Soon the Windows will be renamed to the Copilot OS as well.
I could see instead of fixing it “The Windows brand is synonym with broken software, let’s rebrand it Copilot OS”
>Why are they behaving like this since last year (trying very hard to burn themselves to the ground)
Since last year? Burning themselves into the ground has been their M.O. for the last decade and a half, at least.
I'd argue enshitification started in earnest with Windows 8.
AI just enables them to speed up the process dramatically.
Since last year? Burning themselves into the ground has been their M.O. for the last decade and a half, at least.
I'd argue enshitification started in earnest with Windows 8.
AI just enables them to speed up the process dramatically.
There's a difference in Steve Ballmer's Microsoft and Satya Nadella's Microsoft. Ballmer was a villain, that hurt the company, but he was smart and never caused too serious destruction. Nadella might be slighly less of a villain, but he has no clue what he's doing and is driving the company straight into the ground.
Microsoft would be such an easy fix to get back on the right path, but Nadella is not going to do that, and nobody is going to make you or me the CEO.
Microsoft would be such an easy fix to get back on the right path, but Nadella is not going to do that, and nobody is going to make you or me the CEO.
>Microsoft would be such an easy fix to get back on the right path, ...
Why treat workers right, properly resource teams, and build quality stuff on a roadmap that looks beyond the next quarter when you can just treat your workers, product and customers as if they're all disposable trash.
Basically the standard Fortune 500 playbook with few exceptions.
>...but Nadella is not going to do that, and nobody is going to make you or me the CEO.
That's a good thing. When they eventually fail completely and sell their assets, it'll be a source of cheap datacenters for the competition—at least assuming demand eventually chills out.
Why treat workers right, properly resource teams, and build quality stuff on a roadmap that looks beyond the next quarter when you can just treat your workers, product and customers as if they're all disposable trash.
Basically the standard Fortune 500 playbook with few exceptions.
>...but Nadella is not going to do that, and nobody is going to make you or me the CEO.
That's a good thing. When they eventually fail completely and sell their assets, it'll be a source of cheap datacenters for the competition—at least assuming demand eventually chills out.
> Why treat workers right, properly resource teams, and build quality stuff on a roadmap that looks beyond the next quarter when you can just treat your workers, product and customers as if they're all disposable trash.
Because capitalism is a fact, and actually trying to build the best possible products for your users will give you a market-leading position which your greedy competition can't defeat, and which will give you the most profit as a result. Big CEOs and shareholders still don't get this.
Microsoft has a foothold in the market, and they may feel impossible to defeat, but they're not. If this is their attitude, they will lose.
> That's a good thing. When they eventually fail completely and sell their assets, it'll be a source of cheap datacenters for the competition—at least assuming demand eventually chills out.
If they continue like this, yes. But if they just get their act together, it would be a win-win for everyone. The company isn't doomed, other than by its own active doing.
Because capitalism is a fact, and actually trying to build the best possible products for your users will give you a market-leading position which your greedy competition can't defeat, and which will give you the most profit as a result. Big CEOs and shareholders still don't get this.
Microsoft has a foothold in the market, and they may feel impossible to defeat, but they're not. If this is their attitude, they will lose.
> That's a good thing. When they eventually fail completely and sell their assets, it'll be a source of cheap datacenters for the competition—at least assuming demand eventually chills out.
If they continue like this, yes. But if they just get their act together, it would be a win-win for everyone. The company isn't doomed, other than by its own active doing.
Brand new CNC mills from Hurco use Windows 7 still, this is the brand new specs on their website.
I'm pretty sure a lot of CNC machines still run Windows 98.
3.1 and earlier too. Not relevant when talking about new machines.
Vista and 8 were just shit but they genuinely tried.
10 and 11 are the evil shit. 11 especially so.
10 and 11 are the evil shit. 11 especially so.
10 isn’t that bad, particularly the iot version.
On that note, I've heard the LTSC version of Windows 11 isn't as horrible.
Since it’s pretty hard to acquire legally the assumption is that MAS is being used, I’d probably go for 10 iot with updates till 2032.
11 LTSC is heaps better than consumer editions but it’s still shite.
The second anticheat embraces Linux windows is deadskies.
11 LTSC is heaps better than consumer editions but it’s still shite.
The second anticheat embraces Linux windows is deadskies.
The problem is do we want Linux to get all those stuffs like kernel anti cheat?
Said similar thing to the ladybird browser a while ago — I’d prefer it NOT support some features.
Said similar thing to the ladybird browser a while ago — I’d prefer it NOT support some features.
I’m all for it, the work steam is doing has done more for Linux uptake than anything else in the last decade or two, I’m nearly at the point where I don’t need windows, even for work.
There are rumors of more big layoffs in Jan.
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No vision.
Windows is utter ass.
They don't even use their own browser, languages, or OS half the time because they're so bad.
I don't use it but stuff like VS Code is a point of light but they run it like an internal project, and will drive it into the ground, just like GitHub.
Windows is utter ass.
They don't even use their own browser, languages, or OS half the time because they're so bad.
I don't use it but stuff like VS Code is a point of light but they run it like an internal project, and will drive it into the ground, just like GitHub.
An innovative strategy combining AI, layoffs, low-cost labor, and a surprisingly optional QA team...
Leadership and decision makers or product folks are out of touch. This isn’t new. They have always been that way.
This post is bringing out the MS haters and most don't know what they're talking about. MS took the initial lead in AI and it shows in their products. It was Google that was left in the starting blocks but they have thankfully recovered. Competition is good for all.
What sane person even cares about that monster and their shitty products today anyway? Unless hands are tied by work or contract.
The sooner they drown the better for everyone and the industry.
The sooner they drown the better for everyone and the industry.
About 70% of the world, and game studios, thus Proton.
I interviewed at Azure the same time I interviewed at GCP and the former was an absolute shit show. It was comically bad.
GCP does random layoffs of senior people to screw them from promotions and TC.
Get out of MAANG. There is no decent one, only different flavors of evil and abuse. Integrity is worth more than money. Form a worker-owned co-op consultancy with other decent people and create enduring stability.
Get out of MAANG. There is no decent one, only different flavors of evil and abuse. Integrity is worth more than money. Form a worker-owned co-op consultancy with other decent people and create enduring stability.
Just curious why the experience was so bad?
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The talent level disparity between the two companies was astounding.
Wow that’s really concerning…
You clearly didn't hear about Azure failing their security audits a few years back
Just the other day had to update our offering on the Azure marketplace. It had been a while. What a complete shitshow. From getting logged it (!!!!) to figuring out the new permissions needed to publish. The ui/ux was astoundingly horrible. It blows me away anyone uses this shite.
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Latest example:
Microsoft Office renamed to “Microsoft 365 Copilot app” (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46496465)
Not only the rename is absurd, but the page (office.com) looks heavily vibe-coded