Microsoft, every mention
1,015 scenes (said by Ben Gilbert), the whole family · ← back to Microsoft
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Verbatim, from the transcripts: the passages where Microsoft comes up
Disney: The Renaissance and the Empire · Acquired
- ▶ 35:47 Ben Gilbert One was effectively Microsoft Paint for two-D animation, where you could look at all the lines on a computer, you could select a color, you could bring over your little paint tool, and dump your bucket of color into an enclosed area.
- ▶ 36:00 Ben Gilbert It sounds like I'm describing something that you're like, yes, we've all used MS Paint, but this was
The Walt Disney Company: The most successful enterprise for monetizing human nostalgia (Audio) · Acquired
- ▶ 1:56:27 Ben Gilbert And to me, it really symbolizes that animators are the crown of Disney in this era, in the way that at Google, it's engineers, and at Apple, it's designers, and at Microsoft, it's PMs.
Vanguard: The communist capitalist who saved investors a trillion dollars (Audio) · Acquired
- ▶ 2:43:21 Ben Gilbert They got me when I started my first job at Microsoft
- ▶ 2:46:04 Ben Gilbert This is like Vanguard is Microsoft and Fidelity is Google, and they could launch Gmail and say that thing, that's your primary business.
- ▶ 3:22:01 Ben Gilbert Apple, Microsoft, Google, it's all 20% plus these big, uh, Vanguard, Fidelity, BlackRock, State Street, et cetera.
- ▶ 3:36:02 Ben Gilbert Microsoft.
Ferrari: What happens when you staple a luxury brand to a sports team? (Audio) · Acquired
- ▶ 3:57:18 Ben Gilbert Folks at Microsoft, uh, here in Seattle, who then would have a second career actually working for Ferrari.
10 Years of Acquired (with Michael Lewis) · Acquired
- ▶ 1:07:36 Ben Gilbert I mean, amazing productivity apps on the web, but they lacked enterprise features for years, leaving the door open for Microsoft to catch up and respond with Office.
- ▶ 1:07:36 Ben Gilbert I mean, amazing productivity apps on the web, but they lacked enterprise features for years, leaving the door open for Microsoft to catch up and respond with Office.
- ▶ 1:50:47 Ben Gilbert Come over to the office and I'll sit you down and give you the entire whiteboard and PowerPoint on how the Costco business model works.
Coca-Cola: The Complete History & Strategy (Audio) · Acquired
- ▶ 2:26:55 Ben Gilbert Like, do you remember when Microsoft did bang it on?
Google Part III: The AI Company. Google is amazingly well-positioned... will they win in AI? (Audio) · Acquired
- ▶ 53:36 Ben Gilbert That includes Microsoft.
- ▶ 55:29 Ben Gilbert At some point, Microsoft drops out.
- ▶ 2:12:59 Ben Gilbert Anyway, Microsoft's open AI, they end up tying up.
- ▶ 2:19:38 Ben Gilbert Are they like the Microsoft of the 2000 where they haven't had a breakthrough product in a while?
- ▶ 2:26:21 Ben Gilbert They're working with Microsoft to try to get more compute.
- ▶ 2:26:24 Ben Gilbert They're cutting deals with Microsoft in real time.
- ▶ 2:26:27 Ben Gilbert To try to get more investment, to get more Azure credits or get advances on their Azure credits in order to handle the incredible load in November of 2022 that's coming in of people wanting to use this thing.
- ▶ 2:31:37 Ben Gilbert And if you remember back a few years before, Microsoft released Tay, which was this crazy racist chat bot.
- ▶ 2:32:39 Ben Gilbert And to underscore this, so if you didn't know it in November of 22, you sure knew it by February of 23, because good ol' Microsoft, our biggest, scariest enemy.
- ▶ 2:33:23 Ben Gilbert That now Microsoft can actually challenge Google on their own turf, intent on the internet, with a legitimately different, better differentiated product vector.
- ▶ 2:33:38 Ben Gilbert This is the full leapfrog, and they have the technology partnership to do it.
- ▶ 3:18:48 Ben Gilbert They're the fourth most valuable company in the world behind Nvidia, Microsoft, and Apple.
- ▶ 3:19:27 Ben Gilbert So they're very much playing offense in the way that Meta, Microsoft and Amazon are in deploying that capex.
- ▶ 3:24:13 Ben Gilbert Even Microsoft pivoted Azure to this reasonably quickly.
- ▶ 3:24:13 Ben Gilbert Even Microsoft pivoted Azure to this reasonably quickly.
- ▶ 3:26:38 Ben Gilbert So this kind of becomes one of the pillars of their strategy is you want multi-cloud?
- ▶ 3:30:07 Ben Gilbert Microsoft?
- ▶ 3:30:10 Ben Gilbert They make some models, but.
- ▶ 4:05:37 Ben Gilbert If you liked this episode, go check out our episode on the early history of Google and the 20 tens with our Alphabet episode, and of course, our series on Microsoft and NVIDIA.
Google Part II: Alphabet (Audio) · Acquired
- ▶ 7:46 Ben Gilbert The universe at the time is Microsoft sells sort of enterprise grade mail for a lot of money, or there's all these free web-based services popping up like Hotmail that Microsoft would end up buying and Yahoo Mail and AOL.
- ▶ 15:53 Ben Gilbert The origin of the XML HTTP request is a part of Internet Explorer, first implemented by Microsoft, and used in this part of Outlook called Outlook Web Access.
- ▶ 15:53 Ben Gilbert The origin of the XML HTTP request is a part of Internet Explorer, first implemented by Microsoft, and used in this part of Outlook called Outlook Web Access.
- ▶ 16:07 Ben Gilbert When I worked for my high school, I could log in on any computer into my Outlook through their Web Access, and that thing used Ajax, and I think it only worked in Internet Explorer.
- ▶ 18:34 Ben Gilbert Yeah, Google's entire money printing machine was built on top of Microsoft's and at two layers.
- ▶ 18:40 Ben Gilbert So to this point, over 90% of Google search queries were done on Windows PCs, and 90% were done in Internet Explorer running on those PCs.
- ▶ 18:52 Ben Gilbert So Google's got the killer app for the web in search, and the thing under them is a browser owned by Microsoft, and the thing under that is an operating system owned by Microsoft.
- ▶ 19:02 Ben Gilbert They exist at the pleasure of Microsoft at this point in history.
- ▶ 19:30 Ben Gilbert And web usage isn't bad for Microsoft, but if the platform of the next generation becomes the web, and people are writing web applications instead of Windows applications, that makes Microsoft's platform a lot less valuable versus other…
- ▶ 19:30 Ben Gilbert And web usage isn't bad for Microsoft, but if the platform of the next generation becomes the web, and people are writing web applications instead of Windows applications, that makes Microsoft's platform a lot less valuable versus other…
- ▶ 43:08 Ben Gilbert If you were starting on the foot of competing with Microsoft, or trying to build a word processor, or trying to build a spreadsheet, you would be doomed for failure.
- ▶ 45:28 Ben Gilbert Their whole thing at first was, we're not gonna make a better spreadsheet than Excel, so if we put it in the web, it has to be about sharing collaboration.
- ▶ 45:54 Ben Gilbert You built your big model in Excel.
- ▶ 48:38 Ben Gilbert My internship was at Microsoft and I worked on adding headers and footers to the Microsoft Word web app.
- ▶ 48:38 Ben Gilbert My internship was at Microsoft and I worked on adding headers and footers to the Microsoft Word web app.
- ▶ 48:47 Ben Gilbert The Windows code to have perfect document fidelity to the web, so when you looked on the web and then printed from the web, the document would be laid out pixel for pixel, character for character, exactly how it would look on the printed…
- ▶ 49:43 Ben Gilbert If you have permission to view it, you view it with Microsoft.
- ▶ 49:47 Ben Gilbert It was like, but what if I haven't bought word?
- ▶ 49:50 Ben Gilbert Can I just use word for free in the web then?
- ▶ 49:53 Ben Gilbert Is Microsoft okay with that?
- ▶ 49:58 Ben Gilbert It forces the company to think about pricing and packaging.
- ▶ 50:29 Ben Gilbert Is that true that there's more active users of Google Workspace than there is of Office?
- ▶ 1:42:34 Ben Gilbert Microsoft is realizing that for some set of users,
- ▶ 1:42:38 Ben Gilbert Google's actually making more money on any given PC user than Microsoft is, and they're not happy with this and say, fine, we at least just need to be in that game too.
- ▶ 1:42:49 Ben Gilbert So, the negotiations are kind of happening with Microsoft and DoubleClick.
- ▶ 1:43:16 Ben Gilbert He steps out, he runs down the hall, and he sees a conference room full of all the Microsoft people and their accountants and their lawyers, and he's like,
- ▶ 1:43:24 Ben Gilbert oh my god, oh my god, you guys, you're, you're about to decide this deal with Microsoft.
- ▶ 1:43:41 Ben Gilbert There's a whole presentation series that happens where Yahoo, Microsoft, AOL, and Google are basically all getting the pitch and DoubleClick is now showing.
- ▶ 1:44:40 Ben Gilbert There was an incoming message from Microsoft's corporate development team.
- ▶ 1:44:51 Ben Gilbert Ballmer wrote that if the offer match was not acceptable, DoubleClick should simply mark up the paper to meet its needs and then sign it, and Microsoft would review and rapidly countersign to close the deal with minimal negotiation…
- ▶ 1:46:20 Ben Gilbert Which Microsoft then bought for twice as much.
- ▶ 1:53:01 Ben Gilbert They sort of took the mantle from Microsoft and had not yet relinquished it to Facebook or later to the Stripe or OpenAI or Anthropic or any of the sort of companies we would talk about in the future as this, like, dense concentration of…
- ▶ 2:02:54 Ben Gilbert There's no amount of money suddenly that you could pay Microsoft where they would keep you as the default search engine because they just want all the traffic to go to Bing because they now have a great way to monetize.
- ▶ 2:02:54 Ben Gilbert There's no amount of money suddenly that you could pay Microsoft where they would keep you as the default search engine because they just want all the traffic to go to Bing because they now have a great way to monetize.
- ▶ 2:03:07 Ben Gilbert And the thing that of course Microsoft would fail to realize with Bing is you can't be second place in search.
- ▶ 2:03:07 Ben Gilbert And the thing that of course Microsoft would fail to realize with Bing is you can't be second place in search.
- ▶ 2:07:05 Ben Gilbert That was sort of nice, because you type in the URL bar and that's your organic typing, and then the other one is your, uh, I'm willing to give a kickback to Google, probably, but it could also be Bing, could be Yahoo, could be whoever.
- ▶ 2:13:08 Ben Gilbert In a lot of years, it was actually faster than Chrome, and they would go back and forth, and it really spurred Apple, who was already a steward of WebKit, and they sort of had their own competitive response to Microsoft after Steve Jobs…
- ▶ 2:14:12 Ben Gilbert I mean, Microsoft certainly didn't have an incentive to do it in the business model they were in at the time, and Apple doesn't.
- ▶ 2:16:33 Ben Gilbert But in practice, as long as it's not Microsoft, and as long as it's more fragmented, that's probably a trade they're perfectly happy with.
- ▶ 2:16:51 Ben Gilbert Google's delayed it because they, it's not Microsoft.
- ▶ 2:18:36 Ben Gilbert I've been reflecting a little bit on, like, why, basically from 1998 onward, Google's biggest threat was Microsoft, and not because of Bing, not because of building advertising, because of this kind of destabilizing thing.
- ▶ 2:18:36 Ben Gilbert I've been reflecting a little bit on, like, why, basically from 1998 onward, Google's biggest threat was Microsoft, and not because of Bing, not because of building advertising, because of this kind of destabilizing thing.
- ▶ 2:18:47 Ben Gilbert There's sort of a fine point on it, which is that spiritually, Microsoft was the platform of the PC era, and with this platform shift, it would be, like, very convenient to just be like, oh, Google's the platform of the web era, but
- ▶ 2:19:20 Ben Gilbert So there's this kind of funky thing where, like, Microsoft built and owned Windows and then dominated the PC era because of that.
- ▶ 2:19:20 Ben Gilbert So there's this kind of funky thing where, like, Microsoft built and owned Windows and then dominated the PC era because of that.
- ▶ 2:20:00 Ben Gilbert But it's not their platform in the way that it was Microsoft's platform in that era.
- ▶ 2:20:33 Ben Gilbert Let's say Bing launches in 2009 and there is no Chrome and Microsoft still has 70% share and will for a while.
- ▶ 2:20:33 Ben Gilbert Let's say Bing launches in 2009 and there is no Chrome and Microsoft still has 70% share and will for a while.
- ▶ 2:20:40 Ben Gilbert And they make Bing the default.
- ▶ 2:20:40 Ben Gilbert And they make Bing the default.
- ▶ 2:20:48 Ben Gilbert So they basically would have like four years of 70% of people using browsers on any devices being defaulted to Bing.
- ▶ 2:20:48 Ben Gilbert So they basically would have like four years of 70% of people using browsers on any devices being defaulted to Bing.
- ▶ 2:21:12 Ben Gilbert To your point, maybe without Chrome, Bing would have been a serious competitor to Google.
- ▶ 2:30:15 Ben Gilbert So they end up selling this company to Microsoft, right?
- ▶ 2:32:28 Ben Gilbert As we talked about in our Microsoft part two, this was, you pay Microsoft single digit dollars, and you get an operating system, and
- ▶ 2:38:01 Ben Gilbert If they don't buy Android and they don't get started basically in the month that they did, this market belongs to Microsoft.
- ▶ 2:38:08 Ben Gilbert No, Microsoft.
- ▶ 2:38:15 Ben Gilbert There's going to be a fully integrated player, which Apple was going to be, and then there's going to be an OEM plus licensed operating system, and the model would have just been that Microsoft sells operating systems, a mobile operating…
- ▶ 2:58:44 Ben Gilbert And before this, Microsoft had a shot.
- ▶ 2:59:17 Ben Gilbert And three, we aren't Microsoft.
- ▶ 2:59:22 Ben Gilbert Microsoft managed to suck up all the profit in that entire value chain, and handset makers, you currently make money, so why would you go work with Microsoft who did that to the PC makers?
- ▶ 3:02:12 Ben Gilbert Microsoft was dominant in PCs and then lost their dominance in the web era.
- ▶ 3:03:20 Ben Gilbert Famously, IBM made more revenue than Microsoft for a lot longer than people think.
- ▶ 3:13:31 Ben Gilbert And Microsoft did miss it.
- ▶ 3:14:20 Ben Gilbert You know, we've jumped over some failures, but it's been hit after hit after hit in a lot of these areas that really matter, just like we talked about on the Microsoft episodes.
- ▶ 3:21:47 Ben Gilbert The whole Chrome and Bing thing was defense against Microsoft, Android was defense against Apple and Microsoft, and Google Plus is now defense against Facebook.
- ▶ 3:21:47 Ben Gilbert The whole Chrome and Bing thing was defense against Microsoft, Android was defense against Apple and Microsoft, and Google Plus is now defense against Facebook.
- ▶ 3:45:19 Ben Gilbert For example, in this episode, talking about Android, they massively counterpositioned against Microsoft.
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