Who’s the new Microsoft

Posted on November 15, 2007
Filed Under Uncategorized | | Written by Gary Reid

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For ages (well a couple of years) people have been touting Google as the new Microsoft, and yes Google has the ability to become a scary beast - while Microsoft took over your PC, Google is taking over your online life, data and privacy, they really do know what you did last summer.

But a modest, quietly spoken chap once said Developers, Developers, Developers. Far from being a crazy 80’s guy with hair that makes mine look stylish Mr Balmer had a point.

A point the people at Facebook obviously thought was a really good one.

A day, no an hour doesn’t pass without some bloody ‘new Facebook widget’ dropping into my feed reader. Today Socialists was highlighted by Techcrunch UK, a great article, but what’s the bloody point in it?

Do you really need a graph or a tag cloud of your life? If you do may I suggest you actually need to get a life as a tag cloud isn’t going to compensate for it.

But, how much screen real estate do you need on Facebook to house all of these widgets? Well not to worry there is a widget to ‘hide’ them!

The thing is Facebook has harnessed a really powerful force. Early adopters are fickle people, they hop around from new thing to new thing, so you get a few million of them using and talking about your service then they go off and build someone elses empire for them. God help us if it’s a competitors.

So, let’s keep them busy, building stuff, stuff the next wave may find useful…not a bad idea… and of course if they are building a Facebook widget they definitely aren’t building the next new Facebook killer.

Just like the late 90’s when the majority of developers built stuff for Microsoft, today we could see that becoming Facebook.

So, what we now need is a Facebook widget that updates us daily on just who the new Microsoft is going to be and which of our friends agree with it’s predictions, there again, maybe not…

Comments

3 Responses to “Who’s the new Microsoft”

Windows Vista News on November 16th, 2007 3:15 am

Who’s the new Microsoft…

Did you see the post at kitchentwo.com…
Peter on November 29th, 2007 11:11 am

Hey, what happend to folkstr, where is the community, wiki …?
Ella on November 30th, 2007 2:26 pm

I saw an announcement from the new owner of Folkstr a few day days ago at Folkstr.com. However the site has been down since then. I am clueless as well, communication has been very limited.

Its really early to tell, but I liked it better when Mr. Reid owned the application. He did an awesome job at keeping the community in the loop of every move. ella