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July 27, 2007 6:27 AM PDT
Perspective: Embracing disruption as a way of (tech) life
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I recently saw Marathon Man for the first time in 30 years. But it still makes me squirm. (Who wouldn't squirm?) Drilling holes into Hoffman's teeth without the help of an anesthetic, Olivier repeatedly asks, "Is it safe?"
Not long after, I recounted the scene for an acquaintance, who had never watched the movie. He was especially bemused by the Olivier character's now-signature line.
"Is it safe?" he joked. "If we were talking about the computer business, I could answer that. No, it's definitely not--especially these days."
We shared a knowing chuckle because the guy's resume reads like a veritable tech version of the Dead Pool, punctuated by pit stops at one-time high flyers Wang, Digital Equipment and Silicon Graphics. If anyone knew what it was like to ride a professional roller-coaster, he was the perfect poster child.
But the more I've thought about his offhand remark, the more I find myself nodding in agreement. These are exciting times in the computer industry--maybe the most fun since Netscape pointed the way for the rest of the industry. It's also getting pretty hairy.
Technology innovations are being introduced at a furious clip. And look who's behind them. For the most part, they're being ushered in by a wave of entrepreneurs who set up shop in the aftermath of the dot-com debacle. Many may never amount to much, but let's not be hasty about weighing in with a final verdict. Remember that when instant messaging first arrived on the scene, few people back then believed it would have more than a minor impact.
The evidence is staring you in the face. Constant disruption as a way of life is going to upset a lot more apple carts. Big budgets and the legions of employees may be great on paper, but the rules of the game aren't the same anymore. Today you can build a cool application or service simply by mashing up other existing services.
The big companies read the papers (and check the blogs) too. They haven't suddenly forgotten their history. It's a question of being nimble enough to respond. Clearly, nobody wants to be the next DEC.
When he met on Thursday with financial analysts, CEO Steve Ballmer announced that Microsoft would heretofore embrace "disruptive technologies" like Web-based applications. "Every piece of software--the basic core value in the way software gets created--will change in the next 3, 5 or 10 years," he said.
Ballmer added that future software will all factor in some aspect of desktop, Web and server elements. Considering how Web-based apps pose a serious threat to Microsoft's traditional desktop software, this is quite a remarkable strategy shift--assuming Ballmer can pull it off.
It's more than just the threat presented to Microsoft from Google. The proliferation of Internet standards and Web services has helped flatten the world (in the Tom Friedman sense) and that makes for an entirely new ball game.
Facebook. Flickr, maybe even Twitter one day. Who knows? The software landscape is changing seemingly all the time. I can't predict who will come out on top. But I do know the losers will be the ones who still believe the old way of doing things is good enough.
Biography
Charles Cooper is CNET News.com's executive editor of commentary.
See more CNET content tagged:
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When the base layer churns constantly, the affects on the dependent layers can be catastrophic. Think of a supply system where one part of production is working with release version numbers and others are working with build numbers. Try to integrate that.
"The wheel is turning and you can't slow down and you can't get off and you can't stand still and if the thunder don't get you then the lightning will."
Eventually, a spoiler will slow it down. The question is will it be a savvy captain telling his owner he is NOT going to fire up the extra boilers to get a new speed run record to New York or will it be an ice mountain seen too late to turn the boat.
Reader post by: wauler
Actually we are doing it in china and I am sure it gonna make huge sense shortly. I mean the future lies in web-based RSS and user-driven mashup, so the youtubes especially facebook vertically are in the right direction but not enough no wonder sometimes they will lost doing something offend their users. We must reject the concept doing the traditional Internet business let alone Operating systems like WebOs or Webservice Opening API. We must build the web as a platform which has dedicated subject and group thus we can have control to the customer so that we can grasp the internetlised content and application, there is a chinese saying:皮之不存毛将焉附. something like and Operator2.0, you know they have vendor of network equipment and handset maker help setup the infrastrcture and provide application then customers help themself generate content: voice, data and even more...And definetely we have enter into an era of unified competition totally (同质化全竞争)thanks to the fantastic spurt of ICT and TMT world tend to be flat. But ours will quadplay within internet, software, hardware and media industry, like yahoo to media, salesfore to software, apple to hardware, so this is really gonna be future stuff and we are trying to make it in china.
How:
vision, mission, strategy
vision, focus, execuation
innovation: speed and simplicity
engineering: user experience and security