Gripe Corner

When I fancy an odd winge

Could the Death of Groove Music Pass be the Death of Microsoft?

It seems that MS are jumping out of a sinking industry. Getting us users to move from one sinking ship to another and announcing it as great news. How long can Spotify exist with being over 600 million in debt and not making a profit? Just how have they survived so long?

With MS killing of its hardware side, as those in the know have just announced they expect the Surface range to die next year. Could only make people wonder, just how long has the XBox got?

Microsoft is giving every impression of a shrinking company, the average consumer may come to forget who they are. This in turn may affect enterprise customers thinking. Seeing Microsoft retreating into a virtual world where nobody cares about it.

Their competitors have streaked past them in the consumer market to be companies that everybody knows and recognises. Even those companies know that they can use their vast resources and pockets to prop up a side of the business that in turn makes their other products look good. People will become those that only use Microsoft products in the office. A competitor could see just how Microsoft has become and decide then they want that business. By then Microsoft would simply be too small to have the resources to fight back effectively.

Links:

MS Power User

The Register

Update: So when I wrote this I was extremely pissed off at losing such a good service that I love and use all the time. And will continue to do so until December 31st anyway. But seeing as the Spotify app for Windows Phone is so bad and its the only device I would use, I also hate paying for something so poor and buggy. Don’t you just hate it when good things come to an end.

I’ve had my ups and downs with Microsoft as a company. This has just kicked off one of those down periods. Lets hope they do something good soon to turn that around.

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What You Got Then and What You Get Now – It’s Not Like It Used To Be

Blu-Tack-new-and-old“It’s not like it used to be.” You hear it said quite often, especially by those old folk (like us). This used to describe such things as the food we eat, people’s manners and buses being on time. Well people’s taste buds change more often than they think, yes people are getting ruder and more ignorant. Especially when I’m driving and they just don’t get out of my way. Idiots.  How dare they? Oh and buses are actually still pretty much on time. Well it can’t all be bad.

Another thing people gripe about is the size of things. Such comments as: –

“I remember when Wagon Wheels (the chocolate biscuit) were as big as your head when I was a kid.”

Well they could have been, you were a lot smaller then and so was your head. I know with some people it’s hard to imagine their head being smaller than it is now. Perhaps that’s just my opinion.

Recently I was confronted with absolute proof that things aren’t as big as they used to be. Blu Tack. Yes that magical stuff is handy in all sorts of situations and I remember half of my bedroom being held together with the stuff when I was much much younger. For a long time now I’ve had my comic and art book collection in storage. It was well overdue for being sorted and to see just what kind of state they were in since I saw them last. Which was before I got married. Yes that was sometime ago.

While carefully digging through and reading the odd one of two. I was quite surprised to see that pretty much everything was still in good condition. Everything was still sealed in plastic bags. But between a couple of books was an old friend. A packet of Blu Tack and, only three-quarters used. What a find. Of course I had only just bought a pack a month or two before. Typical. But when I placed them side by side the difference was very clear.

I don’t know exactly how old the one on the right is, but the reference to Trim-phones places it in the early Eighties if not Seventies. Yes I’ve been holding onto that one for a while.

But the real measure of what you got then and what you get now can be found inside. Not only is the older one wider and taller but thicker as well. Yes OK I know talking about Blu Tack is more than a little strange, but in this case there’s a principal. It shows that companies have cut the size of things you used to remember of the products you used everyday. What a difference three decades makes.

If anybody else has anything like this, please let me know.

Blu-Tack-new-and-old-inside

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