From: mike 


http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&article
Id=294264

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 And now, the Microsoft coffee table. Don’t kid yourself; Microsoft is
going into the furniture business. The product that Microsoft unveiled last
week under the name “Surface” isn’t a technology, a reference design, a
user interface, an application, a PC or an appliance. It’s furniture. And
yes, that really is the business Microsoft intends to get into.

Why? Maybe because after years of bleating about “Microsoft innovation,”
someone in Redmond finally understands why that’s an oxymoron. The IT
industry hates real change — and big and powerful as it is, Microsoft can’t
move the entire IT industry.

But move furniture? Now that’s a possibility.

In case you’ve somehow missed hearing about it, Surface is a 42-by-21-in.
coffee table with a large touch screen built into the top. Several users
can work on it at once, without an external keyboard or mouse in sight.

Yes, it runs Windows Vista, and it has Ethernet, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth
connectivity. But as a PC, it’s a terrible idea. Giant touch screens are
miserable to use for office applications. And that’s what PCs are for,
right?

In a nutshell, that’s the Microsoft innovation problem. As long as
Microsoft only sells software, the rest of the IT industry has to make the
hardware for it. But everyone knows what hardware runs Microsoft software:
PCs. And PCs are optimized for office applications. So to play to its
installed base, Microsoft can’t stray far from the same old stuff.

And Microsoft can’t get into the PC hardware business either, because that
would risk alienating its biggest customers. High-end mice and keyboards
from Microsoft? Sure — but not PCs.

Thus, the Xbox game console — Microsoft hardware that doesn’t antagonize
Hewlett-Packard, Dell or Lenovo.

And thus, the Microsoft coffee table. Like the Xbox, Surface is built and
sold by Microsoft. It isn’t a reference design that Microsoft will license
to other vendors so they can add in Microsoft software. That’s the business
model for Microsoft’s cash-cow products, but that business is slowly
running dry.

True, Microsoft will have to come up with applications that are tailored
for furniture. But because Microsoft controls the hardware, that’s not so
hard to do. If something needs a big change, Microsoft doesn’t have to get
the whole IT industry and its entire installed base to go along.

Weird as it sounds, in the IT business, Microsoft is an 800-pound gorilla
chained to a million-ton mountain. But in the furniture business, Microsoft
is just one more little guy — and the master of its destiny.

If all this seems a bit removed from what corporate IT does, it is — at
least for now. Only a few casinos, hotels and retailers will get Surfaces
this year, and their IT staffs will doubtless treat these coffee tables as
the specialty items they are.

And there’s no guarantee any other IT people will ever have to worry about
them. At $5,000 to $10,000 per table, Surface could wind up being the wrong
furniture at the wrong price, and another expensive dead end for Microsoft.

But don’t get complacent. Microsoft plans to push Surface as a consumer
product eventually, once it gets the price down. (Adjusted for inflation,
Surface actually costs about the same as an IBM PC when it was rolled out
in 1981.) That could drive Surface into our reception areas and executive
offices.

And what Microsoft learns from Surface could well show up in other
Microsoft products we use, both software and hardware. That makes it worth
keeping an eye on.

Maybe most important, Microsoft’s coffee table business might be the first
clear sign of a very different, much less predictable Microsoft. A
genuinely innovative Microsoft, yes, but also a Microsoft with even more
control over how fast it can move to change its products — and how fast
we’ll have to move to keep up.

Which could mean that very soon, we’ll be needing a lot more coffee.
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 /m

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