I’m writing this in Las Vegas, on the second day of the Microsoft Mix08 conference. We asked around the table (last night at dinner) what was everyone’s favorite demo and announcement yesterday and I have to say that mine was Ray Ozzie’s keynote speech.

Ever since Ray came to Microsoft and was appointed heir to Bill Gates empire - I’ve waited in excitement as to the details of just how Ray saw the future. Over the years Gates and Microsoft have paralleled my own career and as each new technology trend or future vision became clear - I’ve always looked to Microsoft to validate and confirm my own beliefs and ‘visions’.

In this case - the issue was “how does Microsoft grok the distributed web - where they don’t control everything? How does Microsoft react to Google’s dominance in search? How does Microsoft come off to their own developer base - while expanding it into the world of php, LAMP and ‘openess’?”

This was supposed to be the ‘new open Microsoft’ Mix08. This was supposed to be the time when Microsoft found itself caged in the corner - and they were forced to come out swinging. This was also the Mix08 where Silverlight finally came into its own as a Flash killer - and the inevitable downfall of Flash - would begin.

I hope everyone noticed the systematic taking apart of Sony’s video console empire by Microsoft and the XBox (0ver the past few years) - and the $5B they lost acheving that market share. Well the same thing is about to happen to Flash wth Silverlight.

But first lets focus on Ray Ozzies vision - and how far out ahead he is of his own company.

In fact - the best way I can describe it - is that Ray Ozzie was giving a keynote - which should have been a Google keynote.

I’ve never heard Larry or Sergey elucidate the future like Ray did. I’ve never heard Eric Schmidt describe the balance between infrastructure (the cloud), deployed technology into the masses and the balance between the PC, mobile and the web. I’ve never heard anyone at Gogle describe anything they’re doing - other than just “throwing shit at a wall - and seeing what sticks!” That’s what Google’s strategy is.

In other words - Google doesn’t have a wholistic strategy!

Well Microsoft does - and that’s what Ray is all about.

Ray can sit back - watch all this short term, execution stuff get taken care of - while he keeps his arms around the ‘whole thing’. The vision of a Social Mesh or a Device Mesh and the Choices Enterpise has in front of it - so succinctly head the nail on the head - that I almost burst out in a standing ovation.

Ray gave the same keynote I would have given. Every single word he said, every single concept, buzzword and vision - was exactly the way I see the future. It was amazing!

The balance between Enterprise, the Cloud and partner services clearly layed out the future for business.

The balance between all these disparate devices - connected together around web services and content - clearly mapped out the future of entertainment and communication.

And the essence of the Social mesh - and how users/humans are driving everything - shows that Microsoft (despite its old school culture and legions of old school thinkers ) is being dragged - kicking and screaming - into the present. That’s Ray’s job.

This is what Google is all about. Every single one of Ray’s pronouncements is what Google is already building or has built. Every single one of Ray’s visions - more or less explained what Google’s grid, OpenSocial APIs, Soical Graph APIs, GMail APIs, Google apps, etc. - ARE.

So why was Ray giving the keynote that Larry or Sergey should be giving? Why doesn’t Google so clearly and obviously explain what they’re doing?

Why is it that Microsoft - once again - is taking the leadership horns and mantle and leading us towards the future?

Well sports fans - the answer to that and 1,000 other questions - will become clearer - later on.

For now - lets just say Ray is WAY out ahead of his own company, more or less explaining what Google is doing.

UPDATE: Here’s the video of Ray’s keynote - requires Silverlight.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 6th, 2008 at 10:33 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.