Microsoft used to make real software

I loved reading Joel Spolsky's latest blog entry My First BillG Review. Not that I like VBA, but I do like the way Bill used to personally approve all important features and the way he kept questioning until he was sure that the people involved had a handle on the technical requirements.

I also thought that it was interesting that Joel (an ex-microsofty) likened Steve Ballmer's leadership of Microsoft to John Sculley's famously bad leadership at Apple.

Now before you all die from a heart attack that I might have anything good to say about Microsoft, I can be often quoted as saying that one of the very few truly innovative products that Microsoft released was Excel (the focus of the story). It was the first ever GUI spreadsheet, released on the first mass market GUI computer (the Mac). No one else saw the power that a mouse driven UI would bring to the number crunching spreadsheet.

Very few companies make even one truly innovative move, so don't think I think that Microsoft is all bad. Just mostly ;)

I wonder what Bill is thinking now that he has announced he is winding down with Microsoft over the next two years. I wonder if he fears for the future of his company. He must know only too well what happened to Apple when Steve left (using the word "left" here in it's lesser known pro-active form ;)