So why should Bill Gates and Ray Ozzie back Ruby on Rails? Because it has struck a nerve with leading edge web designer. If Microsoft wants to get its groove on (terrible pun) a huge fast innovative push with RoR would get the world’s attention.
Unfortunately, if Microsoft was to engage in this sort of strategy there’s a high potential that they will increase their cool factor, attract more alphageeks, and be able to quickly whip out awesome Web services to dazzle their user base. They might end up winning over the public.
But it takes more than a technology sea change. It’s a mind shift.
One of the biggest error I see big software companies make over and over again is trying too hard to retain control over every piece of technology they use. There’s a side to it that makes sense. When you have big teams working on a technology, when you’re delivering to demanding customers, being in control lowers your overhead. And you can draw a line from lower overhead straight to the bottom line.
What you can’t easily measure is what you end up losing. Losing in innovation, losing in new ideas, losing by not being exposed to radical new thinking that puts you two steps ahead of the competition, losing smart and passionate people who’d rather work elsewhere. Lost opportunities are hard to quantify when you’re not even able to perceive them.
It all stems from the closed echo chamber that a company creates around its technologies, in justifying to itself why in-house decisions must be better than anything not invented here. You just can’t think outside the box when you yourself drew up that box.
The best thing that could happen to Microsoft would be the moment Microsoft decides to use other people’s technologies. It would be painful, letting go always is. But there’s no gain without some pain.
I don’t see that happening. If anything, the one big company that gets it, at least by some recent changes, is Yahoo. Right now we’re witnessing what in few years will become a textbook example for a company re-inventing itself and one upping the competition. And I’m not even surprised that Microsoft has its focus on the “other” big company.
I want to end with another great quote from Ron:
It’s OK to eat your children.
It’s more than OK. In the software industry, it’s the only way to survive.