Microsoft, Past and Future
What I find surprising is that, in the process of writing a historical review on Microsoft, anyone would ignore the fact that MS has repeatedly identified areas of profit, moved in, failed spectacularly, iterated aggressively, and ultimately become dominant, at least for a time.  e.g. What killed Netscape?<p>Microsoft's surface tablets are signs of big things to come.  They're currently too expensive for what they are, but they could find a huge niche.  They're portable tablets meant for content creation, not mere consumption. If you want a tablet that will let you draw, take notes, etc. as easily as on paper, iPads aren't even close to the current Surface. The surface pro would have been <i>exactly</i> what I wanted in undergrad physics for a lecture-hall machine.  Many artists probably feel the same way now.<p>Tablets have long been too underpowered to tackle real creative tasks.  The surface proves that the hardware has changed, although the cost is still high.  I expect the next few generations of surfaces to get cheaper and more refined rapidly.  People who love tablets are soon going to want something more than a glorified phone, and the Surface is going to be the go-to option.<p>Yeah, so MS might dominate the content-creation/student/artist tablet niche.  Big whoop.  Well, success in any consumer hardware niche might do for MS what it did for Apple.  Namely, make them a huge pile of cash and jump-start their supply-chain so they can move into other areas.  It might not play out this way.  Apple has been looking for ways to make the iPad more content-creation friendly beyond just marketing them as such.  Still, iOS on an iPad is a <i>huge</i> step behind Win8 on a Surface pro for creative tasks right <i>now</i>.  All MS has to do is keep iterating the Surface and avoid another Vista-style PR blunder with Win9.