Live from D: Gates and Ballmer debut Windows 7
By Ryan Block 
posted May 27th 2008 9:15PM
posted May 27th 2008 9:15PM
We're reporting live from D to see Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher chat it up with Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer about all things Microsoft. Live coverage after the break!
6:27 - Announcer welcomes Les Hinton, CEO of Dow Jones. Applauding Walt and Kara, discussing the "change in ownership," talking News Corp. Errr.
6:30 - Welcoming out Walt and Kara... aaand here they are.
6:31 - Mossberg: "It's been a turbulent year for a lot of these companies." Swisher: "It's been a big news year." Indeed it has.
6:36 - They want to have a Bill + Steve redux, except this time the Steve is Ballmer, not Jobs. Playing the Gates retirement video from CES.
6:43 - Stiiiiiiiill playing the video. It's still pretty good though, and they added a few new clips here and there.
6:46 - All done! Mossberg: Ladies and gentlemen, Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer!
6:47 - Taking it back to the beginning, what kind of classmate/roommate was Bill in college? "He was a pretty shy guy... quiet, kind of shy, but a certain kind of spark. Especially later in the day, early in the morning. Bill was usually going to bed by the time I was waking up." Bill's talking about how he constantly played hookey.
6:50 - Ballmer talking about how Gates came and went Harvard. Gates: "You can leave and come back!" Say, is that a hint about Bills retirement? Ballmer's talking up his time spent at Procter and Gamble. Mossberg: Was it about then that you tried to hire Steve? Gates: "Not yet..." they were still way early on in the company.
6:53 - Mossberg: Did you wait to finish business school? Ballmer: "This is classic. Gates calls, 'Hey, what are you doing? Oh, god, too bad you don't have a twin brother or something...' he didn't just come out and say anything. 'Too bad, too bad -- and he hung up!' That was the sales call!"
6:54 - Gates on the early days: "We had so many customers, so many choices about what we could do next. We've always managed the company very conservatively." Talking anecdotally about how early-Microsoft wanted to have enough in the bank to pay its employees for a year if their customers stopped paying. "I had this very conservative view of our financial limits."
6:57 - Ballmer: "I wondered, why did I leave Stanford business school for this?" Eventually Bill gave him the real pitch: "We can put a computer on everyone's desk." Gates: "I needed Steve. I needed the skills he had, I needed a partner." Ballmer: "Bill said, 'Prove we can hire one good guy, and we'll hire 2-18'... and that became our management approach!" Ballmer says Microsoft hedges all its bets, takes all its risks technologically -- "Why take financial risks?"
7:03 - Mossberg: There's this perception that [Bill's] the technology guy, and [Steve's] the sales guy. Is that right? Bill: They've been jointly involved in a lot of crossover stuff, "Steve and I have done all this stuff together." Ballmer: Discussing working on the Windows 1.0 as a project manager. (Remember that infomercial?) "I'm not an engineer!"
7:04 - Swisher: Would you call yourself a businessman? Gates: "Sure. Sales minus costs equals profits. Is there more?" Big laughter. Mossberg: Did it bug you that Bill blew up and became extremely famous? Ballmer: "No. ... It was always clear Bill was the senior partner and I was the junior partner... it's never bothered me at all."
7:08 - Swisher: Do you still get veto on company decisions? Gates: "No." Says he's become the junior partner when he swapped roles with Ballmer. Mossberg asking about Bill's participation these days and going forward. "It's a very different role" he's taking on. Ozzie and Mundie have stepped up, and he's looking to Steve to help pick and choose his future projects.
7:12 - Ballmer: "I want to know what [Bill] thinks." Swisher wants to talk Yahoo! Ballmer gives the quick rundown of events to date. "We are not rebidding for the company -- we reserve the right to do so, but it's not on the docket." Swisher: What are you interested in, in Yahoo? Ha, they're wheeling out a whiteboard for Ballmer to diagram his explanation. Swisher: "This is like crack for him." Ballmer discussing ads, bidders, search, and the scale of it all. "To accelerate scale, it made sense for us to look at Yahoo!'s business."
7:17 - Ballmer says they're still in talks with Yahoo! about a "partnership." Swisher mentions that Ballmer's model of competing with Google is reminiscent of a monopoly. Ballmer gives the who, me? look. Gates: "Guys like us avoid monopolies because we compete!" Naturally, the lot of that exchange was all very tongue-in-cheek.
7:20 - Ballmer: "You need scale, you need business and technology innovation. Large and small... this is a funny marketplace in which to say you're cheaper [than the competition]." Swisher: What's the key element" Ballmer: "The most important thing is that we have a good team and that we're patient." And money -- investment. Ballmer's getting super intense. Mossberg: "You're getting a little scary there." Ballmer: "WELL, YOU GOT THE REAL ME!" Dude, this is Steve, what do you want?
7:24 - Mossberg wants to talk Vista. "Is Vista a failure? Is it a mistake?" Ballmer: "It's not a failure, it's not a mistake. Are there things we'll modify and improve going forward? Sure." Gates is mum, smiling off into the distance. Bet he can't wait to wash his hands of this stuff.
7:26 - Ballmer: "Let me ask Bill..." is Vista up to your expectations compared to '95 and 3.0? Gates: "There's no product that we've ever shipped that was 100% of what I wanted. That's part of the magic of software, people give you feedback... and you get to make a new version. ... We have a culture of 'we need to do better."
7:28 - Ballmer: "There are two unique things: in a lot of our Windows releases in the past, we've always had a second stream. With 95 we were introducing NT in the background... the number one thing people found jarring [with Vista] was that we changed the UI. ... That was ironic." Mossberg: Will you show us a little bit of Windows 7? Ballmer: "Sure! This is the smallest snippet of Windows 7. It's just a small little snippet.'"
7:29 - "This is 'likely to ship within three years of general availability of Vista.'" Demo time! It does multi-touch!
7:35 - They worked with the Surface team on the multi-touch stuff. Microsoft is re-thinking the whole user interface to better accommodate multi-touch for day to day use.
7:37 - Not running on surface. Running on a Dell Latitude XT. They've changed the taskbar, but it was difficult to tell exactly what they did.
7:39 - Swisher and Mossberg: So, what does this represent? Is this the next phase of the way people will do day to day work on their computers? Gates: "We're at an interesting junction... in the years to come, the roles of speech, vision, ink, all of those will become huge. I showed what an intelligent whiteboard would be like."
7:43 - "For the person at home and the person at work, that interaction will change dramatically." Talking about the single-user interfaces we have today. Mossberg: This is 15-18 months from release, your friends in Cupertino probably have one more turn before you get this out the door. They have the iPhone, which is on the market today... is there a risk that the work you're doing here will look like they got there first? Ballmer: "There's a lot in Windows 7, and our goal's got to be, with our hardware partners, to produce fantastic PCs. ... We'll sell 270m PCs a year, and Apple will sell 10m. Apple is fantastically successful, and so are we."
7:45 - Ballmer's talking about Microsoft's "real opportunity" to improve things in the future -- which is another way of saying that things could be better, but there's no real specific commitment to making the Windows experience better.
7:47 - Mossberg's drilling Bill on the Mac vs. PC, Bill's reticent. Ballmer: "Every share point Apple picks up is a share point we don't like. ... But it depends on what your goal is. We like selling 290m units. ... Our model is better." Mossberg: But you CAN'T be happy with this Vista situation? Ballmer: "What's the appropriate response? I kind of like what Bill already said." Gates: "You're kind of repeating yourself." Ouch. Big applause.
7:51 - Q from the internet: Do you feel the unsuccessful pursuit of Yahoo! has tarnished Microsoft at all? Ballmer: "No. ... at very least, people now know we're serious about our online business."
7:53 - Talking about the phone market, Mossberg and Ballmer are debating unit volume between Nokia, RIM, Windows Mobile, Apple. On Android, Ballmer: "It's another person taking another crack at the pie. ... Google comes late, without experience, and no clear business model. ... But we take them seriously."
7:54 - Open floor for Gates as he transitions out of Microsoft: "It probably is the last time I'll get to speak here..." Nawwwwww. "Melinda will be speaking Thursday, you'll hear from here why this will be a fun journey."
7:58 - Audience questions, but unfortunately none have been all that interesting so far.
8:02 - O'Reilly: You set out to put a computer on every desk -- and you achieved that. So do you have a new audacious goal? Gates talking about the future and goals of how Microsoft thinks the future will look. Interactive TV, tablet PC, and so on.
8:08 - Question about apps in the browser, and what that means for the future of software. Ballmer doesn't think it's all or nothing.
Okay, that's it!
OMG bet it looks like Vista...
No, I bet it looks like Leopard!
BINGO!
I bet it looks like Windows 7!
Oh will some of you idiots give it a rest.
If you dont like it when PC people show up to Mac threads and post stupid stuff, maybe you can lead by example.
Even if they do show an actual desktop shot of Windows 7 (don't get your hopes up with the new Windows team leaders), its most likely going to look like Vista.
Rumor has it tonight's info is going to be about touch
(see: http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1412)
Why would I care what it looks like? I customize the UI to my tastes. Its what's under the hood that counts and why vista sucked so bad.
Im bored, and I am gonna make some weird funky concept of windows 7 that would work well on both a touch and mouse-keyboard interface
i bet its going be about ninjas
OK so I am hoping it is better received than Vista. Vista is what it is and there is not to much to say... It does take a beating...now if Microsoft would just drop the legacy support they could be on to something...oh yeah it would be OSX.
who gives a s*** what it looks like how does it run?
I just finished 5 mins ago...
Its a bit crappy, but I hope you get the concept:
http://lettuceandcarrots.com/fastwin7.swf
@ L8on....
You stole my avatar!!!
@aledc78: Dude, it's not like you created it to begin with!
If anyone is interested in seeing a video of the multi-touch stuff shown during the conference, some people at Microsoft already made a video :
http://video.msn.com/video.aspx?mkt=en-US&playlist=videoByUuids:uuids:8700c7ff-546f-4e1d-85f7-65659dd1f14f&showPlaylist=true&from=msnvideo
Via the Windows Vista blog : http://windowsvistablog.com/blogs/windowsvista/archive/2008/05/27/microsoft-demonstrates-multi-touch.aspx
duh. Longhorn looked like Xp too.
You can see aero on the photo of paint.
No live stream?
that would be better than breaking my f5 key... PICS NAO plzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
i think your 'z' key's buster too, miss thang
Hey guys, Windows 7 is the real answer to everything you wanted! New, shiny, amazing features everyone has been asking for!! Don't look over there, look here. That's just Vista in the corner, users love it, trust us. But forget about that, let's look at how awesome Windows 7 will be. Just hang on for a bit and Windows will be the best OS ever. It's coming soon! Not like the 7 years it took to get Vista out, this one is almost done.
You guys are like a woman that's dating a married man and believing that he will leave his wife for you any day now. WinXP, Linux, OSX. Make your choice. Vista is a failure, and MS is stringing you along.
Use Firefox with the ReloadEvery plugin. ;-)
Just set it to check every 5 seconds.
i predict a Vista+OS-X+Ubuntu hybrid......or maybe i dream....either way, im stoked!
*drools*
that could be amazing.
Yeah, it would be the ultimate bloated and dumbed-down overcomplicated sack of crap ever!
You mean the POSIX standard? They can't compete on quality, they have to have their own weird API's people have to reimplement to compete with them.
ubistaX?
pretty excited for this!
you and 4 other people
make that five lol
I hope Gates goes out on a high-note.
I'd like to see Balmer fall off the stage.
Or the Hungarian egg guy make a comeback.
LOL YEAH THAt GUY
I can't wait! Is Stevonius Jobsenheimer going to be there?
I hope they keep the name Windows 7. It's just a good name. Vista was not a very good choice of names in my opinion. And it really drives me crazy when people don't pronounce it right, and call it "Veesta".
I pronounce it "craaaap".
And since Win 7 will be replacing vista just over a year after it's release I don't think I'm alone.
Yeah, I think that they should screw all the names like vista and Xp and switch (back) to numbers.
This irritated me too until about a month ago. I believe Microsoft pronounces it "Vis-ta," however, the Spanish pronunciation of the word "Vista" is infact "Vee-sta." You're probably wondering what the heck that has to do with anything. "Vista" in Spanish means view or clarity. Microsoft has touted Vista by saying that it removes clutter, making things more clear. It's my belief that a marketing person liked the word's meaning in Spanish but hated the pronunciation, thus changing it to "Vis-ta."
I'm probably royaly wrong, but that's my two cents.
Ironically, Vista is VERY cluttered in my opinion.
I enjoy the clean look of a freshly installed desktop of Windows XP, with the Bliss wallpaper, and the nice empty recycling bin.
...wha?
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/vista
Why do you think it's "veesta?" Are you Ren?
I don't think they could keep the name 'Windows 7' without a majority of the internet saying they're ripping off the Mac OSes. This is probably the reason why Ubuntu still has their code names for each release.
"OS 10 vs Windows 7" -- It just doesn't seem right to me.
Hmm, I dont see why everybody is "hating" on windows seven If people were smart they would already know that windows seven addresses problems found in windows vista, like slow, buggyness, the xp compatibility is stripped. security, vista was secure, but windows seven is recoded from scratch so its going to be better with that.
And everyone has to stop making false statements, We dont know anything new, Stop saying that its going to look like Mac. It just makes all of you look like little children, which quite sadly, might be of age above 35. very sad.
5 is man
and 6 is the devil
i guess that would make me seven
Yeah because windows never used numbers in their name, oh wait...
And who pronounces it Veesta? I've never heard that before.
@ APVangeliLMS
I feel that while what you say might be true, and I certainly hope it will turn out that way, those same things were said about Vista. Vista was supposed to be all that and more, but wasn't. I'm afraid 7 might turn out the same way...
dude, just because vista in english has the same spelling, ancient word origin, and meaning in spanish doesn't mean it's not an english word.
plus saying "veesta" makes you an automatic douche
Dude, obviously they are going to call it Windows 11 to one-up on Apple.
vista is a spanish word, therefore it IS pronounced veesta
check yo 'delf next time
they should totally do "Windows VII" ..thatd be classic..
Chris, does that mean windows 7 is being released last 3 or 4 months ago?
decu55,
douche _is_ a french word, therefore one should call you "doosh" rather than "dowch"
@APVangeliLMS
Windows 7 recoded form scratch?! Oh boy!
Man, you have NO IDEA what an Operating System is.
It's not a silly interface that execute commands, that is Win3.1 and earlier, where you was doing (basically) executing DOS commands on the back.
An Operating System is far more complex it controls about everything inside your computer, it manages your RAM, HDD and all other devices, communicate with them, and more. (Read more in details: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system)
Another operating system is not your notepad, it can't be program in a week, or 3 years. Windows 7 is nothing more then what XP was form Windows 2000.
Same OS, same issues, just new features and little bug fix and little optimization and tweaks. If you expect that Windows 7 will be anything better then Windows 7 you are so wrong.
If you have issues with Vista, you will have them with Windows 7 and up.
That is probably because you have a crappy old computer that is NOT Vista compatible. Not to defend Vista or Microsoft, but it was mentioned several times that Vista is not design for old computer, in fact they dropped support for many old technologies. By old technologies I don't mean floppy drive and parallel port I mean technologies used by motherboard chipsets, BIOS, etc..
If you have an old system use XP.
If you have a new system XP will be an old man complaining non-stop on how the old days was better, and annoy you.
Vista is the new kid, fresh ready to intake new technology, however it hates old stuff... like you when you look at that black and white 5inch TV with what they laughingly called mono speakers. If it doesn't bother you, then trow away your TV and use that instead. Yea... not much fun, is it? Well that is what you are doing with Vista. As for XP, it is like you are trying to show how to play video games complex as Call of Duty 4 to your grand parents. Good luck.
What I am saying is that both OS are great OS, both have their issues like every other OS in this planet, as long as humans program, bugs and annoyance will still exists. You just have to read the system requirements. I made Vista run on my mother computer (Pentium 3 800Mhz with 256MB of RAM, YES it runs, Microsoft could have put that as minimum system requirements, however they did not as those computer contains old technology. Already the box of Vista talks about pixel shader... yea how many average computer users do you know know what really is "pixel shader", see. Of course you still have that PIII that was over-clocked an match Vista specs, but read between the lines a bit, and use your head. Another example, look at the famous 3D studio Mac system requirements, teh site says a PIII 500Mhz. Do you REALLY think you will be able to make Hollywood movies (Finding Nemo and such) with such equipment? It will take ages to render such animation...
phanbouy,
nice insult, too bad you cannot argue anything
we're talking about spanish, not french
and that furthers my point, douche and being pronounced doosh not dowch, so is vista being pronounced veesta not vihsta
like i said, check yo 'delf next time
o yea, come up with a better insult word
"...makes you an automatic douche"
"one should call you 'doosh' "
douche
douche
douche
douche
o and spell my name right
its becu55, not decu55
just like its spelled douche, not bouche
Didn't they have code names for the next few versions after Vista? Like Vienna and I can't remember the other one
Windows 7 IS Vienna, which was formerly Blackcomb. The codenames stopped when Sinofsky came along because he doesn't like codenames - all the Office releases were known as Office 10 (XP), Office 11 (2003), Office 12 (2007) etc.
Windows XP is v5.1, Vista is 6.0, Server 2008 is 6.1, and Windows 7 will be....7
I think Vista was called Longhorn or something like that.
Is there any live streaming? Like a Keynote?
yea heres a link to the streaming video
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6304687408656696643&q=developers+developers+developers
hope they show off WinFS and how the API will revolutionize file management for the average user, rather than just doing the usual MS keynote with ridiculous RFID technologies built into phones that we wont see for years in the consumer space.
i also want to see a subscription based distribution model for software (like the steam of microsoft products for say, office, visual studio, etc) and unification of the whole live marketplace across all microsoft platforms
Yeah, but it's only like a minute
Cool, I wonder if we will get any juicy info on the new/updated OS.
Perhaps we'll actually see the features that were supposed to be in Vista...or maybe it will actually be usable? Probably not...
i hope they remember to thank the DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS DEVELOPERS!
Heheh, that's never gonna get old.
do we really want to trust this guy with the future os, maybe instead of the blue screen this video will play in windows 7 when we get errors.
You guys should wear helmet cams and stream to the web ...
... and I'm actually serious.
It does say "Live from D...", I'm hoping for some live streaming
I think it's just a live blog
oops, worded it wrong
i meant live pictures like other live events
9:15 now, no video
I see you have your timezones down good.
@shadowarmy75
I see you have your grammar down goo..*ahem*... well.
Looks like we're getting a photo blog
who wants to bet on when someone ruins the whole things with a "free software", etc poster?
I wish i could.
Steve and Bill are going to state that they are giving up, and that OSX is just so superior and our programmers cannot keep up with Apple's advances so we admit defeat. Just my prediction that's all.
Right, and the iPhone 3G model will have Windows Mobile 7 pre-installed. Just my prediction that's all.
In all seriousness though, I wish they had said that on April Fools. It'd be epic!
I predict you're a dick
and before you start calling me a micro-whatever I'm writing this on my Mac
STFU fanboy.
Does it really have to be a gang war between Mac and PC? Jeez. I use both.
I predict that everyone on here have no sense of humor, and have no way of seeing sarcasm.
Well not in the magical sarcasm free void of text do we
Its people like you that cause PC people to hate you so very, very much.
Even linux users are in on the Mac hatred. If its sarcasm, then your horrible at it, and have forgotten what sarcasm is about (tags would help). If its sincere, then you are an irritating shit.
http://i31.tinypic.com/ojk035.jpg
No, we in fact do have a sense of humor. Ours just happen to tell us that you're not funny.
HOPE IT LOOKS DIFFERENT TO VISTA, OSX AND XP
I HOPE IT SUPPORTS CAPSLOCK POP-UP WARNINGS
LOL. OOPS. DAMN IT CAN'T COME SOON ENOUGH.
Looks epic
Someone I know claimed they Beta Tested it already and says it looks exactly like vista only runs faster ... but I dont think I trust them that much!
Chances are the new user interface has not made it into beta yet. They always work the back end with existing front end code, then at the end, refresh the front end.
Oh cool! I see. That makes sense.
I disagree. I think they can start with the front end, adding functionality later by programming the core of the thing. With this the can either way show mocked up print-screens of their GUI or show the iffy functionality that it has at this moment.
Which one you think they will prefer?...
crazyfacka, have you ever programmed? It's always better to first do the backend, then work on the GUI. This way you design the GUI around the backend, so you can access the features implemented. Otherwise you end up going back, re-doing a part of the GUI because you decided to add or remove even a minor feature.
Hmm that is an interesting point!
What is he uploading this from? Computer?, iPhone?, Cell Phone?
TI-81
Wow...
I'm Bored
come on hurry up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! jeez they're delaying this more than vista...
Ha Ha! :)
its been like 15 mins since the last pic.. i thought this was live.
Live blog on CNET now: http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9952546-7.html
Will probably update faster, but no pics.