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Bad Boy Ballmer : The Man Who Rules Microsoft
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Author: Fredric Alan Maxwell
List Price: $26.95
Our Price: Click to see the latest and low price
ISBN: 0066210143
Publisher: William Morrow (17 September, 2002)
Edition: Hardcover
Sales Rank: 259,455
Average Customer Rating: 3.11 out of 5
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Customer ReviewsRating: 1 out of 5
Extremely disappointing
Very poorly written, frequently goes off on irrelevant tangents, clearly biased against Ballmer, MS and Bill Gates, and full of factual errors. His attempts to describe technology are laughable.
Rating: 3 out of 5
Interesting, Geekish, Exhuberate, and Brilliant
Fredric Alan Maxwell is loud and proud. I would have discarded the book early in the reading, if it had not been for exuberate descriptions and storys of Steve Ballmer. Maxwell seems to hate capitalism. I'm a strong believer in capitalism, so his scarcastic remarks really annoyed me. Rather than letting the reader analyze the facts about Microsoft, he interjected stupid idols, such as, calling Microsoft the "beast". Its like he wants the reader to believe, Microsoft is the gangster who rapes, pillages, and destroys the community. Maxwell does not seem to be high tech expert, he can barely talk intelligently about subjects like Java, dot.net, and Server technology.
Think about it, Microsoft has made Corporate America richer because of its products. Microsoft wealth is simply a product of supply and demand. Customer continue to demand their products. Most of the VB and MFC programmers I know have migrated to developing in C# , ASP.net, and VB.Net. Dot.net was a great strategic move by MS. Win 95 was a hugh success and pattern to follow for emerging hardware introductions. Win 95 made the leap from 16 bit apps to 32 bit apps. The 32 bit apps were cool, so I dished out the money and receive value for several years using win 95. I've never regretted my investment in MS products.Maxwell wants badly to denounce Microsoft incredible wealth machinery by claiming MS pulled a fast one. Maxwell points out the battle turned from the Justice Department to the political election. MS would reverse political democratic tradition by supporting Republican George Bush Junior and hope his administration would not agressively pursue the anti-trust charges. $2 million in soft money to the Republican party. Ballmer would yell "Who op!" three times seeing a possible escape from Judge Jackson. Bush would reveal, he was on the side of big business, just what Microsoft wanted to hear. At the turn of the century, 2000, Ballmer became the MS CEO, fourth richest man in the world, and characterized himself by screaming "I love this company!". I found Ballmers biography from childhood to adult: interesting, geekish, exhuberate, and brilliant. Ballmer would meet Gates at the Currier house. Gates would leave Harvard claiming they had nothing more to teach him. Gates and Paul Allen purchased existing code for 75k and created Basic. Ballmer graduates Harvard and goes to work for P&G. Later, Ballmer's excellence in math and ambition would take him to Stanford. In the meantime, Gates would be under pressure to build an OS compatible for the IBM PC Junior. Prior to graduation Ballmer would leave Stanford and help Microsoft manage the amazing feat. Ballmer is a interesting person to follow. I found his story inspiring.
Rating: 5 out of 5
Interesting and Eye-opening Read
I got Bad Boy Ballmer as a present, put it on my bedside table, and picked it up one night last week. I read it all the way through, discovering more about Microsoft than I'd read anywhere else. A tech buddy has his birthday next week. I'm getting him a copy.
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