It's called damage control.

"Microsoft is barely invested in HD-DVD at all"

"Vista isn't a failure"

It's simple guys. Microsoft isn't gonna "die" but its certainly not the monopoly it once was, as Windows can't push proprietary technology like it once could.

I would like some discussion from some literate posters who have actually read the post, and aren't Microsoft fanboys, if that's possible. Some people that perhaps can refute, or argue against the actual article itself instead of the person who wrote it, in a big smear campaign.

Worse than the New Your Times, I swear. Stop being fanboys. 

Nice analysis. I also don't think MS is falsifying financial reports.

My bigger concern is that the company has become a developer of inferior products, like the 360(RRoD) and Vista(Vista copyright tech, and vista's attempts to exclude the use of anything that doesn't make MS money), and uses those mediums to push its trademarks in an effort to tax the industry, instead of innovate it.

As for their press releases, they're obviously bullshit, but bullshit to the point of being illegal, I think they hover just on the "legal" edge of that line.

@NJ5

Well I don't think "fanboys" can ever be united NJ5......do you as that literally breaks the meaning of a fanboy

I mean the closest we've seen is something like fanboys uniting wii60 (against PS3) --- but that died out long back.

n SONy & M$ fanboys uniting is impossible

Yeah, I can't say that I agree either.

In retrospect though, it is really a shame that Microsoft didn't support HDDVD as much as this article seems to suggest they did.

Even now if Microsoft had backed it whole heartedly and included the HDDVD inside of the 360. Even if it had lost to Blu-Ray and was in the current state it is in now, it would still not be so bad. Games can survive on HD-DVD in the future for Microsoft cant they? Microsoft wouldn't have to pay Sony royalties for Blu-Ray, and they would have their own proprietary game format disc in HDDVD.

I even think that if some time passed, and mirosoft really grew balsy they could support HD-DVD movies in the same proprietary fassion that Sony supports UMD's for the PSP.

Oh , but that wouldn't work, I forgot, sony wons alot of movie studios don't they, thats why UMD's were able to stay afloat for so long.
okay. so in conclusion, HD-DVD would not ever be cost effective for MS, but you have to admit, it was an okay idea.

im rambling, its late , i apologize for the incoherent ramblings.

ZenfoldorVGI, I think you're jumping to conclusions with your accusations of fanboyism. The fact is that Microsoft barely invested in HD-DVD.

1- They made a HD-DVD add-on for the 360, which is only used for movies and wasn't heavily promoted.

2- You can play HD-DVD movies in Vista, but you can also play Blu-Ray ones.

The fact is that no matter whether MS is dying or not, this article is crap, and the posts above prove it.

I don't necessarily hate Microsoft. I do feel they attempt to milk their consumers, and have become jaded since they decided to drop XP support completely, and my 360 RRoD'd. I'm a PSWii man now, so when talking to me, don't assume that I'm an unbiased observer.

1. If you read the article, it actually reviews the entire relationship between HD-DVD and microsoft, which seems to be fairly factual, and makes your numbered point seem like you just made it up from assumptions.

2. That is also completely covered thoroughly in the article, and more in-depth analysis reveals some information you seem to not know.

As for you being a fanboy, your either the biggest MS fanboy around, or just an asshole towards me personally, because I was simply trying to post an article that, I assume, might have a certain tilt against MS towards the end, but is filled with interesting information, and large amounts stuff that you would need to know to even take place in the argument.

Nothing you(nor anyone but that mod)has said so far has been even remotely related to the majority of the blog, nor does it address any concerns. Your assertion that, even though you have only "skimmed" the blog, you simply assume enough off the top of your head to discredit it, and that somehow "proves" someone elses opinions are wrong, is the biggest pile of bullshit I've ever heard. Go sell that somewhere else.

SSJ12 is a quality poster, though he and I don't see eye to eye on a lot of issues, at least he knows how to tell everyone to stfu when they're being "internetish".

A while back Business Week did an analysis on the cost to make Vista and estimated that just the payroll for the development was ~$10 billion.  The fact that they had to start from scratch part of the way through probably hurt them a bit but in no way is Vista anything but a complete and utter failure in terms of economics.  $10b to make an OS is retarded and its probably the most money spent on developing software by a factor of 10x or 20x.....seriously Vista is horrendous from an economic standpoint.

I will admit that its an estimate but I think even if they were off by 80% on the low side I would still be justified in saying Vista is an economic failure so it doesn't really matter.... 

I'm sorry but an article including "Microsoft is dying" in its name better be more based on facts about the whole company than being mostly about a format which Microsoft never cared much about.

I am not a MS fanboy (I don't own a 360), and what I posted is nothing directed to you personally. I openly admitted that I didn't read the whole article (because frankly I don't care about the detailed history of HD-DVD).

Furthermore, after reading Bod's remarks, it's very obvious that it would be a waste of time to read this article. Who cares about doingpoint-to-point rebuttals when the general tone of the article itself reveals that we shouldn't trust the author and his arguments? If we paid that much attention to every "microsoft is dying" article, we'd be discussing them all day, because there are many!