Steve Ballmer

I watched the whole keynote yesterday, and at the end, they ripped down the sort of back of the tent behind the stage, and there's the entire development team in the red, yellow, green, and blue squares of the Windows logo sort of sitting outside on the big sports field on Redmond's campus.

And there's only 360 people that built Windows 95, so it's still kind of a small team, but they're all there. They're fired up. They're part of the moment. Okay, so that's the launch event. In Redmond, at least. Around the world, people are lined up around the block to buy an operating system. There's a lot of news coverage of that. It was basically the iPhone launch of its day. Yes.

And there's only 360 people that built Windows 95, so it's still kind of a small team, but they're all there. They're fired up. They're part of the moment. Okay, so that's the launch event. In Redmond, at least. Around the world, people are lined up around the block to buy an operating system. There's a lot of news coverage of that. It was basically the iPhone launch of its day. Yes.

They lit up the CN Tower, the Tower of London. This date, August 24th, 1995, they basically treated an operating system launch the way that you would launch a movie or a new Madonna album. Right. it was a marketing case study, so much so that the folks from Coca-Cola actually reached out to Microsoft to ask them, how do you do marketing this well in the new age? Oh,

They lit up the CN Tower, the Tower of London. This date, August 24th, 1995, they basically treated an operating system launch the way that you would launch a movie or a new Madonna album. Right. it was a marketing case study, so much so that the folks from Coca-Cola actually reached out to Microsoft to ask them, how do you do marketing this well in the new age? Oh,

Yes. This is a company that freaking invented Santa Claus to sell us all sugar water. And they're calling Microsoft asking, how do you market in this new era? It was that successful. They launched concurrently worldwide in eight languages. So this thread that Microsoft had of early international continued all the way through to this moment.

Yes. This is a company that freaking invented Santa Claus to sell us all sugar water. And they're calling Microsoft asking, how do you market in this new era? It was that successful. They launched concurrently worldwide in eight languages. So this thread that Microsoft had of early international continued all the way through to this moment.

They invested heavily in doing all of the localization and help stuff. so that the whole world really could adopt something all at one time. It really was the perfect product at the right time. The internet, games, all of that.

They invested heavily in doing all of the localization and help stuff. so that the whole world really could adopt something all at one time. It really was the perfect product at the right time. The internet, games, all of that.

Yes, that's the takeaway. They thought about software in a completely different way. And yes, the start menu, while it got cluttered and complicated and messed up over time, the idea of a button that you click to start using your computer was very appealing to people.

Yes, that's the takeaway. They thought about software in a completely different way. And yes, the start menu, while it got cluttered and complicated and messed up over time, the idea of a button that you click to start using your computer was very appealing to people.

Oh, yeah. I mean, the Mac just never had any real PC penetration. From the IBM PC forward, it never had big market share.

Oh, yeah. I mean, the Mac just never had any real PC penetration. From the IBM PC forward, it never had big market share.

And that is how they tried to market it. They marketed it as people on job sites using Windows. They marketed it as people doing crafts. And there's like someone who's modeling something for an F1 car. It's just fun watching all these old videos and seeing all the different personas.

And that is how they tried to market it. They marketed it as people on job sites using Windows. They marketed it as people doing crafts. And there's like someone who's modeling something for an F1 car. It's just fun watching all these old videos and seeing all the different personas.

Yep. Now, I must say, this all pains me deeply as someone who never owned a PC, grew up using a Mac, loved every bit of my Mac, was even an apologist in the sort of OS 9 era of... This isn't very good, but I'm still going to say it's good. And, you know, I was on the OS 10 public beta. I only clicked a start menu when I was like fixing a teacher's computer at school.

Yep. Now, I must say, this all pains me deeply as someone who never owned a PC, grew up using a Mac, loved every bit of my Mac, was even an apologist in the sort of OS 9 era of... This isn't very good, but I'm still going to say it's good. And, you know, I was on the OS 10 public beta. I only clicked a start menu when I was like fixing a teacher's computer at school.

Even though the takeaway here is everyone thought this was a great operating system and it won the market. I always looked at it like, well, it's not a Mac.

Even though the takeaway here is everyone thought this was a great operating system and it won the market. I always looked at it like, well, it's not a Mac.

The way that Apple products became mainstream always felt odd to me as someone who was using them when they weren't. But it's been interesting gaining a new appreciation for Microsoft through studying their history that I absolutely did not have as a user during this era.