Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft CEO is Dumping MSFT

Summary: Additional signs that Vista Phony 7 [sic] is failing as Ballmer dumps close to a fifth of his holdings in the company he runs

LOOK NO FURTHER than Microsoft for evidence of the company's gradual collapse. Even its top people lost faith. Bill Gates has been getting rid of his Microsoft shares for quite some time (only gradually), but Steve Ballmer too is starting to get rid of Microsoft shares, starting with a huge disposal of $1.34 billion in Microsoft stock.



Steve BallmerChips B Malroy says that "If this isn't an impending sign that the stock is going tank soon, then its a sign of Ballmer being soon forced out, or both." There is a lot more in the IRC logs. "Notice that the sales," he adds, "were not made (at least the news of the sale) public until late Friday... Because a sale like this by the CEO would have caused the stock price to tank.

"It looks like Ballmer is trying to cash in, and just doesn't have enough stock, even with his one position on the board itself, to prevent his eventual ouster. Just more rats deserting the sinking ship, but this time it might be the CEO himself."

According to Microsoft boosters, Ballmer will sell almost a fifth of his stake. The sources add: "Ballmer last made a sale of Microsoft stock in 2003. Bill Gates remains the largest individual shareholder in the company. The Microsoft chairman routinely sells 80 million shares a year in a portfolio diversification strategy. As of the company's last proxy statement, Gates owned 621 million shares, or more than 7 percent of the company."

“But if you sell it too fast, it will surely tank.”
      --Chips B Malroy
"Ok, so neither Ballmer or Gates wants to be left holding the bag of Microsoft stock when it tanks," Chips B Malroy speculates. "But if you sell it too fast, it will surely tank.

"Could it be that WP7 is already a bust, with Kinect not far behind? Is this the real reason that the CEO is dumping stock?"

Both products had about half a billion dollars dedicated just to marketing. That is some huge waste. Ballmer recently joked rather than properly answered the question when asked if WP7 (Vista Phony 7 [sic]) failing would cost him his job.

Chips B Malroy quotes from a very recent article (or several): "But given how many mistakes Microsoft made in the design of the Windows Phone 7 OS, it probably makes sense to focus on not using the device. No one, as near as I can tell, will want to spend much time with it. Maybe the slogan should be "The smartphone for people who hate smartphones." [...] It doesn't support copy-and-paste. It doesn't offer an easy way to switch between open applications. And it doesn't have a universal search that allows you to find applications, content, messages or other data stored on your device. [...] What's more, its Web browser supports neither Adobe's Flash software nor HTML5, which Apple has promoted as an alternative to Flash."

Notice that Microsoft shares no numbers about WP7 (Vista Phony 7 [sic]) sales. It means that the number of actual sales (not channel stuffing and granting of phones to all Microsoft employees, with an apparent similar deal at Dell) must be embarrassing.

Oiaohm responds by saying: "Android is only first wave of Linux. Meego is lining up to be second wave. So we are going to have Meego vs Android. [...] Really, Meego is about unifying distributions. Fedora [and] Suse already have Meego forms."

“Android is only first wave of Linux. Meego is lining up to be second wave.”
      --Oiaohm
"It's important to show that Microsoft is failing to compete with Linux in the form of Android and with Apple on ARM devices. This will be when the snowball start to speed up on the decline of MS," Chips B Malroy claims. "We should not want the US gov to bail out MS when the time comes, as in "too big to fail." MS will try to pull that one. [...] using taxpayers money to bail out MS when and if it fails, is not funny."

"Really, here is the funny part," says Oiaohm in response. "By the time US gov tries to bail out MS it might be impossible. Only way to bail MS out would be to raid it and release all its source code. Basically terminate its existence."

Chips B Malroy continues: "Well, the brainwashed here will be crying for the gov to bail them out, so they won't have to try another OS. Inertia is all that is keeping MS going, that and the hold they have on OEM's preinstalls. The preinstalls are now in effect being broken by Apple and Google. This trend is likely to rapidly accelerate. At some point, enough users will have used Android/ChromeOS and iOS on ARM devices to try them on Intel computers. When that happens, MS is dead."

"But OEM preinstalls are not going to be enough," replies Oiaohm. "Linux has preinstalls now on phones and other devices. The market is poisoned. Problem is in a way that there is no way to stop it [editor's note: actually, Microsoft reportedly extorts with patents in attempt to prevent this now]. It's exactly like when Linux took the super computer market. Just on a large scale."

The full conversation will be published later.

For those who think that this is far fetched, remember that Microsoft's debt is growing and the future seems far from promising, even based on analysts (who are usually easy for companies to 'buy'). Just because rich people came out of Microsoft does not mean they'll donate their money to save Microsoft. It just doesn't work that way.

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

If You Don't Control Your Online Platform, Then Someone Else is Controlling You
be (or become) independent
The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Has a Policy on Racism and Sexism
In then future we'll show the misogyny and racial slurs
Links 22/09/2025: Murdochs Might Join Fentanylware (TikTok) 'Investors' (Masters), United Kingdom Recognises Palestinian Statehood
Links for the day
The 50-Pound Note Experiment and the "War on Cash"
Britain is actually seeing a rebound in cash payments, and it's not a temporary phenomenon
 
What Scares Them the Most is Independent News Sites That They Cannot Control and Censor
Wikileaks was a good example of this
Oracle Started This Year With Slop. Then It Stopped.
Passing fads are like this
Distros That Run on PCs Made 20 Years Ago and Don't Use Systemd
Betas for now
The Complaint About Brett Wilson LLP - Part I - Abusing British Women on Behalf of American Men Who Abuse American Women
Transparency is important to us, so we've decided to make this series
Slopwatch: Google News and the Evident Slopfarm Infestation
This is what people get about Linux when they query Google for Linux
Gemini Links 22/09/2025: Esperanto Music History and Apps For Android
Links for the day
Links 22/09/2025: More American 'Censorship' (Retaliation for Journalism), Cheeto "Might Be Losing His Race Against Time"
Links for the day
The Blob Slop
Give me more words, give me some text
Slopwatch: Blaming the Victims for Microsoft's Failures and Plagiarising Phoronix
That's what Google has been reduced to: slop and slopfarms
Links 22/09/2025: Breaches, Windows TCO, and Arrests
Links for the day
Gemini Links 22/09/2025: Rabbit Hole and DeGoogling Fairphone
Links for the day
Links 22/09/2025: Russian War Planes Invade NATO Airspace While Dihydroxyacetone Man Escalates Attack on Free Speech Because of Critics
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, September 21, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, September 21, 2025
Links 21/09/2025: "Hey Hi" (Hype) Under Fire, Fakes Identified; Tesla Burns Family
Links for the day
Google's Software is Malware and Malware in Mobile Devices
Originally posted by Rob Musial
Links 20/09/2025: Hegemony Coming to a Close, Luigi Mangione Ruled Not Terrorist
Links for the day
Gemini Links 21/09/2025: "Charlie Kirk Was a Hateful Piece of Shit" and Slop Code Attempted by Microsofter
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, September 20, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, September 20, 2025
Gemini Links 20/09/2025: Snowy Photos and utism is a Spectrum
Links for the day
Microsoft-Sponsored Xenophobia and Nationalism
IBM is very similar in this regard
Vintage is Sometimes Better
Why can't we get back to "simple" if (or where) "simple" means better?
Climate Breakdown Means We'll be Publishing More, Not Less
Press freedom will be a common, recurring theme
Our 5-Year Geminispace Anniversary is Coming Up
I still remember when Gemini Protocol was quite new
It's Right to Point Out Violence From the Right
Violence is a recurring theme
Tentative Summary of Things to Publish in Project 2030
I'll still be in my forties by then
Web Browsers That "Do Hey Hi" (AI)
State-of-the-art plagiarism or "autocomplete on steroids" (not coined by us, nevertheless a nice description) don't have much/any prospect
Links 20/09/2025: Hardware Projects in View, Some Independent Publishers About Russia Prosper After Cheeto Cuts Funding
Links for the day
Gemini Links 20/09/2025: Options and TV Time Machine
Links for the day
Links 20/09/2025: Retrocomputer, Antique Phone Experience, and More
Links for the day
Links 20/09/2025: Internet Shutdowns, Media Censorship, and Climate Worries
Links for the day
About 700 New Gemini Capsules in 13 Months (or 54 Per Month)
4.8K would represent a 20% increase
Rust People: Drain the Swap, You're Holding It Wrong
Does Rust make sense?
Techrights the Name Turns 15
About 6 weeks from now we turn 19
Microsoft is Running Out of Time and Floating Fake Figures, Fake Projects, Fake Narratives, Fake Excuses
Also, a lot of Microsoft's "revenue" claims are circular financing (i.e. Microsoft buying from itself, which means Ponzi-like fraud)
Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, linuxconfig.org, and Plagiarised Phoronix
Many articles out there are nowadays fake
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, September 19, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, September 19, 2025
Gemini Links 20/09/2025: Navigating the Pressures of Modern Life and SpellBinding Accidentally Wrote Another Gemini Server
Links for the day