Microsoft merges HD-DVD division with two others

[MerrickG]

As for how this affects the format war is anyones guess, but I discovered an article in which states that Microsoft has merged three divisions including the HD-DVD division into one division.

http://www.news.com/8301-13860_3-9837302-56.html

This probably means little in the overall format war, but I do find it positive that MS no longer sees that HD-DVD is worth its own division.

[Steverhcp02]

well, amir "left" because of this.

READ: Amir was canned and they cut overhead by merging different groups. IE: no future for HD DVD as a whole. Its easier to drop HD DVD as a 3 man group thna to drop HD DVD by itself. the PR would be a headache. Now they can probably phase it out slowly and just "devote resources to the other 2"

[MerrickG]

Yet, Amir still hangs around AVS like no other.

[JohnGalt]

In my experience this sort of reshuffling / repackaging of business units more often than not precedes a quiet shutdown or sale of that portion of the assets. The deadweight along with those making more than they're worth to the remainder of the business are shuffled in then released. Not universally true of course but that's how it often seems to work and obviously MS R&D will be so Windows-centric as to be nearly worthless to anyone outside the Redmond campus.

I'd interpret Amir's being moved out of this boondoggle as his having relatively more valuable skills than those who are still stuck to the tar baby.

[simpspin]

Originally Posted by merrick97

Yet, Amir still hangs around AVS like no other.

Maybe he has more free time?

[Neo65]

It has to do with the WMP group not delivering what they were counted on. It's a widely known gossip in the PC space that the gentleman who ran the WMP group let that group get arrogant and killed every ounce of product innovation from what is supposed to be the cutting edge media player interface.

Ballmer did everything short of a press announcement to let the world know that WMP screwed up big time and disbanded the group, the members of the group that joined other groups were not always treated kindly either, since they had to learn the hard way that WMP is used by tens of millions of people not because people loved it, but because it came free with windows. The wmp app itself was terrible.

[sj001]

Originally Posted by merrick97

Yet, Amir still hangs around AVS like no other.

Amir, now that he is not an "official" insider, still continues the same rhetoric as before. But maybe even he can see that Red will fail soon.

[plee]

Microsoft has spent years and invested billions of dollars in the TV business, changing approaches several times along the way.

I suppose you eventually want to show some profit or at least break even. Seems like they just grouped all of these money losing ventures together to eventually dissolve them.

[JohnGalt]

Originally Posted by Neo65

It's a widely known gossip in the PC space that the gentleman who ran the WMP group let that group get arrogant and killed every ounce of product innovation from what is supposed to be the cutting edge media player interface.

Well there's the problem right there: Microsoft has never been an innovator in any space other than predatory business and licensing practices. In the technology spaces they occupy they've never been other than an acquirer and imitator though given enough time and money they usually manage to cough up somewhat usable products ... eventually.

[X400]

Amir probably made a very very nice chunk of change though so i doubt he really cares

[atomik kinder]

Originally Posted by JohnGalt

In my experience this sort of reshuffling / repackaging of business units more often than not precedes a quiet shutdown or sale of that portion of the assets. The deadweight along with those making more than they're worth to the remainder of the business are shuffled in then released. Not universally true of course but that's how it often seems to work and obviously MS R&D will be so Windows-centric as to be nearly worthless to anyone outside the Redmond campus.

I'd interpret Amir's being moved out of this boondoggle as his having relatively more valuable skills than those who are still stuck to the tar baby.

The exact same thing happened to my sister. Several months back the company she worked for merged several departments. Then, in a few months they laid some of them off, then more and finally she got laid off just a month before Christmas and the whole dept is gone.

[JackStraw]

Originally Posted by JohnGalt

In my experience this sort of reshuffling / repackaging of business units more often than not precedes a quiet shutdown or sale of that portion of the assets. The deadweight along with those making more than they're worth to the remainder of the business are shuffled in then released.

That was actually the first thing that came to my mind. I think most people in the corporate world have seen something like this where they shuffle things under one umbrella, maybe a small scale layoff, and then quietly do away with said functions (I like to call it "consolidation before elimination"). I've seen it and have been a victim of it in the past.

Which may make that article a little more significant than just a simple reorganization.

[Ilka]

I don't see this departmental shuffle as just a prelude to a shutdown, instead, I'd vote for the Michael Bay version of M$ trying to get its ducks in a row for their coming attempts to control video D/L'ing, where HD DVD is just a side-show (but a necessary one to forestall the acceptance of nex-gen physical media distribution).

[spicynacho]

Wow, reading the article, it is even more clear that HD DVD is the red headed step child of this group. The only mention of them is that they are being merged. The head of the group is the guy from IPTV. The other faction of this group is the media center folks.

Everyone knows, inside and outside of MS, that IPTV is a long term pipe dream and media center is a product that is now emerging and coming into its own. HD DVD does not fit in to this other than to transition whatever talent they have into a new position.

[SpikesBluBlooded]

What's with that really big girl clearing her throat in the corner?

[maximiza]

They are are trying to create synergy to make slaves out of us all. Run for the hills save yourselves, save your Blu-Ray players!!!!

[mikey p]

Originally Posted by merrick97

Yet, Amir still hangs around AVS like no other.

Where else can he go, what else can he do? You can thank him for me being Blu today, he did a great job!

[MozartMan]

Speaking of Amir, he created new thread on AVS trying to convince people that DD+ and 16 bit is good enough audio quality:

Advanced topics in HD audio:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=960826

[RUR]

Originally Posted by MozartMan

Speaking of Amir, he created new thread on AVS trying to convince people that DD+ and 16 bit is good enough audio quality:

Advanced topics in HD audio:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=960826

and what would his motive be?

Originally Posted by amirm

Fair point. A number of reasons do come to mind though:

1. One day you want to store these movies on a hard disk and stream them from there. Why would we want to store 2-3 times more data than we need? And even if you have the storage, you need bandwidth to stream them. I hate to allocate more to audio than people use for SD video and audio put together!
etc. etc. blah, blah, blah....

[DrinkMore]

Originally Posted by RUR

and what would his motive be?

I saw that. Pretty sick if you ask me. Inserted some "subliminal" message about downloading content. Idiot.

What I find even sadder is that man has been posting on AVS for 7 years. SEVEN YEARS!!! Anyone else find that sad?? Surely he would have move along by then.

I like you all, but please - shoot me if I am here for 7 years