Microsoft denies existence of ‘post-PC’ era
A post-PC era? Pish. It’s a PC-plus era, of course. But then Microsoft would say that.
There has been much talk of late about the world entering the post-PC era, with smartphones, tablets, and other devices meaning the time of the personal computer is drawing to a close. Microsoft is having none of it, obviously, arguing instead that the PC is alive and well, and merely maturing. One exec has even reclassified this new time as the PC-plus era.
Vice President of corporate communications Frank Shaw is the man who coined the term PC-plus, arguing in a TechNet blog post that rather than killing the personal computer, these devices are existing alongside the decades-old technology. If anything, he suggests, the products which are optimized to do just one or a small number of things a PC can do are “complimentary devices.”
Is he talking out of his hat? And is Microsoft as a whole really just voicing wishful thinking on this score? I’m actually torn right now on the whole issue.
The fact is that most people still use a PC as their primary device for accessing the Web and doing a wide range of different things. So on that score the PC is most definitely not dead. However, the times are definitely a-changin’, as Bob Dylan may or may not have once sung. Smartphones in particular have the capacity to replace the need for PCs in many people’s lives, and they’re growing ever more powerful and capable with each passing month.
The crux of this argument is whether you consider smartphones, tablets, and other similar devices as a kind of PC or not. If so then it’s not that we’re entering a post-PC era but more that the PC is evolving into a range of new species. Either way Microsoft needs to evolve along with the PC if it hopes to flourish. And that has to be worrying Steve Ballmer and co.
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August 25th, 2011
As many others have pointed out, while tablets are the latest must-have toy, the current generation is really not suited at all to content creation. Certainly not the multimedia content that leads to the wow factor in ultramobile content consumption.
Complex, large-scale content creation is still the province of desktop computing, regardless of OS.
August 25th, 2011
You know what… Can I say something about this nonsense “Content Creation” mantra to the survival of the PC?
If you have 10,000 people, will you have 9,000 creating content and 1,000 consuming it? Probably NOT… It will be the other way around.
That is why the PC as we know today will not going to what it is and it was a few years ago. It diminish to the number of “creating content” levels while the NEW will rise to the “consume content” levels.
This is what is happening and will happen… A transformation that like or not is happening and it will happen…
So, people, deal with it… Stop fighting it and embrace it and demand from the TECH giants the changes that you would like to see it…
Cheers,
AG
August 25th, 2011
This has been coming for years. And this guy is speaking complete nonsense. AG has it correct for my money. Netbooks were the start, tablets are here at the minute and tablets will evolve to a new level soon enough to truly take home the market. The truth is, most people want to browse the web for the news, use Facebook, check their emails and maybe, at a stretch, do a bit of basic word processing for letters and such things. A computer is overkill for these tasks. These days, when a tablet is as powerful as a PC was 10 years ago, it is a small wonder that people are gradually using tablets over desktops. Computers have traditionally dominated due to a lack of alternatives (c’mon, who would use their black screen Nokia with the original Snake game to do anything other than text, ring or play Snake for example?!), but now things, they are a-changing.
Computers will always have a place but that place is no longer clearly defined. We are no longer in a PC-anything era. We simply don’t know – it is a transition phase. Who knows, in 2 years we might all be sat using our Windows 8 based tablets typing on blorge.com – with or without our corresponding Windows 8 computer and PC-plus system.
August 26th, 2011
“Post PC” is a wrong term to use. Mobile phones have evolved into personal computers. Its more personal than a desktop which you probably share with others at home. The PC has moved from its traditional form factor of a desktop to laptops, netbooks, tablets and smart phones. All different form factors useful for various tasks.
August 27th, 2011
OK smart-arses, explain to me just how a tablet is going to have the resources within it to adequately record, process and then publish streaming multimedia content in the high-gloss ultra professional finsh that more and more people expect?
I am not anti-tablet, having bought one just recently. I don’t believe that the traditional PC is going to have the same market domination of more recent years, infact I agree that it will become a niche player.
But tablets do need a lot of evolution both in both hardware and software before they make the traditional laptop or desktop PC completely obsolete.