Over a year ago, I commented that sometimes it feels like working at Microsoft is like working in Dinosaur Country. Every time, I hear the phrase “software as a service” or it’s cousin “software plus services” it makes me feel this way. Most of the people uttering this crap don’t realize that this makes them sound as dated as the old codgers who kept on talking about “horseless carriages” when everyone else called them automobiles or just plain cars.

Case in point, this article from the Telegraph entitled Microsoft powers up for change which contains this humdinger of an opening paragrapgh

Chief executive says free software, downloadable online, is on the horizon for consumers. Josephine Moulds reports

Steve Ballmer, chief executive of Microsoft, yesterday signalled another step towards a dramatic change in the software giant's business model.

In London on a whistle-stop tour, Ballmer was discussing the delivery of software packages over the internet. "We are a software company, and yet in a sense, the very form of our core capability is changing. We need to change our capabilities so that we are not just good at writing bits that you put out on CD and deliver, but rather writing this thing that is a living, breathing, dynamic, organic thing."

What’s next? A press release announcing that pasteurization may not be a fad? A news story conceding that heavier-than-air aircraft may just be the way to go after all? 

*sigh*

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