Microsoft Troubles - IX, the story unfolds with Apple closing in on Microsoft size.

Three pieces in the trade press showing how things are unfolding.

Om Malik points out that Intel and Microsoft fortunes are closely intertwined.
Jean-Louis Gassée suggests that "Personal Computing" (on those pesky Personal Computers) is downsizing and changing.
Joe Wilcox analyses Microsoft latest results and contrasts a little with

Whatever the state of play is, Steve Ballmer has been at the helm of Microsoft for a decade.
These are his results. He's taken an effective monopoly with a guaranteed cash-flow and a mountain of cash and turned it into "not the coolest place to work".

Will Microsoft go out with a Whimper, not a Bang?
A fierce Open Source advocate friend now "Just doesn't care" about Microsoft.
Is apathy the marker for a company's decline?

"Why Intel Will Be a Mobile Loser" by Om Malik
Atom would be competitive until 2011.
Too bad Intel sold its StrongARM technology to Marvell.

"Very Personal Computing" - Edited by Jean-Louis Gassée

The center of financial gravity in the computing world—the Center of Money—has shifted.

"Microsoft Q3 2010 by the numbers: Beats the Street, but Apple closes in" by Joe Wilcox

Apple announced fiscal 2010 Q2 results: $13.5 billion revenue and net profit of $3.07 billion, or $3.33 a share.

In 2009 Q2, the year before, Microsoft reported $4.4 billion operating income, $2.98 billion net income or 33 cents a share.
Apple: $9.08 billion revenue and $1.62 billion net income or $1.79 earnings per share.

Apple made enormous revenue and earnings gains against Microsoft in just one year.
The question now isn't so much if Apple might catch or surpass Microsoft but when.

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