Microsoft Gives Up the Grail

Ballmer: That didn't go over so well.
Flunky: The reaction seemed about 50-50.
Ballmer: At best.

That was elevator chitchat overheard by a Business 2.0 reporter and relayed on a blog by the magazine's Owen Thomas. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer had just emerged from a meeting with analysts in Manhattan last Thursday.

Yes, that meeting -- the one at which he uttered those magical, market-cap-killing words about the company's new Vista operating system: "Perhaps people are somewhat too bullish."

On Wall Street, of course, that's the same thing as wandering down a dark alley and wondering aloud if you have too many $100 bills in your wallet. ...