Ballmer gives LSE a masterclass in not answering questions

SHY, SOFTLY SPOKEN Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer might have got his latest business idea from his son, and if true it could be his scariest yet - get paid to be tracked everywhere by any or every company.

In a rambling speech at the London School of Economics with a small secret service-style protection team close at hand (that is true), Microsoft's dancing monkey boy CEO gave only a quick glimpse of his physical prowess with a volleyball move while talking about clouds.

What he did mention was that the UK will be the launch country for Windows Phone 7 and that there will be a Windows tablet out by Christmas. But then we've heard that sort of thing before, World War One was supposed to be over by 25 December, too.

In what was advertised as a speech about the future of cloud computing, Ballmer told the audience of academics, students and the media nothing that they didn't already know and instead gave a master class in how not to answer questions.

What the Vole's chief did let slip, however, was that cloud computing will be "a big deal" if society organises itself around it. Well yes, when all the important personal and corporate data are going to be held by third parties and whizzing around the Internet, security is going to be paramount. And Ballmer and his mates will be happy to sell you that, if you're willing to bite.

Giving an indication of how hard any sort of global security architecture will be, Ballmer spoke of a need for the US, Europe and China to harmonise their laws to try to stop 'piracy'. One wonders whether Ballmer prefers the Chinese Communist party's idea of security?

In another scary aside, he said that private browsing had been controversial within Microsoft. No doubt the accountants were frothing at the mouth at the possibility of less user behaviour data being available for the Vole's marketeers.

Professing his support for people's privacy despite the admission that his own staff didn't like that, Ballmer said it should be up to users how much privacy they want. But let's not fret, what possible business solution for privacy could there be that could be acceptable to a large number of consumers?

How about if consumers are to be willingly paid a notional sum for their behaviour to be tracked? That apparently was suggested by none other than Steve Ballmer's son. Way to go, boy! µ