Thanks for asking great questions today. We had a great day here in the Scoble house. Had a nice goodbye party with tons of great people (we had just as many Google employees at the house today as attended Gnomedex yesterday). Lots of good New Orleans cookin! Anyone wanna come over and help eat it? The beer is still cold. Anyway, let’s get started.
BRAD ASKED: “What’s the one thing your most proud of about your time at MSoft, the one thing you might do differently, and the one thing you didn’t get to do but wanted to?”
MY ANSWER: Getting Steve Ballmer to change Microsoft’s support of a Washington State Gay Rights bill which led to its passing. That was probably the riskiest thing I did but I told my mom I’d look for ways to stand up for minorities in society and glad to help play a part in that. What might I do differently? I’m still sad I didn’t learn to program. I think it hurt my credibility with developers both inside and outside the company and I wish I had more skills. Even now I’m finding that I’m interested in learning more about how to build things rather than just mouth off about them. What was the one thing I wanted to do? I really wanted to go to China and India and see what Microsoft was doing there. I was planning a trip to India when I decided to change jobs. Hopefully I’ll still get to do something like that but it’ll be looking at Microsoft and other software companies from the outside rather than the inside.
BROOK ASKED: “What is Microsoft’s internal perception of what you did for them, and have the noticed a change in public perception?”
MY ANSWER: There are more than 60,000 employees at Microsoft and the perception would vary widely from employee to employee. Many employees (nay, most) still don’t know who I am or care what’s going on in the blogging world. But, today I had more than 100 people at my house, a large percentage of whom were Microsoft employees (including executives from Research and Audio) so I think that demonstrates the extraordinary love I’ve felt from most Microsoft employees that I’ve run into over the years. As to change in public perception. It’s hard to sense that, but in internal measurements I have seen show sizeable movements in our survey results. I really only cared about what customers thought anyway and I keep hearing that Microsoft is an easier company to deal with now than it was four years ago. Here’s another way to look at it: today you can go to Google, search “OneNote blog” and find Chris Pratley who runs the OneNote team. You can leave him a comment and tell him you think his product sucks. And you can see how he, and his team, reacts to that. To me that’s a huge change from how I used to help people in newsgroups before blogs.
STEVEN ASKS: “What can you tell us about RSS/OPML/XMLRPC and the internal opinions of Microsoft? (ie. Don’t care so much about RSS readers, dime a dozen)”
This is an area where we’ve seen Microsoft make huge adoptions. When I started at Microsoft three years ago they didn’t have RSS in any product. Now they have it in lots including Sharepoint, which is the intranet tool used by many many Fortune 100 companies. I can’t understate that enough. And, if I helped by saying that Microsoft product planners and marketers who didn’t support RSS should be fired then I’m very happy to have played my part. OPML is also supported by Outlook for inbound and outbound RSS feeds. I think you should watch what Ray Ozzie does in this area very closely. The stuff I saw before I left was astounding.
HE ALSO ASKS: “You switched to WordPress because Matt added OPML support, do you still use Manilla, Frontier or the OPML Editor and are Microsoft doing anything at all within this realm?”
Sharepoint looks very close to Manila. I am still using the OPML Editor and will use it more in the future at PodTech.
RANDY ASKS: “Now for a tough question Robert. Do you think Windows is a drag on product teams, not a factor, or a benefit to other product teams? Explain.”
It’s both a drag and a benefit. First, the drags. Windows only ships once every two to five years (at least the consumer Windows like Windows 95, 98, ME, XP, and now Windows Vista). So, if a developer comes up with some killer new feature he or she needs to wait until the next version will ship. Features under development today won’t ship until 2008 or later. I know a lot of people who like working more on Windows Live technologies (like Virtual Earth) for just that reason — they can ship new features every few weeks and don’t need to wait for Windows to ship.
Benefit? Well, anything you put into Windows will be used by millions of people. Even a feature hidden deep inside a control panel will get massive usage. There aren’t many software projects in the world where you can say “my little tiny feature will get used by millions, or maybe hundreds of millions of people around the world.”
That said, I’d like to see Windows be a bit more agile in shipping out new features. I want a Media Player, for instance, that has podcasting support built in. How long are we going to have to wait?
BRIAN ASKS: “Is there a super-duper secret backhannel method for communicating directly to Bill Gates?”
Nope. He answers email sent from Microsoft employees to billg@microsoft.com (he answered a couple of mine directly which always thrilled me and other employees who got this treatment). Employees can also submit “ThinkWeek” papers directly to him. I spent some time looking through the ThinkWeek site (it’s open to every employee) and you can see BillG interacting with tons of different employees right there. So can any employee interact with him.
Oh, and customers can email him at the same address, but then it’s a little more likely that one of his assistants will answer it.
Getting into his office physically is a bit harder, but not impossible. The best way is to write a killer ThinkWeek paper about something that he wants to learn more about. Some of my writing was included in a paper written by Lili Cheng and a few other researchers and that turned into a 1.5-hour conversation about RSS and blogs. That turned into public statements by BillG and let to RSS being included in many projects throughout the company.
JEFFREY ASKS: “Who’s Mini?”
I don’t know. He says he met me once, though. The only guy I know who knows him is Jay Greene who is a journalist at BusinessWeek. I asked him to sell Mini out, but, of course, Jay refused. I’m sure Jay will be happy to confirm to anyone that Mini isn’t me, though. (I’ve been asked that more than once lately).
GEORG ASKS: “I’m from Austria and will be in October in San Francisco. Stupid question: Will there be something like a geek-dinner?”
I’ve been telling everyone that all you need to do is bring a bottle of wine and you are welcome at our new house in Half Moon Bay (we have a guest room and we love meeting bloggers, geeks, developers, interesting people). And, of course, we’ll have lots of fun events.
GABE ASKS: “Three things you would change at Microsoft?”
1) I would incubate more products outside of Microsoft for a longer period of time. What do I mean by that? Well, I’ve seen lots of things change this industry that were done by small teams of people. Xbox? Two people. .NET? A handful. Live.com? A handful. Or, look outside the company. How many people built my favorite TechMeme? One! The problem is that if any team develops something that’s cool it’s brought into the main mother ship very quickly now. That slows them down as they now need to deal with being dependent on other people and other teams. In fact watch what Google does. They keep teams separate which makes them look chaotic and not strategic but it lets them innovate longer before they get sucked into the “integration” phase. I’d also like to see teams forced to get some momentum on their own before being integrated into Office or Windows or Live.com. The MSN Spaces team, for instance, got so many users so fast that they needed to focus most of their energy the first year on infrastructure rather than features. If they hadn’t been integrated into MSN Messenger for another year maybe that would have forced the team to compete on the basis of sheer features instead of integration. But, keep in mind that I’m full of shit too and doing what I say might have really screwed up things. That’s what’s fun about business. No one really knows the right idea until after it’s been discovered, implemented, and customers chime in.
2) I would actually start a new company that’s designed to destroy the old one. Xerox got very close to doing that with Xerox PARC, but the executives weren’t able to pull the trigger. Imagine what our industry would have been like if the executives there HAD pulled the trigger?
3) I would put a single person in charge of naming and fire anyone who didn’t listen to the dictator. I’d do the same thing about corporate image. Same with conference planning. Same with advertising. Committees just suck the soul out of the best ideas. On the other hand, I would hate to be that person cause if you screwed up you’d have no one else to blame.
HE ALSO ASKS: “Three companies you would purchase and or merge with?”
I always wished we got along better with Sony. Some parts of Sony just make beautiful products. I used a Sony camcorder. I’m watching a Sony TV. It’s stunning. Jeff Sandquist loves his new tiny Vaio notebook. But, integrating Microsoft’s corporate cultures would be very difficult, and the DOJ would never allow the game divisions to exist in the same company.
SCOTT ASKS: “What didn’t Microsoft want you to blog about?”
The one thing I was asked to stay away from was legal issues. Mostly for my own protection. Executives told me stories about spending months away from home to spend time in courtrooms. They all say it was the worst experience of their lives and they didn’t wish that on their worst enemies.
JIM ASKS: “Does Ray Ozzie have what it takes to change the Microsoft macro development culture from cathedral to bazaar?”
Yes. I came very close to staying at Microsoft just because of Ray. I hope everyone gives him a chance.
CHRIS ASKS: “Why do people hate Microsoft?”
Because Microsoft has treated many companies and people poorly. I have lots of stories about that. Remember before I worked at Microsoft? Someone at Microsoft tried to get me fired from a job. I’ve talked with lots of journalists who feel that Microsoft just tries to control what they write and don’t talk with them like human beings.
But, there’s something deeper. It’s the same reason I hate the Yankees. We hate entities that are on top. Our culture loves to make people bigger than life and then rip them down. That culture is exactly why so many people read gossip magazines (or, in our industry, why ValleyWag is already so popular).
UMA ASKS: “So what are your thoughts about fixing the blogging mess at Microsoft (since now you can really speak your mind ?)”
If you think it’s a mess at Microsoft you should hear stories from other companies. Most other companies’ employees in the world aren’t allowed to blog at all. Personally I LOVE the mess. It creates opportunities for you! If you think it’s a mess, clean up something. Invite people out for coffee and see if you can work together with other people to make it better.
I keep bugging execs to blog, for instance. They’ll get a clue about the power of doing this sooner or later. If they don’t, they’ll be fired and then the “clued in” leaders will get a shot. Just stick around. That type of change in the corporate world is coming and coming fast. The audiences are just getting too connected. Look at how fast my story broke. All you need to do is tell 15 bloggers something and if it rings true it’ll get repeated around the world. That’s what gets executives fired.
That’s what I was trying to warn Steve Ballmer about. The fact that he isn’t talking with the grassroots IS getting noticed.
GERT ASKS: “f you had a good/huge say in the development of Windows Vista: what would be the first thing to be changed, added, …”
First of all, the best stuff I’ve seen is the small things. 1,000 small things put together make a great experience. Things that bug me? The small things. The UI that isn’t consistent across all apps and all Windows. Why is that? Because Microsoft internally is like a hundred companies all under the same roof. Those companies often have their own ideas about how things should be done. It comes out in the small things. And, conversely, when things enthrall you that’s probably where tons of small things were done well.
But, specifically? My computer doesn’t understand that I have different roles. Why does it look the same when I’m using Second Life as it does when I’m watching a movie or as it does when I’m editing my blog or when I’m working on a spreadsheet. My computer is stupid (keep in mind I’m using Maryam’s new MacBook Pro and it’s just as stupid). I’d like it to understand a lot more about the roles I’m in and bring me experiences (and files and apps) that match those roles. For instance, when I’m watching a movie, why doesn’t my Sidebar pull up a YouTube gadget that lets me watch more videos after my movie is done? It should recognize that I’m in a movie-watching, or entertainment role. When I’m working on a spreadsheet, that stuff should go away and I’d love to see things like Money, a calculator, financial tools, stock reports, and other stuff that’d be in a “money management” role. But, our computers are stupid.
Don’t even start thinking about Steve Gillmor’s “attention” ideas.
ALFRED ASKS: “Who is the person you most wanted to interview for Channel 9 but didn’t get to interview?”
David Cutler. He is more responsible for the kernel than anyone else but doesn’t give interviews anymore. I heard that he wants his work to speak for him, which I respect. But I’d still love to interview him cause those of us using Windows really are playing inside his ideas and that would be fascinating.
A ASKS: “What would you say is the biggest flaw at Microsoft?”
Its inability to see small things when those things are still small. Did Microsoft see RSS eight years ago? No. Did it see blogging five years ago? No. Did it see search eight years ago? No.
It’s the small things that’ll do a big company in.
JOHNNY ASKS: “Do you think Microsoft should have tried to be more international and less USA-national?”
That’s always a problem in the tech industry, but Microsoft actually is a leader here. Most products are released in 26 languages. One video I did that still is in the hopper on Channel 9 is one I did with the localization teams. Really great stuff they do. But, there’s more to do. Microsoft has offices all over the world, though, and that’s a huge strength that it has that it should use more.
CAROLUS ASKS: “Now that you are leaving, are you going to buy a Mac, and only run windows when you absolutely have to?”
Yes. I am buying a Mac. But I’m also buying another Tablet PC.
I will probably run Windows Vista on my Mac. I’m using Maryam’s new MacBook Pro right now and I still don’t like OSX as much as Vista. But, I know lots of people don’t agree with me there. Yes, I’ll use Windows Vista as my main OS. The latest builds are really looking great, although I’m still having problems with drivers here and there.
SHE ALSO ASKS: “When will Mac and Windows become one?”
Well, with Parallels and BootCamp, it’s getting closer. But, I doubt they’ll ever be totally one. There are too many APIs on each one that only work well natively. Rebuilding those so that they both would run together would be akin to tearing down New York and rebuilding it from scratch. Not gonna happen due to sheer economics. Not to mention that the people who built the buildings aren’t working in the industry anymore.
SEARCHENGINES ASKS: “1- http/xml ultimately became known as AJAX last year – and took off – why did microsoft not attempt to promote the technology and publicize it.”
Whenever you ask a question like this you need to realize that Microsoft is a business. Now, phrase the question again: “what would the business value be of publicizing a marketing term like AJAX?” I don’t see any. What do you see? I think Microsoft is completely happy simply to employ Scott Isaacs and other geeks who developed the core technology underneath AJAX.
SEARCHENGINES ALSO ASKS: “MSN search engine only became a unique engine last year – why did Microsoft go YEARS without attempting to create an individual search engine.”
Because it didn’t look like search was going to be a big business. Google, in fact, almost went out of business. The other day I met a guy who worked at Exodus and told me that Google almost was closed down because it couldn’t pay its bills. It wasn’t until AdSense came along that Microsoft woke up to the fact that there was a business there.
Google was a small thing that Microsoft missed.
JACK ASKS: “Do you have a non-disclosure agreement with MS?, if there isn’t, will you join Google instead of PodTech?”
Yes, I do. But, I think what you are really asking is about a non-compete agreement. I think I have one of those too.
I’m not going to Google and doubt I would. Although if they want to offer me millions of dollars I sure would listen! Heheh.
JACK ASKS: “How should Microsoft view its competition-should it focus on the bigger competitors or the smaller ones?”
If you are building music stars, can you build them by copying Elvis or the Beattles? No.
Microsoft should focus on doing interesting things with software that help humans. If it does that, it’ll thrive for a long long time. If it just copies its competitors it’ll find that it’ll be increasingly difficult to hire the smartest people. Which will cause them to go into a death spiral. Smart people want to build innovative new things. They don’t want to copy what someone else does.
Hey, look at maps. No need to copy. None of the big companies has let me put reviews on addresses on maps. Wake me up when the innovation is done!
Translation: focus on doing things to help people live their lives and the rest of it will take care of themselves. That said, do watch what your competitors are doing to see if they learned something you didn’t see.
BRETT ASKS: “The actual number isn’t important but I wanted to know if there *was* a number that would have kept you at Microsoft? Did Microsoft ever ask you, “What would it take to keep you?” or were you leaving regardless of what they could have done?”
I’ve thought about that a lot. I’m sure that there’s a number that would have gotten me to stay for a while longer. But, I don’t believe that really would have mattered long term.
I’m a guy who likes taking risks and trying new things. As my mom was dying I realized I just wanted to shake my life up a lot and try something dramatically new/different. Having failure on the table again as a possiblity was a bit part of my decision. Oh, and getting rid of our twice-a-month commute down to California to see Patrick.
RONPIH ASKS: “Why did you decide to take a job at Microsoft?”
Because it is a company I admired and wanted to learn more about. And, because an executive bought a Tablet PC and was so passionate about gadgets that we’d have interesting conversations. Then he started reading my blog and asked if I’d be interested in joining the evangelism group.
Having someone show some interest in me and my career was intoxicating and exciting.
RONPIH ALSO ASKS: “What, if anything, changed your perceptions of the reasons you decided to take a job at Microsoft in the time you worked there?”
My reasons were only strengthened. It is — by far — the most interesting company in the world right now. Google seems sexier, but does Google have a research division? Does it have an Xbox team? Does it do everything from mice to Hotmail? No. Microsoft stands alone in my mind. It also is the most interesting organization of humans that I can think of. Despite its flaws it still builds the software that most of us use everyday.
RONPIH ALSO ASKS: “What obstacles did you encounter that made your job more difficult than it had to be?”
That’s a hard one to answer. I didn’t hit a lot of the stuff you might expect. Yeah, PR at the beginning gave the Channel 9 team a bit of trouble but we won them over.
I think that if there’s a thing that made my job more difficult it was the constant and increasing email load. I wish I had the temerity to ask for help with that.
RONPIH AGAIN: “What made you consider an offer from another company?”
I helped write the offer. So, of course I was interested in it! 🙂
I covered this already in blog posts before. 1) I saw a dramatic new user model developing (content for portable devices and computers) and I wanted to try some new ideas I had. 2) I wanted to be back down in the Bay Area to be closer to our families. 3) I liked John Furrier and believed in him. 4) The team he was building was top-notch and interesting. 5) There was a considerable potential reward for the risk I was taking (I was trading in the best job in the industry for something unknown and that had the potential of failure).
RONPIH: “Would you consider working at Microsoft again in the future?”
Absolutely.
RONPIH: “What advice would you give to your successor?”
Be yourself. Don’t try to be my successor. I don’t wish that on anyone. Could Elvis copy the Beattles? No.
Build relationships with as many people as you can. Listen to feedback, particularly the harsh stuff (lots of geeks don’t like it when they are told off, instead, assume that they are right and you are wrong).
RICHARD ASKS: “What really happened to Longhorn? It was such an ambitious and groundbreaking product around PDC 2003. Vista is NOT Longhorn!”
Huh? Name one thing that Longhorn would have let you do that Vista doesn’t let you do.
DMAD ASKS: “Why did you keep whining about your less than $100,000/yr salary? Do you were fairly compensated
for carrying around a camera and interviewing people that actually worked on products that were intended to make money for the company?”
Because I was getting offers for more that I kept turning down. My value to the company had gone way behind just “carrying around a camera.” Demonstrates that you have no clue about what I actually did. One example? I spoke at Google to Google’s best customers and they gave me a better rating than 98% of the other speakers. Is that valueable? You betcha and companies were willing to pay for that. Why do you think that Steve Jobs is worth billions? Most of what he does is communicate with other people.
JAWAHAR ASKS: “Will you revive “talkingmoose” ?”
Hmmm, that might be fun, but I really don’t think a character blog or an anonymous blog is the best use of my time.
ENZO ASKS: “For the upcoming generations, like those whom have just graduated from college or high school, would you recommend working at Microsoft? Or would you suggest anywhere else?”
I can’t answer that. For some people I’d definitely recommend working at Microsoft. For others a startup might be more appropriate. It depends on what you’re trying to do. For instance, Emre, who works in Research, just came to Microsoft from Stanford. He said he considered startups and other big companies and no other company he researched was doing as much interesting work as Microsoft was doing.
Sorry — but if you think that most of what Steve Jobs is communicate with other people, you don’t have a clue.
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Sorry — but if you think that most of what Steve Jobs is communicate with other people, you don’t have a clue.
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Mujibur: have you ever talked with a CEO? I have.
Jonathan Schwartz told me that his #1 job is communicating with other people. That’s what he does most of the time. In meetings with customers. In the press. On stage at conferences. Etc.
I worked with lots of people who worked closely with Steve Jobs and they agree that most of what he does is communicate. Yeah, he fires people once in a while to make a point. Or, he negotiates deals. Or he brainstorms ideas with his top designers and developers and strategists, but most of his important work is speaking and communicating to groups of people.
Have you ever worked with a CEO of a major company?
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Mujibur: have you ever talked with a CEO? I have.
Jonathan Schwartz told me that his #1 job is communicating with other people. That’s what he does most of the time. In meetings with customers. In the press. On stage at conferences. Etc.
I worked with lots of people who worked closely with Steve Jobs and they agree that most of what he does is communicate. Yeah, he fires people once in a while to make a point. Or, he negotiates deals. Or he brainstorms ideas with his top designers and developers and strategists, but most of his important work is speaking and communicating to groups of people.
Have you ever worked with a CEO of a major company?
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This was a very interesting posts that provided a lot of insight into Microsoft. I liked how you mentioned your helped write your offer to PodTech which tell sounds a lot like they came to you and were willing to do nearly anything to get you on board. I wonder if you had sought them out or vice versa?
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This was a very interesting posts that provided a lot of insight into Microsoft. I liked how you mentioned your helped write your offer to PodTech which tell sounds a lot like they came to you and were willing to do nearly anything to get you on board. I wonder if you had sought them out or vice versa?
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Brett: John and I were on a panel discussion together at Pepperdine University (talking with MBAs). Afterward we went drinking together and started talking and I asked him whether it’d be interesting if I came to work for him and then we started riffing on that and it went from there.
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Brett: John and I were on a panel discussion together at Pepperdine University (talking with MBAs). Afterward we went drinking together and started talking and I asked him whether it’d be interesting if I came to work for him and then we started riffing on that and it went from there.
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1) Microsoft tries to empower users? Hmm, read the WGA blog. I hope you’re happy about the denial over issues that legit customers are having, and how Microsoft is introducing remotely-controlled software at the expense of users. Sure enough, this would be a good reason to leave such hostile company.
2) Didn’t like Seattle anymore? Why didn’t you move to the MSN labs then (or even better, Mac BU)? You are not resigning because of the commute, you must be leaving because you are sick of Microsoft.
3) Microsot easier to deal with? How? MS blogs are used as marketing tools. Might surprise you, but I prefer a lot passionate Microsoft employees taking the time to come and answer questions on public forums. That’s where they are showing their worth.
4) I don’t buy this “small things Microsoft has not seen”. Take decentralized file sharing. It took off with Kazaa. Kazaa was a small thing? You bet not, the writing was on the wall since Internet inception.
5) Your new gig with HD videos? I don’t get it yet. You are going to have a real hard time creating a passionate community of people downloading insanely huge files only to watch a passive media. Also, now that you are no more at Microsoft, you are back in a very crowded market. I hope you understand that the bulk of your audience has been listening more what you said about Microsoft because it was Microsoft, than what you said about you. It was not about you, it was about you as a Microsoft employee.
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1) Microsoft tries to empower users? Hmm, read the WGA blog. I hope you’re happy about the denial over issues that legit customers are having, and how Microsoft is introducing remotely-controlled software at the expense of users. Sure enough, this would be a good reason to leave such hostile company.
2) Didn’t like Seattle anymore? Why didn’t you move to the MSN labs then (or even better, Mac BU)? You are not resigning because of the commute, you must be leaving because you are sick of Microsoft.
3) Microsot easier to deal with? How? MS blogs are used as marketing tools. Might surprise you, but I prefer a lot passionate Microsoft employees taking the time to come and answer questions on public forums. That’s where they are showing their worth.
4) I don’t buy this “small things Microsoft has not seen”. Take decentralized file sharing. It took off with Kazaa. Kazaa was a small thing? You bet not, the writing was on the wall since Internet inception.
5) Your new gig with HD videos? I don’t get it yet. You are going to have a real hard time creating a passionate community of people downloading insanely huge files only to watch a passive media. Also, now that you are no more at Microsoft, you are back in a very crowded market. I hope you understand that the bulk of your audience has been listening more what you said about Microsoft because it was Microsoft, than what you said about you. It was not about you, it was about you as a Microsoft employee.
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What is it about the possibility of failure that drives a person? I no longer have a job after eight years at the firm. I feel a bit more alive; I’m more alert. Employees of the company asked me if I was scared: I’m not. Conflicted, yes. I was the original computer guy at the law firm, and I’m no longer employed. It’s wonderful to have the blood flowing more freely… isn’t it?
BTW: What else do public company CEOs do but talk, read, meet and write? What? They build widgets in their corner offices? Mujibur seems a bit rude but worse he isn’t specific. Details, my man.
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What is it about the possibility of failure that drives a person? I no longer have a job after eight years at the firm. I feel a bit more alive; I’m more alert. Employees of the company asked me if I was scared: I’m not. Conflicted, yes. I was the original computer guy at the law firm, and I’m no longer employed. It’s wonderful to have the blood flowing more freely… isn’t it?
BTW: What else do public company CEOs do but talk, read, meet and write? What? They build widgets in their corner offices? Mujibur seems a bit rude but worse he isn’t specific. Details, my man.
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Stephane: there are parts of Microsoft that serve the business. At the end of the day Microsoft is a business and if it sees a way to make more money then it’ll do that. I don’t always agree with Microsoft. I don’t like activation and this stuff either, even if I could see the need for it (piracy is a HUGE problem, particularly in societies where it’s acceptable to steal intellectual property).
2) Because I didn’t want to be a PM. What job would I have done? What reward would I have gotten for taking on new risk and giving up a freaking awesome job?
3) Forums are fun. I wrote 100,000 newsgroup posts in the 1990s. But, ask “normal people” about whether they use newsgroups and they have no idea. They do, however, know how to use Google, Yahoo, or MSN. Those bring up blogs many times more often than newsgroups or forums like the ones on Channel 9 (you do realize that Channel 9 is a forum too, right?)
4) Kazaa? Yeah, that really has gone on to make a big and respectable business.
5) You don’t have to get what I’m gonna do. There’s plenty of people out there who DO get it. PodTech is getting millions of downloads per month. So is its competitors.
As to Microsoft. You forget that I had a fairly large audience BEFORE I got to Microsoft. But, I already predicted myself that I’d lose a portion of my audience if I don’t give them a payback similar to the Microsoft payback they got from when I was an insider there.
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Stephane: there are parts of Microsoft that serve the business. At the end of the day Microsoft is a business and if it sees a way to make more money then it’ll do that. I don’t always agree with Microsoft. I don’t like activation and this stuff either, even if I could see the need for it (piracy is a HUGE problem, particularly in societies where it’s acceptable to steal intellectual property).
2) Because I didn’t want to be a PM. What job would I have done? What reward would I have gotten for taking on new risk and giving up a freaking awesome job?
3) Forums are fun. I wrote 100,000 newsgroup posts in the 1990s. But, ask “normal people” about whether they use newsgroups and they have no idea. They do, however, know how to use Google, Yahoo, or MSN. Those bring up blogs many times more often than newsgroups or forums like the ones on Channel 9 (you do realize that Channel 9 is a forum too, right?)
4) Kazaa? Yeah, that really has gone on to make a big and respectable business.
5) You don’t have to get what I’m gonna do. There’s plenty of people out there who DO get it. PodTech is getting millions of downloads per month. So is its competitors.
As to Microsoft. You forget that I had a fairly large audience BEFORE I got to Microsoft. But, I already predicted myself that I’d lose a portion of my audience if I don’t give them a payback similar to the Microsoft payback they got from when I was an insider there.
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Scott >It’s wonderful to have the blood flowing more freely… isn’t it?
It sure does! Yeah, my creativity is just flowing. It might not be coming out on the blog, but it sure is in my ideas and excitement.
Steve Jobs build a product? Heheh! Ask Woz about that one!
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Scott >It’s wonderful to have the blood flowing more freely… isn’t it?
It sure does! Yeah, my creativity is just flowing. It might not be coming out on the blog, but it sure is in my ideas and excitement.
Steve Jobs build a product? Heheh! Ask Woz about that one!
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Scoble said “there are parts of Microsoft that serve the business. At the end of the day Microsoft is a business and if it sees a way to make more money then it’ll do that.”
I don’t have a problem with a company trying to make ton of money. I do have a problem with a company which lacks a code of ethics, and relies now on plain ext…ion to get their way. There cannot be any excuse. And again, it’s hiding under the disguise of a critical security update, it’s affecting legit customers (due to the many windows configurations out there), and the blog is PR. The old Microsoft lives.
Scoble said “What job would I have done?” : if MSN labs only offered you a job as a PM, then that’s stupid.
Scoble said “But, ask “normal people” about whether they use newsgroups and they have no idea. They do, however, know how to use Google” : there are three things in old-style public forums that every other forum lacks (including C9) : visibility, search made efficient thanks to Google groups, search results useful thanks to MS employees answering there. Just yesterday I was tackling a problem in a FTP stack. MSDN gave no clue whatsoever. Blogs? are you serious? MSDN online? forget about it. Google groups gave me targeted answers in 3 clicks, with the blessing of official code snippets from Microsoft. That counts a lot in my book…
Scoble said “Kazaa? Yeah, that really has gone on to make a big and respectable business.” : I know you are kidding, but you’ll be the first to have users pay for the bandwidth to download your HD, so don’t mock them, right?
As for Kazaa not being in a respectable business, don’t blame the tool.
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Scoble said “there are parts of Microsoft that serve the business. At the end of the day Microsoft is a business and if it sees a way to make more money then it’ll do that.”
I don’t have a problem with a company trying to make ton of money. I do have a problem with a company which lacks a code of ethics, and relies now on plain ext…ion to get their way. There cannot be any excuse. And again, it’s hiding under the disguise of a critical security update, it’s affecting legit customers (due to the many windows configurations out there), and the blog is PR. The old Microsoft lives.
Scoble said “What job would I have done?” : if MSN labs only offered you a job as a PM, then that’s stupid.
Scoble said “But, ask “normal people” about whether they use newsgroups and they have no idea. They do, however, know how to use Google” : there are three things in old-style public forums that every other forum lacks (including C9) : visibility, search made efficient thanks to Google groups, search results useful thanks to MS employees answering there. Just yesterday I was tackling a problem in a FTP stack. MSDN gave no clue whatsoever. Blogs? are you serious? MSDN online? forget about it. Google groups gave me targeted answers in 3 clicks, with the blessing of official code snippets from Microsoft. That counts a lot in my book…
Scoble said “Kazaa? Yeah, that really has gone on to make a big and respectable business.” : I know you are kidding, but you’ll be the first to have users pay for the bandwidth to download your HD, so don’t mock them, right?
As for Kazaa not being in a respectable business, don’t blame the tool.
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Stephane: normal people have no idea what Google Groups are. Please do some user research here. They know the main google.com page, but rarely know anything else. Look at the market share stats!!! They are abysmal for anything else Google is doing.
You are actually proving my point. Advanced users know how to find things out. Normal people don’t. You’re advanced. Off the charts, actually, if you know about Google Groups.
The HD distribution problem will be solved soon. Watch RedSwoosh.com.
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Stephane: normal people have no idea what Google Groups are. Please do some user research here. They know the main google.com page, but rarely know anything else. Look at the market share stats!!! They are abysmal for anything else Google is doing.
You are actually proving my point. Advanced users know how to find things out. Normal people don’t. You’re advanced. Off the charts, actually, if you know about Google Groups.
The HD distribution problem will be solved soon. Watch RedSwoosh.com.
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Hmmmm, used Google lately? You don’t have to know Google groups.
Case in point. Google groups answers come aggregated in the main regular search results page. There is not enough of that right now to my taste, the archive is vastly superior to all MSDN combined all blogs combined, but that can change any day.
Read the JoelOnSoftware post on Microsoft thinking in IFs, by opposition to Google thinking in AI.
In addition, compare that to Microsoft silently cutting off old content in MSDN in a deliberate way to push the latest technologies. Just see what .NET did to WIN32, even though our Windows world revolves around WIN32, not .NET.
Redswoosh? thanks for the link. The site is down though.
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Hmmmm, used Google lately? You don’t have to know Google groups.
Case in point. Google groups answers come aggregated in the main regular search results page. There is not enough of that right now to my taste, the archive is vastly superior to all MSDN combined all blogs combined, but that can change any day.
Read the JoelOnSoftware post on Microsoft thinking in IFs, by opposition to Google thinking in AI.
In addition, compare that to Microsoft silently cutting off old content in MSDN in a deliberate way to push the latest technologies. Just see what .NET did to WIN32, even though our Windows world revolves around WIN32, not .NET.
Redswoosh? thanks for the link. The site is down though.
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Robert – one ‘exit question’ I meant to ask you but didn’t get around to:
Now you’re not working for Microsoft, do you think you will miss people who come to your blog and, regardless of the content of a post, will leave whiny/bitchy comments furthering their own anti-MS agenda?
(for examples, cast your eyes upwards)
Will ya miss it, eh? Will ya? 🙂
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Robert – one ‘exit question’ I meant to ask you but didn’t get around to:
Now you’re not working for Microsoft, do you think you will miss people who come to your blog and, regardless of the content of a post, will leave whiny/bitchy comments furthering their own anti-MS agenda?
(for examples, cast your eyes upwards)
Will ya miss it, eh? Will ya? 🙂
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Quite frankly I find that an absolutely fantastic read. I don’t know why, but I think that was/is the closest insight to life at Micrsoft we’ll see for quite a while.
Anyway, my question. At Microsoft, were you discouraged from using non-MS products? For example, I read earlier this week that Bill Gates does not have an iPod (which is, of course, fine – it’s not the law that everyone has to have one!) – if so, did you conform or rebel?
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Quite frankly I find that an absolutely fantastic read. I don’t know why, but I think that was/is the closest insight to life at Micrsoft we’ll see for quite a while.
Anyway, my question. At Microsoft, were you discouraged from using non-MS products? For example, I read earlier this week that Bill Gates does not have an iPod (which is, of course, fine – it’s not the law that everyone has to have one!) – if so, did you conform or rebel?
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A question I’d like to know the answer to is “How long before you’re back on the Microsoft payroll?”
Clearly, unless you’re being incredibly devious, we can’t expect you to know and, even if you were Mr Devious McDevious of Devious Street, we can even less expect you to tell us!
Yours, someone-who’s-on-their-4th-technology-start-up.
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A question I’d like to know the answer to is “How long before you’re back on the Microsoft payroll?”
Clearly, unless you’re being incredibly devious, we can’t expect you to know and, even if you were Mr Devious McDevious of Devious Street, we can even less expect you to tell us!
Yours, someone-who’s-on-their-4th-technology-start-up.
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Great read, especially this point:
“I would actually start a new company that’s designed to destroy the old one.”
I think you meant could the Beatles copy Elvis though. 🙂
I do disagree with an aspect of your other post though and will write on that later.
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Great read, especially this point:
“I would actually start a new company that’s designed to destroy the old one.”
I think you meant could the Beatles copy Elvis though. 🙂
I do disagree with an aspect of your other post though and will write on that later.
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>At Microsoft, were you discouraged from using non-MS products?
No. The best thing was when the MSN Spaces team came over and asked me “how could we win you back?” The IE team did that too.
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>At Microsoft, were you discouraged from using non-MS products?
No. The best thing was when the MSN Spaces team came over and asked me “how could we win you back?” The IE team did that too.
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Were you valuable at Microsoft?
When I first got into blogging, I was reading Dave Winer, and from him, I got to You.
And YOU brought me back to the DARK SIDE. I realized that Microsoft was changing, or trying to change. Yes, they have a lot of good products.
I never used an apple, but I have a BSD machine behind me right now, and OSx is based on unix so we are the same.
Now wait for labor day. Our Summer here starts after Labor Day. You will be working then and probably wont get to enjoy the summer, but it will be nice.
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Were you valuable at Microsoft?
When I first got into blogging, I was reading Dave Winer, and from him, I got to You.
And YOU brought me back to the DARK SIDE. I realized that Microsoft was changing, or trying to change. Yes, they have a lot of good products.
I never used an apple, but I have a BSD machine behind me right now, and OSx is based on unix so we are the same.
Now wait for labor day. Our Summer here starts after Labor Day. You will be working then and probably wont get to enjoy the summer, but it will be nice.
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um, a read of businessweek tells one that you were likely not even close to being the one that got Ballmer to change his positon. Unless we are being led te believe you are the chairman of this group that wrote the letter..
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2005/tc20050512_7358_PG2_tc024.htm
Your name turns up nowhere in this reporting of the issue. You weren’t even on the cc of the email. I think you clearly overestimate your importance on that issue.
On your salary issue, you said repeatedly your extracurricular activities were not part of your MS duites. Those duties only entailed toting around a camera and interviewing people. So, why would MS pay your for doing something the didn’t help them sell more software? It seems you were getting paid what MS felt you were worth to the company. They obviously saw no value to them in your extra-curricular activities. So, your whining about the salary was strange. Now it would have made more sense if you said “I can make more giving speeches at fringe tech conferences than I can toting around a camera”. But to whine that MS wasn’t compensating you for something that wasn’t part of your job in the first place seemed childish.
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um, a read of businessweek tells one that you were likely not even close to being the one that got Ballmer to change his positon. Unless we are being led te believe you are the chairman of this group that wrote the letter..
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2005/tc20050512_7358_PG2_tc024.htm
Your name turns up nowhere in this reporting of the issue. You weren’t even on the cc of the email. I think you clearly overestimate your importance on that issue.
On your salary issue, you said repeatedly your extracurricular activities were not part of your MS duites. Those duties only entailed toting around a camera and interviewing people. So, why would MS pay your for doing something the didn’t help them sell more software? It seems you were getting paid what MS felt you were worth to the company. They obviously saw no value to them in your extra-curricular activities. So, your whining about the salary was strange. Now it would have made more sense if you said “I can make more giving speeches at fringe tech conferences than I can toting around a camera”. But to whine that MS wasn’t compensating you for something that wasn’t part of your job in the first place seemed childish.
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Dmad: ask the head of the gay and lesbian group at Microsoft what he thinks. He wrote me a personal thanks. I don’t care if I got the PR for it. I just care that the right thing got done.
On salary, even my night and weekend work added into my career at Microsoft. I was invited to Google because I was Microsoft’s most visible blogger. Microsoft got a lot out of that visit.
Not everything at Microsoft is about selling more software.
And, maybe my skills weren’t valued as much at Microsoft but they were valued by the marketplace. You might not like it. You might not agree with it. But it is there.
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Dmad: ask the head of the gay and lesbian group at Microsoft what he thinks. He wrote me a personal thanks. I don’t care if I got the PR for it. I just care that the right thing got done.
On salary, even my night and weekend work added into my career at Microsoft. I was invited to Google because I was Microsoft’s most visible blogger. Microsoft got a lot out of that visit.
Not everything at Microsoft is about selling more software.
And, maybe my skills weren’t valued as much at Microsoft but they were valued by the marketplace. You might not like it. You might not agree with it. But it is there.
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Thanks for this post.
I agree with Scoble’s Google Groups comment. A tool like that is blatently obvious to a tech person (likewise, so is Google Scholar, which is fantastic for academics). A regular person only knows regular google. A regular person types into that box exactly what is on their mind – believe me, I have seen people pour sentences into that box, I’ve seen people put in a website into that box – i.e. scobleizer.wordpress.com. And I’m talking about people with a university education.
Just because the google reader interface is very very simple, and that the link is easy to access, doesn’t mean the average person has ever used it, or know what it is. Most people I know are a) afraid to click on things they don’t know b) not interested in things they haven’t heard of before
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Thanks for this post.
I agree with Scoble’s Google Groups comment. A tool like that is blatently obvious to a tech person (likewise, so is Google Scholar, which is fantastic for academics). A regular person only knows regular google. A regular person types into that box exactly what is on their mind – believe me, I have seen people pour sentences into that box, I’ve seen people put in a website into that box – i.e. scobleizer.wordpress.com. And I’m talking about people with a university education.
Just because the google reader interface is very very simple, and that the link is easy to access, doesn’t mean the average person has ever used it, or know what it is. Most people I know are a) afraid to click on things they don’t know b) not interested in things they haven’t heard of before
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Sarah,
In my case, results from Google groups appeared as part of the regular Google search results, aggregated at the top. I know this is not always done. I don’t quite know the reason why it works like this, just many other UI tweaks that Google does every now and then. The point being, you don’t have to know Google groups, it comes to you. Remember the motto of RSS : you don’t have to know it, it comes to you.
I would agree that Google groups, Google reader, and the bulk of what came from Google labs so far are not mainstream, but that’s besides my point.
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Sarah,
In my case, results from Google groups appeared as part of the regular Google search results, aggregated at the top. I know this is not always done. I don’t quite know the reason why it works like this, just many other UI tweaks that Google does every now and then. The point being, you don’t have to know Google groups, it comes to you. Remember the motto of RSS : you don’t have to know it, it comes to you.
I would agree that Google groups, Google reader, and the bulk of what came from Google labs so far are not mainstream, but that’s besides my point.
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http://digg.com/tech_news/Scoble_FINALLY_Reveals_things_he_could_NOT_say_While_at_Microsoft
Thank you, but be prepaid you many be getting tens of thousands of extra hits to your site by days end
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http://digg.com/tech_news/Scoble_FINALLY_Reveals_things_he_could_NOT_say_While_at_Microsoft
Thank you, but be prepaid you many be getting tens of thousands of extra hits to your site by days end
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Interesting. Hmm
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Interesting. Hmm
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Robert,
So youre the one who convinced Balmer to support the Gay Rights bill?
Yeah, technology companies really have a say so in legislation (thats sarcasm) – boneheaded move, my friend.
Only a leftie believes that legislators should write laws the people dont support, but hey, if youre moving to Cali, you should be ok with that 😛
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Robert,
So youre the one who convinced Balmer to support the Gay Rights bill?
Yeah, technology companies really have a say so in legislation (thats sarcasm) – boneheaded move, my friend.
Only a leftie believes that legislators should write laws the people dont support, but hey, if youre moving to Cali, you should be ok with that 😛
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Lauri, I know you’re a Republican. So you’re for getting rid of all lobbyists who work on behalf of companies and special interest groups? Cool! Something we’d agree on! 🙂
Not to mention it seems like you think that churches with 2,000 members should have any say in such things either. Is that what you’re saying?
If so, I’ll let you go first since you made the point. You tell your church to stay out of our public life and then I’ll say the same thing to the companies I work for, OK?
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Lauri, I know you’re a Republican. So you’re for getting rid of all lobbyists who work on behalf of companies and special interest groups? Cool! Something we’d agree on! 🙂
Not to mention it seems like you think that churches with 2,000 members should have any say in such things either. Is that what you’re saying?
If so, I’ll let you go first since you made the point. You tell your church to stay out of our public life and then I’ll say the same thing to the companies I work for, OK?
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@24 Actually from a shareholder perspective and a business perspective everything IS about selling more software. If they don’t they don’t stay in business. It’s pretty simple. And someone wants to make you a VP huh? Scary.
As for the gay rights bill, whether the right thing was done is highly debatable. Many are of the opinion companies should stay neutral on such issues. But, we can agree to disagree there. What’s hilarious is how this issue showed how easily invfluenced Ballmer can be. It was an amaturish PR move on MS’s part.
MS’s performance during the time you were there would indicate they didn’t get much out of your supposed visibility. But, I understand why you say numbers don’t matter when they don’t support your theory.
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@24 Actually from a shareholder perspective and a business perspective everything IS about selling more software. If they don’t they don’t stay in business. It’s pretty simple. And someone wants to make you a VP huh? Scary.
As for the gay rights bill, whether the right thing was done is highly debatable. Many are of the opinion companies should stay neutral on such issues. But, we can agree to disagree there. What’s hilarious is how this issue showed how easily invfluenced Ballmer can be. It was an amaturish PR move on MS’s part.
MS’s performance during the time you were there would indicate they didn’t get much out of your supposed visibility. But, I understand why you say numbers don’t matter when they don’t support your theory.
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Dmad: since arriving at Microsoft revenues have gone up. A LOT. Profits have gone up. A LOT. Customer satisfaction numbers have gone up for the first time in about a decade.
There were thousands of employees who signed a petition. But I was the first in public to sign my own name and speak out against it.
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Dmad: since arriving at Microsoft revenues have gone up. A LOT. Profits have gone up. A LOT. Customer satisfaction numbers have gone up for the first time in about a decade.
There were thousands of employees who signed a petition. But I was the first in public to sign my own name and speak out against it.
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robert,
I’m not a republican.
I think corporations have a right to lobby, but its only proper they keep out of issues that don’t directly impact their business. A corporation has a right to make a point that a law would impact their the market or their business.
Its similar for a religious organization or church. The issues are just different. A church can lobby to not have gay marriage;–and gay groups can lobby for it to be there.
—Unless there is a specific corporate perspective that matters to the issue, the involvement of corporate lobbying is hubris and unwelcome. Its not any different from a celebrity endorsing something just because they can sing and have no new or insightful perspective on the issue. Corporations shouldn’t throw their weight behind issues that they have nothing distinct to say about. It makes politics more like a game and less about the reality of the issues. The corporations if they do it are doing it for PR.
Involvement of large amounts of money in politics and in contributions is a problem that i think should be met with restrictions, but thats a different issue than endorsement and lobbying that doesn’t involve big money.
I made a comment when this issue first came up; we don’t need corporations to be more involved in politics than they are. Its one thing to be happy to have helped a bill pass that you support, and another to be happy to have done it by using the weight of a corporation which will only support by weighing PR issues. Why are you proud of that?
You could have made a difference just mentioning the bill on your blog. You could have convinced Ballmer to make Microsoft’s corporate culture more welcoming to gays. But I bet most people looking at the issue are thinking; why is it Microsoft’s business?
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robert,
I’m not a republican.
I think corporations have a right to lobby, but its only proper they keep out of issues that don’t directly impact their business. A corporation has a right to make a point that a law would impact their the market or their business.
Its similar for a religious organization or church. The issues are just different. A church can lobby to not have gay marriage;–and gay groups can lobby for it to be there.
—Unless there is a specific corporate perspective that matters to the issue, the involvement of corporate lobbying is hubris and unwelcome. Its not any different from a celebrity endorsing something just because they can sing and have no new or insightful perspective on the issue. Corporations shouldn’t throw their weight behind issues that they have nothing distinct to say about. It makes politics more like a game and less about the reality of the issues. The corporations if they do it are doing it for PR.
Involvement of large amounts of money in politics and in contributions is a problem that i think should be met with restrictions, but thats a different issue than endorsement and lobbying that doesn’t involve big money.
I made a comment when this issue first came up; we don’t need corporations to be more involved in politics than they are. Its one thing to be happy to have helped a bill pass that you support, and another to be happy to have done it by using the weight of a corporation which will only support by weighing PR issues. Why are you proud of that?
You could have made a difference just mentioning the bill on your blog. You could have convinced Ballmer to make Microsoft’s corporate culture more welcoming to gays. But I bet most people looking at the issue are thinking; why is it Microsoft’s business?
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Because its people are affected. And, because, if a state has better laws it’s easier to relocate smart people there.
Some of the best developers I know are gay. And, we’ve already seen how one or two people can totally change the world of software.
So, this stuff impacts Microsoft’s bottom line in a very real way.
There’s a reason that the tech industry is very big in San Francisco and surrounding areas.
If Microsoft wants to compete with Silicon Valley it better have an environment that is MORE friendly toward potential workers. Ironically this bill didn’t pass with eight years of Microsoft’s support. It was only until a small church pushed around Microsoft that it passed. There’s a lesson there too. Sometimes by advocating for a specific position you’ll cause a blow-back that’ll hurt your cause.
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Because its people are affected. And, because, if a state has better laws it’s easier to relocate smart people there.
Some of the best developers I know are gay. And, we’ve already seen how one or two people can totally change the world of software.
So, this stuff impacts Microsoft’s bottom line in a very real way.
There’s a reason that the tech industry is very big in San Francisco and surrounding areas.
If Microsoft wants to compete with Silicon Valley it better have an environment that is MORE friendly toward potential workers. Ironically this bill didn’t pass with eight years of Microsoft’s support. It was only until a small church pushed around Microsoft that it passed. There’s a lesson there too. Sometimes by advocating for a specific position you’ll cause a blow-back that’ll hurt your cause.
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Thanks Robert!
MSFT: Wonderful opportunity, wonderful journey, wonderful exit…the wheel goes round and round, please continue to share the experience.
– scott –
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Thanks Robert!
MSFT: Wonderful opportunity, wonderful journey, wonderful exit…the wheel goes round and round, please continue to share the experience.
– scott –
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Hey, I thought you weren’t taking credit for Microsoft’s change in stance on HB1515?
http://radio.weblogs.com/0001011/2005/05/06.html#a10011
Do I get a hundred Scoble dollars to spend at Channel 9 now?
🙂
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Hey, I thought you weren’t taking credit for Microsoft’s change in stance on HB1515?
http://radio.weblogs.com/0001011/2005/05/06.html#a10011
Do I get a hundred Scoble dollars to spend at Channel 9 now?
🙂
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Ed: well, I didn’t take credit back then cause I didn’t think I did that big a thing. But, I’ve gotten thanks from many gay Microsoft employees saying that my support of them meant an awful lot (including a really nice note a week or so ago from the leader of GAIM, Microsoft’s gay and lesbian employee association). So, I’ve been convinced that I did play a key role, although I didn’t think what I did was that big a deal back then.
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Ed: well, I didn’t take credit back then cause I didn’t think I did that big a thing. But, I’ve gotten thanks from many gay Microsoft employees saying that my support of them meant an awful lot (including a really nice note a week or so ago from the leader of GAIM, Microsoft’s gay and lesbian employee association). So, I’ve been convinced that I did play a key role, although I didn’t think what I did was that big a deal back then.
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@32 And yet investors have been unimpressed.. A LOT. Please tell me you aren’t taking credit for revenues and profits going up. Remind me again what product you were responsible for producing?
That “boo hoo! it will hurt recruiting” is a red herring. I pretty sure MS’s stance on social issues will not be a make or break deal between an offer from, say, Google and and offer from Microsoft for a potential hire.
And I’m not sure but I’d be willing to bet the % of people affected in MS, or even the tech industry are reflective of society. I mean, this isn’t the rag business, or the dance business. So, MS is appealing to special interest minority groups and not the larger company. Again, I rather doubt this will be a make or break deal in hiring highly skilled candidates.
So, in your “Bay Area” comment certainly your are not positing that the tech industry grew out of the gay community in the Bay Area, are you? It’s likely that there might be a higher percentage of gays in the tech industry in the Bay Area because,well, there’s a higher percentage of gays in the candidate poll. But that doesn’t necessarily extrapolate nationally. Again, I say as you increase the candidate poll, (and I’m sure MS recruits beyond Seattle and the Bay Area) the percentage of people affected by MS’s policy likely reflect the national and WW numbers. Which is to say, is 3% or under (it’s NOT 10% as some are led to believe). So, in short MS caved to minority special interests. Which means they really didn’t care about ALL their people, only a select few.
Look, if MS wants to have that policy, fine. Let them. They are well within their rights to have whatever hiring policies they want. Nothing wrong with that. They should NOT, however, tell elected officials how they should vote, nor try to influence what other businesses’s policies should be.
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@32 And yet investors have been unimpressed.. A LOT. Please tell me you aren’t taking credit for revenues and profits going up. Remind me again what product you were responsible for producing?
That “boo hoo! it will hurt recruiting” is a red herring. I pretty sure MS’s stance on social issues will not be a make or break deal between an offer from, say, Google and and offer from Microsoft for a potential hire.
And I’m not sure but I’d be willing to bet the % of people affected in MS, or even the tech industry are reflective of society. I mean, this isn’t the rag business, or the dance business. So, MS is appealing to special interest minority groups and not the larger company. Again, I rather doubt this will be a make or break deal in hiring highly skilled candidates.
So, in your “Bay Area” comment certainly your are not positing that the tech industry grew out of the gay community in the Bay Area, are you? It’s likely that there might be a higher percentage of gays in the tech industry in the Bay Area because,well, there’s a higher percentage of gays in the candidate poll. But that doesn’t necessarily extrapolate nationally. Again, I say as you increase the candidate poll, (and I’m sure MS recruits beyond Seattle and the Bay Area) the percentage of people affected by MS’s policy likely reflect the national and WW numbers. Which is to say, is 3% or under (it’s NOT 10% as some are led to believe). So, in short MS caved to minority special interests. Which means they really didn’t care about ALL their people, only a select few.
Look, if MS wants to have that policy, fine. Let them. They are well within their rights to have whatever hiring policies they want. Nothing wrong with that. They should NOT, however, tell elected officials how they should vote, nor try to influence what other businesses’s policies should be.
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Robert, if MS had stayed out of this very hotly debated issue, my church would have been quiet as well, church mice..
If the legislature is so sure its what the people want, why are they too scared to let the people of this state vote on it? Is it possibly because no state to date has gotten approval thru the voting process to brand a lifestyle as needing extra protections? That’s a big yes indeedy.
And yes, I would say lobbyists are a total cancer to a republic..
But I agree with Dmad in the extreme; there are a bunch of bullies inside MS who think they can get their sympathetic legislature to roll over the public; and to that end, I hope those legislators have a short public life and will soon be voted out.
In fact, I think we can all but count on it in the next few elections here.. 🙂
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Robert, if MS had stayed out of this very hotly debated issue, my church would have been quiet as well, church mice..
If the legislature is so sure its what the people want, why are they too scared to let the people of this state vote on it? Is it possibly because no state to date has gotten approval thru the voting process to brand a lifestyle as needing extra protections? That’s a big yes indeedy.
And yes, I would say lobbyists are a total cancer to a republic..
But I agree with Dmad in the extreme; there are a bunch of bullies inside MS who think they can get their sympathetic legislature to roll over the public; and to that end, I hope those legislators have a short public life and will soon be voted out.
In fact, I think we can all but count on it in the next few elections here.. 🙂
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oh, and p.s. ..
our church has about 3500 members, not 2000. 🙂
like Hutch keeps saying, when you step into our world, we have every right to step into yours… right?
i feel 100% sure that Antioch did not go looking for this particular fight. The Gay & Lesbian Advocates have been trying to force this on the public for more than 2 decades. The public is under no obligation to tolerate a lifestyle they dont agree with.
Therein lies the problem; you cannot and will never be able, to force the public to accept or tolerate a lifestyle they dont approve of. Not even legislation will do it .. but if the advocates inside of MS who whined to Balmer that they werent getting all the special protections they deemed necessary were really interested in what the public thinks, and not forcing themselves on the rest of us, then they should put it to a vote.
what is the problem with that?
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oh, and p.s. ..
our church has about 3500 members, not 2000. 🙂
like Hutch keeps saying, when you step into our world, we have every right to step into yours… right?
i feel 100% sure that Antioch did not go looking for this particular fight. The Gay & Lesbian Advocates have been trying to force this on the public for more than 2 decades. The public is under no obligation to tolerate a lifestyle they dont agree with.
Therein lies the problem; you cannot and will never be able, to force the public to accept or tolerate a lifestyle they dont approve of. Not even legislation will do it .. but if the advocates inside of MS who whined to Balmer that they werent getting all the special protections they deemed necessary were really interested in what the public thinks, and not forcing themselves on the rest of us, then they should put it to a vote.
what is the problem with that?
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To lauri:
You can open up the public’s mind about ideas though and help them understand that gay and lesbian people are good people, who just have different urges.
f like gay marriage (otherwise the bush a
Back in the days of the past, many people thought that being a working woman was an “unacceptable lifestyle”, that women voting was unacceptable or even that a world where blacks and whites are equal was “unacceptable”. Yet those who believe in the cause of equality and equal rights ‘forced’ themselves on the public and made the public understand that they were just humans who deserved the same rights as majority.
I would also like to point out that there isn’t any such solid majority you speak of on stufdmin would have been able to pass all the bills they wanted to ban it).
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To lauri:
You can open up the public’s mind about ideas though and help them understand that gay and lesbian people are good people, who just have different urges.
f like gay marriage (otherwise the bush a
Back in the days of the past, many people thought that being a working woman was an “unacceptable lifestyle”, that women voting was unacceptable or even that a world where blacks and whites are equal was “unacceptable”. Yet those who believe in the cause of equality and equal rights ‘forced’ themselves on the public and made the public understand that they were just humans who deserved the same rights as majority.
I would also like to point out that there isn’t any such solid majority you speak of on stufdmin would have been able to pass all the bills they wanted to ban it).
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“Huh? Name one thing that Longhorn would have let you do that Vista doesn’t let you do.”
Ummmmm… WinFS!??!?!
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“Huh? Name one thing that Longhorn would have let you do that Vista doesn’t let you do.”
Ummmmm… WinFS!??!?!
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I’m no techie, but didn’t Kazaa effectively mutate into Skype?
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I’m no techie, but didn’t Kazaa effectively mutate into Skype?
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“The public is under no obligation to TOLERATE a lifestyle they dont agree with.” (My emphasis.) — What country are you living in?
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“The public is under no obligation to TOLERATE a lifestyle they dont agree with.” (My emphasis.) — What country are you living in?
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Robert – As a serial entrepreneur pre-MS, I can tell you that the MS experience is extremely valuable for someone coming out of school. A person can’t understand a large organization, bureaucracy, or how to work with large companies without being on the inside for awhile.
Granted, there are some negatives: unnecessary process, huge delta between MS haves/have nots, inability to make life-changing money without putting in a decade or more, etc. However, it’s a badge that helps make someone more well rounded and ultimately more valuable to future employers or new ventures.
It makes a lot of sense so long as a person can keep everything in perspective and make the leap when he/she is ready…as you have.
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Robert – As a serial entrepreneur pre-MS, I can tell you that the MS experience is extremely valuable for someone coming out of school. A person can’t understand a large organization, bureaucracy, or how to work with large companies without being on the inside for awhile.
Granted, there are some negatives: unnecessary process, huge delta between MS haves/have nots, inability to make life-changing money without putting in a decade or more, etc. However, it’s a badge that helps make someone more well rounded and ultimately more valuable to future employers or new ventures.
It makes a lot of sense so long as a person can keep everything in perspective and make the leap when he/she is ready…as you have.
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@45. A free country. Did Germany tolerate Nazism? Did Eastern Europe tolerate Communism? If the majority of the public disagrees with a lifestyle or way of life (don’t get me wrong, I’m not equating those that choose to publized their sexual lifestyle with the above) they are well within their rights to not tolerate it. Hell, the US was founded because a large number of people didn’t tolerate religious oppression.
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@45. A free country. Did Germany tolerate Nazism? Did Eastern Europe tolerate Communism? If the majority of the public disagrees with a lifestyle or way of life (don’t get me wrong, I’m not equating those that choose to publized their sexual lifestyle with the above) they are well within their rights to not tolerate it. Hell, the US was founded because a large number of people didn’t tolerate religious oppression.
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Dmad: according to my family who grew up in Nazi Germany, yes, most people DID tolerate Nazism. That’s why I stand up for minorities in our society so much. The majority often behaves like assholes toward minorities.
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Dmad: according to my family who grew up in Nazi Germany, yes, most people DID tolerate Nazism. That’s why I stand up for minorities in our society so much. The majority often behaves like assholes toward minorities.
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@42. Well, marriage is not a right, otherwise I wouldn’t need the state to endorse it.
As for your women and race examples the diffence there is one cannot choose their race or gender. Now I’m sure this will get us way off the rails, but until someone can definitively prove the existence of a homosexual gene, or can explain Anne Heche or bi-sexuality, many will remain unconvinced that one is not choosing to live thet lifestyle.
Still I’m curious why the gay community feels the need to where their sexual preferences on their sleeve? I mean, I can’t remember the last time I saw a “Straight Pride” parade, can you? In a way I feel that by advertising their sexual preferences they bring some if this on themselves. I could care less what one does in their bedroom, why to gays thinks it’s anyone business?
But to bring this back to the original point, given that MS seems to have a rather vocal internal lobbying group in the form of the “GLEAM” group, based on the email BusinessWeek published, and that this issue had apparently been on the table for a number of times in Washington in the past, I find it hard to believe that group was not already exercising its influence on Ballmer and thus find it lacking any credibility other than Scoble’s own inflated ego that he was the catalyst in causing Ballmer to roll over (no pun intended)
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@42. Well, marriage is not a right, otherwise I wouldn’t need the state to endorse it.
As for your women and race examples the diffence there is one cannot choose their race or gender. Now I’m sure this will get us way off the rails, but until someone can definitively prove the existence of a homosexual gene, or can explain Anne Heche or bi-sexuality, many will remain unconvinced that one is not choosing to live thet lifestyle.
Still I’m curious why the gay community feels the need to where their sexual preferences on their sleeve? I mean, I can’t remember the last time I saw a “Straight Pride” parade, can you? In a way I feel that by advertising their sexual preferences they bring some if this on themselves. I could care less what one does in their bedroom, why to gays thinks it’s anyone business?
But to bring this back to the original point, given that MS seems to have a rather vocal internal lobbying group in the form of the “GLEAM” group, based on the email BusinessWeek published, and that this issue had apparently been on the table for a number of times in Washington in the past, I find it hard to believe that group was not already exercising its influence on Ballmer and thus find it lacking any credibility other than Scoble’s own inflated ego that he was the catalyst in causing Ballmer to roll over (no pun intended)
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Oh, Dmad, you can’t be serious, can you? Every day is heterosexual day out in public. Yesterday when I was down in Seattle with Buzz I saw couples holding hands, kissing, lying together on the grass.
We make a HUGE display of heterosexual behavior. Ever been to Las Vegas? Why are there dozens of marriage chapels?
And we get a little upset when homosexuals throw a parade or fly a flag? Give me a break.
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Oh, Dmad, you can’t be serious, can you? Every day is heterosexual day out in public. Yesterday when I was down in Seattle with Buzz I saw couples holding hands, kissing, lying together on the grass.
We make a HUGE display of heterosexual behavior. Ever been to Las Vegas? Why are there dozens of marriage chapels?
And we get a little upset when homosexuals throw a parade or fly a flag? Give me a break.
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Dmad: a little known fact. My boss at the time was, and is, a member of the church that was pressuring Microsoft to change its stance.
So, taking that stand was certainly not a smart career move to make. Luckily I worked for a boss that separated his beliefs from his business decisions. But I didn’t know that for sure before making that post.
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Dmad: a little known fact. My boss at the time was, and is, a member of the church that was pressuring Microsoft to change its stance.
So, taking that stand was certainly not a smart career move to make. Luckily I worked for a boss that separated his beliefs from his business decisions. But I didn’t know that for sure before making that post.
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Robert,
I find this all truly fascinating. You will not have the discussion of a vote, will you? You simply cannot allow the public to voice its opinion on something YOU think we should all accept.
I can tolerate a number of things I dont approve of, but when one section of society deems they need “special protections” that the rest of us dont get, then yes, its an issue.
Gays in America are not being forced to sit in the back of the busses and never have been. Give me a break – they get a social pass on pretty much everything.
As for pride parades? Show me where heteros walk naked down any city street (I’ve lived all over the country – Ive seen it) and expect everyone else to just shut up.
Why are you so reluctant to allow the public to vote…? Can you answer that question?
As for Antioch, the church got involved AFTER the fact. And why is it a problem for a church to have an opinion on a political matter? There is actually no separation rule, although lefties for decades have been saying there is.
The Constitution states: Congress shall make no law intituting a state religion. But churches are more than welcome to have opinions; churches are not barred from this behavior.
Granted, since their opinion doesnt match up with yours, they are automatically wrong?
But still, answer my question about putting it to a public vote – if youre able.
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Robert,
I find this all truly fascinating. You will not have the discussion of a vote, will you? You simply cannot allow the public to voice its opinion on something YOU think we should all accept.
I can tolerate a number of things I dont approve of, but when one section of society deems they need “special protections” that the rest of us dont get, then yes, its an issue.
Gays in America are not being forced to sit in the back of the busses and never have been. Give me a break – they get a social pass on pretty much everything.
As for pride parades? Show me where heteros walk naked down any city street (I’ve lived all over the country – Ive seen it) and expect everyone else to just shut up.
Why are you so reluctant to allow the public to vote…? Can you answer that question?
As for Antioch, the church got involved AFTER the fact. And why is it a problem for a church to have an opinion on a political matter? There is actually no separation rule, although lefties for decades have been saying there is.
The Constitution states: Congress shall make no law intituting a state religion. But churches are more than welcome to have opinions; churches are not barred from this behavior.
Granted, since their opinion doesnt match up with yours, they are automatically wrong?
But still, answer my question about putting it to a public vote – if youre able.
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The United States seems alone among constitutional democracies in its inability to see the dangers of subjecting minority rights to majority votes. It seems impossible to eradicate the myth that people should be punished, e.g., by being fired from a job, because others disapprove of them. Adherents are curiously willing to use 21st-century technologies like blogging, and 20th-century methods like lobbying, to perpetuate a philosophy that seems nothing more than medieval.
Seen at a purely pragmatic level, if you run a business in a state that’s hostile to minorities, even to minorities you think justly and properly deserve hostility, your business is gonna suffer. Deservedly.
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The United States seems alone among constitutional democracies in its inability to see the dangers of subjecting minority rights to majority votes. It seems impossible to eradicate the myth that people should be punished, e.g., by being fired from a job, because others disapprove of them. Adherents are curiously willing to use 21st-century technologies like blogging, and 20th-century methods like lobbying, to perpetuate a philosophy that seems nothing more than medieval.
Seen at a purely pragmatic level, if you run a business in a state that’s hostile to minorities, even to minorities you think justly and properly deserve hostility, your business is gonna suffer. Deservedly.
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Joe, we are not a constitutional democracy, we are a Republic… big difference.
as for gays being fired from a job, simply because they are gay? That is already illegal. but it is illegal under an umbrella of issues that are illegal to fire someone for, and have been for some time now.
MS is among the frontrunners in the business world for allowing same sex benefits…
what Robert supposedly “talked Steve Balmer into supporting” was SPECIAL rights, for an already protected class of people; the American Worker.
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Joe, we are not a constitutional democracy, we are a Republic… big difference.
as for gays being fired from a job, simply because they are gay? That is already illegal. but it is illegal under an umbrella of issues that are illegal to fire someone for, and have been for some time now.
MS is among the frontrunners in the business world for allowing same sex benefits…
what Robert supposedly “talked Steve Balmer into supporting” was SPECIAL rights, for an already protected class of people; the American Worker.
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Lauri, then you might explain why many Microsoft employees wrote me and said “thanks” and explained why they remained in the closet. See, even if something is illegal, still doesn’t make it uncommon. It’s very hard to prove discrimination, too. Truth is we don’t have many people who have an open mind to people who are different than themselves.
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Lauri, then you might explain why many Microsoft employees wrote me and said “thanks” and explained why they remained in the closet. See, even if something is illegal, still doesn’t make it uncommon. It’s very hard to prove discrimination, too. Truth is we don’t have many people who have an open mind to people who are different than themselves.
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Lauri, you’ve obviously never been to New Orleans. Or Las Vegas during New Years. Or, San Francisco during Bay to Breakers. There are naked heterosexuals there in public. In Berkeley one naked guy even went to UC Cal.
And we don’t live in a Democracy. If we did we’d see the majority beat up the minority everytime.
Sounds like you’d be happy in Nazi Germany. There the majority had its say.
I’m more into protecting minorities from being crapped on by the majorities.
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Lauri, you’ve obviously never been to New Orleans. Or Las Vegas during New Years. Or, San Francisco during Bay to Breakers. There are naked heterosexuals there in public. In Berkeley one naked guy even went to UC Cal.
And we don’t live in a Democracy. If we did we’d see the majority beat up the minority everytime.
Sounds like you’d be happy in Nazi Germany. There the majority had its say.
I’m more into protecting minorities from being crapped on by the majorities.
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Not to mention quite a few beaches in Florida, Hawaii, and California. Even the ones who wear clothes only cover a few square inches of their bodies.
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Not to mention quite a few beaches in Florida, Hawaii, and California. Even the ones who wear clothes only cover a few square inches of their bodies.
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Robert, I lived in New Orleans for about two years.. so, try again.
And are you calling me a Nazi? Wow… truly classy. And since the gays are NOT in fact “being crapped on” by the majority, this issue is less than interesting to me.
Guess you just cannot answer it truthfully; you’d prefer to have our laws legislated to us, than let the public have any say. Its the way of the lefties … make laws that the rest of us spend decades trying to extract back out, since they are wholly unecessary.
And for being such an advocate for “tolerance” you have shown zip, zero none for anyone that doesnt agree with your leftie bent. Good luck with that.
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Robert, I lived in New Orleans for about two years.. so, try again.
And are you calling me a Nazi? Wow… truly classy. And since the gays are NOT in fact “being crapped on” by the majority, this issue is less than interesting to me.
Guess you just cannot answer it truthfully; you’d prefer to have our laws legislated to us, than let the public have any say. Its the way of the lefties … make laws that the rest of us spend decades trying to extract back out, since they are wholly unecessary.
And for being such an advocate for “tolerance” you have shown zip, zero none for anyone that doesnt agree with your leftie bent. Good luck with that.
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One more thing; as for the gays who are in the closet still? That isnt because of what society says; its because they are inherently dishonest people. Dishonest with themselves, and everyone around them.
If we have to give them special rights so they can come out of the closet, then thats just sad. Nobody makes that decision but THEM. Not us.
And before you try that childishness of “guess YOU dont know any gay people!!!” I have a great brother who is gay, as well as a few uncles .. various friends, and our family doctor for the first 8 years we lived here.
Go try painting someone less intelligent into a corner with your hand wringing… it aint working.
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One more thing; as for the gays who are in the closet still? That isnt because of what society says; its because they are inherently dishonest people. Dishonest with themselves, and everyone around them.
If we have to give them special rights so they can come out of the closet, then thats just sad. Nobody makes that decision but THEM. Not us.
And before you try that childishness of “guess YOU dont know any gay people!!!” I have a great brother who is gay, as well as a few uncles .. various friends, and our family doctor for the first 8 years we lived here.
Go try painting someone less intelligent into a corner with your hand wringing… it aint working.
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and one last thing, then im truly done with discussing anything of merit on your blog.
the naked gays who simulate sex on the streets in their Pride Parades are just an embarrassment to society as a whole. so, comparing a girl in a bikini on a beach to a gay male in assless chaps simulating sex with his partner of the moment is a bit of a stretch, even for you.
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and one last thing, then im truly done with discussing anything of merit on your blog.
the naked gays who simulate sex on the streets in their Pride Parades are just an embarrassment to society as a whole. so, comparing a girl in a bikini on a beach to a gay male in assless chaps simulating sex with his partner of the moment is a bit of a stretch, even for you.
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Lauri,
I didn’t say you’re a Nazi. Please be a careful reader. I said you would have LOVED the 1940s society in Germany. Why? Cause the majority kicked ass over the minority.
I answered the question very straightforward: we live in a representative democracy. Where law rules, not the mob. You want the mob to rule. I don’t.
I’ve seen what that gets us. Our Republican mob is taking away rights left and right.
And, if you think Gays are treated equally well everywhere (even in California, where I have observed hate acts on playgrounds and murders on the street of San Francisco) you are drinking better Merlot than I am on this Fourth of July. Can I have some?
Since you lived in New Orleans (I’m still not sure about that) then you might talk to Ernie the Attorney and hear his stories of sex acts that take place during Mardi Graw. Heterosexual ones. Right out in front of everyone. And I’m not talking about the flashing of mamary glands that Maryam and I saw either.
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Lauri,
I didn’t say you’re a Nazi. Please be a careful reader. I said you would have LOVED the 1940s society in Germany. Why? Cause the majority kicked ass over the minority.
I answered the question very straightforward: we live in a representative democracy. Where law rules, not the mob. You want the mob to rule. I don’t.
I’ve seen what that gets us. Our Republican mob is taking away rights left and right.
And, if you think Gays are treated equally well everywhere (even in California, where I have observed hate acts on playgrounds and murders on the street of San Francisco) you are drinking better Merlot than I am on this Fourth of July. Can I have some?
Since you lived in New Orleans (I’m still not sure about that) then you might talk to Ernie the Attorney and hear his stories of sex acts that take place during Mardi Graw. Heterosexual ones. Right out in front of everyone. And I’m not talking about the flashing of mamary glands that Maryam and I saw either.
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Scoble, I’ve read your blog for a few years now and admittedly have had mixed feelings about most of your writing. I’ve never commented here before but given I work for Apple I want to clarify that what you do, whether you call it communication or carry around a camera, is not at all comparable to the what Steve Jobs. The reason MS is not willing to pay you X dollars is because you don’t have a measurable impact on their bottomline, it’s simply not worth it because they can create a new Scoble very easily. On the other hand, someone like Steve Jobs. a great developer or even a salesmen deal directly with the companies business and thus are valued for higher. They cannot be replaced so easily.
Your type of work, blogging, is of value to Podtech. That is their core business, and thus they are willing to compensate you for it. Hopefully that helps clarify to you why MS or even us at Apple wouldn’t pay you more then 100k a year.
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Scoble, I’ve read your blog for a few years now and admittedly have had mixed feelings about most of your writing. I’ve never commented here before but given I work for Apple I want to clarify that what you do, whether you call it communication or carry around a camera, is not at all comparable to the what Steve Jobs. The reason MS is not willing to pay you X dollars is because you don’t have a measurable impact on their bottomline, it’s simply not worth it because they can create a new Scoble very easily. On the other hand, someone like Steve Jobs. a great developer or even a salesmen deal directly with the companies business and thus are valued for higher. They cannot be replaced so easily.
Your type of work, blogging, is of value to Podtech. That is their core business, and thus they are willing to compensate you for it. Hopefully that helps clarify to you why MS or even us at Apple wouldn’t pay you more then 100k a year.
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Macboy: how do you know that Apple didn’t offer me a job? I turned down quite a few jobs around the industry for more money than I’m making at Podtech.
And a Scoble can be created quite easily? Hmmm, it takes at least nine months and a Scoble has to be involved in the process and all the ones I know are already taken! 🙂
But, seriously, if you think that a new one of me can be created quickly then you are smoking good dope over there in Steve Jobs’ land. Can you bring some to my house in Half Moon Bay when I arrive?
You did miss that I got the best reviews at Google’s Zeitgeist after only Malcolm Gladwell, didn’t you? That I beat a Vice President of Microsoft’s audience scores there who also spoke. That I beat the CEOs from AOL, Yahoo, and many other big name places. If it’s so easy to communicate with audiences why didn’t anyone else beat me?
Communication is NEVER as easy as it seems.
Hell, all of Bill Gates speech writers and coaches still haven’t helped HIM become as good a communicator as Steve Jobs.
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Macboy: how do you know that Apple didn’t offer me a job? I turned down quite a few jobs around the industry for more money than I’m making at Podtech.
And a Scoble can be created quite easily? Hmmm, it takes at least nine months and a Scoble has to be involved in the process and all the ones I know are already taken! 🙂
But, seriously, if you think that a new one of me can be created quickly then you are smoking good dope over there in Steve Jobs’ land. Can you bring some to my house in Half Moon Bay when I arrive?
You did miss that I got the best reviews at Google’s Zeitgeist after only Malcolm Gladwell, didn’t you? That I beat a Vice President of Microsoft’s audience scores there who also spoke. That I beat the CEOs from AOL, Yahoo, and many other big name places. If it’s so easy to communicate with audiences why didn’t anyone else beat me?
Communication is NEVER as easy as it seems.
Hell, all of Bill Gates speech writers and coaches still haven’t helped HIM become as good a communicator as Steve Jobs.
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Robert,
I suggest you learn about the actual country you live in: the US is a representative republic regardless of what you wish we were, which means we are NOT a representative democracy.
As for Republicans taking away your rights? LOL! Thats a good one. I always get a kick out of the predictable responses of people who hate that the President’s first job is to protect the country.
But we’ll show Bush come 08… cause I’m never voting for him again!
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Robert,
I suggest you learn about the actual country you live in: the US is a representative republic regardless of what you wish we were, which means we are NOT a representative democracy.
As for Republicans taking away your rights? LOL! Thats a good one. I always get a kick out of the predictable responses of people who hate that the President’s first job is to protect the country.
But we’ll show Bush come 08… cause I’m never voting for him again!
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Thanks for correcting me, I just misspoke there. Too much emotion, not enough thinking. Heheh.
At times of “protection” is when we always hand over our rights. We’re so predictable.
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Thanks for correcting me, I just misspoke there. Too much emotion, not enough thinking. Heheh.
At times of “protection” is when we always hand over our rights. We’re so predictable.
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Excellent insights Robert and one that my profession could learn a great deal from. All done without buting NDAs etc. That’s an art.
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Excellent insights Robert and one that my profession could learn a great deal from. All done without buting NDAs etc. That’s an art.
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@66. Well, I must admit you are sticking to the talking points, well. Rights being taken away for “protection”. Seems no one had a problem with it during Roosevelt’s tenure, but could that be because he was a Dem? Nah!
No one is saying gays don’t get treated unfairly. But, often it’s their own doing because they shout from the rooftops that they are gay and demand that they get special rights? Do you come into a room and announce you are straigth. Again, I could care less what your sexual proclivities are, it shouldn’t be relevant to anything.
Your denseness never ceases to amaze me. I never said heterosexuals don’t engage in PDA’s. Gays do to, I have no problem with that. What I said was heterosexuals don’t organize “Straight Pride” parades and demand that attention be given to them because f of their sexual choice like many gays do. I have met, worked with, and are friends with many gays that are in fact embarrassed by such parades and the demands to heard, given “special rights” and wanting to use the court system to create laws rather than enforce them. They feel that in the long run it is counterproductive. Amazingly by not choosing to shout their gayness from the rooftops saying “We’re here and we’re queer”, they find that they get treated rather fairly.
As for your attack on MacBoy, again your defensiveness gets in the way of seeing his point. So you got good irrelevant scores at some random tech conference. Other than you, who the hell cares? No one but you likely remembered it a day later. How many of those scores resulted in more sales of MS software? Shipping Vista sooner? Taking share away from your competitors? Yea, again, I know numbers that translate into profits don’t matter to you when it doesn’t support your position, but his point was your actual job at MS seemed to be easily plug and playable, not your extracurricular activities.
And Lauri, not sure what you would be showing Bush in ’08. He can’t run again.
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@66. Well, I must admit you are sticking to the talking points, well. Rights being taken away for “protection”. Seems no one had a problem with it during Roosevelt’s tenure, but could that be because he was a Dem? Nah!
No one is saying gays don’t get treated unfairly. But, often it’s their own doing because they shout from the rooftops that they are gay and demand that they get special rights? Do you come into a room and announce you are straigth. Again, I could care less what your sexual proclivities are, it shouldn’t be relevant to anything.
Your denseness never ceases to amaze me. I never said heterosexuals don’t engage in PDA’s. Gays do to, I have no problem with that. What I said was heterosexuals don’t organize “Straight Pride” parades and demand that attention be given to them because f of their sexual choice like many gays do. I have met, worked with, and are friends with many gays that are in fact embarrassed by such parades and the demands to heard, given “special rights” and wanting to use the court system to create laws rather than enforce them. They feel that in the long run it is counterproductive. Amazingly by not choosing to shout their gayness from the rooftops saying “We’re here and we’re queer”, they find that they get treated rather fairly.
As for your attack on MacBoy, again your defensiveness gets in the way of seeing his point. So you got good irrelevant scores at some random tech conference. Other than you, who the hell cares? No one but you likely remembered it a day later. How many of those scores resulted in more sales of MS software? Shipping Vista sooner? Taking share away from your competitors? Yea, again, I know numbers that translate into profits don’t matter to you when it doesn’t support your position, but his point was your actual job at MS seemed to be easily plug and playable, not your extracurricular activities.
And Lauri, not sure what you would be showing Bush in ’08. He can’t run again.
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Cool.
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Cool.
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Dmad, while I’m mostly with you (& Lauri) on “gay rights” (and Lauri on “representative republic”), I must say that Scoble’s proof is more compelling than you suggest with your latest rhetorical flourishes.
It is NOT irrelevant that Scoble has been recently rated so highly as a “communicator” — against distinguished peers and competitors. And the gig was not discretely “extracurricular.” It’s pertinent to his point that Scoble can communicate.
Now, you may argue that Scoble would be little without his Microsoft leverage. Maybe (though he’d likely reply with more historical evidence, e.g., Ch.9). But how many employees had opportunity to leverage Microsoft? And where is the near equivalent…at the same ethical level (i.e., excluding mini)? Maybe Scoble is not just a compelling communicator (external to Microsoft) but also a persuasive politician (internal).
And you could press your point on ROI. Coming from the Direct Marketing world, I sympathize. We want everything to be denominatable, trackable. But some things can’t be. Some values can’t be so reduced. “Helping to change the face of Microsoft” is a fuzzy feat. (But it might be a real feat, nonetheless!)
But to suggest that Scoble’s role (not mere “job”) is “plug and playable”…. Really? (Technically, Steve Jobs’ job is too. How many more copies of hardware has Steve directly sold…than, say, Sculley?)
Now, granted, Scoble is no CEO, President, or Founder of Apple or Microsoft. But that’s not the point. We are entering a new (tech) era, and Scoble has been one of its chief communicators…for a chief company and her customers.
And consider the “News.” Were Rather, Jennings, Brokaw (or Cronkite) heads of their companies? Yet are their roles “plug and play”? Blogging may be different, but not so completely as you seem to suggest. Not for non-News companies…
Yesterday it was PR, today it is blogger as “bridge” between customer and corporation. What if 1,000,000 read him and 1% soften toward Microsoft while Microsoft actually becomes more “friendly”? Is there no value there?
Finally, are you quite sure that no one, nowhere, has reconsidered buying Microsoft (stock or product) in partial consideration of Robert’s words? (If so, I’ll happily provide a personal case study.)
As we learned from one of the founders of “Direct Marketing”: “The pen is mightier than the sword.” Words change the world. While I do not support Robert in his use of them for certain advocacies, I recognize his distinctive skills for what they are. Their value should not be understated.
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Dmad, while I’m mostly with you (& Lauri) on “gay rights” (and Lauri on “representative republic”), I must say that Scoble’s proof is more compelling than you suggest with your latest rhetorical flourishes.
It is NOT irrelevant that Scoble has been recently rated so highly as a “communicator” — against distinguished peers and competitors. And the gig was not discretely “extracurricular.” It’s pertinent to his point that Scoble can communicate.
Now, you may argue that Scoble would be little without his Microsoft leverage. Maybe (though he’d likely reply with more historical evidence, e.g., Ch.9). But how many employees had opportunity to leverage Microsoft? And where is the near equivalent…at the same ethical level (i.e., excluding mini)? Maybe Scoble is not just a compelling communicator (external to Microsoft) but also a persuasive politician (internal).
And you could press your point on ROI. Coming from the Direct Marketing world, I sympathize. We want everything to be denominatable, trackable. But some things can’t be. Some values can’t be so reduced. “Helping to change the face of Microsoft” is a fuzzy feat. (But it might be a real feat, nonetheless!)
But to suggest that Scoble’s role (not mere “job”) is “plug and playable”…. Really? (Technically, Steve Jobs’ job is too. How many more copies of hardware has Steve directly sold…than, say, Sculley?)
Now, granted, Scoble is no CEO, President, or Founder of Apple or Microsoft. But that’s not the point. We are entering a new (tech) era, and Scoble has been one of its chief communicators…for a chief company and her customers.
And consider the “News.” Were Rather, Jennings, Brokaw (or Cronkite) heads of their companies? Yet are their roles “plug and play”? Blogging may be different, but not so completely as you seem to suggest. Not for non-News companies…
Yesterday it was PR, today it is blogger as “bridge” between customer and corporation. What if 1,000,000 read him and 1% soften toward Microsoft while Microsoft actually becomes more “friendly”? Is there no value there?
Finally, are you quite sure that no one, nowhere, has reconsidered buying Microsoft (stock or product) in partial consideration of Robert’s words? (If so, I’ll happily provide a personal case study.)
As we learned from one of the founders of “Direct Marketing”: “The pen is mightier than the sword.” Words change the world. While I do not support Robert in his use of them for certain advocacies, I recognize his distinctive skills for what they are. Their value should not be understated.
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Scoble – I’ve worked at MS for more than 5 years – how is it that I’ve never heard of you nor what you do?
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Scoble – I’ve worked at MS for more than 5 years – how is it that I’ve never heard of you nor what you do?
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Irwin, I don’t know. Where you been all this time?
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Irwin, I don’t know. Where you been all this time?
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@68
Dmad, its a joke…of course Bush cant run again. But the Dems better start trotting out something new other than “I hate George W Bush” if they hope to ever get elected again.
Granted, for most conservatives GW is far too liberal – so, the Dems better pull one big rabbit out of their hats come 08…. but I dont think its likely.
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@68
Dmad, its a joke…of course Bush cant run again. But the Dems better start trotting out something new other than “I hate George W Bush” if they hope to ever get elected again.
Granted, for most conservatives GW is far too liberal – so, the Dems better pull one big rabbit out of their hats come 08…. but I dont think its likely.
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So, Robert, you take pride in helping throw us back into the days when only the rich could vote and when, oddly enough, minorities had NO say-so in the rights of the land? “How so”, you might ask?
Back in our early colonies, land ownership is what granted voting rights to an individual. This generally kept out those “pesky minorities, women and poor people” — leaving the decision making to high-minded rich people. Never mind the fact that the majority of people were NOT rich and minorities were too busy getting beaten by their plantation “owners” to go house shopping (please DO sense my outrage and sarcasm all at once).
You support having multi-billion dollar mega-corporations push their weight around to pass laws. (and even put aside the fact that you pushed for the two richest white guys in the company to put their support behind this bill). By doing so, a single few rich guys who run the company can bowl over the opinions of the masses — effectively putting us back before the 15th amendment, the 19th amendment, and the voting rights act.
You stated that you wanted churches to stay out of politics yet our whole political system was created out of the need for religious liberty. I also didn’t see you complaining when Congress made a law that created the Department of Education and then prohibited the free exercise of religion there (which had been done since we landed on Plymouth Rock).
Be truthful, you aren’t fighting for minorities, you are pushing an agenda that would not have passed if you really believed in the democratic process.
Furthermore, this country was not founded on minority rule; it was founded on majority rule. All individuals are conferred the same rights, but when those votes are tallied, the most votes win. If that means that the majority of people say that you can’t wear purple shirts on Friday, then by golly, that’s what needs to happen. This is why these decisions were supposed to be left to the states and local governments. Communities could make up rules that made sense to them, and some large group of nay-sayers from across the country couldn’t force them to change just because they felt they should.
The point being Robert, you subverted the democratic system, pushed for two rich white guys to put their weight behind a law, then got out of the state so that you could revel in screwing the system once again. Let me guess, you voted for Kerry?
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So, Robert, you take pride in helping throw us back into the days when only the rich could vote and when, oddly enough, minorities had NO say-so in the rights of the land? “How so”, you might ask?
Back in our early colonies, land ownership is what granted voting rights to an individual. This generally kept out those “pesky minorities, women and poor people” — leaving the decision making to high-minded rich people. Never mind the fact that the majority of people were NOT rich and minorities were too busy getting beaten by their plantation “owners” to go house shopping (please DO sense my outrage and sarcasm all at once).
You support having multi-billion dollar mega-corporations push their weight around to pass laws. (and even put aside the fact that you pushed for the two richest white guys in the company to put their support behind this bill). By doing so, a single few rich guys who run the company can bowl over the opinions of the masses — effectively putting us back before the 15th amendment, the 19th amendment, and the voting rights act.
You stated that you wanted churches to stay out of politics yet our whole political system was created out of the need for religious liberty. I also didn’t see you complaining when Congress made a law that created the Department of Education and then prohibited the free exercise of religion there (which had been done since we landed on Plymouth Rock).
Be truthful, you aren’t fighting for minorities, you are pushing an agenda that would not have passed if you really believed in the democratic process.
Furthermore, this country was not founded on minority rule; it was founded on majority rule. All individuals are conferred the same rights, but when those votes are tallied, the most votes win. If that means that the majority of people say that you can’t wear purple shirts on Friday, then by golly, that’s what needs to happen. This is why these decisions were supposed to be left to the states and local governments. Communities could make up rules that made sense to them, and some large group of nay-sayers from across the country couldn’t force them to change just because they felt they should.
The point being Robert, you subverted the democratic system, pushed for two rich white guys to put their weight behind a law, then got out of the state so that you could revel in screwing the system once again. Let me guess, you voted for Kerry?
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> Not to mention quite a few beaches in Florida,
> Hawaii, and California. Even the ones who wear
> clothes only cover a few square inches of their
> bodies.
> Comment by Robert Scoble — July 4, 2006 @ 12:11 pm
And did you stop to ask everyone if they were all heterosexual/homosexual? How could you tell? Oh, they were holding hands with a woman? I have gay friends that do that all the time. The difference is, Robert, I have some gay friends. I don’t approve of the lifestyle and they know it. They don’t agree with my beliefs, and I know it. The difference is that we have common sense and respect for one another’s differences. They have enough sense to say that it’s wrong for people to parade down a street naked just as much as anyone else.
Another tactic of the drones that schools like Berkley pump out is that they immediately tell people they are Nazis or compare them to Nazis simply because they don’t let the minority viewpoints overrun majority views. How about holding up a real argument instead of resorting to ad hominem? Once you actually come back with facts and agree to stay on point, then we can discuss this intelligently. Until then, you are just another drone following the brainwashing you were given in the socialist school system we can state-run universities.
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> Not to mention quite a few beaches in Florida,
> Hawaii, and California. Even the ones who wear
> clothes only cover a few square inches of their
> bodies.
> Comment by Robert Scoble — July 4, 2006 @ 12:11 pm
And did you stop to ask everyone if they were all heterosexual/homosexual? How could you tell? Oh, they were holding hands with a woman? I have gay friends that do that all the time. The difference is, Robert, I have some gay friends. I don’t approve of the lifestyle and they know it. They don’t agree with my beliefs, and I know it. The difference is that we have common sense and respect for one another’s differences. They have enough sense to say that it’s wrong for people to parade down a street naked just as much as anyone else.
Another tactic of the drones that schools like Berkley pump out is that they immediately tell people they are Nazis or compare them to Nazis simply because they don’t let the minority viewpoints overrun majority views. How about holding up a real argument instead of resorting to ad hominem? Once you actually come back with facts and agree to stay on point, then we can discuss this intelligently. Until then, you are just another drone following the brainwashing you were given in the socialist school system we can state-run universities.
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Interesting stuff, I wondered how this happened.
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Interesting stuff, I wondered how this happened.
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I hope I’m not too late to add to this. I’m an ex-‘softie who spent the last few years in the Windows division. At the risk of being lost amongst the trolls but with the hope of actually helping someone out there . . . here are my reactions.
My perception is that most ‘softies might not know you because most folks live in silos. The annual tech fair is an eye opener for a lot of people who don’t have any idea what the rest of the company is doing. Is it any surprise that “Scoble” isn’t a buzzword internally? If I would change one thing about Microsoft culture it would be this. Or maybe the empire-building that I believe eventually leads to the silo lifestyle.
IE 7 and Vista both have (shoddy) RSS client support. Not to mention the Live initiative. It’s not that everyone at Microsoft is clueless, but rather that unless something has a solid business model it just ain’t gonna happen. People outside of Microsoft didn’t see the HUGE internal furvor from the folks with their boots on the ground (Individual Contributors) about OSS as everyone tried to get senior management to realize that Linux, Firefox, et al. were not only viable, but possibly a threat to some of the company’s bottom line. I realize this runs counter to the silo statement above, but there are certainly some if not many engineers in the company who are real geeks, seeking out all the new cool things. Heck, RaymondC’s sig used to be “just another Linux hacker”. For better ___ support, the mantra is always “wait for the next service pack”. Probably applies in this case.
Windows release cycles seem to have changed. The old model is 1) release the RTM version and 2) everyone finally runs it once you release SP1. The new model is to add 3) there’s some “refresh” release like XP SP2 or WS03 R2 that is sort of a mini-RTM for a new OS. That seems to be the mechanism to add all those features that customers really wanted but just didn’t ship at RTM. I wasn’t an exec. I don’t know what happens most days in the war meetings. I’m just a nobody. That’s only what I observed from the trenches. I suppose it’s better than the wait for NT4 SP4 was.
Remaking Microsoft into two camps, the younger of which is intended to kill the elder, sounds too much like an Apple nightmare of yore. I don’t think you’re Mini, but maybe you’re related to Steve Jobs. As an engineer, that sounds dreadful. I leave it to anyone interested to Google up that history lesson. *shudder*
I completely agree about the need for a naming dictator. Forget about the personas. I’ve never met Abby or Ichiro. I’m more worried about my mom. I *love* my mom. The whole Messenger confusion is only one example of the needless support headaches I have with her. Maybe in some imaginary world those things bother Abby or Ichiro. I have no idea. I only know that mom doesn’t like it.
I also agree that people hate Microsoft because it is now Goliath. I still remember when it was David instead. David could fight kinda dirty ’cause he was the underdog. Goliath needs to just stand there and take the hurt. Microsoft as David has gone the way of the Blibbet. Were I a bit more superstitious I’d cry out “resurrect the Blibbet”, but I’m not. Goliath isn’t cool. I don’t know how to change that.
As far as roles go in Windows . . . well . . . that’s a deep problem. Look to the NT object manager and ask how it should be changed to “understand” roles. Start there at the core and build out. I agree that the development community as a whole (and Microsoft especially) needs to start thinking in terms of roles. In practical terms, things are a little better in Unix-land. In design terms . . . um . . . I don’t want to start a flame war, so I’ll lay off. Suffice it to say that there are some really smart people in the Windows division who are starting to think about roles instead of just entities and their permissions (a big part of the problem is rooted in the security model). Expect a big change in the way stuff works. In 10-15 years. 😦 I hope that I didn’t break my NDA somehow with these statements.
On the inability to see small things: Absolutely any new initiative needs a business model. How much income can that new thing make? How much will the company lose if it doesn’t implement that? The little things usually don’t have any definable $$$ impact. I agree that there ought to be more flexibility to explore new income sources (meaning cool new tech), but unless you’re in research that’s probably not going to happen at Microsoft. Yes, there needs to be change. Taking small risks can pay off in the large. Taking large risks that the company keeps dumping money into might do that, too, but for my money I’d rahter have thousands of small longshot bets than only a handful of allegedly-not-longshots that seem to eventually pan out to be money pits.
Will Mac and Windows become one? Was that supposed to be a real question or a troll? Do that DaveC interview you wanted to do. Then go talk with some devs on Mach. I just don’t see that happening. Ever. Apple currently (and quite happily) runs on a Unix(-like?) kernel. Windows is NT, which at heart is very VMS-like. Unix and VMS are oil and water (or vice versa). Dual booting might become more common. Once Bootcamp RTMs I’m going to go buy a Mac. There have been too many problems reported from early adopters for me to want to trust Bootcamp yet, though.
On the Google love (or not?): Google treats its engineers amazingly well. I have no idea about the non-engineers. It’s biggest draw as an employer is exactly that. Work on cool stuff with very little management or process overhead, ship frequently, live/breathe tech but eat tasty healthy free food, be surrounded by some of the smartest people in the industry, and spend one day a week working on something else – whatever else, but be productive. Tell any engineer “I’m going to take away all of the little problems in your day to day life and let you just focus on solving problems”. Hired. Period. That’s Google. What they actually produce doesn’t really excite me and I’ll probably never work there, but I can see the reason they drain brains away from the likes of Microsoft.
In regard to Richard’s question about Longhorn and Vista: Gotta ship the bits. Sometimes that means cutting most or all of the 3 main pillars you were building the product around. Oh, well. Anything good will eventually wander back into the source tree and ship in a later version. Maybe one day we’ll finally see all of the Cairo features on a desktop. Who knows?
And about working at Microsoft: I went to Microsoft straight out of college. I spent ~7 years there working at a company that I would consider to be one of the best “finishing schools” for software engineers. On the one hand, there are smart people there working on almost anything you’re interested in doing in software. On the other, it’s like New York, New York – it can be rough; if you can make it there you can make it anywhere. I recommend it highly. I interviewed with several companies who told me that they prefer candidates with that kind of background.
Thanks for hearing/reading me out. I apologize for the length of the comment and also for my lack of any spelling or grammar checking. Hope it’s not too offensive to the dictionary-huggers out there.
– Drew
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I hope I’m not too late to add to this. I’m an ex-‘softie who spent the last few years in the Windows division. At the risk of being lost amongst the trolls but with the hope of actually helping someone out there . . . here are my reactions.
My perception is that most ‘softies might not know you because most folks live in silos. The annual tech fair is an eye opener for a lot of people who don’t have any idea what the rest of the company is doing. Is it any surprise that “Scoble” isn’t a buzzword internally? If I would change one thing about Microsoft culture it would be this. Or maybe the empire-building that I believe eventually leads to the silo lifestyle.
IE 7 and Vista both have (shoddy) RSS client support. Not to mention the Live initiative. It’s not that everyone at Microsoft is clueless, but rather that unless something has a solid business model it just ain’t gonna happen. People outside of Microsoft didn’t see the HUGE internal furvor from the folks with their boots on the ground (Individual Contributors) about OSS as everyone tried to get senior management to realize that Linux, Firefox, et al. were not only viable, but possibly a threat to some of the company’s bottom line. I realize this runs counter to the silo statement above, but there are certainly some if not many engineers in the company who are real geeks, seeking out all the new cool things. Heck, RaymondC’s sig used to be “just another Linux hacker”. For better ___ support, the mantra is always “wait for the next service pack”. Probably applies in this case.
Windows release cycles seem to have changed. The old model is 1) release the RTM version and 2) everyone finally runs it once you release SP1. The new model is to add 3) there’s some “refresh” release like XP SP2 or WS03 R2 that is sort of a mini-RTM for a new OS. That seems to be the mechanism to add all those features that customers really wanted but just didn’t ship at RTM. I wasn’t an exec. I don’t know what happens most days in the war meetings. I’m just a nobody. That’s only what I observed from the trenches. I suppose it’s better than the wait for NT4 SP4 was.
Remaking Microsoft into two camps, the younger of which is intended to kill the elder, sounds too much like an Apple nightmare of yore. I don’t think you’re Mini, but maybe you’re related to Steve Jobs. As an engineer, that sounds dreadful. I leave it to anyone interested to Google up that history lesson. *shudder*
I completely agree about the need for a naming dictator. Forget about the personas. I’ve never met Abby or Ichiro. I’m more worried about my mom. I *love* my mom. The whole Messenger confusion is only one example of the needless support headaches I have with her. Maybe in some imaginary world those things bother Abby or Ichiro. I have no idea. I only know that mom doesn’t like it.
I also agree that people hate Microsoft because it is now Goliath. I still remember when it was David instead. David could fight kinda dirty ’cause he was the underdog. Goliath needs to just stand there and take the hurt. Microsoft as David has gone the way of the Blibbet. Were I a bit more superstitious I’d cry out “resurrect the Blibbet”, but I’m not. Goliath isn’t cool. I don’t know how to change that.
As far as roles go in Windows . . . well . . . that’s a deep problem. Look to the NT object manager and ask how it should be changed to “understand” roles. Start there at the core and build out. I agree that the development community as a whole (and Microsoft especially) needs to start thinking in terms of roles. In practical terms, things are a little better in Unix-land. In design terms . . . um . . . I don’t want to start a flame war, so I’ll lay off. Suffice it to say that there are some really smart people in the Windows division who are starting to think about roles instead of just entities and their permissions (a big part of the problem is rooted in the security model). Expect a big change in the way stuff works. In 10-15 years. 😦 I hope that I didn’t break my NDA somehow with these statements.
On the inability to see small things: Absolutely any new initiative needs a business model. How much income can that new thing make? How much will the company lose if it doesn’t implement that? The little things usually don’t have any definable $$$ impact. I agree that there ought to be more flexibility to explore new income sources (meaning cool new tech), but unless you’re in research that’s probably not going to happen at Microsoft. Yes, there needs to be change. Taking small risks can pay off in the large. Taking large risks that the company keeps dumping money into might do that, too, but for my money I’d rahter have thousands of small longshot bets than only a handful of allegedly-not-longshots that seem to eventually pan out to be money pits.
Will Mac and Windows become one? Was that supposed to be a real question or a troll? Do that DaveC interview you wanted to do. Then go talk with some devs on Mach. I just don’t see that happening. Ever. Apple currently (and quite happily) runs on a Unix(-like?) kernel. Windows is NT, which at heart is very VMS-like. Unix and VMS are oil and water (or vice versa). Dual booting might become more common. Once Bootcamp RTMs I’m going to go buy a Mac. There have been too many problems reported from early adopters for me to want to trust Bootcamp yet, though.
On the Google love (or not?): Google treats its engineers amazingly well. I have no idea about the non-engineers. It’s biggest draw as an employer is exactly that. Work on cool stuff with very little management or process overhead, ship frequently, live/breathe tech but eat tasty healthy free food, be surrounded by some of the smartest people in the industry, and spend one day a week working on something else – whatever else, but be productive. Tell any engineer “I’m going to take away all of the little problems in your day to day life and let you just focus on solving problems”. Hired. Period. That’s Google. What they actually produce doesn’t really excite me and I’ll probably never work there, but I can see the reason they drain brains away from the likes of Microsoft.
In regard to Richard’s question about Longhorn and Vista: Gotta ship the bits. Sometimes that means cutting most or all of the 3 main pillars you were building the product around. Oh, well. Anything good will eventually wander back into the source tree and ship in a later version. Maybe one day we’ll finally see all of the Cairo features on a desktop. Who knows?
And about working at Microsoft: I went to Microsoft straight out of college. I spent ~7 years there working at a company that I would consider to be one of the best “finishing schools” for software engineers. On the one hand, there are smart people there working on almost anything you’re interested in doing in software. On the other, it’s like New York, New York – it can be rough; if you can make it there you can make it anywhere. I recommend it highly. I interviewed with several companies who told me that they prefer candidates with that kind of background.
Thanks for hearing/reading me out. I apologize for the length of the comment and also for my lack of any spelling or grammar checking. Hope it’s not too offensive to the dictionary-huggers out there.
– Drew
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Drew, thanks, I appreciated every one of your comments, even the ones that disagreed with what I said. I learned a lot, and that’s the most I can ask for. Would love to meet you someday.
As for new company to compete with the old? I guess that’s what we’re getting with Google anyway. Too bad that Gates didn’t just spin off an Internet division to compete with the old fogeys anyway back in the late 1990s. If he had maybe Google wouldn’t have existed. But, that’s the innovator’s dilemma, isn’t it?
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Drew, thanks, I appreciated every one of your comments, even the ones that disagreed with what I said. I learned a lot, and that’s the most I can ask for. Would love to meet you someday.
As for new company to compete with the old? I guess that’s what we’re getting with Google anyway. Too bad that Gates didn’t just spin off an Internet division to compete with the old fogeys anyway back in the late 1990s. If he had maybe Google wouldn’t have existed. But, that’s the innovator’s dilemma, isn’t it?
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Hi Guys,
Please follow this link to get un-limited interview questions on asp.net, testing, php, java, oracle etc.This site also includes Freelance projects, Online air ticket reservation functionality, gaming, latest sports news, discussion forum, directory submission, latest jobs.
http://www.interviewhelper.org
Follow the link and have all these functionalities under one url.
Thanks and Regards,
Interview Helper Team
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