shepherdweb.com

Me, a Microsoft-basher?

February 22nd, 2007

I received the following email yesterday:

I had never really considered you a hardcore Microsoft-basher, but reading your blog lately (and the sidebar links) have convinced me otherwise.

- Naive Stephen

I was taken aback at first, but after reviewing my recent publications and and a little soul searching, I decided there was some truth to Stephen’s accusation.

Way back in October of 2006 (that’s “way back”, right?) I volunteered to help Microsoft with their Community Launch event for Office, Vista, .NET 3.0, and Exchange Server 2007. My motivation for volunteering was the promise of access to all sorts of insider training and some freebies. Both were delivered as promised, although a little later than promised. So why am I upset?

I’m not really, not on the outside anyway. You may recall a big stink about Microsoft giving away a bunch of laptops to bloggers back in December. Needless to say, I was not the recipient of one of those laptops. Many of the bloggers who received the laptops could not have cared less about the newly (and freely) acquired hardware. Some even returned them or just gave them away. Do you see where I’m going with this? I’m slaving over more videos, demos, and presentation material than I really have time for in preparation for a grass roots promotional event for Microsoft…and I got a laptop skin (I don’t own a laptop, by the way). These other guys openly mock and chide Microsoft, and they got a free laptop. I don’t get it.

Ok, so I’m not really mad at Microsoft. The whole scenario just seemed unjust. And there’s another factor. Do you know that feeling when you want something, but don’t really need it? You’ve already got one that works fine; It’s not as shiny and fast as the new ones, but it gets the job done. Well, I’m there. My iMac is about 2 years old now. It gets the job done. It still runs the old Power PC architecture, not the new lightning Intel x86 architecture. It won’t run Vista, but Tiger runs great on it. I want both! Ok, enough selfish babbling.

Next Thursday Tuesday I will be presenting for the Microsoft Community Launch in Lubbock. I will be covering Windows Vista and the .NET 3.0 Framework. If you would like to attend, RSVP to info@ldnug.net by February 24th. There will be free pizza and door prizes (including a laptop skin).

Details:

Microsoft Community Launch Event and Lubbock .NET Users Group Meeting.
February 27th
7:00-9:00pm
Tyler Tech-INCODE
5808 4th Street
Lubbock, Texas

1 Comment »

  1. shepherdweb.com » Installing Vista Business on Virtual PC 2007 » Shane Shepherd: web design and development; music wrote,

    [...] Although I couldn’t run all the cool Vista bling (Windows Aero Glass) in the virtual environment, I still had fun trying out all the new features in Vista. I think the Finder erm…Explorer is easier to use that it’s XP predecessor. I also like the built in tagging, although this does not work on all document types. The new search functionality is pretty fast, and even finds stuff buried inside of documents. However, I didn’t like that the search from the Start Menu behaves differently than the search from the Explorer window. Being a person who does not bash MS, I’m looking forward to having Vista installed in a non-virtualized environment…someday. Technorati Tags: Virtual PC 2007, Vista, Windows Filed under: Microsoft, Humor, Windows, Vista by Shane | [...]

    Pingback on March 2, 2007 @ 4:26 pm

Leave a comment

RSS feed for comments on this post.

TrackBack URI