Dan Warne01 January 2007, 5:03 AM
It's like playing peek-a-boo with a child: now Microsoft wants to give you a laptop. Now it doesn't. Now it does.
It's like playing peek-a-boo with a child: now Microsoft wants to give you a laptop. Now it doesn't. Now it does.
Microsoft has changed its mind again over what the 90 bloggers it sent expensive laptops to should do with them. Now, the New York Times reports, Microsoft says the bloggers can keep them.
After being accused of offering bloggers pre-Vista-launch bribes in the form of expensive Acer Ferrari laptops, Microsoft sent out clarifying emails stating it wanted the laptops back, or given away, after the bloggers' review period was finished.
That didn't go down too well, either. "The PR backpedal is just silly," said blogger Marshall Kirkpatrick, director of pre-launch startup SplashCast.
Now, Microsoft says those clarifying emails confused some people and its official position is that bloggers are free to keep the laptops if they want after all.
"Microsoft’s official position is that once these bloggers are done experiencing the product, they can choose what they want to do with them," a Microsoft spokeswoman told the New York Times [sign-in required].
The gift giving program created a scandal that polarised the blogging community between those who thought giving away gifts worth thousands of dollars to bloggers just before the release of Vista crossed ethical boundaries, and those who thought bloggers were exempt from journalistic ethics and argued, "C’mon guys… Get over yourselves. In every type of business free items are given to the taste makers of that genre."
Microsoft's panicked flip-flop response to the resulting scandal has simultaneously aggravated the bloggers it gave the gifts to and done little to assuage ethical concerns in the wider community.
After blogger Long Zheng revealed the extent of the gift-giving program on his blog, Microsoft manager responsible, Aaron Coldiron, attempted to hose down the issue, pointing out that bloggers were offered the option of returning the laptop, giving it away to their readers, or keeping it.
"Full disclosure - while I hope you will blog about your experience with the PC, you don’t have to. Also, you are welcome to send the machine back to us after you are done playing with it, or you can give it away on your site, or you can keep it," he said.
After readers commented that this was akin to offering a cop cash and letting him know he could return it if he wanted, Microsoft's Coldiron started emailing bloggers, asserting that the laptops were for review only, and should be returned to Microsoft or given away at the end of the review period.
"No good deed goes unpunished, right? You may have seen that other bloggers got review machines as well. Some of that coverage was not factual. As you write your review I just wanted to emphasize that this is a review PC. I strongly recommend you disclose that we sent you this machine for review, and I hope you give your honest opinions. Just to make sure there is no misunderstanding of our intentions I’m going to ask that you either give the PC away or send it back when you no longer need it for product reviews," he said.
Irritated bloggers then accused Microsoft of making things worse and bungling its PR response. One commenter on Mitch Denny's blog claimed that bloggers never had ethical obligations; don't need em, don't want em. Do want the free laptop though.
Microsoft has now capitulated to this wave of pressure and formally stated the bloggers can keep the laptops after all.
The whole tawdry tale has now been immortalised in computing history by being made into a cartoon.
More coverage
Microsoft Vista Ferrari payoffs -- horrible move - calcanis.com
Costly gift from Microsoft is an invitation to blog - nytimes.com
Anatomy of a blogger bribe - Linux-watch.com
Why Microsoft is resorting to bribery - theopensourcery.com
Microsoft's cynical response to laptop scandal - tech.blorge.com
Microsoft bribing bloggers with laptops - slashdot.org
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