tara and the blue monster…

But this cartoon is still missing the ‘for the better’ qualification!
There’s little doubt, in my mind at least, that Microsoft has and will continue to change the world. (The sheer number of users of their products almost guarantee this.) It’s the way they change the world that matters.
‘Microsoft make a positive, tangible difference to the world or go home’ doesn’t have the same ring to it though, does it?

Interesting that you say that it’s all over if it only goes external… so does this mean that if internally the concept is rejected then it’s all over for you too?

> The fact that Microsoft is sending it back externally shows there’s a two-way conversation starting.
I don’t know about that; a mirror does the same thing, but that doesn’t mean it is actually paying attention to you, considering your needs or desires, or serving you in any way beyond providing your reflection. And it might not even be doing that; it might just be blinding you with glare, which seems to me more like what Microsoft’s interactions with the public often seem to be. If Microsoft’s use of your cartoon does show that there is a two-way conversation starting, it seems to be with you, not the general public.
If Microsoft really wants to have a conversation with the general public, it needs to show that it is listening by acting on what the public is saying and asking about the company and its products. For example:
1. A lot of people seem to be having Xbox 360 system failures, including me, my brother, and writers for various Web sites. Why have there been so many problems and what, if anything, is Microsoft doing to improve quality? (Beyond handling repairs, which it has already changed AFTER replacing my system with a filthy, used one instead of repairing it.)
2. Your Xbox 360 DRM system is unpopular among those who know about it because it permanently links content to a particular console, not even transferring rights to warranty-replacement or upgrade-replacement consoles, and the secondary user-associated DRM requires users to be logged in to use their content, rendering content unavailable when a replacement console does not have access to the Internet. Why do you not allow the transfer of rights from one console to another even for the same user? Do you not realize that this policy is preventing you from making money every time someone who might otherwise make a purchase from the Xbox Live Marketplace decides against the hassle and restrictions of your DRM?
3. What might cause simple file copy operations to fail under Windows Vista and more importantly, when such failures occur, why does Windows not bother to report them to users, instead just allowing its file transfer windows to close silently?
4. Why does the so-called “Activation Assistant” for Microsoft Office 2007 demos that comes pre-installed on HP computers report that Microsoft Office, a demo of which also comes pre-installed on HP computers, is not installed even when it is installed and even when a Microsoft Office application is actually running?
5. Why does attempting to UNinstall the aforementioned “Activation Assistant” result in an error message that Microsoft Office must be installed before the “Activation Assistant” can be installed even when BOTH are already installed?
6. Why does it do so when Microsoft Office has already been uninstalled instead of just uninstalling itself?
7. What were you thinking with the interface to Internet Explorer 7?
8. Why is the CSS support in IE 7 still so poor—so very far behind Firefox, Opera, Safari, Konqueror, etc.?
9. Why do Windows Live support queries go unanswered?
Those are just off the top of my head, but if Microsoft really wants to have a two-way conversation with the public, it can start with these kinds of issues—the kind of things that affect the general public—not just by fueling the PR machine with words and pictures from prominent bloggers.
By the way, file-copying issue and IE 7 aside, I actually like Windows Vista, which makes the file-copying thing very frustrating indeed since it is by itself a deal-breaking problem (I had to revert my Windows workstation to Windows XP).

Someone at Microsoft should read The Brand Gap.
Microsoft would do well to understand the laws of brand extension and category divergence. If the DoJ had broken them up, I think they’d be a lot stronger as a collective today and wouldn’t have the stigma of a quashed conviction and a pardon by a president sending people to their death in a pointless conflict (where is the declaration of war?)
And if you never go home, where is your work/life balance?

Perhaps there should be an official “trickster” or “Loki” job position in large companies – someone who’s job it is to actively stir up trouble, point out that the emperor has no clothes, and generally act as a counterpoint to the groupthink that can sometimes stifle a large organization.
(And I’m not talking about trouble for the sake of it, or offensive trouble – constructive trouble, if such a thing is possible).
It would take a brave organization to do that though… and performance reviews for that person would be interesting.

You’re the one who wrote “Microsoft is sending it back externally”, Hugh, so you seem to be both accepting and rejecting the notion of collective forms of communication. Certainly, things work differently depending upon the direction—companies have PR people through which their official or semi-official company messages are funneled while the general public has both cumulative individual voices and some voices that are quite loud and clear even apart from the others (e.g., prominent bloggers)—but messages are definitely being sent both ways. Even so, you’re right, Hugh, that it isn’t really a conversation on that level. It’s more like a lecture by someone who ignores the audience instead of participating with it. It could be more like a proper conversation, though, if the company wanted it to be.
The difficulty is that while a company such as Microsoft can get a pretty good idea of what people are really thinking and what they really want from direct feedback, prominent blog articles, discussion forums, and such, the public does not often receive such clear, honest, open messages in reply. When they have something to sell, the relevant employees of any given company are happy to tell us all what to buy and where to buy it, but that is not really interactive beyond responding to perceived market demands or desires.
If the people inside a company were to provide a company-level response to collective public feedback and buzz, though—honestly and openly acknowledging and addressing the seemingly high rate of Xbox 360 consoles, for example, or the immovability of Xbox 360 content rights—then I think it would be fair to say that a company and the public are having a conversation of some sort. That is completely up to the people inside the company, though; collectively, the public always speaks what is on the minds of the people of whom it is comprised without any organizational barriers, but companies and their employees do not always listen or respond in kind.