And Now, Some Economic Commentary
Posted October 15th, 2008 by Howard Tayler
I particularly like the new Washington Mutual website*.
(*Note: No, that’s not actually their new site. But I had a lot of fun trying to read about savings accounts…)
Explore posts in the same categories: Politics, Humor, Random Linkage
October 15th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
NICE!
Traditional ARM was my absolute favorite pop-up message. :)
October 16th, 2008 at 8:28 pm
BRILLIANT.
My first instinct was to ignore the website as just some random site that cribbed the video. But then I read the comments, and oh man. That is a great, great parody site.
October 17th, 2008 at 7:34 pm
Long time reader, first time poster. I really like your strip, seriously it’s freakin awesome. But the talking Nintendo Wii ad you have at the top of your page inspired me to join and post. Not cool man…
I no longer am able to send your strips to co-workers or check them out at them at work when your advertising starts talking at me without warning.
October 17th, 2008 at 7:55 pm
@BenC
I haven’t seen the ad, and my ad buyer assures me that this kind of thing is expressly forbidden in the contract. They’re chasing that one down now.
If you see anything like that in the future, please screen-grab it and email me, okay?
October 17th, 2008 at 10:04 pm
I’m sorry to hear that BenC had that happen to him. I’m just glad it didn’t happen to me at my job. Yikes…
In funnier news, when I logged onto the site tonight, the ad at the top of the page? WaMu. I kid you not!!
October 18th, 2008 at 12:14 am
[sigh] Yet another entry for the Museum of Pacific Northwestern
Failures….
October 18th, 2008 at 8:24 am
@csadn: Hey, Microsoft pretty much makes up for the rest of ‘em, right?
October 18th, 2008 at 8:30 pm
Please dont joke like that Howard. Actually Microsoft should pick up a bank or too while they are at it XD.
October 19th, 2008 at 12:10 am
Howard Tayler: Um, actually, between the excremental quality of
their product and the fact that their very name is synonymous with
Greed and the Unsubtle Application of F.U.D.*, they are the center-
piece exhibit for PNW Failures.
[*: http://catb.org/jargon/html/F/FUD-wars.html ; the FUD page
itself is rendered NSFW due to the entry preceding it….]
October 19th, 2008 at 9:46 am
@csadn: They may have failed consumers (I’m looking at YOU, Vista), but they haven’t failed their shareholders. We need to quantify that-there definition of “fail”.
October 19th, 2008 at 10:30 am
Howard Tayler: I just encountered the ad with sound and emailed a screenshot to you.
October 20th, 2008 at 12:23 am
randytayler: MS has a bucketload more Consumers than Share-
holders — a fact MS ought keep in mind, as they’ve Annoyed enough
of the former over the years to generate the beginnings of a
backlash which will do Bad Things to the stock prices of the latter.
October 20th, 2008 at 5:24 am
csadn - Really? You’d think that a smart company would try to create a product that people actually want to use. And you’d think that a company that consistently disappoints and annoys their customers would soon find themselves happily “customer-free.”
Why do you think that hasn’t happend to Microsoft? Oh, I know, it’s “right around the corner.” Microsoft has been in business over over 30 years. They pre-date the whole Internet craze. Their death has been predicted for as long as people were able to log onto a dialup BBS at 1200 baud and gripe and complain about BASIC.
I wouldn’t attempt to speak for the entire industry, just my little 25,000 user version of it. We migrated from GroupWise to Exchange about 4 months ago and my users LOVE Outlook. Not just like it, not just tolarate it, even 4 months later, I get people emailing me who are THRILLED with it.
If you polled the tech world, you’d probably find some fairly serious resentment against MSFT. If you polled the generally population (i.e. the people who actually PAY for and use the software) you’d find that a much different opinion.
To label M$FT as the centerpiece of PNW failures displays either an amazing lack of understanding of economics, or bigotry to the point of myopic self dillusionment.
Sorry to jump on the soapbox, but if the best you’ve got is “they’re greedy and I don’t like them,” save it for the open-source boards.
/soapbox off
October 20th, 2008 at 7:40 am
Microsoft is successful. More successful than it deserves to be, but at least it’s not as evil as Sony. And I like some of their input devices (specifically, all the ones I’ve tried except the five-button mice that you can’t pick up without pressing the side buttons). And, unlike Apple, the short-tempered megalomaniac who founded Microsoft has retired.
…Aaaaand I feel like I should balance that last bit out by pointing out that Vista strikes me as Mac OS X minus sensible ergonomics.
October 21st, 2008 at 12:46 am
rbliss: First — I’ve never even *heard* of this “GroupWise” you
mention; I had to look it up. Comparing it to the info available
for Exchange does not indicate any great advantage for either
product. However, that’s not the point — the point was, as you
typed, “M$”; the fact that Microsoft is synonymous with FUD, greed,
and generally bad product. (I noted in my searches a lack of
cases of Novell being in the defendant’s chair of a courtroom….)
Second: Also, as you stated, there’s a *lot* of people who also
“don’t like” Microsoft — and who “don’t like” them a lot more
strongly than I. So, to quote Redbeard Rum, “Opinion is divided on
the subject.” (Oh, by the way: I don’t frequent the open-source
boards, either.)
So, for the moment, MS gets listed as “ten out of ten for economics,
but minus several million for Not Annoying Folks”.
Sam: Oh, mighty Nyarlathotep, do *NOT* get me started on Sony.
:)
October 22nd, 2008 at 11:54 pm
(For the record, I tried a Mac for 6 months, and finally ate the cost and moved back to XP. I love XP. XP is enough to forgive any other Microsoft transgression… even Vista.)
October 23rd, 2008 at 12:27 pm
the thing is microsoft beats mac for technical users, because it is the standard it will continue to be the standard. most of us will stick with xp for the foreseeable future, switching when vista becomes stable or the next os is. linux attracts many technical users but until it develops a market share it just will never get the commercial development to stand on its own. (how many linux users do you know that don’t own at least one windows box?) it will never get the market share until it develops a marketing department and gets the commercial developers interested.
October 24th, 2008 at 8:55 am
Red: There’s just one problem.
Until people like you start using it, it won’t have market share. You can’t just say “I won’t use it until it gets market share”, because if everyone did, it wouldn’t. Until people start using it heavily, it won’t get commercial development. _Right now_, the average linux distribution is easier to use than Windows 95 was. (I know, I helped sell and install Win95 when it came out). It’s definitely easier than DOS 5.0 or 6.22
I own a windows box, yes. But I also own two Macs. (I don’t really use them much). The use for the windows box is for a single data recovery program that isn’t out for any other OS.
October 25th, 2008 at 12:03 am
@Bookworm: “It’s definitely easier than DOS 5.0 or 6.22″
Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot-Interrogative
That’s gotta be hyperbole but, if there’s any truth at all in it, I guess it’s time to see if one of my collection of laptops can support a load.
So, what’s the percentage of objectively valid content in your assertion?
Thanks,
D.