The ‘Mohave’ Experiment

@tayme "I am guessing that if there was a Windows Store or Linux Store .......... It would be empty, no one would care. That is why the gateway stores closed. @Mary, Mike loves to twist/skew/bend the logic of any argument in the weirdest ways I have ever seen to change the the topic into something he can better defend. Its so obvious its down right hilarious. I would think he is doing it as a sarcastic joke its so crazy, but alas he actually believes the stuff he comes up with. Weelittlethorn.....flat out MS lovin blow heart that goes rude/childish as soon as possible. Dip Stick actually has tact and applies reasonable logic that you can understand, might not agree with all the time but its reasonable. Paul is loving all it as we go back and forth. 2 months ago this sad little blog had more pingbacks than comments. He just throws out bombs and watches the comment count. The worst thing is, I reply to it.

joe-dokes said: "You, Paul Thurott, Dip Stick, MIke, et al (That's, and others in Latin.) believe that their is an army of writers, bloggers, journalists, and commentators who spend twenty four hours a day bashing Microsoft and praising Apple. Paul refers to these people as the iCabal." You cannot possibly sit here and tell us that there is no pro-Apple bias in most of the tech media. Are you seriously denying that this exist? I read print publications from PC World to Business Week and Advertising Age and the swipes at Microsoft and the continuous, unquestioned praise of Apple is so thick that you would have to be really trying not to see it. Reeeeeealy trying. "I merely pointed out that not only are there Apple fanbois, but there are also Windows fanbois" Yes, and if those guys signed up on MacSuperSite to tell everyone how much Apple sucks then I assume you would be ok with that? I doubt it. "You and your winjihadist crowd spend twenty four hours a day bashing Apple and their products. There is a group of people working very hard to tell people how awful Apple is, and they are you all." I personally don't tell people what they should and should not buy or tell you that Apple's products are trash, and most of the comments on various messageboards from Windows users I've seen are mostly responding to fanatical Apple users that descended on stories about Microsoft to trash and bash and tell everyone how they should be using products from Apple. They also do this in any topic about some device that competes with an Apple one. Other times the comments mock Apple or their users when Apple is caught in a situation that Apple users gleefully mocked some other company over. The rise of any fanboyism with Microsoft seems to have developed as an reaction to the crass fanaticism of Apple users over the past 5 years.

@MaryW - "They are not all kids. They are not all poor. They are (probably) mostly PC users. There is a good chance that they already own or use an Apple product." I would guess that at the local Apple store here that they are 95% teenagers. Usually the adults that are in there are there to make a predetermined purchase...usually involving an iPod, iPhone, or accessories. I did not say anything about them being poor. They probably are all PC users...gone to the mall to hang out and use the free internet because school or Mom and Dad limit their online time or have MySpace blocked. And yes, they probably all own an iPod. At Christmas time, the store is packed with parents buy the 3rd or 4th iPod for a kid...Now, don't get me wrong...I use and like Apple products...I am just saying that very few of those 32 million Apple store visitors turn into a Mac sold. --tayme

Apple spends just half a billion on R&D. Microsoft spends 10 times that amount per annum. Instead of getting cool things like Microsoft Surface, Apple churns out multitudes of false "factoids" about Windows Vista.

@Master3 thanks for proving my point. 99% of what Gateway sold was....drum roll please.....PC loaded with Windows. 1% was cheap plasma TV's, and accessories for Windows PC's. They could of had the OC48's at each store it would not have mattered. CompUSA went under because there are just to many, with Bestbuy, Circuit City and others in local towns. CompUSA bought "the good guys" in California. Circuity City will be gone or bought out in less than two years. Walmart is here to stay, but I am guessing computer sales make up less than 5% of what they sell each year.

@Mike, so this blog post was about a MS add campaign that was created to help Vista's bad reputation and how its part of a larger effort that is costing MS 200-500 million for this effort. My comments and other responded to this subject, until you got here and....... Tried to turn it into how much Apple spends on R & D, by trying to link a 3 year old article that gives 3 line items from Apples budget, the biggest of which is R&D, but you say its smaller than the two other line items when they are added together????????????????...WTF!!!!??? I repeat ""Mike loves to twist/skew/bend the logic of any argument in the weirdest ways I have ever seen ".

Actually snake, the subject had already been changed (by you, actually) by the time I commented on it. Perhaps you should read back through the thread before making accusations. (Or is that fact averse bit kicking in again)

@master3 >>Maybe they could have spent that and got MobileMe? Why? Mobileme is no where the failure that Vista has proven to be and at lest then 1/100th of the cost and time. Now remember little boy, Mary's mom was right when she stated: "If its printed in the NY Times it must be true". Yawn! (Windows 7, SP1)

>>And please explain to us, um Yawn, why Vista is a failure. How many links do you want? Ever heard of Google? Heck, how about starting with Paul's "Vista is a train wreck"? Its cool Microsoft points to the matrix of licenses sold. But what is very interesting is the # of seats in use after 18 months. The Hell you say? - Even with the wonderful pricing of $7.95 for home use my employer offers (>XXXXX and more than 80,000 seats) the uptake has been well way then 10%. Much like Windows ME most of us are stating to "y'all" try again " - It all about the eXPerience - Remember that? Now that I answered your question and statements of fact. Its now your turn, Please explain to us why Microsoft felt it had to place a shill-politician-MS Evangelist on this board (not you, put pretty damm close by looking at your profile, number of post and date signed up). Feel free to say what you want about me, I could care less. My feeling don't get hurt. Sorry, if the truth hurts. If it somehow makes you feel better I own MS stock and sure would like the money being spent on this advert retracted and put back in my wallet, I am speaking for all of the small investors that pay market price for our stocks. As always, Yawn! (Windows 7, SP1)

Yawn! said: >>And please explain to us, um Yawn, why Vista is a failure. How many links do you want? Ever heard of Google? Heck, how about starting with Paul's "Vista is a train wreck"? Its cool Microsoft points to the matrix of licenses sold. But what is very interesting is the # of seats in use after 18 months. The Hell you say? - Even with the wonderful pricing of $7.95 for home use my employer offers (>XXXXX and more than 80,000 seats) the uptake has been well way then 10%. Much like Windows ME most of us are stating to "y'all" try again " - It all about the eXPerience - Remember that? Now that I answered your question and statements of fact. Its now your turn, Yeah..... That didnt answer a thing. It would have been easier to just say "this is just my opinion" or "I'm basing this purely on anecdotal evidence...". Old opinion pieces and that cliche "Well everyone may have Vista, but they downgraded 10 minutes later" nonsense doesn't cut it. "Please explain to us why Microsoft felt it had to place a shill-politician-MS Evangelist on this board (not you, put pretty damm close by looking at your profile, number of post and date signed up). " And now we move to the "Im so whacked out of my mind that the idea that people use Microsoft products and actually like them is too much for my mind to grasp" phase. Yeah, yawn, MS is paying us to post on this blog. Really? Is this what you have to resort to to? "If it somehow makes you feel better I own MS stock and sure would like the money being spent on this advert retracted and put back in my wallet, I am speaking for all of the small investors that pay market price for our stocks." I honestly dont care what you own or invest in, thank you.

Wow. All these comments, and before the results of the experiement Paul mentions are even online. Supports the assumption that most of the comments are based on some personal agenda, not on actual facts...

Paul, I know it sounds like "Mohave" (3 syllables). But it looks like "Mojave". Pronounced just like it sounds. Those of us who traversed it many times--in un-airconditioned cars--know the Mojave Desert (eastern Southern California) as a rather awesome...desert. Hope Microsoft knew that going in. (We often rented an evaporative cooler to stick in a window.) I like the "experiment" (of which we would have heard nothing had it not gone well).

I watched the video this morning and I think it's absolutely brilliant. This will be absolutely effective at pointing out to people that haven't actually seen or used Vista that maybe what they've heard is wrong. I certainly can't think of a better way to counter the unwarranted negativity. I think the tech press will generally react negatively just because it's Microsoft, but I believe it will help the general public reconsider their opinions. This needs to be made into 30 second ads and put on TV. Next step: Eliminate crapware on all PCs.

@Webguy3000 At least some of the resistance in corporate IT is also a perception problem. I know IT people who hate Vista and have never run it. I worked in an organization that used hundreds of old, custom-developed applications, and compatibility just wasn't very good, pre-SP1. No company is going to upgrade existing PCs to Vista. Corporate IT have *never* upgraded PCs from one OS to another. Vista will make its way into corporate IT via new PCs to the extent it does at all. A few other factors play into corporate IT's Vista resistance. It's cheaper and easier to manage one OS version than two (or more). Companies are extending the life of desktop PCs from three years to four or five due to the cost savings realized from replacing PCs less often. Lastly, Windows 7 comes out in 18 months, so companies only have to hold out a little longer to adopt the new OS, rather than adopting Vista now and then being faced with the same thing next December.

"I merely pointed out that not only are there Apple fanbois, but there are also Windows fanbois, of which you are one. You and your winjihadist crowd spend twenty four hours a day bashing Apple and their products. There is a group of people working very hard to tell people how awful Apple is, and they are you all." Sorry, but that makes me an iPundit, not a "winjihadist" (which is a stupid name, made up by lostahismind). "Weelittlethorn.....flat out MS lovin blow heart that goes rude/childish as soon as possible." Ya, you know, cuz name calling is so much more mature. What's the name of the teacher that wet-nursed you back into the computer room to protect you from the school yard bullies? "The worst thing is, I reply to it." You got that right. Quit wasting our time and Paul's bandwidth. "its part of a larger effort that is costing MS 200-500 million" Sorry, you've lost your marbles on that one. It's ~$300M. Not $500M. "Tried to turn it into how much Apple spends on R & D, by trying to link a 3 year old article that gives 3 line items from Apples budget, the biggest of which is R&D, but you say its smaller than the two other line items when they are added together???????????????" The second sentence stated $287M spent on advertising - for iPods - more than 3 years after the product was released. If that's not a similar argument to Microsoft spending $300 on Window Vista, only 2 years after release, then you clearly haven't found all your marbles yet. "Maybe they could have spent that and got MobileMe?" They don't need to. Exchange already just works. "What did the experiment demonstrate? That trained retail sales people, with Vista pre-installed on an MS chosen computer can actually operate Vista. This is supposed to be something that convinces people to buy Vista?" ....and a jagoff in a grey turtleneck putting out ads saying the competition sucks is supposed to convince people to buy a Mac? I went into a local Best Buy store playing the role of "past-Windows, Mac-interested newb" recently and wanted a tech guy to demonstrate a Mac to me (just for sh!ts and giggles). I asked them how easy it is to install software on it. They didn't know. They showed me iLife instead. I asked them to show me how to set up parental controls. It took them about 20 clicks to find it. I asked if I could see a printed manual or help guide for the system to peruse to see how easy it would be to learn. They couldn't provide one. I even said I like going on to YouTube, Flickr, and a random bunch of other social networking sites that I named off the top of my head (which I don't really go to). He recommended I install Firefox for that because "the regular browser on Mac systems doesn't work properly with many websites" (his words, not mine). I said, "so how do I find that on the system?". He replied, "Oh, well that's not installed. You have to download and install that yourself.". To which, brings me back to my first question. I said something to the effect of "This isn't very user-friendly. How do I get a system that's secure and easy for my kids to learn on?". To which he replied, "I know what you're saying. We don't get very many Mac sales, and Apple doesn't train salespeople on their systems unless it's an Apple Store. Other companies do though." (I think he meant that most manufacturers send company people to the big-box stores to give sales reps the lowdown on systems with feature points and product demos whereas Apple doesn't)....and then he says, get this...."Let me show you something I think you'll like better. Have you seen our new HP systems with Windows Vista? They're much easier to use. I recommend them over Mac's, and we've had more customers satisfied with these than with the Apple machines. They're over here on our main display counter...."

BTW, Chris Flores wrote in the Windows Vista Blog: "Finally, some people have asked if Mojave is the big marketing project we're working on - it's not. The Mojave Experiment is just that: an experiment we conducted on the fly that yielded interesting results. We're publishing the video today because we think you'll also find it interesting" So this is not an official part of the big $300mil "fighting back" campaign. We'll just have to wait and see what that becomes.

chuckb84 said: "This is supposed to be something that convinces people to buy Vista?" Yeah, we get it..... NOTHING TO SEE HERE! THIS IS FAKE! FAKE! FAKE! VISTA SUCKS! VISTA SUCKS! VISTA SUCKS! VISTA SUCKS! VISTA SUCKS! VISTA SUCKS! VISTA SUCKS! FRAUD! FRAUD! M$ SUCKS M$ SUCKS M$ SUCKS M$ SUCKS Viva Apple! (raise hand in fascist salute)

Oh and here's a gem quote from the NeoWin discussion of this story: "I find it sad that MS have had to resort to 'paying' people to 'lie' in an obviously scripted advertisement in order to generate sales of this rapidly failing OS." I want to invite all of the Apple fanatics to answer a simple question: How do you feel about statements like this from your fellow Apple users? Dont you feel the least bit uneasy that some of you simply hate a company to the point where this type of thing is just casually tossed around without question or rebuke from other Apple users?

"I'm sure Dipsh!t Admin can testify to that" I apologized--repeatedly--for that unfortunate remark. You, however, remain an unrepentant a$$. At least you're consistent.

Man those videos are lame. Dress them up in 80's clothing and do the Pepsi challenge all over again. I feel like I am watching some cheesy Pizza Hut commercial. Sad that MS had to stoop this level.

"Stoop...why is this stooping, but not the Apple adverts that don't even show the advantages of OS X, but only exaggerating issues and mocking MS?" I think Mary Jo Foley answered that question quite well.

tayme said: @MaryW - "32 million visitors to Apple retail stores in the last quarter." Most of whom are teenagers hanging out and browsing MySpace and Facebook. At least at the store in my city. --tayme The plural of anecdotal is not data.

OK, nevermind, I started watching the MobileMe demo. I huess that it's Exchange using your browser with Apple's mail app too, plus pic , files and storage. Still looks kinda pricey for the average Joe, but obviously I'm not the average Joe. Two patrner's have the iPhone, i and sent instructions for Exchange setup to him. It took him under 5 minutes [learning typing is not as easy as qwerty] and then happiness. It was so much easier to checl email on the iPhone, using Exchange, then logging in on our work PC's. We cannot stay logged in as there are confidential stuff. My buddy with the Blackberry setup email with Exchange, but his calender would not sync, and the button to allow it to sync would showed 'NO' and could not turn to 'YES'. Anyone know why?

"Ouuuuuch.... that hurts... sorry Wae but you're busted !!!! " ? Why? Because I posted that on YouTube, then already posted a link to it here, only to have losta try to turn it against me? Sorry, but you're wrong. I intentionally posted that link on this board several times before. But no worries - here's another one for your enjoyment: http://www.spike.com/video/ultimate-os-x/2869092 "My buddy with the Blackberry setup email with Exchange, but his calender would not sync, and the button to allow it to sync would showed 'NO' and could not turn to 'YES'. Anyone know why?" Get your IT admin to setup Blackberry Enterprise Server. Properly! "Rob Kingston, Group Manager of Commercial Product Marketing for HP said, "Looking into the crystal ball, I don't think businesses will see much value in upgrading to Vista until late next year, and even so, Microsoft will probably have come out with something else by then." Some companies are extremely slow. I know of some companies that are only now just moving to XP from.... 98! That said, the foolish people saying they will "skip Vista and get the next version" are just being retarded. If they still have problems with compatibility issues with Vista, they should get on their hardware or software vendor's case or choose Certified for Windows Vista products as an alternate. Vista is almost 2 years old now, and "Vista R2" (Windows 7) won't magically fix their compatibility headaches - only time for these lagging 3rd-party vendors to get their acts together will. There's a reason why Microsoft pushes the certification tracks for 3rd party hardware and software vendors. Companies that don't just make their customers suffer.

"I intentionally posted that link on this board several times before." And you're proud of this? Wow. You're the kind of guy who Rob Schneider makes movies for.