Caveat: I’ve been sitting on the information contained in this post for quite a while now, but it has finally perturbed me enough to put it out there for all of you (and myself, for that matter). If you would be so kind as to help spread the word, that would be great as the lie has spread like wildfire and taken on various forms, such as sites now reporting that Windows 8 will be 128-bit (ridiculous). Not only that, but the perpetrator that started this mess needs to be called out with fair warning given to all. What you choose to believe by the end of this post will be up to you, but my intentions here are to help sift out the garbage in a community full of journalists who – like me – truly bust their butts to bring you solid, unique, and honest content.
Most of you may recall the “exclusive” I posted on this almost 2 months ago now. As most of you may also recall, I’m no stranger to the LinkedIn profile browsing. Well, when I found Mr. Robert Morgan’s profile, I got WAY too excited for my own good. I whipped up that post as soon as I could, then took a step back to see if anyone else had found it. Well, as it had turned out, sometime like a week earlier, it had been, “found” by eightforums (I’ve linked the Google cached page for that link just in case they try to delete it and play none-the-wiser, as you can already compare it to the post on their page today to see that they deleted my comments calling them out on the issue). I say “found” because – as it turns out – it wasn’t really found at all. It was fabricated. Everything on that profile was garbage, and when you read back at what his job description said, it does indeed look like something a “journalist” would write so as to create one hell of a scoop. Check it out again:
Experience
Senior Research & Development Microsoft
Public Company; MSFT; Computer Software industry
January 2002 – Present (7 years 10 months)
Working in high security department for research and development involving strategic planning for medium and longterm projects. Research & Development projects including 128bit architecture compatibility with the Windows 8 kernel and Windows 9 project plan. Forming relationships with major partners: Intel, AMD, HP and IBM.
Let’s critique this, shall we? First off, “working in a high-security department for research and development” is something that no employee working in those conditions would -in their right mind – write in their profile. I’ve seen some pretty amazing things pop up in people’s job profiles, but nothing so blatant. Second, Research and Development isn’t the Windows team. Each is its own department with its own funding and its own projects. At BEST, Windows 9 MIGHT be accurate here (as in, Research and Development is working on technologies that may make it into Windows much later), but it’s not. If anyone is going to be working on a 128-bit kernel for Windows, it’s going to be the architecture side of the Windows core team (David Cutler’s crew, etc.); not MSR.
I don’t think 128-bit is in the scope of anyone for the next 7-10 years. After all, 64-bit is rarely properly utilized these days – nevermind dropping 128-bit into the laps of devs and consumers! And that brings up another point… at best, 128-bit would exist only for very select industries that could truly use it right now. AMD’s Bulldozer project is real, but it has absolutely nothing to do with Windows 8 or, I would imagine, Windows 9, either.
Alright, so… let’s assume that profile was indeed real. eightforums was certainly enjoying the traffic off of their initial “find.” As a matter of fact, they somehow managed to land an exclusive interview with the guy afterwards! Once again, I’ve linked to the Google cached page for the same reason I did a few paragraphs ago. So… whatever happened with that interview, anyway? What happened with it is that it was one great big old pile of BS, that’s what happened with it! It was a big, fat lie (along with the cake, of course).
Yes, your supposedly down-right and honest Windows 8 market-cornering buddies over at eightforums managed to pull the wool over the eyes of almost every major news site out there. Unfortunately, enough minor details lined up enough for those like me to jump the gun and post what we did, when we did and without ever verifying if this guy was even an employee in the first place. This stuff happens sometimes and, well, I don’t take too kindly to it. Especially considering how much time and effort I know I put into bringing you all the content that I do – nevermind how much time and effort the countless other real journalists around the community put in! Not only that, but stuff like this makes a mockery of the credibility of the sites you know and trust. We’re as human as you are, though, so I’m one who is fully willing to say, “hey, this guy fooled me and I’m sorry he ended up fooling you, too, vicariously through my post.”
Now, a couple of days or so after all of this stuff went global, I noticed a couple of my respected peers make some comments on this story that started to make me take a second look at it all. First, Paul Thurrott said the following:
Windows 8 To Be 128-bit Only? LOL
Wow. I have to admit, the most amazing thing about this rumor is that anyone believed it. I won’t single anyone out, but spare me. It’s completely and utterly bogus. Obviously.
The fact that this all got around to him in the form that Windows 8 was going to be *ONLY* was baffling enough for me, never mind seeing the next hit being doled out by one Steven Bink of bink.nu:
Bink says: Sorry but this is BS so to say. We are still in the transition to 64bit, That Morgan guy does not exits at MS
By that time, I immediately thought back to the crap I had already called out the eightforums people on and then… it all just made too much sense that they would be the ones to fabricate garbage like this. At this point, I have now also verified (thanks to two kind Microsoft folks for checking for me) that Robert Morgan is/was nowhere to be found in the employee database. It was all just a load of crap created by a site desperate for traffic and attention. They throw up frivolous posts just to somehow meander Windows 8 into the text to boost their rank in search engines for the keyword. Not only that, but their forum is littered with garbage posts that – once again – only exist so as to skyrocket their keyword density.
So, now we’re at this juncture ONCE AGAIN with eightforums. First, it was stealing content from my site (which, I hope I’ve made clear will not be tolerated any longer) and now, one big lie heard ’round the net. And to top it off, dishonest means obviously get you somewhere since this guy was apparently at PDC 2009 as press! How he got in, I have no idea but at this point, I wouldn’t doubt it if he really wasn’t there and his PDC coverage was also a big, fat lie. Everything he wrote could have been discerned from watching the keynotes streaming online. Not to mention, out of all his blabber about, “I wonder if we will hear about Windows 8,” he produced a whole lot of NOTHING! My favorite line of his from PDC comes from his PDC Day 1 blog entry:
What can we dig up about Windows 8? I see tons of wannabe journalists and some actually talented bloggers, how will we be different then all the others? We’ll bring you the dirt!!, we’ll interview the top minds at the conference in the next few days to get all the best information. Like always, members of the Windows 8 forums will get the stuff we just can’t post here, all that leaked information, we try to get all our members to say things off record and sneak them into the underground circles of Windows 8 Forums, only members can see!
“Wannabe journalists,” huh? LOL! Oh, the irony. Lot of top minds he interviewed there, huh? Lot of Windows 8 information they were able to dig up, huh? And leave it to this guy to not only pull the wool over everyone’s eyes a couple of times, but his loyal followers by creating a paid membership for his website as well! He’s actually going to charge people for his lies. Man, if you’re a glutton for being ripped off, by all means, whip out that Paypal account… but if you’re AT ALL wise – even if you’re a member on that forum and see me as the bad guy because I’m taking shots at your “leader” – you’ll take a good look at the big picture here and see that this guy has provided absolutely NOTHING of substance for his readers or for this community. Nothing. Just a bunch of empty promises and cliffhangers. Where’s the PDC 2009 Windows 8 info you were going to dig up? Where are the interviews with the “top minds” about Windows 8? Where’s that Robert Morgan interview exclusive you supposedly had? I mean, to see just how bad it is, take a look at his latest ENLIGHTENING post:
Seriously? You’re *that* desperate to throw Windows 8 (and italicize it, none-the-less) into a story? lol. Oh, the humanity…
So, at this point, I can’t spell it out much clearer for everyone. For some reason, though, I can’t help but wonder who you’re going to believe: Some nobody site trying to corner the Windows 8 market by littering their site with pointless references to Windows 8, or tried-and-true individuals who have been in this community for countless years reporting the good with the bad and truly busting their butts to bring you content with REAL substance? I certainly hope the latter, as people like me calling out sites like eightforums serves me no purpose other than wasting my time and creating drama that I would rather not have to deal with. In cases like this, though, it’s totally worth it.
Update: Be sure to go to his site to catch him poking fun at the frequency of road maps I post. Even I laughed at it; nothing like a good bit of roasting every once in a while. 
Update 2: I’ve decided to remove the antagonizing comment about awaiting negative comments from eightforums and disable comments for this post. End of discussion. If you have something to say, feel free to email me. Thanks to those of you who left supportive comments initially. I really do appreciate it.
-Stephen
http://www.msftkitchen.com
Please don’t feed the trolls.
Thanks for calling this out! You’re right, eightforums is a piece of crap. Even their favicon is a complete ripoff of the Microsoft Store logo!
Javache: I always avoid it when possible. This, however, is not one of those times, unfortunately…
Ryan E: You know, I’m all for a site like that where you have a community who speculates and does whatever they want to do, but I draw the line at stolen/unreferenced content and completely fabricated stories. It would be one thing to let it go if this site had no public visibility, but this – their one claim to fame – being a lie, I pretty much felt obligated to come out with it, no matter how it may make me look. I know my intentions are honest and I know there are many people out there who see that (like you). That’s all that matters. =)
-Stephen
Even though I don’t disagree with a single thing you say about the folks who perpetrated the fraud, I believe much of this must rest on your shoulders. You had the resources to verify the story since you were able to do so after the fact. Journalists are responsible for what they publish. That’s why newspaper reporters verify their stories through multiple sources. The “I was duped” defense doesn’t cut it.
Dave
Dave: At the time, I didn’t have the sources. It was only after the fact that I had a couple of employees contact me to let me know there was no such person as Robert Morgan. For as much as I blame that site, I’ve also taken responsibility for my part of it. Needless to say, I’ll be much more cautious before I jump the gun with something like this, but instead of trying to dodge a bullet by just leaving well enough alone with this issue, I decided to stick my neck out on the line and deal with whatever I need to. In the mean time, I’ll just keep on doing what I love to do here.
While this is ultimately a hobby for me (I don’t get paid to do this or anything), I’m at the point now where I’m fully accepting of when I need to eat crow and this is one of those times. Though, it’s the only time in all of my 2+ years of doing this, so it has been a good reality check that I simply need to take some additional values into consideration when posting content like that. I doubt you’ll see too many other sites do this and I’m also awaiting the backlash of those who want to shrug off the issue and blame me (and people who had the resources to verify this stuff in the first place, no less).
That said, I don’t blame anyone who decides to do that. There’s a certain amount of accountability someone like me has to assume if others trust me and run with a story before verifying it themselves (since they don’t feel they have to, given they trust me), so I’m all for accepting my slice of humble pie.
-Stephen
To accept responsibility on “jumping the gun” shows that your news reporting is sound and that you are human. Making a mistake is one thing, but acknowledging that fact separates the average from the above average. I for one can’t wait to see the next ‘Big story’ that Windows8 Forums unleashes (sarcasm in full effect here).
Re: [recall the, "exclusive"] and [had been, "found"] and [I say, "found"] and [something a, "journalist"] and those other commas in front of anything starting with a quote … none of those commas should be there. You letting your word processor write this?
Corrected. My thanks to the grammar nazi.
j/k. lol.
-Stephen