Archive for the ‘Rants and Rambling’ Category

Before I get into this, let me just say that I never thought I would actually join the ranks of the masses who have experienced something now commonly referred to as “Dell Hell.” With that said, please allow what’s to follow to serve as a cautionary tale should you currently be considering the purchase of a new Dell machine.

I’m going to start with the conclusion for those of you who want the end result up front. Long story short, I’m out $1000 and there’s not a damn thing I’ve been able to do about it through the channels of Dell’s support systems that us mere mortals are left to contend with. So, here I am resorting to writing a post and then sending it to everyone I can until I hopefully get the attention of someone who cares. DO NOT order a Dell system online if you want to split the charges between a Dell preferred account and your own card! If you do, make sure you’ve got enough in the bank just in case Dell decides to charge your card for the full amount PLUS the amount that they should have charged you for in the first place (that’s right; you may initially be out the grand total of the FULL cost of your purchase PLUS the amount you initially intended to go on your card)!

To take it back to the beginning, I was interested in purchasing a Dell m11x. They were running a $300-off special, so I decided I would configure one via the Web site, see how much it cost, then apply for a Dell preferred account. Well, I was happy to be instantly approved for a $1000 credit limit on a Dell preferred account! I’m always up for building my credit, so this was a great opportunity — or so I thought. After being ridiculously careful with how I went about paying for the m11x, I selected to put $1000 onto the Dell preferred account and have the remainder charged to my debit card. The VERY last thing I could have happen was to have all $1400+ extracted from my bank account because then I wouldn’t be able to make rent.

Well, that was a Saturday night. Low and behold, I check my bank account the following Tuesday and sure as the day is long, Dell charged the full freakin’ amount to my debit card! At this point, I was already furious because I was EXTREMELY careful to see to this very thing not having even the slightest possibility of happening. Now I couldn’t make rent. Thanks, Dell!

After calling Dell and discussing the matter with them, they said I would have refund of the full amount, then they would split the charge as it should have been split: $1000 to my Dell preferred account and $400+ to my debit. I had to give what I felt was a really stupid excuse to my renters for being a bit late with my rent (who actually says, “uh, yeah, I need a few days because I bought a laptop but got overcharged by Dell”), but whatever. It is what it is… or so I thought. By the way, the person I initially spoke with at Dell was as helpful as she could be, bless her heart (she still continues to try to be helpful beyond what she has control over).

Well, after sending a very long email and requesting it be sent up the appropriate channels to have the Dell site looked at for errors with their payment system, I continued to monitor my bank account. A day or two later, the charge for $1400+ disappeared. Completely gone. Those funds were unlocked and it seemed everything was in good standing. Soon afterwords (within another day or two), I noticed a charge for the correct amount of $400+ out of my account. Great! They dropped the original charged, opened those funds back up, then took out the right amount I had originally provisioned. Everything stayed like this for the next two days and it seemed like a resolution to the matter, so I started using my card as I normally would have.

5 days later, I get a letter from my bank. Basically, it states my account has been overdrawn by over $300. I immediately fly through the roof and go running into my office to check my bank account. The NIGHT of the final time I checked my bank account, Dell ONCE AGAIN charged my card for $1400. ON TOP of the $400+ they correctly extracted. So now, Dell had a total of $1800+ drawn out of my account. UNBELIEVABLE. I immediately go to my bank, express my concerns and tell them that I’m looking for someone to blame here, because I used my account in a typical fashion based on the data that was provided for me. My account history shows I’ve been anything *but* reckless as well.

Well, the day I received the letter above, I just so happened to get refunded the $1400 that was charged a week prior — but not before the damage had been done. There was now a total ~7 days worth of pre-authorization charges that were charged overdraft fees since my bank makes decisions based on available balance and not currently balance.

Now it was REALLY on.

I called Dell the next Monday since everything in the last two paragraphs that consisted of “in the now” transpired over the course of a Saturday and Dell’s financial services aren’t opened on the weekend. I got a hold of a woman who Dell decided to name “Alex.” Come to find out, the people who were in charge of this whole thing didn’t even transfer the $1000 balance to my Dell preferred account! Had I known that — as well as the fact that things were going to get to this point — I just wouldn’t have called them and there I would have had the $1000 inadvertently recuperated! Anyway, this was just one more incompetent action (or lack thereof) of Dell’s financial department. If I wasn’t taking notes by this point, I would have certainly started then.

After finding this out, Alex was very quick to apologize that my $1000 hadn’t been activated on my Dell preferred account (which, I couldn’t have cared less about since my concern was the $1000 in overdraft fees incurred by someone’s recklessness with my debit card). Once I finally got her to understand what my *real* concern was, she gave me a fax number (512-283-0029) and told me to fax specific details to the attention of “Payment Research.” I created a very detailed cover letter with adequate credentials to get a hold of me. Following the cover letter I faxed them was a second page; a letter that I had my bank draw up when I went to see them about this on Saturday. The letter expressed the overdraft charges that were incurred due to Dell’s recklessness and contained more than enough ways to engage my bank.

I was told I would hear back from someone within 48 hours. I needed something done THEN but I realized I would just have to cool my jets and give them at least 24 hours. Well, fast-forward to now (one week later after submitting my fax and trying to follow up with them numerous times) and I’ve spoken with up to 8 people — first- and second-tier support as well as managers — and where have I ended up? I’ve ended up with having to explain to each of these people the SAME PROBLEM over and over and over and over and over and over again an NONE OF THEM UNDERSTAND WHAT I AM TALKING ABOUT. If they don’t think I’m referring to the $1000 credit limit (which they were VERY quick to see to getting thrown on my Dell preferred account), then I have someone condescendingly telling me that all Dell would owe at the most would be $60 in overdraft charges for the two items I ordered (laptop + case).

Oh, and to top things off? I asked the last person I spoke to who the heck “Payment Research” is and THEY HAD NO IDEA. So, here, I’ve been waiting this WHOLE TIME for absolutely NOTHING; all the while, calling and being told over-and-over again that I just have to continue to wait until they hear something back about the investigation into my account. So, here I have been completely left out-to-dry because of Dell’s faulty online system to accurately split Dell preferred account amounts with credit/debit card purchases, followed by their making damn sure they had their $400+ before giving me a refund, but only AFTER the original pre-authorization charges disappeared!

The only option I was given from the last guy I could barely understand was to dispute the charges for the laptop. You know where that would leave me? Still $1000 in the hole with overdraft charges because any amount refunded would be what I’ve already paid anyway. Not being understood is INCREDIBLY frustrating and a COMPLETE waste of my time as a consumer. I’ve tried as hard as I can to get my bank and Dell interfacing with these issues but to no avail. I’m a pretty proactive person, so if *I’ve* had this much trouble, I can only imagine how frustrating a situation like this has been for a non-technical, non-aggressive person.

My feeling is that Dell just doesn’t give a crap when things like this happen. I’m sorry, but a company with the reputation of Dell should have systems in place to quickly alleviate a situation like this. If “Payment Research” is investigating anything, it’s probably any and every way to cover up the tracks of whoever the imbecile was that decided to have a field day with my card!

If I had even the slightest inclination that this would happen, I would have nixed my overdraft protection so that the second wave of charges wouldn’t have gone through. Wow, imagine how inconvenient that might have been for Dell! What would Dell have done if they were unable to take $1800 out of a little peon’s bank account? Who knows, but I’m sure it would have been something along the lines of a threat. Is that really how you operate, Dell?

I absolutely refuse to sit idly by while this situation stands as-is. Dell, you can bet your bottom dollar that I’m going to make as much noise as I can and trust me; it’s going to take a lot more than the prospect of a free laptop to shut me up and make this better. You’ve affected my livelihood and caused a whirlwind of financial troubles for me. All I want is a resolution to the matter and to be covered for the amount of money I was charged in overdraft fees thanks to Dell’s inadequate system. As I write this, I still sit in disbelief that I’m having to do this with Dell. I hope my speaking out costs you even just a fraction of the financial woes you’ve stuck me with. I know it won’t matter to you because you’re Dell and you can afford it. It’s just a shame that a business would actually take the liberty to charge someone the total of the full amount of a product when not supposed to, then take the amount they *were* supposed to *on top of that* before having refunded the initial erroneously charged amount in the first place! Dell, you may have the money to operate in that manner, but those of us who are applying for Dell preferred accounts in the first place, don’t.

Disgusted with Dell,
Stephen Chapman

Well, after quite an exciting day of Windows 8 information leaking its way out to the Internet, it appears Microsoft is officially on the war path to finding who leaked the information in the first place. As noted on Twitter by Tom Warren of Neowin, the blog of Francisco Martin — one of the first to bring some of this Windows 8 information to light — has apparently been nixed by Microsoft (his blog resided on spaces.live.com). The earliest that these slides can be traced back is to the Website win7vista.com (thanks to @tom_warren for the link).

The documents were originally XPS files converted to PDFs with the goal of removing any incriminating watermarks. Well, win7vista.com made a mistake. As “DanielRemains” — the individual who posted the leaked content — notes, “I spent many hours working on these on removing watermarks etc.” Unfortunately, he seemed to miss a slide and it has undoubtedly brought some unwanted attention to one Derek Goode from HP. Here’s the slide which shows his email address (Update: email address removed from slide by request):

Whether or not Derek Goode is the individual who leaked the slides directly, if it was a colleague who did it behind his back, or some other scenario, Microsoft is clearly on the prowl. win7vista.com wanted all the credit, so I hope they’re ready for what’s about to ensue. Don’t be surprised if many of these posts around the Internet involving this Windows 8 documentation suddenly disappear.

-Stephen Chapman
http://msftkitchen.com

While having a conversation on Windows Live Messenger with MJ Foley today, the subject of project Natal came up. If you don’t know what it is, it’s basically a camera and microphone device for your Xbox 360 that will track your movements, gestures, and voice commands all in real-time. If you *do* happen to know what Natal is, then you just read that last sentence for nothing! *ahem*… Anyway, I had a funny thought that came to mind after reading MJ’s latest short about Natal: Basically, since Steve Ballmer has been the primary candidate speaking about Natal at select conferences, I thought of something I hope Microsoft (and Steve) seriously considers when launching Natal… and that is to have Steve give a repeat performance of the following:

… except, the difference for Natal’s launch would be to have a fighting game up on the big screen in the background and see if Ballmer can win simply by Natal “watching” him run around the stage in a frenzy like that. How great would THAT be!? Pretty darn great if I say so myself! And I do. From a marketing standpoint, it would be a great way to have Natal go viral instantly on YouTube, I think. Anyway, please consider doing this, Steve/Microsoft! I think it would pretty much be the most awesome thing ever. The end.

-Stephen Chapman

http://www.msftkitchen.com

If you’re like me, you’re as intrigued as the next person by the iPad. We’ve gone from desktops to laptops to small laptops to even smaller laptops (aka “netbooks”) and now, the iPad. The device looks great and if you love your iPod Touch as much as I do, it seems like playing your favorite games and using your favorite apps on a ginormous screen would be awesome. But is it $499 worth of awesome? Sadly, not for me. To determine if the iPad is for you, put the price aside for a second and ask yourself the following 3 questions:

1 – Do you read books/ebooks? One of the major selling points of the iPad is the convenience and beauty of reading books/comics/etc. but alas, I personally don’t read books. I like the idea of reading books! Unfortunately, I just don’t have the attention span to sit down and read a book. So, if you’re like me, this selling point is absolutely useless.

2 – Do you need a portable media player (movies, music, et al) the size of a magazine? Well, it would be cool to have a video player the size of the iPad screen, but apparently, they didn’t implement that capability. Also, my portable music bases are covered and the iPad just doesn’t quite fit the bill of portable even if my bases weren’t covered. I suppose there are some neighborhoods in this country where you could find people jogging down the street with their iPads, but not mine. Lastly, take into consideration the iPad’s form factor. If you’re going to watch a 2-hour-long movie, you won’t be doing it laying in bed. Not comfortably, at least. It would be like holding a magazine that whole time with nothing to prop it on except yourself or whatever you can creatively cook up.

3 – Going even broader here, where/how do you plan to utilize it if not the 2 ways above? See, I don’t even know for this one. I see myself starting off on my couch or maybe laying in bed, but even at that, I can’t see myself using $499-worth of this device. Browsing the internet? Okay, but my netbook does that perfectly and port-ably here at home. Games? Yes, definitely. Other apps? Nah.

I know people who say the iPad really is a game-changer. One of my friends is a former Microsoft-fan-gone-Apple-dev who said he has no idea how Windows users do it now that he’s got his iPad with him everywhere he goes. I guess if it’s *that* good, then the worst-case scenario for us burdened Windows users is having to wait for the HP Slate, huh?

In all honesty, though, I really would love to mess with an iPad, but even if I love the thing, I can’t justify the price tag based on my answers to the three questions above. Wanting one just to have one doesn’t quite compute here. If you want a really, really comprehensive review of the iPad noting both it’s shining qualities and biggest failures, check out Paul Thurrott’s iPad review here.

-Stephen Chapman

http://www.msftkitchen.com

iThink the iPad is the perfect breeding ground for iNspiration! The testing bed for this theory (we’ll call it my… iTheory, if you will) of mine is apparently my Twitter account, where iHave seemingly taken a liking to posting one pun after another (we’ll call them… iPuns) in regards to the iPad. Yes, the iPad has become a “magical and revolutionary” device (Steve Jobs’ words, not mine)… but not in the sense of actually using the darn thing! In fact, iHave had so much fun with this, iThought iWould share some of my favorites the iPad has allowed me to brainstorm on Twitter. Minor additions will follow:

“iPad… Is that Apple’s attempt at Thai cuisine?” – Yes, indeed! There are treasures of tasty morsels to behold in Apple’s iPad Thai and iPad See Ew (pronounced, “see you,” which is what the iPad will NOT be doing since it doesn’t even have a built-in camera)!

“iPun on the iPad while listening to my iPod” – That one’s self-explanatory and really, really stupid, but… it was funny in the moment!

“iPad Thai, iPadma Lakshmi, Lilly iPad. Why don’t you crash at my iPad, San Diego iPadres… These doing anything for anyone? lol.” – @seraph_ben on Twitter made a good suggestion with this one, “change ‘my pad’ to MiPad.” Indeed, sir!

“I love how Steve Jobs called the iPad “revolutionary.” There’s nothing revolutionary about a big-ass iPhone! *EV*olutionary, maybe…” which I then followed up with, “[a]ctually, it’s not even an oversized iPhone… it’s a ginormous iPod Touch! iPad Touch, iPod Touch… who’s keeping track of these things?” – This one actually brings me to a good point. This thing really is just a ginormous iPod touch… and from what iCan tell so far, it’s not even as functional as one! Time will tell.

And last but not least, my favorite revelation the iPad allowed my brain to observe:

“iPad iPed iPid iPod iPud – The vowels recited in Apple’s iLanguage, 2 out of 5 are actual products! (Oh, and sometimes iPyd)” – That says it all!

And that, my friends, is how the iPad — this new “magical and revolutionary” device (Steve Jobs’ words, not mine) — is truly a breeding ground for iNspiration! =) And one more thing iPointed out on Twitter, iThink this guy had it right all along:

The iPad: Just a Big-Ass iPod Touch
(or, in the case of this picture, iPhone)

-Stephen
http://www.msftkitchen.com

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

I took the time to write up a little review of Windows 7 on Amazon.com a couple of days ago. I tried to make it approachable for users of all operating systems since I have nothing against anyone for what they choose to use (I honestly hate the OS wars, but I don’t mind getting down into the trenches if I have to, mwah ha ha). Anyway, here’s an excerpt from the beginning of my review:

Let me preface this review with my qualifications so that you may understand the extent I’ve gone to with operating systems to end up proudly claiming, “I’m a PC.”

 

I use Linux (RedHat) at work, I’ve tried Ubuntu and Lycoris long before it, I’ve tried Debian and Slackware and however many other flavors of *nix in the past just to say I tried them. I’ve messed with BeOS (Zeta development was an exciting time), I’ve played with Mac OS X on numerous occasions (beautiful OS), and I’ve tried countless obscure operating systems that I doubt even 1% of those reading this would know about (and trust me; there’s a reason for you not knowing about them, lol). Why have I messed with them all? Because I enjoy operating systems and I find them to be amazing achievements. There’s no denying that Mac OS X is a beautiful OS that performs quite well within the structured hardware environment Apple has created. Linux is hella useful on an enterprise level (though Windows Server is easily comparable these days) and even home flavors of Linux have become quite nice (Ubuntu)! The fact of the matter is that I’m partial to Windows through my experiences with having tried just about every flavor of every OS out there over the past 10 years or so. I used to collect beta versions of operating systems (not just Windows, but others as well), so I’ve not only tried the final products, but I’ve also gained appreciation for them by seeing them and playing with them through their development cycles. Where Windows is concerned, at one point or another, I’ve instally just about every build of every version currently out there (and trust me, there are TONS of builds – alpha and beta bits from every version of Windows, including obscure bits like Windows Neptune). I’ve ridden the roller coaster through the highs (Windows 95, 98, 2000, XP, and now 7) and lows (Windows ME, Windows Vista’s initial release) and I couldn’t be happier that I’ve stuck it out.

 

Enter Windows 7.

Check it out and rate it however you feel it should be if you’re a member of Amazon! It’s nice to see that Windows 7 actually has so many positive reviews, I think. There was a 1-star, “review” (I say, “review” because too many people think that Amazon is simply a forum for them to get up on their soapbox) there that I guess the, “reviewer” decided to nix once I left a comment questioning the integrity of his opinion. He basically felt like Windows should be cheaper than it is for people like him who want to run Windows on a second partition just to, “use occasionally.” Somehow he felt that in all his marketing genius, that would help Windows’ market share… you know, if Microsoft brought down the price of their OS simply so people who wanted to use it, “occasionally” could do so. Since when did an OPERATING SYSTEM (sit there for a second and think about just what an operating system is and does) become something to be purchased and used occasionally!? There is software out there that provides very specific functionality (albeit, very well) that costs WAAAAY more than the operating systems that run them! Windows 7, too expensive? Hardly. But I digress…

Link: Windows 7 Review on Amazon

UPDATE: 7 of 7 people approve my review of Windows 7! (Dorky, I know… lol)

-Stephen
Microsoft Kitchen

Welcome to Microsoft Kitchen! To quote the final post I wrote on UX Evangelist:

Since the course of time has lead my focal point away from strictly UX-related content and more towards researching the future of Microsoft’s products, I felt it was time for an upgrade; a new, fresh website with a broader focus to more accurately reflect my content. I needed to come up with something that had unique appeal and would be both easy-to-remember and instantly recognizable. With that in mind, what better than Microsoft Kitchen? The product of a delirious Stephen having spent hours checking GoDaddy for hundreds of mostly non-available names, it’s a bit quirky but highly relevant and provides me with a great slogan: “Serving up some seriously tasty Microsoft.”

Equal parts professional journalism and personal hobby, the plan with Microsoft Kitchen is to continue cooking up the unique flavors of Microsoft news, reviews, rumors, speculation, and whatever else I think readers will find tasty! Mentally tasty, that is. I mean, if I post something so good that it makes you lick your screen, then that’s great but I’m not counting on it. lol. Anyway, Microsoft Kitchen will simply pick up where I’m leaving off. Though the blog is live, I have some additional functionality coming down the pike VERY soon.

I’m excited to begin a new venture and to implement all the things I have in store for Microsoft Kitchen. I’ve still got a good bit of formatting, clean-up, and template-tweaking to do on this end, so feel free to leave comments if you experience anything buggy with the template. As I mentioned above, this is where all the action is going to happen going forth, to feel free to nix UX Evangelist from all of your locations (except Twitter – all I did was change my name). To get started, click the button that says, “start” in the menu bar up top. That will take you to the main page index.

Thanks for reading!

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

*sigh* I’m really tired of this and if you’re tired of the same old rants from me about people essentially stealing my hard work, then this is one post you can skip… but I would greatly appreciate your time to read this and help spread it around.

Most of you out there know how much effort I have been putting into digging up content for the past year or so. As a journalist, it’s a double-edged sword when some of your research methods are both fruitful and able to be implemented by any old Joe Schmoe out there. As I just posted in a comment elsewhere, I’m not some egomaniacal gloryhound; I just want credit where credit is due.

This post was prompted by me receiving several hate e-mails from readers of the eightforums website. “You stole his content,” one person said. “You’re a fraud with a no-name website” another said. Well, let’s let the truth be known about who takes from who, shall we? And, yes, everything I’m about to post will be accompanied with screenshots so that certain people can’t do damage control to try and save face.

First off, I was emailed by the owner of eightforums yesterday. He was all cool and collective in his introduction, just wanting to know if I wanted to talk on the phone or via messenger sometime. Now, I’m thinking this guy is a nice guy, so I go read his blog that he linked. The first thing I see is the following blog post:

Click here to see it for yourself (Nevermind; he removed the linkback. Imagine that… lol)

That looks fine and dandy, right? Nice little asterisk there linking to my site here and what not… well, that didn’t sit too well with me considering that whole blog entry was written in a first-person perspective, yet it contained a really random reference to the article HERE on Microsoft Kitchen; NOT on UX Evangelist where I posted it FIRST that very same day! Just to make sure my hunch was correct, I decided to compare that blog entry of his to Google’s cache of it and boy was I right:

Click here to see it for yourself

Isn’t it miraculous that just before he emailed me (thus ensuring I would then see his site since I obviously hadn’t seen it before), he put a nice link up on that one blog entry? Oh, and it would have also helped his credibility if he updated his forum where he mirrored his original blog post:

Click here to see it for yourself

And just in case he happens to try to add it there before anyone sees that, Google’s got it cached from as recently as the first of this month with no link:

Click here to see it for yourself

Nice try, Mike. I’m sure you’re a nice guy and all, but now you know why I didn’t email you back. Trying to corner the Windows 8 market by using dishonest journalistic methods is a surefire way to start us off on the very wrong foot. I’m used to this and I’ve been around this block a few times, so now I’m waiting for the, “you’re wrong” followed by some absurd, “proof” I’m going to have to refute…

Oh, and now that I’ve got that one out of the way, on to another site who has been exercising douchebaggery. Ironically, the way to get there is to add a simple, “the” to good old Mike’s site: theeightforums.com

I stumbled upon their site one day a couple of weeks ago and noticed one of their users (their username is tw33k) ripping my posts word-for-word without even so much as a link. Trying to be diplomatic about the whole thing, I signed up on their forum and created a post kindly mentioning that a user had posted such information. I also linked to those posts – as well as others, so that the folks of that community interested in Windows 8 could have a look and see. Well, guess what happened to that post a number of days after I posted it? It got deleted while the guy who was ripping off my content remains. WHAT THE HELL?

You can see the post cached in Google HERE and just the same, you can see that my username on their forum is credited with 1 post – yet, if you search for my posts, there are none to be found (nevermind if you go look on the page where my post was found, it’s not there).

My Username:

 

Results when Searching for my Posts:

 

Google Cache Screen Shot:

 

My Post Missing in the Forum:

 

My Original Post:

Listen. I couldn’t care less about the traffic their sites may get but I ABSOLUTELY REFUSE to sit here after putting in the time and energy to find this information and post it while sites like that STEAL THE WORK and try to take the credit!!! It makes me SO ANGRY that these people have absolutely no ethics or couth! I mean, you’d think I was asking for a million dollars or something by simply asking for credit where credit is due. That’s just the way this stuff is supposed to work. I’m sick and f’n tired of brainstorming ideas like scouring LinkedIn for profiles and tirelessly searching the internet to find content that people just so casually rip off! I wish I believed in karma, but I don’t. Because of that, I will NEVER make any bones about it to call these people out. I’ve tried being diplomatic and I’ve tried being Mr. Nice Guy, but that doesn’t cut it. Pretty soon, I’m going to cut the chit-chat and start going for the jugular of the websites who continue to operate under these circumstances.

I may have been born at night but it wasn’t last night. And if you thought I put a lot of effort into gathering the references for this post, just imagine all the effort I put into gathering the content I post on this site. Now, most of this could be alleviated with an apology, but people are about as happy to admit they’re wrong as they are about getting shot in the foot, i.e., not very. Here’s to the possibility of it ending just that simply.

Thanks for reading and I hope you never have to deal with crap like this. Oh, and apologies for any grammatical errors. I’m tired and exhausted from having to continually deal with this issue.

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com

I tweeted… twittered… twitted… whatever the heck you call it; anyway, I basically posted on Twitter the other day my loathing of the stupid, “I’m a Mac and I’m a PC” commercials. That day (about 3 or 4 days ago, actually) I saw TWO of those commercials that I had never seen before and I couldn’t help but shake my head and think to myself one thing:

Just how the hell would Apple market their OS if it weren’t for Windows!?

Yeah, now THERE’S a novel concept! I mean, just how big of a niche is Apple appealing to with the whole, “ohhh, every PC has bad viruses and they’re going to eat all your datas?” It can’t possibly be THAT many! Oops… maybe I’ve just stumbled onto something there.

It seems that for all of their, “Mac users are, “up here” and everyone else is just, “down there”,” they don’t really give a good reason to use their product. Not once does one (or do I, at least) get the impression from those commercials to get a Mac other than for the purpose of, “not getting millions of viruses.” You know, if I’m going to buy something, I don’t want FUD marketing techniques to sell it to me. Granted, if someone wanted to, they could go pull up Apple’s website to see what a Mac is really supposed to be about but doesn’t that defeat the purpose? How is someone going to look it up if they don’t have a computer to begin with? Oh, that’s right… chances are, everyone already has a computer with Windows on it. Once again, just where would Steve Jobs’ OS be without good ol’ Bill G’s already dominating the market?

Okay, so let’s say I don’t have a computer at home, so all I have to go by are Apple’s commercials. Okay, I want to go check out a Mac. Is there an Apple store close by? Let’s have a look in the phone book to call and see. Oh, well looky there! There’s only ONE in my state and it’s 3 frickin’ hours away! That’s alright, let me see if any other retailers near by sell Macs. (Once again, back to the phone book) Okay, there are. Let’s go to the store and check them out!

*Microsoft’s commercials kick in here* and I do indeed find something more powerful and just as good-looking and usable in a PC… and for considerably less, to boot! It’s really simple in my head: You walk into a store where you can compare the two and a PC sells itself! If it works great in the store, it’s going to work great at home unless you’re like Rafael Rivera and visit naughty sites all the time (he’s exemplary of what, “InPrivate” mode was built into IE8 for, har har!).

Anyway, maybe Apple’s OS is great and beats the pants off of Windows… but I’m not going to go and actively seek it out when I have absolutely no reason to due to the problems I DO NOT have with, “millions of viruses” and the gazillion random crashes I DO NOT have! No, Apple’s going to have to sell their product to me directly… or at least give me SOME reason to look into it! Until then, I’m pretty sure that most users like me will remain quite content with their status of being a PC. Yes, all of us low-life PC users will sit down here and look up the nostrils of the snooty Mac users (not all of them, because I know some good people who use a Mac because they like it and not just to be cool) and laugh at them because we can’t figure out just why the heck they think they’re all so cool.

Oh, and I’m not ditching Apple’s OS by any means. I’m a huge fan of people using what they like and what works for them, but as a content Windows user, it baffles me that I’ve been watching these stupid Apple commercials attempt to beat the same message over and over and over and over into peoples’ heads for, what… 2 years now? Something like that? *Pssst!* Hey, Apple! Try appealing to those willing to give your product a try, should they find it to be discernible enough from what they currently use to do as such! Oh, what’s that? There’s really nothing that’s that much greater about your OS? Shame. I guess one of these days, I’ll get even so much as ONE of those, “millions of viruses” that plague Windows and I’ll go running to adopt your invincible OS!

And just to drive the point home, Apple did a FINE job selling their iPod Touch to me via their commercials. I couldn’t keep watching that Crash Bandikoot racing game much longer without having it for myself… along with all the MP3′s I frequently listen to and all the other awesome apps! So, Apple knows how to do it… they just can’t if the product doesn’t sell itself via its own means. To me, this is even more proof that Apple’s OS just couldn’t stand on its own two feet if it weren’t relying on bashing Windows at every turn.

But who am I kidding? I’m just preaching to the choir here. Oh well. Thanks for reading my rant anyway (if you made it this far). =)

-Stephen
http://msftkitchen.com