SillyDog701

[Antony]

How do you get a good review? Not making sure your product is good, you simply give away (not loan) laptops to reviewers.

Microsoft has reportedly sent out new AMD-equipped Acer laptops in an effort to get prominent bloggers using Microsoft’s new Vista operating system.

The promotional effort comes just before the official release of the new Windows Vista operating system, but Microsoft isn’t a computer manufacturer so why are they giving away laptops?

Typically when a company wants journalists to review their new software on a fast machine they loan it out for review purposes and then the machine gets returned. If Microsoft were to give away copies of Vista that would make sense and probably raise no eyebrows at all, but giving away a whole laptop understandably strikes some as little more than bribery.

Wired has the story.

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[Don_HH2K]

Or, they want to get feedback on Vista running on a machine with a supported configuration. Those so-called prominent bloggers might not have a system that's fully "Vista Premium Ready". For example, a Premium Ready system has 1GB of memory accessible to the operating system; my video card takes up 128MB of my 1GB, leaving me with 896MB to work with. Small things can make a big difference.

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[Antony]

Then, unlike other common practise, the reviewers got to keep a laptop, not just some promotional items such as pens, stationeries.

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[Antony]

Microsoft denied the bribe.

A Microsoft Australia spokeswoman said six Australian bloggers had been on the list to receive the Acer "Ferrari" laptops, worth more than $2000 each.

But the laptop program, run from the US in conjunction with Microsoft's "Vanishing Point" game for developers, was designed as an evaluation program, not a bribe for positive comments, the company said.

"The blogging community, in general, is highly intelligent and quite cynical. Anyone who thinks they can be easily swayed is fooling themselves," the spokeswoman said.

"No editorial commentary was expected or required."

Australian IT reports.

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[Don_HH2K]

A Microsoft Australia spokeswoman said six Australian bloggers had been on the list to receive the Acer "Ferrari" laptops, worth more than $2000 each.

I wanted one of those a few months ago.

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[Antony]

While compiling the [sdt=12733]2006 Year in Review[/sdt], this is something very similar:

Bush Administration Paid Journalists for Reports Critical of Castro (Sept. 8): White House's Office of Cuba Broadcasting paid ten Cuban-American reporters to deliver anti-Castro commentary on Radio and TV Martí.

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