Angry mother gives Steve Ballmer an earful
Poor Steve Ballmer. This guy just can’t stop putting his giant foot in his mouth. The brash Microsoft executive got taken to school by an angry mother during a question and answer session at the Gartner ITxpo conference. The woman, speaking on behalf of her 13 year old daughter, started shouting at Ballmer, claiming that she was forced to uninstall Vista and downgrade back to XP just two days after her daughter installed the new OS due to bugs and system issues. To his credit, Ballmer managed to fire back by saying "Your daughter saw a lot of value." To the mom’s credit, she responded by saying "She’s 13." Steve-O continued un-phased, stating that Vista is "bigger" than XP, and isn’t going to get any "smaller" with the upcoming SP 1 revision. The mom got the last word, however, shouting "Good, I’ll let you come over and install it for me" before triumphantly leaving her soapbox for calmer waters. Nice try, Steve, but we think the mom won this round.
Does anyone remember Windows Millenium Edition (Windows ME)? I’m having a very curious and odd sense of deja vu with Vista.
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Doesn’t everyone know that you don’t go toe-to-toe with a mother of a 13 year old. She will always have a quick response. And anyone who is married will know that a woman will also always get the last word. He should have just sat there without talking and waited for this lady to finish, without responding.
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Did we have to have a picture with his tongue hanging out of his mouth…yuck! MS should not treat customers like this from the CEO. Consumers have ways of voting with their dollars.
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On the other hand, If your 13-year old daughter starts a giant P2P network and you get sued by the RIAA or MPAA, are you going to go track down the Torrent developers and attempt to shout them out of the room? Any consideration here in regards to taking responsibility for what your child is doing? That never occurs to anyone, it seems.
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Linux, nothing more needs to be said
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@JSC
I am at a loss. What did the child do wrong? She istalled Vista it did not work because of bugs and had to reinstall XP. Ballmer told the mother that the child saw the value…no the child wanted the lastest OS. Which was the point the mother was trying to get across. Ballmer fumbled what could have been a good PR moment.
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I find it odd that he chose to describe it in terms if size (”Vista is ‘bigger’ than XP, and isn’t going to get any ’smaller’”) rather than quality.
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With the junk that Microsoft puts out there it’s not quality that makes them run it’s quantity. That’s why Vista will be “bigger” than XP. Vista will have so many SPs. I’ve been a long time user of Microsoft since Win3.1. Maybe it’s time for Apple or Linux.
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@ Jsc
Yeah Im also confused because the girl She installed Vista it did not work and had to reinstall XP. Whats wrong with that? The mother was mad because Microsoft put out software that wasnt ready. I know theres gonna be bugs but yeah, I would be mad too.
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Uh…a little girl installed vista on mommys computer…was the computer specd for vista? Did the little girl install everything correctly? Was it a legit copy of vista or a pirated one?
I love how people want to bash microsoft and at the same time use windows all the time…if your so smart that you know what an OS should be, go make one…you can’t? Oh you use OS X or linux? Why is windows the dominant operating system? Oh because microsoft is a big bully and blah blah blah…people aren’t robots that have to do what ms says, if it wasn’t the superior product, it wouldn’t be the dominant one
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HAHA!! HE GOT PWN3D BIG TIM3!!! ROFL…mao
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@Zac
The point is not the child at all…plug in who you want there….it is not even that people seem to prefer XP over Vista…the issue is how Steve Ballmer handled. He came off as if he could have cared less. Even if he did not care, he should have handled it better in public.
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@ ozziedog
yeah i guess you’re right.. mac anyone?
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I have been a longtime supporter of MS products. My computer has the last MS operating system(XP, currently not in use) I will buy on it now due in part to statements like this from the CEO. I am writing this message using Ubuntu’s Linux.
I have used/purchased
MS Windows 3.1, 98, XP; Visual Studio 6, Net, VB 6, MS Office, Internet Explorer 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7; and Visio.
Microsoft lost me when they wrote Windows Genuine Advantage, which has cost me several hours trying to fix friend’s machines that had valid keys, DRM which cost me the music I purchased last year when MS messed up the code in their new Media player. I will not call MS to try to fix this; I purchased the music and I’m tire of MS bull. I decided not to buy Vista when I read the restrictive licensing agreement which only allows the PC software to be transferred to one other person.
The final straw was not being able to use the music in any of my media players thanks to MS coding mistakes. That is the reason why XP is sitting dormant on the other partition of my hard drive.
I would suggest to the world that everyone should follow suit till MS relearns that being in business is not about the $$ but about the customer.
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