- leaked builds are not installed by Average Joe users. It may be disappointing to realize that the only people interested in trying out alpha build OSes are committed enthusiasts. Following from this,

- negative attitudes towards Vista were not formed during the alpha/beta phase. Quite the opposite: a lot of excitement was generated around leaked builds. Negativity really solidified through some bad early press, Apple’s marketing, and most importantly MS’s seeming inability to respond to these challenges in any coherent manner. ‘Mojave’ is at least a year late.

- builds should not be leaked, yet the author (who is not on the Windows team) had a copy of build in question. So leaks are OK if the author gets a copy, but not if other Windows enthusiasts get a similar opportunity to explore.

I could not agree more with Karl’s statement that stopping leaks is Microsoft’s responsibility. One fruity competitor is so adept at controlling information that the lack of leaks is a central component of their marketing strategies. Why can’t Microsoft, with it’s hierarchical org chart and mountains of cash, achieve the same results? It seems almost nonsensical that a blog post like this would imply otherwise, as if Microsoft is somehow ‘different’ to all other corporations and institutions and deserves some kind of special treatment from the community.

Again, apologies for the very late comment. I felt compelled to post, particularly after realizing that a great asset to this community had left due to comments made above.

It dissapoints me that so many people are happy with such mediocre products – especially given MS’s staggering resources.

1) Tomthum74 is not a Microsoft employee.
2) Bruce, however, is.

I guess the difference in comment maturity would’ve been a big giveaway, but I checked just in case.

Personally I have no opinion about leaked builds. Microsoft’s position, of course, is that there shouldn’t be any.

Chris – I reckon you’re right, sucking up isn’t going to get you any special Microsoft access. Its not malicious, though – we just want to keep our jobs.

Prince – sorry you’ve had a bad experience with Microsoft. While I doubt it was malicious or mocking, I respect your right to avoid any beta program or product that gives you a bad time.

606 – did you accidently misplace a comment you intended for slashdot? *grin*

Tomthum74 – while I appreciate the support, I have to say that Microsoft’s 30000+ employees are all ultimately on much smaller product or feature teams, none of whom think that they cannot fail. At least, I hope not.

My Point, Nobody Knows except team making product, all others are feeding off US newbies.

Signed:PHYSICIAN THOMAS STEWART VON DRASHEK M.D.

its like watching a bunch of teenagers in a locker room in here, all mouth no brains. what ever happened to respectability in this country? did Osama take that from us too? you think the guys that worked at Nasa during the space program would have posted comments for the whole world to see with even one letter of profanity? what you write onhere will last forever, be recorded and stored in the human knowledge bank for all time, and the best you can come up with is “shit” and “fags?”

Microsoft is a giant, a monster, and failure is not about to happen. there are over 30,000 employees here in redmond alone, do you think a company that huge can ever fail? Microsoft will either make it buy it or crush it, and there is nothing anyone will ever do to get in the way of that. Computers are a way of life, and unfortunately you cant do anything with them with out an OS, and the OS of choice for 95% of all computers is Microsoft Windows. Linux? never happen. ever hear the term you get what you pay for? well 606 said Microsoft = FAIL, maybe if you put down the bong and look at the financial news, you would have seen a little story about Microsoft getting turned down a $46,000,000,000 offer for yahoo.com. meaning they had that much to spend. meaning they are far from failure. when you hear about chapter 11 proceedings, then you come back and tell us you were right. until then get bent.

So you know what, Karl, go fuck yourself!
And Prince you can go join him. People grow, learn and change their minds because of what they learned. If you hold everyone to shit that they used to say you might as well be one of my highschool girlfriends.

Finally, in ECO 101 they talk a lot about competition. There is a key word that is being left out on competition topics of MS vs [Insert Compeditor Here], that is the word fair. Fair Competition is what makes great products. Using dirty techniques might seem cool if you are using the ‘underdogs’ products, or if you are a child, or if your drunk , but they are ultimatly bad for you the consumer and consumers of the other product. This creates a very similar situation to what we avoid by making monopoly’s illegal.

Microsoft = FAIL – no matter what happens, or what Microsoft do.

The end result will be shit.