--Microsoft, internal document [PDF]

LAST NIGHT we offered an exclusive glimpse at Microsoft's definition of vapourware. It is about announcing products ahead of their existence and hyping them up by making promises that won't be fulfilled. In order to make vapourware effective, Microsoft must also control the press. To quote more from Microsoft's internal documents [PDF], "Ideally, use of the competing technology becomes associated with mental deficiency, as in, "he believes in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and OS/2." Just keep rubbing it in, via the press, analysts, newsgroups, whatever." Microsoft understands that control of the press is crucial, which is why Microsoft is literally buying some of it.

GE to use Microsoft technology for ad sales: WSJ

[...]

General Electric Co.'s NBC Universal will announce Thursday that it will use technology from Microsoft Corp.

“Later on they also lobby together for software patents in Europe.”A lot of people still fail to realise that NBC is very much a General Electric drone, so its information on energy matters will be affected accordingly. This is a recipe for disaster. Here is more coverage from MarketWatch and from Rupert Murdoch's press. Microsoft getting closer to NBC Universal is the equivalent of Microsoft getting closer to General Electric, which recently they did directly when they announced a deal. Later on they also lobby together for software patents in Europe.

All of this domination of the press leads Microsoft to controlling the agenda-setting media. Microsoft gets to tell editors what the consensus on its products should be, so it is hardly surprising that news headlines matching "Vista" in the past week are only 3 compared to those matching "Windows 7", of which there are 17. It's called vapourware when the promoted product does not even exist. Fantasies supersede reality.

We could carry on talking about Dell becoming a slave of Microsoft again, but this is a topic for another day. There is money changing hands and that alone tends to define what companies -- including media companies -- will publicly promote [1, 2, 3]. ⬆