HE HAS JUST TRIED WINDOWS VISTA AND HE TOTALLY LOST IT. Here is what he wrote in his micro-blogging journal.

The QI star and Guardian technology columnist's rant started on Sunday afternoon. "I hate Vista so much I want to cry," he wrote. "Bought a Vaio. The most useless $4k ever spent. It just will not join a sec-enabled network. HOW????".

Within minutes he'd submitted another, more heated update. "I have nine macs!!!!!! I don't need another f***ing mac. I just want ONE ARSING PC that isn't complete SH*T."

Which was promptly followed by: "Too late. It's going out the window. I can't put up with this sort of arse."

The pressure then really started to take its toll. "Listemn [sic] I have parallels, I have fusion, I have 2 distros of Linux. I need jsut [sic] one, just 1 of c***ing Vista so that I can review things."

This is not good for the already-stagnant reputation of Windows. Stephen Fry is a renowned and respectable technologist.

Windows Vista suffers from some other new issues, as noted in last week's news [1, 2]. The company seems to abstain from mentioning the "V" word and this was pointed out in several publications this morning. The only "V" they mention is Vapourware, not Vista. As James Plamondon wrote in Microsoft's top secret training material, "In the face of strong competition, Evangelism's focus may shift immediately to the next version of the same technology, however. Indeed, Phase 1 (Evangelism Starts) for version x+1 may start as soon as this Final Release of version X."

Notice the fact that when challenged by GNU/Linux (mostly on sub-notebooks) and Macs, Microsoft points to non-existent products that promise so much, yet deliver so little. Vista 7 is just another Vista. ⬆

____ 1. Gates and Seinfeld Ads Voted Top 'Bad' Commercial

In fact, according to the Anderson Analytics 2008 fall survey involving college students, Microsoft could not have done any worse than to produce those video advertisements.

2. Students Give Bill and Jerry the Big Fail

News Commentary. Perhaps colleges were good reason for Microsoft to pull those Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates and comedian Jerry Seinfield commercials.

You remembered them, right? What? They were that forgetful? Apparently, some college students would undergo brain surgery to remove the memories.

Anderson Analytics has released its fall survey of about 1,000 college students and what brands resonate with them. I looked for the survey or some news release about it, but there's nothing obvious from the Andersen Analytics Web site. Fortunately, Advertising Age has a synopsis. I'll update this post later today with fuller results, should they become available from Anderson Analytics.