Bonum Certa Men Certa

Microsoft Business Keeps Declining and Microsoft is Lying About It, As Usual

Microsoft lies



Summary: Response to the financial deception which Microsoft has just spread to unsuspecting journalists (and the sobering reality)

MICROSOFT is bluffing big time, but almost nobody calls them on it. We contacted one Microsoft-focused journalist (Joseph Tartakoff) who was parroting Microsoft only to find that in defence of his writings, he only repeats more Microsoft talking points*. A lot of reporting is done by one journalist who echoes another, who is affected by seeding from Microsoft's PR people (whose role is by definition to deceive and it comes to show how far PR goes). Yesterday we explained why Microsoft is lying in its report, so we won't be doing that again. Microsoft can claim to have only "embellished" the results, but the outcome is still the same. Microsoft can adjust their expectations (for analysts to be "surprised") and it does this all the time. We have shown this repeatedly for years. Since 2008 in fact, we have exposed the ways Microsoft was spinning, cooking numbers, and lying about its results. Microsoft is almost obliged to lie in order to paint a good picture to its clients. It's a form of mass hypnosis.



“Microsoft can claim to have only "embellished" the results, but the outcome is still the same.”Anyway, few people did actually engage in some investigative reporting and got hold of the real numbers. These show that Microsoft is down in almost every area of business, even compared to the slump of last year (right after Wall Street had crashed) which should be easy to beat. Many companies beat that quarter, many by huge numbers (like hundreds of percentages in profit growth).

Joe Wilcox deserves credit for actually doing some work and extracting real numbers from Microsoft's bundle of lies. In his article he states that "Business [is] down 3 percent from $4.88 billion a year earlier [is] Online Services Business [is] down 5 percent from $609 million a year earlier [and] Entertainment & Devices [is] down 11 percent from $3.26 billion a year earlier."

And this is what Microsoft calls a good quarter? A lengthy discussion about this took place in our IRC channel yesterday. It starts here.

Chips B. Malroy explains that: "Overall, I see this quarter as a failure for MS in dollar terms, once the deferral is out of the picture, it looks like a decrease to me. In fact some divisions lost, especially Xbox360 lost. Wilcox article actually shows decreased on most things."

DaemonFC says that "they don't like to lose, so they force themselves to put up with loss every quarter in divisions that are never going to do well."

And on it goes...

Microsoft employees from Mini Microsoft are apparently not foolish enough to believe the spin from Microsoft. One commenter writes (identity unverified): "if you take out the deffered revenue out of the report, microsoft missed on the revenue side by about half billion dollars and barely makes it on the earning side due to cost cutting. summary: expect more cost cutting since that seem to have neautralized the revenue miss."

As Pogson puts it:

The figures are now in. That other OS client division brought in $2.8 billion more revenue than in the same quarter last year. The sad thing is that $1.7 billion of revenue counted this quarter was deferred income from sales of Vista (with upgrade rights to “7″). That means they got a 20% increase in revenue when PC production returned to normal from the slump. That means no “pop” in the quarter in which “7″ was released. The CPU and PC sector saw 30 and 15% increases. Up-selling is just not working…


Yes, Microsoft growth from Vista 7 debut is outpaced by overall growth in the market. This is telling. One of our readers told me yesterday: "They can only fake things for so long of course. The bang you are hearing in the future is MS hitting a brick wall." Not even a brand new release of Windows managed to put a smile on the face of Microsoft's CFO. He quit the company last month and the Seattle Times reveals that he got himself a "hush deal":

In addition to the $1.9 million sayonara payout disclosed last month, Liddell's Dec. 1 "resignation agreement" bars him from ever writing, speaking, blogging or podcasting anything about Microsoft and its executives covered by a confidentiality agreement he signed in 2005.


Going back to the numbers, Chips B. Malroy says: "Wilcox, big fanboi that he is, still does dive into the numbers more, for that I too give him some credit"

Compare that to Joseph Tartakoff, who is parroting Microsoft's claim: "Msft has sold 60 million Windows 7 licenses over two quarters #pcbuzz"

These are of course fake numbers and we have already explained why (many times in fact). Microsoft used exactly the same tricks with Windows Vista. These numbers are bunk, just like Microsoft's results, which will easily have the readers forget that Windows revenue was down by a staggering 40% in the previous quarter (Microsoft announced this on the very same day that Vista 7 was released, so the financial news was buried by design). ____ * For instance, he uses "official" Microsoft numbers when he writes that "MSFT headcount down 8 percent year over year #pcbuzz". Many more were temporary and external staff, but Microsoft does not want reporters to pay any attention to them. I also told him that "MSFT faked their results through deferral" and he then referred to analysts, whose expectations are always being beaten because Microsoft ensures they are set that way by revising them. The state of reporting is depressing when people who call themselves "journalists" become lazy and prefer to be told what to write (by companies).

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Fresh IBM Layoffs Reported in Europe and North America, Jobs Allegedly Moved to South Asia (Low Salaries)
As usual, IBM does not talk about this
Microsoft Has Not Much Left to Show Investors, Shares Fall Almost 20%
It's not even clear how Microsoft makes money anymore
The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): The OSI Election is Rigged, Biased Against People Who Oppose the Openwashing of GPL-Violating Bots Operated by Microsoft for Profit (OSI Gets Paid to Promote This)
they reckon that pretence of calm would serve them best, helped by puff pieces
In Vietnam, statCounter Sees Microsoft Windows Falling Below 7% "Market Share"
Can Microsoft still demand $500 or more per Windows licence?
 
Links 11/03/2025: NASA Besieged and "DOGE Has Become What It Claimed To Destroy"
Links for the day
Illuminating Injustice is Critical When Reckless Microsofters and Law Firms Try to Silence Reporters of Violence Against Women
I want to clarify that I'm well within my right (and not running afoul of any rules) by explaining what goes on here
EPO Central Staff Committee: "The Strategy of the Office Lacks Transparency and Cannot be Understood"
Microsoft and the EPO violate data protection laws
Links 11/03/2025: Spring and Misfin Server
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, March 10, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, March 10, 2025
Latvia (and Lithuania) Stepping Away From GAFAM, Microsoft
Windows becomes unessential as Android and GNU/Linux rise
Microsoft Layoffs Are Infectious (Don't Get Acquired or Become a Partner)
It seems like companies choosing to become "buddies" with Microsoft are dooming themselves and their products
A Closer Look Inside the EPO, Courtesy of Benoît Battistelli's Submissive Lapdogs Roberta Romano-Götsch and Elodie Bergot
new report comes from the Local Staff Committee Munich (LSCMN)
Links 10/03/2025: Staff Strikes, Mass Layoffs in Gaming Industry
Links for the day
Gemini Links 10/03/2025: "Eat The Rich" and Two-Year Anniversary of the 'Space Elevator' Orbit (Like 'Webring')
Links for the day
Links 10/03/2025: Small Web Praised, LLM Chatbots Exposed as Worse Than Useless Again
Links for the day
A Call for GNU/Linux and BSD Developers to Unite Against GAFAM and the Regime They Empower
We have long encouraged and continue to encourage people who value Software Freedom to altogether boycott GAFAM
The Ludicrous Mythology of Commonality as Signal of Value, Merit, Popularity
Devalue what's true, promote marketing?
[Video] Richard Stallman on the Four Essential Freedoms (Manuel Cuda News, 2025)
Added to a channel several days ago by Manuel Cuda News
Gemini Links 10/03/2025: Realisation About Young People, Punks, and Discord IPO
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, March 09, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, March 09, 2025
[Video] Richard Stallman on Understanding the Misconception of So-called 'Artificial Intelligence'
to "know and understand"
FSF's Defective by Design (DBD): Amazon Tightens the Digital Handcuffs
Reproduced verbatim
The Fall of the Open Source Initiative (OSI): Plenty of Issues, Plenty of Censorship
The OSI is abusive on many levels!
EPO Staff Appraisals Apparently Benefit Kakistocracy, Including Cheaters Who Grant Illegal Patents and Punish Good Patent Examiners (Who Find Valid Reasons for Denials)
In prior reports the staff representatives said that rewards typically went to people who granted many patents, i.e. didn't do proper examination and instead just allowed many fake patents get enshrined as EPs, causing fiasco (from which some patent attorneys could profit)
As The Web Gets Drowned Out, Sinking in a Pool of LLM Slop, Real News Sites With Real News Become Increasingly Rare If Not Extinct
This is a real problem
Links 09/03/2025: Moderna Patents Thrown Out, Climate United Sues E.P.A.
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/03/2025: Lagrange 1.18.5 and Writing Mannerisms
Links for the day
Links 09/03/2025: FiveThirtyEight Killed by Disney, Nature (Journal) Chooses Suicide by Slop
Links for the day
Links 08/03/2025: International Women's Day, Software Patents Being Squashed
Links for the day
Hiding Problems Doesn't Work
transparent organisations will be more stable and sustainable
The Harder They Try to Censor, the Bigger the Scandal (and the Impact) Will Be
We don't plan to self-censor our coverage; sometimes we just delay publication a little
Gemini Links 09/03/2025: Leasehold Derangement Syndrome, Raspberry Pi, and More
Links for the day
All-Time Low for Microsoft in Africa
it helps show how irrelevant Microsoft is becoming
French woman (frontaliere) trafficked to promote unauthorised cross border Swiss insurance
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
New York Times & Guardian reporting on Modern Slavery Act prosecution of Glodi Wabelua
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Diana & Adrian von Bidder-Senn, EVP, Palm Sunday & Debian death on wedding day
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
The RTO (Return-to-office) Layoffs or 'Soft' Layoffs at IBM and Red Hat
There are certainly many layoffs going on there, but many are described as "resignations" or "retirements" after RTO or some other form of relocation
Under the Pen Name "John O'Donnell" (LLM Slop, Not Real Article or Author) LinuxLinks Pushes Spammy Page
it happened some hours ago.
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, March 08, 2025
IRC logs for Saturday, March 08, 2025