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• twitter

  2011-01-11 14:56:15

  This is a good example of Microsoft PR damage control. There are five articles above from various lightweight tech publications that are almost identical. The articles all contain the same fact light talking points and make the performer look bad. For example, the word "cheap" is used in all though the performer did not use it. The Next Web goes on to speculate that there were children present at the free concert for a cell phone and offered several examples of "the Microsoft we know and love" intoxicating potential customers. Another article calls her an uppity newly wed. Perry must be surprised and embarrassed by it all and afraid of the company punishing her in other ways. This is what people can expect from such a nasty company that spends so much money promoting and bribing shameless bullies and attack dogs. A more obvious example of Microsoft's influence on media is the way big publishers typically portray Richard Stallman.
  
  There's usually more to these stories and it's always worse than the Microsoft press bullies make it out. A more charitable explanation, given the paucity of facts, would be that Perry had a misunderstanding and was embarrassed by the crowd's reaction. If what the Next Web says is true, a reasonable person might have thought there would be an open bar. For all we know, the unfortunate pop star was told there was one. Her reaction was in line with the point of the concert, "Microsoft is big, rich and powerful," and aimed to be a crowd pleaser. A more graceful company would have ignored the potential slight. Perhaps there was a Twitter or Facebook eruption that the company was unable to astroturf fast enough.