Comment by colpabar

1 month ago

I really wonder if a company like microsoft has any real concern over people tweeting negative things about it. It seems like companies are finally realizing a lot of it can just be ignored, but with microsoft specifically, what’s the risk? Who in a position to deny ms enough money that they’d care or even notice is going to decide to do it based on people protesting?

25 comments

colpabar

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hashim  1 month ago

Yes, unfortunately this is what happens when you have people who are constantly critical of Microsoft based on what they know of the company from the 90s and 00s, it devalues genuine modern criticisms and makes all criticism meaningless.

  • lostlogin  1 month ago

    > this is what happens when you have people who are constantly critical of Microsoft based on what they know of the company from the 90s and 00s

    There are more than a couple of us who have Office or Teams imposed on us. There is plenty to complain about that is current and most definitely valid.

    • hashim  1 month ago

      "Software with slightly worse UX than the competing products" is not an ethical concern.

  • WD-42  1 month ago

    Have you used a modern Microsoft OS? They are somehow worse than they were in the 90s and 00s. I don’t remember having to agree to sell my personal information in the 90s or having advertising baked into the start menu in windows xp.

    • hashim  1 month ago

      I agree that in-OS advertising for a paid product is dumb, but a) I thankfully still use Windows 10 which doesn't have those, and b) those are ultimately UX concerns, not ethical. And no, Microsoft doesn't sell your data no matter how many in tech subscribe to that conspiracy theory.

      3 replies →

squigz  1 month ago

The problem here is thinking that the only form of protest anyone ever engages in is tweeting things. Some people stop supporting companies they disagree with, both individually and, if they're able, with their own company.

  • hashim  1 month ago

    Not just some people - a lot of people, and an increasing amount of people in the last year or so, including whole countries like Ireland, Spain and Slovenia. See the BDS movement/website/Facebook pages. As a lifelong Windows user I've been seriously considering moving to a Linux distro for my next desktop. I'll need to dig into the news some more, but this decision more than likely means I can stick with Windows.

  • colpabar  1 month ago

    But that’s my point - who will do that? Who is going to go to their company’s CEO and convince them to put in the massive amount of effort to switch cloud providers? Who is going to say “I don’t think we should use Teams anymore” and actually be able to switch to something else? I have no idea if microsoft even cares about retail customers anymore, but are there really enough people who are going to boycott microsoft products (I honestly don’t know what those products even are) over this?

    I just don’t think they have anything to worry about. I personally think it’s good what they’re doing here, but I guess I’m too cynical to believe they are doing it out of the goodness of their hearts, and I don’t think the real reason is that they’re worried about bad publicity.

    • squigz  1 month ago

      > are there really enough people who are going to boycott microsoft products

      Maybe not, but some is better than none, and I'll continue to push more people to do it, rather than tell them nothing they do matters.

      > over this?

      Maybe it's not just this. Maybe this is the straw that breaks the user's back. Or maybe the next thing is.

      My point was to address your belief that they're too big for anyone to make any difference. That isn't true, and the belief that you or any other citizen can't make a difference is their biggest advantage.

      (I put this last because I know what HN will say to this, but: are CEOs and other executives not people too? Can they not make principled moves either?)

      4 replies →

    • lucasmullens  1 month ago

      Some people like me are running a company and are still picking out their tech stack. I don't like Microsoft, and that absolutely affects how likely I am to use their services. My situation might not be that common but PR surely still matters some.

    • MangoToupe  1 month ago

      > Who is going to go to their company’s CEO and convince them to put in the massive amount of effort to switch cloud providers?

      Surely if any movement leads to this, it's BDS, likely the most popular and widely-known boycott since before the end of South African apartheid.

      They even appear to have a page and a visualization devoted to compiling publicly visible impacts: https://bdsmovement.net/our-impact

MangoToupe  1 month ago

I can't speak to Microsoft specifically, but bad press has certainly hurt other similar companies (eg Meta) when it comes to hiring.

BDS is also about as formidable as a boycott movement gets.

  • worik  1 month ago

    > BDS is also about as formidable as a boycott movement gets.

    Barely gotten started.

    This is what made the difference in South Africa, but the boycotts were much bigger

    Amazon, Google and Oracle will have to boycott too. I am boycotting them

  • hashim  1 month ago

    You know a boycott movement is effective when Israel has tens of lobbies like the IAF that are dedicated entirely to passing legislation to make it illegal. Germany has already passed it and the UK is unfortunately looking very close.

thisislife2  1 month ago

You are right that with the Trump administration (well, bipartisan support), US companies don't have to worry about any adverse political action by cooperating with Israel. Negative publicity from the common people also won't adversely affect their bottom line. But they do have to worry about the legal aspects - the US is one of the few countries actually having laws against genocide / war crimes. Trump may be ready to bomb the Hague and the ICC, but we know he can't bomb US courts for any similar proceedings against any US or foreign firms ...