Microsoft Coffee • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#361

Post by jhugo » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 3:13 AM UTC

robbomacrae wrote: post #265

nxc18 wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think people sometimes don’t perceive things the same way and that can lead to misunderstandings. I have sympathy, I’ve been in the position of having some edgy marketing/pr go the wrong way for a software launch. Totally random example that I had _no involvement_ in: launching a tree survey app on the 20th of April that had insufficient moderation tools. I’ll let your imagination around this (totally hypothetical)…

"Personally, I think the prank would have been fine if they filled the boxes with actual coffee beans." Thats exactly what I was expecting from the title and the mentions of it being "costly". I would have found it quite funny to be picking up a box of coffee from Microsoft and it would work on a number of levels. If it was just an empty box with absolutely no product, coffee or software or otherwise, then thats just…

From a comment from pricci currently near the top of the page, who got a box:

> One morning we were going to brew it but it was whole grain and we didn't have a grinder.

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#362

Post by roghummal » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 3:18 AM UTC

orbital-decay wrote: post #195

passivate wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google's index isn't as vast as they claim. Their "About 5,780,000,000 results" is a gross exaggeration. You can't actually view all those results even if you tried.

Most engines are also very aggressive at de-prioritizing abandoned sites, so most of the content from 90s essentially gone dark - it's indexed but cannot be found unless you know exactly what to look for.

abandoned or done?

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#363

Post by Iv » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 3:22 AM UTC

xrd wrote: post #125

When I lived in Japan 25 years ago, two major events happened: the Hanshin earthquake and the Sarin gas attacks. It was an interesting time to learn Japanese by reading the newspapers. I had real, fully contextual practice learning words like kidnapping. But I was still oblivious to what that gas attack meant, and what terrorism would mean to people in a few years after 9/11. After the gas attacks happened, the other…

It is a frequent reaction: Put people in charge of two things they can't control (people's speech and public's reaction) and they tend to become control freaks on the small things they actually have a hang on.

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#364

Post by ghayes » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 3:54 AM UTC

idlewords wrote: post #320

zrkrlc wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think if you’re responsible for eradicating polio, you can be as shitty as you like.

[flagged]

I’m earnestly curious if you believe this statement, or it is just in jest.

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#365

Post by bobsil1 » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 3:55 AM UTC

collinmanderson wrote: post #355

cjlovett wrote: post #202

Fantastic story. I joined Microsoft in 1997 but unfortunately I cannot confirm the story, I never heard this story before, but it doesn't surprise me, we had a lot of fun back then with all kinds of pranks, and Easter eggs, until one day it was all suddenly stopped, ship an Easter egg and get fired was what they told us. That was a very sad day. I can confirm that Microsoft was doing things with Java back then, I wor…

Excel 97 3D Flight-simulator easter egg[0] was amazing. Also, Word 97 had a pinball easter egg. Released November 19, 1996. 7 months after Microsoft Coffee. [0] https://eeggs.com/items/718.html

Word 97 pinball Easter egg: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1eKKEk25Ms

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#366

Post by jrnichols » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 4:04 AM UTC

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #193

> unlike other pranks our prank didn’t just say ‘Microsoft is successful but nerdy’. Instead, it fed the idea that Microsoft kind of sucked as a company in some way; a lazy copycat. > [...] Usually Microsoft was happy to take credit for clever pranks from employees, because it showed we played hard besides working hard. > [...] BillG said, in effect, that the prank was not in good taste, and that it made Microsoft lo…

Things were a lot different corporate-wise back in the late 1990s/early 2000s.

Like when Microsoft employees put a big "E" on Netscape's lawn, which Netscape employees promptly tipped over and put Mozilla on top of it.

https://medium.com/@ddprrt/tales-from-the-browser-wars-mozil...

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#367

Post by nabakin » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 4:12 AM UTC

lupire wrote: post #326

neom wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't teasing, I actually called them. I was curious if it was a deepfake ML video so I wanted to find out. I got passed around quite a bit till I spoke with a guy in news room archives who had been there "a long time and would know", that's why I specifically got passed to him I believe.

Sure, but you could be lying or they could be lying.

Let's never believe anything at all.

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#368

Post by cable2600 » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 4:13 AM UTC

Microsoft Coffee was supposed to be the answer to Sun's Java. Dotnet is the Java killer and it is no joke.

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#369

Post by zelon88 » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 4:51 AM UTC

Can you imaging being Oracle at the time and freaking out thinking Microsoft was coming to eat your lunch.

Re: Microsoft Coffee

#370

Post by hit8run » Sat, Apr 03, 2021, 5:11 AM UTC

So after that prank they felt obliged to create c#.