
Microsoft's DroidRage Twitter campaign goes painfully wrong - CrankyBear
http://www.zdnet.com/microsofts-droidrage-twitter-campaign-goes-painfully-wrong-7000008450/
======
runjake
Look, this is a class example of media-generated hype.

Yesterday, some other tech news site declared something like Microsoft's
"DroidRage" campaign EXPLODES in their face. In their article, they quote over
a half dozen tweets.

So I go onto Twitter and do a search for DroidRage and this "explosion" is
actually more like a dozen or two people having fun with Microsoft.

Anyway, after the publishing of yesterday's article and it's subsequent
posting on TechMeme and the Twittersphere, #DroigRage replies explode with
everyone trying to get their Seinfeld moment.

Look, I think Microsoft's campaign and that kind of marketing are awful.
Ballmer and their marketing dept should be wiped clean. You're alienating
loyalists of whatever product you're making fun of. But this is a total non-
story. It's more of a meme and a chance to stick One More Thing on Microsoft.
This is not newsworthy.

~~~
kumarm
I thought its media Generated hype too till I actually did twitter search on
DroidRage and found its real.

It helps everyone of us to actually check it before posting an ignorant
comment.

~~~
garretruh
I think the point he/she is trying to make is that it only became as "real" as
it is now after the coverage on news sites yesterday. Then everybody decided
to jump on the anti-Microsoft sentiment and share their own supposedly funny
#DroidRage's.

------
toyg
I think somebody should study how MS marketing works, make it a case-study.
Every time they try to be "hip", they end up looking like fools. Remember that
weird Seinfeld ad? The spooky over-polished family for Windows 7? The
competition on "speed-of-opening-apps" on WP7 where nobody was allowed to win?

When they stick to the basics, they usually manage to be half-decent, like for
the Windows 8 campaign: safe, completely unremarkable, but at least it didn't
blow further holes in the already-tarnished brand.

TL;DR: dear Microsoft, don't try to be hip.

~~~
sk5t
You've forgotten the crown jewel: the video for Vista SP1, "Rockin' Our
Sales."[1]

I realize it was meant for internal use only, but good lord, somebody put a
lot of work into this thing. It makes me so uncomfortable to watch, and to
imagine the culture that might well have embraced this.

[1] <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPv8PPl7ANU>

~~~
masklinn
> It makes me so uncomfortable to watch, and to imagine the culture that might
> well have embraced this.

I've seen it happen and... it doesn't even need to be a culture, just a high-
up exec who had a "genius idea", and showed it to his cat who purred, so he
decided to run with it.

Now the culture around tends not to be fantastic, but you only need one person
with a debatable sense of everything and high-enough up the chain that he can
push stuff without any oversight (let alone undersight from those working
under him)

------
hackinthebochs
So a handful of contrary tweets now count as backlash? Oh please. This is the
problem when any journalist tries to use twitter to provide an angle to a
story: you can always cherry pick enough tweets to justify whatever narrative
you wish to push. Without hard numbers this article is completely meaningless.

~~~
kumarm
May be do a search for DroidRage on twitter? Its full of MSFT backlash.

------
TillE
The funny thing is, there are plenty of things I don't like about Android.
Areas where Windows might provide a better user experience.

But malware fearmongering is a bizarre tactic. For the vast vast _vast_
majority of users, it's a hypothetical rather than an actual experience.

~~~
drzaiusapelord
Considering most windows users live in a sea of malware and I have yet to see
a personal computer from one of my users that wasn't deeply infested, what
makes MS think people actually care?

I hate that the WP product team, which has done a bang-up job, has to deal
with incompetent marketing like this. Android has many, many unresolved and
probably unresolvable problems. Buying a Nexus model solves most of these
problems, but wow, what a goddamn mess Touchwiz and Sense based phones are. I
had to wipe my wife's SGS2 and put CM9 on there just to stop a mystery battery
drain that made her phone useless, even after many factory resets. Samsung
blamed google and google blamed samsung and t-mobile blamed everyone but
themselves. Way, way too many chefs here.

Apple and MS get it. You don't give carriers and OEM control over your mobile
OS, because they will be poor stewards of it. Once my Nexus gets long in the
tooth I might move to WP8. It looks pretty sharp.

~~~
meaty
TBH I've only seen a couple of "rotten" machines in the last few years. It's
not all that bad.

Regarding WP, it's a fucking mess. I've had two handsets now and while it's a
good product at the core, some of the decisions (such as isolated storage) are
just shit. It's virtually impossible moving data around apps except using cut
and paste or network access. Also, the network and connection management stuff
is painful if you have to switch between 3.5G and WiFi. The battery life on my
last handset (a Lumia 710) was abysmal even with no apps installed and
everything cleaned out. Oh and long term support is just crap - look at the
palava around the 7.8 upgrade.

My other half's Galaxy Ace is actually pretty crap as well TouchWiz is
horrible, it's slow and the screen is crap. Everyone I know with a Galaxy
S2/S3 is not satisfied with it.

I got given an iPhone 4S as well (which the proximity sensor had packed in on)
which was horrible as well - iOS UI is so noisy, the handset is obviously
suspect if the proximity sensor doesn't even work (didn't work properly from
purchase date) and you can't even replace the battery.

All this pushed me back to grabbing a Nokia 6303 until I found out that the
things are changing hands for £100GBP+ now from people who have given up on
SmartPhones.

It's all gone batshit.

I just want a phone that works.

~~~
keithpeter
Nokia 6303 eh?

\- MicroSD card \- 3.5mm headphone jack \- basic camera \- basic video
recorder \- FM Radio

Perhaps an Orange Rio or Rio2 would do instead? ZTE with orange branding and
Java based apps. Reasonable alpha keyboard and quite cheap in UK.

~~~
meaty
Good suggestion, but unfortunately I have banana fingers so can't use qwerty
phones that well. T9 still works for me though :)

~~~
keithpeter
I have smallish hands (octave+2 on piano) and large fingers (official from my
accordion teacher) and I can take a photo and pop it out as an attachment to
an email with caption single handed from the ancient Rio or my current
Blackberry. Each to his/her own.

------
RKoutnik
Honestly, what were they thinking? Android has a large userbase with plenty of
fanboys (I'm one of them). This is just another case of large corporations
treating social media like another advertising platform instead of using it to
interface with customers.

Win8 was a great idea (same interface on all of my devices? Great!) but
Microsoft has really dropped the ball. I'm glad _someone_ did it, now who's
going to do it right?

------
danso
This reminds me of the #MuslimRage backfire that Newsweek got after publishing
a controversial story about, well, "Muslim Rage", and asking Twitter users to
use that hashtag to, I guess, talk about their own opinions of Muslim Rage:

[http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-
way/2012/09/17/161315765/mus...](http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-
way/2012/09/17/161315765/muslim-rage-explodes-on-twitter-but-in-a-funny-way-
yes-really)

Here's a social-media-tip: If you are the progenitor of an idea/product,
people are automatically wary of self-promotional antics. If your self-
promotional antics involve asking _others_ to do your dirty work: i.e. bash
the competition, your self-promotional antics will likely backfire on you.
People generally don't like negative emotions when they're using social
media... _except_ in the Schadenfreude of watching things backfire, especially
when the victim is a big corporation.

~~~
svachalek
#muslimrage backfire was classy and funny and worth the read.

#[an]droidrage tweets, not so much.

------
sek
I think the problem Microsoft has is that FUD is in their DNA. I worked well
10 years ago.

Seriously maleware on Android? I install a lot of crappy apps and one abused
notifications for promotions.

This coming from Microsoft is reality satire. Now they call their phone
"windows" and the tag you should use is "droidrage". It never occurred to
anybody there this could be a bad idea?

------
Dirlewanger
Microsoft completely underestimated what the public still thinks of their
brand when they start to fling the shit. Gonna be a loooooong time before they
shake the reputation of being that company who makes the bloated OS/malware
everywhere/Clippy.

------
tokenadult
After all these years, Microsoft still needs to get on the Cluetrain. With
worldwide instantaneous one-to-many, one-to-one, and many-to-one communication
available to the masses, business these days has to be a conversation, not a
monolog.

<http://www.cluetrain.com/>

"A powerful global conversation has begun. Through the Internet, people are
discovering and inventing new ways to share relevant knowledge with blinding
speed. As a direct result, markets are getting smarter—and getting smarter
faster than most companies.

"These markets are conversations. Their members communicate in language that
is natural, open, honest, direct, funny and often shocking. Whether explaining
or complaining, joking or serious, the human voice is unmistakably genuine. It
can't be faked.

"Most corporations, on the other hand, only know how to talk in the soothing,
humorless monotone of the mission statement, marketing brochure, and your-
call-is-important-to-us busy signal. Same old tone, same old lies. No wonder
networked markets have no respect for companies unable or unwilling to speak
as they do."

Of course, just now as I use the Google Play store, I'm reminded that the king
of search still needs to improve the search capabilities of its own online
store. Everyone in the industry has more to learn from customers.

~~~
bcoates
Microsoft's hit and mostly miss marketing aside, the company itself is pretty
open and engaged for one of it's size. Lots of employee blogs, hosted forums,
public bug trackers, early and long-running open betas. They'd been
crowdsourcing crash dumps for years before anyone knew what "crowdsourcing"
was.

------
TallGuyShort
I'm afraid I don't keep myself well-informed on the mobile space, and I've
heard reference to malware in Android several times recently. Could someone
fill me in? Is there fear of malicious software at the system level? Or is
this just FUD about spammy apps?

edit: Also - it's unfortunate that only yesterday was I reading about the
Scroogle campaign. Not to single out Microsoft as the only company that
advertises like this, but it's sad to see them sinking to that level...

~~~
revelation
It's just spammy apps. There are very few apps that actively exploit open bugs
to elevate their rights, and then mostly to facilitate jailbreaking :)

The problem of course is the screwed up rights system. Instead of presenting a
big list of permissions for every app on install, how about you just ask me
directly if the app is about to send a text to some number not in my contact
list?

~~~
gurkendoktor
Between exploits and spam, there is also the possibility of phishing. I have
heard of fake Yahoo Mail apps making the rounds but couldn't find them - maybe
that was outside of the Play Market (it was in Asia, where Yahoo is big).

------
netcan
You can accuse or compliment microsoft on many things, but they've never been
slick.

~~~
MartinCron
This is just confirmation bias, the "slick" Microsoft isn't newsworthy.

------
kamjam
It's a shame when companies cannot let their products speak for themselves,
and rather than showing off the positive aspects of their product they have to
resort to (trying to) belittle the competition. Are Microsoft now using the
same PR firms that they use for the Presidential elections who specialize in
this kind of mud-slinging?

It was obvious this was going to happen, what really did they expect? Even if
they had a few stories come through, they are all but drowned out by everyone
else. Funny they did not run a #iPhoneRage campaign... although there is still
time yet!

~~~
drivebyacct2
>Are Microsoft now using the same PR firms that they use for the Presidential
elections who specialize in this kind of mud-slinging

You might find this relevant: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4887574>

I'd read the same thing elsewhere yesterday, when I looked for it, all I could
find was dan's comment.

~~~
kamjam
Thanks for that. Would make a lot of sense if this were true though!

------
mykhamill
The only problem I see it that MS win either way. Not that I like MS, I don't,
but all these companies [[http://www.fool.com/investing/value/2011/10/24/does-
microsof...](http://www.fool.com/investing/value/2011/10/24/does-microsoft-
own-android.aspx)] produce androids and have to give MS money. So MS doesn't
really care who wins in the Android vs WP game, just that it is one of them.

------
l0c0b0x
I guess am not the only one that thinks Microsoft's marketing strategy is and
has always been pure garbage.

You'd think they would have grown out of this pathetic style a long time ago:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sforhbLiwLA>

~~~
philwelch
You realize that was an internal spoof, right?

------
jentulman
I think this speaks towards a lack of confidence in the winphone product, at
least on the part of the marketeers behind this campaign.

To go on the attack as part of your campaign says that you're feeling
defensive and negative about your own position and that you've run out of
positives to trumpet.

------
TomMasz
This is just the sort of thing that could have been avoided with some time
spent researching the Android-oriented web sites and forums. No current mobile
platform is without flaws but assuming that everyone thinks alike with regards
to those flaws is just foolish.

------
tobyjsullivan
What an excellent example of how not to do things. Always operate your
business with integrity and you cannot lose.

And people ask me why start-ups aren't getting into bed with Microsoft these
days... Because who wants a company like this as your biggest partner?

------
madoublet
I couldn't read past the Steven J byline. That guy has lost all credibility,
in my opinion.

~~~
Posibyte
I know this comment doesn't particularly reflect the quality of the article,
but it does have some meat to it. Steven J Vaughan-Nichols has a deep history
of entirely one-sided, poorly written articles that bash Microsoft and boast
Linux beyond all reasonable means. He likes to cherry-pick results many times
to support his reasoning.

Since I believe the author alone affects the quality of the article, I can
fully see where seeing his name automatically causes the quality to dwindle.

~~~
madoublet
Thanks. I think your comment above should be posted as a disclaimer on every
post he writes that makes it to HN.

------
tferraz
I've never seen a facebook or twitter campaign not going terribly wrong.

~~~
shuzchen
I've actually seen a lot of successful twitter campaigns. Barack Obama has had
a few good runs during the campaign (with #forward2012) and recently with
#my2k to push his side of the fiscal cliff issue.

Any twitter campaign will have participants who try to hijack the campaign for
the opposing view. However, Obama has a strong enough base (I mean, ~50% of
voters cast a ballet for him, and he does have a stronger hold on the younger,
more-likely-to-tweet demographic) participating to drown out the hijackers.

The problem with this Windows campaign (I mean, besides that they tried the
exact same thing before and failed) is that they specifically preclude their
most devout supporters from participating. Anyone who is a die-hard Windows
Phone fan has probably switched to WP when it was first available, and some
probably have never touched android (I mean, they might have held onto Windows
CE - anybody remember that? - until the first WP came out). In addition,
anyone already using the latest WP hardware has no reason to tweet in order to
win a free phone they already own.

So given this situation where MS's strong supporters have no content or reason
to tweet, guess who rises up to fill the dead space? This campaign failed
because it was designed to fail.

------
praptak
I can only imagine the corporate decision process behind this disaster: some
big kahuna pushing this idiocy with everybody else too scared/apathetic to
oppose.

------
fitzpasd
I don't think this will be chalked down as a total failure. With the low
market share that WP has, there's no such thing as bad publicity.

------
j_baker
Did Microsoft recently hire Karl Rove as head of marketing? This is classic
push polling: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Push_poll>

------
charonn0
Be mindful of your glass house, Microsofties.

------
navneetpandey
The best tweet was

I tried to install Hotmail app and guess what it contained Malware.

------
drivebyacct2
What the hell were they expecting?

~~~
neumann_alfred
NOBODY expects the robotic liberation! [1]

[1] <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SdGkkp1aq8>

(I am aware this will rightfully get modded down but sometimes a man has to do
what a man has to do)

