Unbelievable "edit" by Microsoft

binarysoul

Wow!!!

I'm shocked!!!!

BBC NEWS | Technology | Microsoft in web photo racism row

Find more posts tagged with

Free for TechExams community: Cybersecurity salary guide

Compare cert salaries and plan your next career move

Button

Comments

SysAdmin4066

As a black male, I am so unrepresented in IT it's not even funny. With that said, I can understand the rationale. It is important to advertise to your clientele. What was disrespectful was just putting a white mans face over the black mans body. They should have just taken a new picture with Polish employees and used that.

hypnotoad

Murphy's law...either:
A. Microsoft doesn't have enough money to hire good marketing people.
B. There are no good marketing people.

Wow...I really need to stop lumping people together...sigh...at least I get some entertainment out of it.

Plantwiz

blargoe wrote: »

I would have used "Air quotes" around "Polish" if I could... I did mentally anyway. Yes, of course I don't know whether any of the people in the first or second picture are Polish in the legal sense. None of them look like what comes to mind when you think "eastern European ancestry"... is that better?

I don't dig all the fake outrage over this, I just think they should have known that someone would catch the switcheroo and try to stick it to the evil empire so to speak.

No hard feelings, merely pointing out that people seem to get in a twist over the way a person looks and we really have no idea about the details of the photos...merely speculation.

Sorry, just one of those moods tonight. I could start by pointing out caucasian women are not represented and why do most marketing images of late I seem to see all show a petite Asian women? Kicker is...I frankly don't care.

Darker skin tones photograph better and the models can were brighter clothing...both making for a more interesting composition.

The world is made up of all sorts of people and I cannot think of an advertising campaign...ever...where I was offended because 'I' wasn't represented. I just don't look at things that way.

Again, Blargoe I really intended no ill feelings.

mikedisd2

This thread is like politics and religion. Are the Polish as racially sensitive as this?

blargoe wrote: »

I don't dig all the fake outrage over this

Got it in one, Blargoe.

Solaris_UNIX

SysAdmin4066 wrote: »

As a black male, I am so unrepresented in IT it's not even funny. With that said, I can understand the rationale. It is important to advertise to your clientele. What was disrespectful was just putting a white mans face over the black mans body. They should have just taken a new picture with Polish employees and used that.

+1

I agree that it was both lazy and disrespectful on Microsoft-Poland's part to just photoshop a European guy's head on a black man's body (i.e. sending a negative message to people who are of African descent). With the economic situation in Poland being as grim as it is right now, it should have been very inexpensive for Microsoft to get a Polish photo-op and inject a small amount of much needed cash into the Polish economy.

Real pictures of real life Poland might be depressing to look at though- kind of like looking at pictures of run down houses in modern day Detroit.

msteinhilber

Maybe this is just some weak ploy to demonstrate how ineffective Microsoft's various photo editors are. This is probably going to lay the groundwork for Microsoft to buy out someone like Adobe

eMeS

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

Did anybody even notice that the original Microsoft USA photo had no white / Caucasian people in it? Take a look at it more closely. It has an Asian American guy on the left, an African-American guy in the middle, and a Latina / Hispanic woman on the right, and I guess the fact that no one was "outraged" by it means that there are no people of European descent working in Microsoft IT jobs, am I right?

How do you know they are anything -American?

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

Maybe if everyone was more like Asian Americans and focused on working hard and doing well in school (above 3.0 GPA) instead of demanding free government handouts and suing their schools for not being able to get a high paying job with a low GPA...

Maybe you need to go read the details of her lawsuit. I assumed you did since a link to it was in a thread response that you posted ( http://www.techexams.net/forums/off-topic/45474-if-your-degree-doesnt-work-sue-college-4.html ).

How do you know that Trina Thompson is not Asian or has Asian heritage?

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

...we wouldn't be in the economic mess that we are in today....

I can't begin to tell you how funny it is when someone that has chosen the forum name "Solaris_Unix" uses the words "economic mess" and isn't speaking about Sun.

MS

blargoe

Plantwiz wrote: »

Again, Blargoe I really intended no ill feelings.

No worries, I guess you could say I'm having one of those nights too

remyforbes777

dynamik wrote: »

The Gary Busey one has been my favorite so far:

That is probably one of the most frightening pictures I have ever seen.

dynamik

remyforbes777 wrote: »

That is probably one of the most frightening pictures I have ever seen.

You need to spend more time on the internet; I can raise the bar much higher than that

Solaris_UNIX

eMeS wrote: »

How do you know they are anything -American?

Touche.

I don't know with certainty that they are of *American descent, but my point of no one being outraged by a lack of Caucasoid people in the original advertisement still stands. If it was an advertisement selling Microsoft IT products to Kenya and it showed three tall, slender well-dressed East-African males in the picture, this would not even be in the news and nobody, including me, would be talking about it. Nobody would be saying- "Hey, isn't this Kenyan Microsoft advertisement racist because nobody in it has blue eyes?" It's almost enough to make it a tempting proposition to move to some place like Kenya or South Korea where one does not have to deal with all the B.S. political correctness issues that for some reason ONLY seem to be an issue in the U.S., Canada, and Europe.

eMeS wrote: »

Maybe you need to go read the details of her lawsuit. I assumed you did since a link to it was in a thread response that you posted ( http://www.techexams.net/forums/off-topic/45474-if-your-degree-doesnt-work-sue-college-4.html ).

How do you know that Trina Thompson is not Asian or has Asian heritage?

I don't know whether or not she has Asian heritage, and frankly, I don't care whether she has Asian heritage or not. The fact of the matter is that an individual who has difficulty spelling simple words such as "tuition" or "reimbursement" on a legal document is going to have difficulty properly filling out a job application regardless of their ethnic background, gender, education, etc. She may or may not have a right to sue the educational system for failing to educate her properly, but that is a moot point for me because the fact that she is lacking basic English language skills still stands. I'm sick of seeing people who are unqualified in basic skills such as being literate in the English language getting top jobs and university student slots in the United States just because of some Marxist quota that is dictated to us by the Federal government.

I'm a big believer in meritocracy- the best person should get the job regardless of their skin color or ethnic background, which is why I brought up the National Basketball Association. We wouldn't use affirmative action quotas to decide who gets to play basketball and who doesn't just because professional basketball teams aren't "diverse" enough, would we? The NBA is a meritocracy- the best basketball player gets drafted, regardless of their ethnic background, there's no racial quotas. Universities and jobs should be the same way. If there happen to be more African Americans who are good at basketball, and drafting them hurts the diversity of the team, so what? The best basketball player should get drafted PERIOD.

eMeS wrote: »

I can't begin to tell you how funny it is when someone that has chosen the forum name "Solaris_Unix" uses the words "economic mess" and isn't speaking about Sun.

MS

You're basing your argument here on an "ad hominem fallacy" (argumentum ad hominem):

Ad hominem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Focusing on whatever operating system I might happen to favor or disfavor vis-a-vis other operating systems causes your line of reasoning to go off on an extraneous tangent that has no bearing on the topic of this thread... And don't even get me started ranting on the financial mess that Schwartz and his Lieutenants have made out of what was once a very successful company because that could easily be a very, very long rant

eMeS

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

I don't know with certainty that they are of *American descent, but my point of no one being outraged by a lack of Caucasoid people in the original advertisement still stands. If it was an advertisement selling Microsoft IT products to Kenya and it showed three tall, slender well-dressed East-African males in the picture, this would not even be in the news and nobody, including me, would be talking about it. Nobody would be saying- "Hey, isn't this Kenyan Microsoft advertisement racist because nobody in it has blue eyes?" It's almost enough to make it a tempting proposition to move to some place like Kenya or South Korea where one does not have to deal with all the B.S. political correctness issues that for some reason ONLY seem to be an issue in the U.S., Canada, and Europe.

I truly don't understand any outrage about the photo, they could have a black Santa Claus with white hands and his nose up a Spainard's ass, and I would not be any more or less likely to be their customer, or be offended.

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

I don't know whether or not she has Asian heritage, and frankly, I don't care whether she has Asian heritage or not. The fact of the matter is that an individual who has difficulty spelling simple words such as "tuition" or "reimbursement" on a legal document is going to have difficulty properly filling out a job application regardless of their ethnic background, gender, education, etc. She may or may not have a right to sue the educational system for failing to educate her properly, but that is a moot point for me because the fact that she is lacking basic English language skills still stands. I'm sick of seeing people who are unqualified in basic skills such as being literate in the English language getting top jobs and university student slots in the United States just because of some Marxist quota that is dictated to us by the Federal government.

One's ability to communicate has no bearing on the right to seek justice. Regardless of what any of us think about her personally (I'm not arguing that she's some great person), she did not state that she expected a "high paying job". What I read is that she was promised some service and she felt like that service was not delivered as promised ("e-recruiting clients call the graduates that recently finished college for an interview...they have not tried hard enough to help" ).

It's up to her to prove her allegations, which is one of the great things about our legal system; the burden of proof lies with the person lodging the allegation.

I don't know what quotas you mean that ensure that people who are unqualified in basic skills get top jobs. If something such as this were in place, wouldn't Trina Thompson be the perfect candidate and hence have landed a "top job"?

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

I'm a big believer in meritocracy- the best person should get the job regardless of their skin color or ethnic background, which is why I brought up the National Basketball Association. We wouldn't use affirmative action quotas to decide who gets to play basketball and who doesn't just because professional basketball teams aren't "diverse" enough, would we? The NBA is a meritocracy- the best basketball player gets drafted, regardless of their ethnic background, there's no racial quotas. Universities and jobs should be the same way, yet they aren't (or at least they aren't in what is rapidly becoming the Marxist P.R.C.- The People's Republic of California). If there happen to be more African Americans who are good at basketball, and drafting them hurts the diversity of the team, so what? The best basketball player should get drafted PERIOD.

You're not really going to get me to argue in support of any government initiative (my reasons for that are a bit different though than what you're arguing here). I do want to point out that affirmative action is not the boogeyman that you're making it out to be. The NBA analogy that you're using is logically faulty and it has been refuted a number of times. Under affirmative action all candidates must be qualified for the jobs they receive.

Personally, I've never lost a job, work, etc.. to someone else because of this mythical affirmative action boogeyman (I do realize that others could have had different personal experiences). As an employer (in many different situations) I've never been forced to hire one person over another in order to fill some imaginary quota.

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

You're basing your argument here on an "ad hominem fallacy" (argumentum ad hominem):

Ad hominem - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Focusing on whatever operating system I might happen to favor or disfavor vis-a-vis other operating systems causes your line of reasoning to go off on an extraneous tangent that has no bearing on the topic of this thread... And don't even get me started ranting on the financial mess that Schwartz and his Lieutenants have made out of what was once a very successful company because that could easily be a very, very long rant

Actually, for it to have be an ad hominem attack would require that your argument be based in fact or have some substance.

I'm not certain that you're on the firmest ground with too much of your logic in these last few posts. It's probably not a stellar decision to start throwing logic rocks around your glass house at this point.

You'll recall from my post that I did not indicate that I thought any other OS was superior. You can run an OS powered by pixie dust and squirrel turds as far as I'm concerned, and I won't tell you that it's superior or inferior to anything else out there. The point of the matter is it wasn't an attack; I really do think it's funny that someone that seems to be a big supporter of a Sun product used the words "economic mess" and wasn't referring to Sun.

MS

Pash

eMeS wrote: »

As an employer (in many different situations) I've never been forced to hire one person over another in order to fill some imaginary quota.

Sorry but just to throw something in the mix here. Just because you haven't seen or practised racial quota hiring doesn't mean it isn't being used somewhere out there. The British police have been doing racial quotas for the last few years, yup it is stupid and makes little sense but the police forces seem to think it is necessary to communicate with different ethnic populations. There are highly qualified ex-forces candidates who may be black or white, who cannot join certain police forces because they are not recruiting their ethnic kind. Should us Brits complain about these types of injustices? I think we should.

My god dynamik where do you find these photos

Solaris_UNIX

eMeS wrote: »

I truly don't understand any outrage about the photo, they could have a black Santa Claus with white hands and his nose up a Spainard's ass, and I would not be any more or less likely to be their customer, or be offended.

That's exactly what I'm saying! People should not be outraged by these photos. I agree 100% with what you just said there, as I'm not any more or less likely to be offended or become or not become Microsoft's customer based on these adverts. I don't know if you've ever spent a lot of time around certain university campuses (UCB and USF come to mind) but the way the political correctness police make a big to do about insignificant things like this can really grate on one's nerves after a while, and that's what I'm trying to speak out against. Consider yourself fortunate that you live in Texas, a state that respects personal liberty and has great gun laws.

eMeS wrote: »

One's ability to communicate has no bearing on the right to seek justice. Regardless of what any of us think about her personally (I'm not arguing that she's some great person), she did not state that she expected a "high paying job". What I read is that she was promised some service and she felt like that service was not delivered as promised ("e-recruiting clients call the graduates that recently finished college for an interview...they have not tried hard enough to help" ).

Ok, if they promised her a job finding service and didn't deliver the service (i.e. you're saying the "for profit" school "scammed" her out of tuition money by not delivering the services they promised) then fine, she should get her tuition refunded. But my point still stands that you're going to have a hard time finding someone a job if they can't read, write, and speak the English language properly and lack basic core skills in the area that they are trying to get a job in. If the school knew they wouldn't be able to get her a job, they shouldn't have promised any "services".

eMeS wrote: »

I don't know what quotas you mean that ensure that people who are unqualified in basic skills get top jobs.

I'm talking about quotas like what they used to have in California before voters passed Proposition 209 to remove racial preferences from higher public education and state contracting (quotas that some of the Berkeley faculty are still trying very hard to bring back- they tried it several years back with the EEOI and they're at it again). Sure, it's more specific to university admissions than to jobs, but I think it shows what will happen if you let certain people have their dystopian way with federal government policy. If you haven't been hanging around Berkeley for the last 20 - 30 years, then it's perfectly understandable that you have no idea what I'm talking about.

To bring yourself up to speed I recommend reading this article by Thomas Sowell:

The New "Yellow Peril" by Thomas Sowell on Creators.com - A Syndicate Of Talent

and then read this from MIT.edu about how the old affirmative action rules (which they're now trying to bring back) led to Asians being admitted at a rate that was less than they should have been admitted based on their qualifications:

Alumnus accuses Berkeley of having anti-Asian quotas - The Tech

and this article where Berkeley published the rates at which qualified Asians were being excluded from admission based on their affirmative action policies:

Counting Asians - affirmative action - Back to School: Dumb and Dumber - Cover Story | National Review | Find Articles at BNET

After Proposition 209, the admission rates for Asians sky-rocketed vis-a-vis other groups because they studied hard and scored high on the SAT examinations and really got good grades compared to certain other ethnic groups... Asians would make up much, much less than 10% of the overall state population but would account for over 55% of the students admitted because of their good grades and high test scores. This drove the affirmative action quota police absolutely crazy- they didn't like this at all, but I thought it was good- if the Asian candidates were more academically qualified, then they should have gotten more university slots vis-a-vis other ethnic groups, just like if more African Americans are top tier basketball players, then they should get more NBA pro-basketball player slots. I may not be of East Asian descent, but I am a firm believer in strict meritocracy. Needless to say, the affirmative action / PC lobby has been fighting very hard against it to bring back the quotas....

Perhaps you've never experienced this because you live in Texas and nowhere near San Fran. or UCB?

eMeS wrote: »

The NBA analogy that your're using is logically faulty and it has been refuted a number of times.

Fair enough. If you think it's faulty then show that it's faulty. Either give your own argument to disprove it or post me a URL link to someone else's. Just saying "It's faulty" and giving no proof doesn't make it so.

eMeS wrote: »

I really do think it's funny that someone that seems to be a big supporter of a Sun product used the words "economic mess" and wasn't referring to Sun.

Well, Sun's business policies are a huge economic mess. Their most recent suicidal policy is that they're phasing out SXCE (Solaris Express Community Edition) which has been highly successful in powering some big sites such as Linked In to focus solely on OpenSolaris Indiana, which, last time I checked was currently missing some of the important features you need for a large scale data center deployment like flash archive / flarcreate and jumpstart (I don't like the AI in Indiana as much as I like Jumpstart).... but do you really want me to go off on a long, pointless 20 page long rant about that? I don't think you do, which is why I've been restraining myself in that area so far

sidsanders

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

Maybe if everyone was more like Asian Americans and focused on working hard and doing well in school (above 3.0 GPA) instead of demanding free government handouts and suing their schools for not being able to get a high paying job with a low GPA we wouldn't be in the economic mess that we are in today....

working hard wouldnt have avoided this economic state. poor choices in real estate/banking (goofy loans, mbs/cds crud -- all about greed), poor leadership in business (car/bank/real estate, you name it) cause a cascade effect which hurts any worker (lazy or not).

this will hurt more than most handouts...
Trustees Report Summary

mikedisd2

Do you guys really need to trade rants? This thread became boring half a page ago.

Solaris_UNIX

sidsanders wrote: »

this will hurt more than most handouts...
Trustees Report Summary

Good point there. I think I might have over stated myself a little bit on the "working hard" thing as it relates to the current economic crisis.

Solaris_UNIX

mikedisd2 wrote: »

Do you guys really need to trade rants? This thread became boring half a page ago.

Sorry about that. Maybe it's time to change subject. So how about those ITIL certifications?

Is it true that they give you this cool collector's pin when you get the cert:

File:Wearer of an ITIL Foundation Certificate pin.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Or am I thinking about the wrong ITIL?

eMeS

Pash wrote: »

Sorry but just to throw something in the mix here. Just because you haven't seen or practised racial quota hiring doesn't mean it isn't being used somewhere out there. The British police have been doing racial quotas for the last few years, yup it is stupid and makes little sense but the police forces seem to think it is necessary to communicate with different ethnic populations. There are highly qualified ex-forces candidates who may be black or white, who cannot join certain police forces because they are not recruiting their ethnic kind. Should us Brits complain about these types of injustices? I think we should.

My god dynamik where do you find these photos

Maybe you could have quoted my entire statement, it was:

"Personally, I've never lost a job, work, etc.. to someone else because of this mythical affirmative action boogeyman (I do realize that others could have had different personal experiences). As an employer (in many different situations) I've never been forced to hire one person over another in order to fill some imaginary quota."

MS

eMeS

Solaris_UNIX wrote: »

Sorry about that. Maybe it's time to change subject. So how about those ITIL certifications?

Is it true that they give you this cool collector's pin when you get the cert:

File:Wearer of an ITIL Foundation Certificate pin.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Or am I thinking about the wrong ITIL?

I really don't get your point here, but if you'd like to talk about ITIL I'd suggest that you do it in the correct forum.

MS

Pash

eMeS wrote: »

Maybe you could have quoted my entire statement, it was:

"Personally, I've never lost a job, work, etc.. to someone else because of this mythical affirmative action boogeyman (I do realize that others could have had different personal experiences). As an employer (in many different situations) I've never been forced to hire one person over another in order to fill some imaginary quota."

MS

Yeh sorry was skim reading responses.

All still valid to the conversation though.

eMeS

Pash wrote: »

Yeh sorry was skim reading responses.

All still valid to the conversation though.

No worries, and I agree.

MS