MSFT Reaches Out To Hackers: 'Do Epic $#!+' 249
hessian writes "Microsoft isn't exactly known for its underground hacker culture, but a recent effort to give its employees more slack is generating some wild experiments. Last summer, Microsoft completed a redesign of one of its original buildings on campus — Building 4, where Bill Gates' office used to be — into a laid-back workshop where staff can tinker with things. It's open to anyone, anytime, and it's got everything from a hardware workshop to an actual working garage door. If it doesn't sound to you like something Microsoft would normally do , the Garage's motto will really shock you: 'Do epic s--t.'"
They forgot the second part (Score:5, Insightful)
"...as long as it doesn't threaten our bottom line."
Epic? (Score:3, Insightful)
Epic $#!+ can't come out of sitting in "Building 4, where Bill Gates' office used to be ..." and pretending it's hacker's garage.
you need a real garage, with real hackers in it, don't think Microsoft's engineers will do the trick.
"$#!+" ? "s--t" ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Are we really so prude and puritan as a culture that we can't even bring ourselves to write "SHIT" ?
This goes beyond political correctness - it's frankly ridiculous.
You can tell immediately (Score:1, Insightful)
when a company tries to exploit a culture that isn't truly core to them. That 1337 5P34K motto sounds so incredibly phony it's pathetic.
Microsoft, here's a hint for you: 133T 5P34K stopped being cool 10 years ago.
A tiny fraction of what's needed (Score:4, Insightful)
First, there needs to be a company culture in which people dare to take time to play in a facility like that.
Second, there needs to be an outside chance that the epic "s--t" will actually see the light of day and not be stomped on by Steve Ballmer because it doesn't run Windows.
Third, there needs to be infrastructure. One MS manager I know tried to order a bookshelf to store technical references for the group's use. The request was denied because the bookshelf wasn't a standard item. What happens when a hacker orders something random?
Fourth, for people who aren't pure hackers but have some self-interest, there needs to be some believable financial benefit to developing something cool
Without all that, this idea is sheer cargo cult.
It's all... (Score:4, Insightful)
...too late.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:uh oh (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, I'm not quite sure what the deal is. I wonder if it originated with the Orthodox Jewish approach of writing "God" as "G-d", which was based on a sort of superstition against writing out the full word, even if it was obvious what the word was.
In older English texts that want to censor such things, they seem to do a better job actually censoring the words so that they're removed entirely, replaced with just a mention that there was a swear, like "the man responded with an interjection not printable in a magazine of this type". That seems like the way to go if you're truly offended by them.
what !@#$% is the point??? (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is not that MSFT employees don't have good ideas; the problem is that management kills them (the ideas that is).
Re:They forgot the second part (Score:5, Insightful)
Like Microsoft Research, this will be a patent farm where ideas that threaten Microsoft's platform go to die.
Maybe, just maybe, someone in marketing will decide they can make a product out of something from this new Microsoft lab. It may even be awesome. But you never know until after the research.
It seems that whenever someone in management lets marketing smoke enough weed to even think about visiting the engineers we get something like Bob or ME or Vista or Metro.
I wish them good luck. Changing corporate culture is very hard when 'those other guys in that other building' are easy to let go when the stock price tumbles for reasons known only to the Random Number God(s).
Re:Cute office space != Culture transplant (Score:2, Insightful)