Death in the dollhouse as Microsoft marketing reboots digital soap operas
(2025/12/08)
- Reference: 1765186208
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/12/08/death_in_the_dollhouse_as/
- Source link:
These are hard times, even for the biggest brands. Facing existential crises, emergency board meetings are in full swing at multinationals Contoso, a huge marketing and sales outfit, and Fabrikam, the famous name in online fashion. Both are under threat from usurper Zava, a retailer so dazzlingly disruptive it is both a chain of DIY home improvement shops and flogger of intelligent athletic apparel.
Far-fetched and fictional? Meet Microsoft’s marketing. The equally far-fetched but astonishingly factual company has been using Contoso and Fabrikam and long-running made-up customers behind decades of fantasy case studies, training and other messaging duties. Now, it seems, they are being [1]retired like superannuated replicants . In steps the fresh new face of Zava.
Fake entities have been with us forever. It’s easier to write a cogent narrative if it has recognizable characters in it, from the invention of fiction in ancient mythology to BigCo Widget Mfg in business school essays. Microsoft, however, has invested enough time and money in its long-running fictional friends to power a 70s TV soap opera. And soap operas don’t end for no reason.
[2]
Don’t under-estimate how much blood, sweat and Teams goes into tech marketing in general, exponentially so with corporate size. If internal decisions within a department seem to take forever, ones that have to get agreement between tech, marketing and a public outcome are awesome to behold. From initial strategy through campaign timeline and down to individual pieces of content, the chain of sign-offs rattles up and down and across an organization like a spider silk-wrapping a fat and juicy fly for later. Now add globalization and social media presence.
[3]
[4]
Ideas that survive this while maintaining reliability and relevance soon carry immense utility, safe and already signed off. In this case, Microsoft has created the perfect customers, perfectly aligned with strategy and messaging, capable of evolving exactly as needed to keep signing up for each new service, each new product, each new push.
Only now, not so much. Soap operas, like tech marketing, stop working when they become too unbelievable or the audience just gets bored. One cannot rule out that even Microsoft can’t believe the idea of established, successful companies leaping into the soft of frontier agentic AI that Redmond is pushing - ask your grandparents where ‘jumping the shark’ comes from.
[5]
In the hierarchy of hype that describes tech marketing, the fake case study stands atop Mount Dull. Real case studies aren’t exactly dramatic, but at least contain real professionals from outside the company describing something that actually happened, and if you’re very lucky with some things that didn’t go quite as planned. White papers and training materials have to have some meat.
Fake case studies? Pure wish fulfillment. As exciting as a tea party in a dollhouse. Unicorns and fluffy bunnies frolicing in summer sunshine. Addictive as crack to everyone on the internal email chain, as numbingly crass as someone else’s drug story to everyone else. That’s before the toxic sheen of generative AI becomes mandatory.
On such things are uncountable millions spent and justified, which in the end is mostly the point. It is of course entirely up to giant corporations how they spend the money they pump out of client bank accounts. If all that was happening was the terrible waste of human lives and minds in exchange for the paycheck, that’s hardly unique to tech marketing. The unforgivable thing is that we all suffer. This stuff is empty calories for the intellect, clogging the channels we need to be clever as we negotiate the ever-changing mudflats of corporate IT. We can’t wait for twenty more years as the Zava reboot works itself out. What can be done?
[6]Whatever legitimate places AI has, inside an OS ain't one
[7]Vibe coding: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing (Sorry, Linus)
[8]From Intel to the infinite, Pat Gelsinger wants Christian AI to change the world
[9]VMware's in court again. Customer relationships rarely go this wrong
[10]How Windows 11 is breaking from its bedrock and moving away
Here’s a thematically satisfying and achievable pitch for a plot twist to bring the curtain down for good. There are many layers of protection available to the creations of tech companies. Copyrights and trademarks and patents, oh my. Likewise, characters and characteristic components of fictional franchises can be robustly defended by their owners if co-opted by competition. Try making a new movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and see how far you get (to be fair, this is also eluding Disney). But a fake corporation in marketing material? Ripe for parody. Impossible to defend.
Anyone can sue anyone about anything, so this is not legal advice. Any trillion dollar corporation could lawyer 99 percent of the population into the dust for having distressing hair if it wanted to — looking at some geek video presenters, that may be ethically acceptable. Trying to sink parodies of something as inherently self-parodic as Zava would be an own goal of Streisandic scope. While creating plausible parody is hard to do, there is one recent technological innovation that’s actually quite good at it. We speak, of course, of generative AI and its profound knowledge of formulaic spiel.
[11]
Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Is there an audience? Is there a point? Corporate messaging stirs up resentment among the healthy, rendering them receptive to a well-crafted lack of respect. As for being worth it, creating a case study where a Microsoft flag-waver speaks frankly of the problems you’ve had with the Azure Juggernaut is going to be personally satisfying, even if you don’t push the boat out, create an AI-voiced and AI-illustrated video for your very own samizdat slop channel on YouTube. Extra points if you use Microsoft AI exclusively.
The very best parodies work because they say something everyone knows to be true, even those being parodied. Dissent is most appreciated by those who can’t voice it, and the bigger the corporation, the greater the internal omerta. They have no mouth, and they must scream. So do it for yourself, do it for everyone force fed the marketing guff, but mostly — do it for the Microsofties. It’s about time this stuff did some good. ®
Get our [12]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/01/microsoft_contoso_fabrikam_zava/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/02/agentic_os_opinion/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/24/opinion_column_vibe_coding/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/03/from_intel_to_the_infinite/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2025/09/08/vmware_in_court_opinion/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/29/opinion_windows_11/
[11] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[12] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Far-fetched and fictional? Meet Microsoft’s marketing. The equally far-fetched but astonishingly factual company has been using Contoso and Fabrikam and long-running made-up customers behind decades of fantasy case studies, training and other messaging duties. Now, it seems, they are being [1]retired like superannuated replicants . In steps the fresh new face of Zava.
Fake entities have been with us forever. It’s easier to write a cogent narrative if it has recognizable characters in it, from the invention of fiction in ancient mythology to BigCo Widget Mfg in business school essays. Microsoft, however, has invested enough time and money in its long-running fictional friends to power a 70s TV soap opera. And soap operas don’t end for no reason.
[2]
Don’t under-estimate how much blood, sweat and Teams goes into tech marketing in general, exponentially so with corporate size. If internal decisions within a department seem to take forever, ones that have to get agreement between tech, marketing and a public outcome are awesome to behold. From initial strategy through campaign timeline and down to individual pieces of content, the chain of sign-offs rattles up and down and across an organization like a spider silk-wrapping a fat and juicy fly for later. Now add globalization and social media presence.
[3]
[4]
Ideas that survive this while maintaining reliability and relevance soon carry immense utility, safe and already signed off. In this case, Microsoft has created the perfect customers, perfectly aligned with strategy and messaging, capable of evolving exactly as needed to keep signing up for each new service, each new product, each new push.
Only now, not so much. Soap operas, like tech marketing, stop working when they become too unbelievable or the audience just gets bored. One cannot rule out that even Microsoft can’t believe the idea of established, successful companies leaping into the soft of frontier agentic AI that Redmond is pushing - ask your grandparents where ‘jumping the shark’ comes from.
[5]
In the hierarchy of hype that describes tech marketing, the fake case study stands atop Mount Dull. Real case studies aren’t exactly dramatic, but at least contain real professionals from outside the company describing something that actually happened, and if you’re very lucky with some things that didn’t go quite as planned. White papers and training materials have to have some meat.
Fake case studies? Pure wish fulfillment. As exciting as a tea party in a dollhouse. Unicorns and fluffy bunnies frolicing in summer sunshine. Addictive as crack to everyone on the internal email chain, as numbingly crass as someone else’s drug story to everyone else. That’s before the toxic sheen of generative AI becomes mandatory.
On such things are uncountable millions spent and justified, which in the end is mostly the point. It is of course entirely up to giant corporations how they spend the money they pump out of client bank accounts. If all that was happening was the terrible waste of human lives and minds in exchange for the paycheck, that’s hardly unique to tech marketing. The unforgivable thing is that we all suffer. This stuff is empty calories for the intellect, clogging the channels we need to be clever as we negotiate the ever-changing mudflats of corporate IT. We can’t wait for twenty more years as the Zava reboot works itself out. What can be done?
[6]Whatever legitimate places AI has, inside an OS ain't one
[7]Vibe coding: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing (Sorry, Linus)
[8]From Intel to the infinite, Pat Gelsinger wants Christian AI to change the world
[9]VMware's in court again. Customer relationships rarely go this wrong
[10]How Windows 11 is breaking from its bedrock and moving away
Here’s a thematically satisfying and achievable pitch for a plot twist to bring the curtain down for good. There are many layers of protection available to the creations of tech companies. Copyrights and trademarks and patents, oh my. Likewise, characters and characteristic components of fictional franchises can be robustly defended by their owners if co-opted by competition. Try making a new movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and see how far you get (to be fair, this is also eluding Disney). But a fake corporation in marketing material? Ripe for parody. Impossible to defend.
Anyone can sue anyone about anything, so this is not legal advice. Any trillion dollar corporation could lawyer 99 percent of the population into the dust for having distressing hair if it wanted to — looking at some geek video presenters, that may be ethically acceptable. Trying to sink parodies of something as inherently self-parodic as Zava would be an own goal of Streisandic scope. While creating plausible parody is hard to do, there is one recent technological innovation that’s actually quite good at it. We speak, of course, of generative AI and its profound knowledge of formulaic spiel.
[11]
Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Is there an audience? Is there a point? Corporate messaging stirs up resentment among the healthy, rendering them receptive to a well-crafted lack of respect. As for being worth it, creating a case study where a Microsoft flag-waver speaks frankly of the problems you’ve had with the Azure Juggernaut is going to be personally satisfying, even if you don’t push the boat out, create an AI-voiced and AI-illustrated video for your very own samizdat slop channel on YouTube. Extra points if you use Microsoft AI exclusively.
The very best parodies work because they say something everyone knows to be true, even those being parodied. Dissent is most appreciated by those who can’t voice it, and the bigger the corporation, the greater the internal omerta. They have no mouth, and they must scream. So do it for yourself, do it for everyone force fed the marketing guff, but mostly — do it for the Microsofties. It’s about time this stuff did some good. ®
Get our [12]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/01/microsoft_contoso_fabrikam_zava/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/02/agentic_os_opinion/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/24/opinion_column_vibe_coding/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/03/from_intel_to_the_infinite/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2025/09/08/vmware_in_court_opinion/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/29/opinion_windows_11/
[11] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aTavxq0n85-_SE9NnysSiQAAAJI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[12] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
They have no mouth, and they must scream
Harlan Ellison may have been spot on.
Kudos for the reference.