What do you call megabucks Microsoft? No really, it's not a joke. El Reg needs you
- Reference: 1588842012
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/05/07/what_to_call_microsoft/
- Source link:
We know that Google has a deep and abiding love for our "Chocolate Factory" sobriquet. Everybody knows "Big Blue" = IBM and caring, sharing Larry Ellison's Oracle is known and adored by all as "Big Red".
Intel is, of course, "Chipzilla" and Cisco, we know, delights in the name "Switchzilla". Ebay is often a "tat bazaar" and good taste forbids us from revealing what Amazon boss Jeff Bezos' nickname almost was.
Apple is well known as "The Cupertino Idiot Tax Operation", although we don't know how the firm feels about it ( [1]it doesn't speak to us .) We do know that it makes the company's apologists a little sad, which can only be a good thing.
But Microsoft is tricky. "The Beast Of Redmond" is a tad old nowadays, as are Borg references. Some have suggested "Slurp" in honour of the company's creepier habits and we can see that also working in relation to the sheer amount of cash the Windows giant is syphoning from the pockets of customers.
But somehow, it lacks that certain je ne sais quoi .
Has the company [2]turned over a new leaf since it became a friend of open source, or will the beatific mask slip to reveal the stockholder-sating beast beneath?
Since we're not allowed down the pub anymore, where such weighty editorial matters would normally be discussed, we are turning the question over to you, the knowledgeable Register readership.
There are no prizes other than the warm feeling from knowing that your suggestion might find its way into the pages of our style guide, nestled somewhere between the ancient terms fondleslab and wristjob. And what could be better than that? ®
Sponsored: [3]Choosing A Low-Code Vendor
[1] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/09/07/reg_effort_to_attend_iphone_7_launch/
[2] https://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/09/18/microsoft_has_developed_its_own_linux_repeat_microsoft_has_developed_its_own_linux/
[3] https://go.theregister.co.uk/tl/1936/-8579/choosing-a-low-code-vendor?td=wptl1936
Re: I'll give it a go...
Microsh*t
The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.
Just liks the wolf in sheeps clothing: a means to infiltrate, then consume.
Buying GitHub was just the start.
Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.
I like it but it needs to be shortened: Wolf Hall
Love 'em or hate 'em - "MicroMite" - Comes complete with hijacked branding - Marmite or Yegemite - choose your poison?
Triple E.
Re: Triple E.
How about BareHug?
Bare as in what you're left with at the end of it.
How
About:
vampire juggernaut.
Or
micro minions
Given their lack of direction and failed initiatives.
Microlost.
Microsoft naming
As Microsoft like renaming every single product every year, are you going to do this on a yearly basis?
Got to be something about Clippy
Team Clippy
Clippy Clippy Shake
Clipsters
etc etc
How about "Microshaft", which is *of course* a reference to all the good work they do in battling the criminal underbelly of IT, facing down both criminals and cops who want it dead, against fantastic odds.
"How about "Microshaft""
Who's the Redmond software firm that's less a virus than a germ?
(Microshaft!)
Damn right.
The term Microshaft is well known by quite a few in the curcles I frequent, is fairly obvious to whom it refers to and slips off the tongue well.
Shaft can refer to a deep entrance to, for example, a mine wherein the riches if the Earth lie or it could refer to being screwed either financially or interms of being able to continue in some way (BSOD?) etc.
Or The Defenesters, they sell you windows and the frequently throw you out of them.
How about the Big Softie?
It incorporates the size, employee nicknames etc
borg still works rather well no?
hmm
They are pushing this thing called "Edge", so maybe Edge Lords --> Edge Borgs?
Bob
A nice short name with a history.
Re: Bob
But Bob doesn't like Pie and doesn't have a sidekick named Weebl!
Good taste?
Fuck that, we wanna know what he was almost called! =-D
(I have good taste... I've been told I taste like chicken.)
Re: Good taste?
I don't believe that good taste came into it at all. Fear that he'd let slip the dogs of law on the other hand...
Tricky
Been playing with Has Been, Yesterday's Man, Once Mattered and suchlike. Not really getting anywhere however, my best shot being:
The-Once-And-Future-Borg
which is a tad long IMO.
Then got onto How the mighty have fallen which led to the more succinct
The Fallen
which has a nice Lucifer Morningstar ring to it.
"The Monopolist Formerly Known As Evil"?
I always use Microsux Windblows.
Shub-Niggurath
Megahard (with or without suffix "on")
Wilson & Kelling?
You know, the ones that invented the broken Windows theory
I'm so angry I can't think
Oh the joy of the challenge, to somehow encapsulate all the frustration, annoyance, anger that MS continues to deliver, into one phrase.
Shitflake sprinklers comes to mind, an unkind reference to the absurd and entirely juvenile re-modelling of Excel and Word, with thousands of choices of "sprinkles" - different styles each more ghastly and lurid - reminiscent of the cultural imposition of chemical flavouring "shots" and said shitflake adornments by the big-name coffee shops.
Perhaps their other superpowers ought to get a mention, "Processor heating engineers", "Renowned cycle stealers" - even as i speak, their "MS Teams" is busy consuming 50% of my 5000 MIPs - testing some poor register bit to beyond death - in order to find out whether I've offered call quality feedback yet, or not. How can starving children program that badly?
Oh, and the whole "you said you didn't want your room tidied, so I did it when you weren't looking, and all your stuff is in the garden" approach to updates - which combines all their previous skills, the fatuous functionality, hogging the processor till you submit to their will, and adds deliberately breaking autosave - which now only works if you store onto MS cloud, rather than disk - and deliberately deleting or hiding documents you were working on.
Maybe "productivity assassins", "teletype tinkerers" - given that most of it is tinkerage now, Excel 2003 was the high point, and the teletype is nearly as old - and it's what they started on.
I don't know, maybe they should also be lambasted for the cringing "world" adverts, making shit office software and pretending it's saving the world? - "Teletype visionaries" - any sort of mash-up of the above?
Have to agree with Reg though, it's best sorted out over a long lunch.
Re: I'm so angry I can't think
I think all the above can be summed up in one word:- MegaSoft
Re: I'm so angry I can't think
I fear I am lacking all couth. I cannot summon ire at Windows. I actually like Win 10 - for some reason, it behaves itself on my machine, runs fast even on 8 year old gear, doesn’t get in the way of my apps, definitely doesn’t throw any unwanted pop ups in my face. Unlike much of the web.
And is actually easier to use than Ubuntu. That may just be the learning curve. While in Windows I can browse to SMB shares, in Ubuntu I get an unhelpful “nope, auth failed”, and no offer to type in a user / password. CLI allows me to mount a share with my Ubuntu username/password, so I know I got the user created right on the other end. Yet, no share browsing.
Must be that lack of couth again. Why browse shares when you can mount them? I dunno, it seems convenient.
I can RDP to Windows no problem, from anywhere. VNC to Ubuntu - not out of the box, or only with encryption off, if coming from Windows. “That’s the fault of your VNC client, peasant”. “You need to replace the Ubuntu-side server with TigerVNC, you noob”. I get it. Lack of couth. It can all be solved, and - is it asking too much to expect this stuff to, well, “just work”?
Re: I'm so angry I can't think
I agree with all the reasons there. And that ribbon, still drives me nuts today
Re: I'm so angry I can't think
"productivity assassins" has my vote. Oh, the number of days I've lost just trying to get their stuff to work. Even this week, having Win10 lock solid when I disconnect from VPN, requiring a forced power-down and losing all unsaved work (Word's autosave didn't!) - what OS is so bad as to allow a single user process to halt the whole machine? Oh, that's right, Windows...
Only one possibility
comes to mind, since I watch some random GoT episode yesterday:
Neverlearn Livebane
If only EE was not already taken. Embrace/Extend
Texting to the rescue
Mbrace X10d
Re: Texting to the rescue
Missed the edit window: M{&X10d
Redmond's besotted tinkerers
"update junkies" "toystore tinkers" "Updates R us"
He didn't get rich writing checks!
Compu-Global-Hyper-Mega-Net
Re: He didn't get rich writing checks!
Is the Junior Vice President available for comment?
What about:
The Usability Graveyard
Embrace™, Extend™, Extinguish™, Enterprise Edition™
God's Gift to Ransomware Writers
Or nice and simple and heartfelt:
The Anguish
There are too many! I think you need a list of them, and you use them at random from that list.
What to call Microsoft?
I'm going to go with "Sir" so they like me while hating the rest of you.
You will obey!
and install this download.
MS seem to be acting more and more like Daleks in recent times.
YOU WILL OBEY!
Seems about right.
{proudly MS free since Sept 2016}
Re: You will obey!
Right, so I've not been a fan since I first tried Linux but I don't get this.
How did we get from complaining that the 'mundanes' never kept their PCs up to date (and so threatened everyone's security) to complaining that doing it for them makes us update too? One or the other, please.
Besides, they've done much worse. Such as the data slurping.
Re: You will obey!
It's more the "I'm applying this update right now whether you want me to or not, and it'll break things you've been using for years, and it'll require a reboot? You say you're busy? Not near as busy as in half an hour when you're trying to get your computer to actually boot again..." kind of update.
Updates that FIX things are good. Updates that BREAK things are really, really bad. Updates you can't stop that break things are like being tied to the railroad tracks and watching the oncoming train.
Re: You will obey!
You don't have to obey. Microsoft give you choices:
Click here to upgrade to Windows 10 now.
Click here to schedule an upgrade to Windows 10 when you are not looking.
Close this window to upgrade to Windows 10.
Zero Wing
All your windows boxes are belong to us.
(Aka subscription model).
MicroMaud
Won't somebody please think of the children!
The Redmond Ring
I like the alliteration and the dual meaning of ring, both seem appropriate.
- A mafia ring
- Ring of power from LotR
how about
Crappy Valley...
Patchit & Pray...
The Windowland Zoo...
Ahayweh...
The Windowmaker
The Windows seller
The other cloud company
The Binged one
... It's a bit hard, they kind of lack personality these days.
I'll give it a go...
MicroStalker
Micro$haft