back to article Microsoft goes green to win IE 8 and Bing users

The planet and economy have been co-opted by Microsoft in its latest effort to win back the web from open-source and Google. Microsoft has announced a $10,000 prize for developers that build what it calls "economy or ecology" themed web applications in its Will Code for Green challenge. All applications must consume Bing and …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Halo

    Feature comparison

    Yeah, like no one else has ever done that before. Why is it that a company does a standard practice with marketing no one bats an eyelash.

    However when Microsoft does it, an endless number of people will come out of the woodwork to complain at how 'Microsoft is Evil' and 'they are crushing everyone' and other such inflammatory statements.

  2. tfewster
    Jobs Halo

    Just a publicity stunt

    > Microsoft's ...campaign, ... will see the software giant donate... for every completed download of IE 8.

    If every download counts - I wonder how many times I can download and rollback the IE8 "upgrade" before August 8th?

    Dammit, foiled again:

    http://www.microsoft.com/Presspass/press/2009/jun09/06-10BetterBrowserPR.mspx

    "Microsoft is donating $1.15 per download to Feeding America(TM), up to a maximum of $1,000,000"

  3. Adam Azarchs
    Stop

    That comparison site

    is full of crock. Especially their "performance" claim. When I run the benchmarks, chrome comes out 350% faster, and let me tell you, I most definitely can tell the difference without "slow motion video".

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Linux

    Get The FUD

    They just end up looking even more stupid than Gordon Brown in a you tube video

  5. Jasmine Strong
    Coat

    Misappropriation of terms

    In the SF Bay area, "will code for green" means something quite different.

  6. Charles Manning

    I use Google for Free

    you don't have to pay me

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Will IE8 tell you which domains it's banning

    Javascript from?

    What's the point of a trusted sites if you can't work out which ones you need to add?

  8. N2

    Zero

    $10,0000 ? El Reg, you are so generous to would be FireFox deserters, by a factor of ten...

    However, theres no way id install IE 8.0 shite for any amount of money.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    money givaways are not a useful aproach

    All the money Microsoft had didn't stop them from losing in search to Google. Offering money won't win them a decent share back either.

    What they need to do is provide a high quality search that users find useful. All the incentives and buzzwords won't help if the core product isn't doing what its users want.

    Right now Google is doing what I want, so I'm happy using that. If Google got bad again (like the days of endless forum posts coming up as valid search results), I'd jump ship to whichever service was the new 'best', be it Yahoo or Microsoft.

    I have avoided microsoft search engines in the past, but not because its Microsoft, just because they weren't good enough. Will Bing be? Well, we'll see, won't we.

  10. Horridbloke
    Paris Hilton

    Buying BACK the web???

    Since when was the web Microsoft's? Never. They've tried enough times to move in and take it over, but they failed and what with the growing importance of little internet dohickeys that don't run windows the lock-out tactic they favour is looking more pathetic than ever. Sod off and die Redmond.

    Paris, because she's open.

    (No, I'm not an Apple user.)

  11. Giles Jones Gold badge

    You know when your products are dire when..

    ...you have to pay people to use them.

    Microsoft are two faced, they try and put technology out there and get it used under an open source model (silverlight). They steal their server improvement ideas from Apache and Linux (Server 2008) and then want to kill off the (open) source of all their good ideas.

    Is it any wonder most people can see through their silly schemes?

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Gnome-dex

    WTH is Gnomedex? Is it the Gnome developers get together or something? If it is, then I would rather be at the KDEdex but I would go the Gnomedex just to cough some swine germs amongst them. (to pay them back for the Gnome desktop)

  13. jjbaulikki

    10k is it?

    10k is all they could muster up for the environment?

  14. Mike48
    Go

    Downloading doesn't mean installing!!

    I don't care for their browser, never did but then I didn't care for Mosaic either! However, the site says "For every copy downloaded..." It doesn't say you have to install the damn thing, so come on folks, let's get Microsoft to spend that million!

    The only down side is MS gets to brag about doing something good... SO?

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    100 grand!! It's gone up!!

    "Last week, Microsoft Australia unveiled a $10,0000 inducement for end-users to dump Firefox for IE8. The $10,000 comes in the form of an online prize that you can only find, according to Microsoft, by uncovering clues optimized to the latest version of Microsoft's browser."

    Sod it, I'll drop FF for $100k! Sod it, I'll stop anything for $100k!

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Linux

    Sniff

    Is that the heady scent of desperation I detect?

  17. Greg J Preece

    *Splutter*

    From their oh-so-objective and not-even-slightly-a-lie comparison chart:

    " Internet Explorer 8 is more compatible with more sites on the Internet than any other browser. "

    *Cough* *Splutter* *Coffee*

    I'm sorry, say that again please. I'll try to keep a straight face this time.

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Gates Horns

    @*Splutter*

    Sorry but the statement " Internet Explorer 8 is more compatible with more sites on the Internet than any other browser. " is demonstrably true. Other browsers follow open universal standards only while IE8 follows universal open standards and also unique IE specific MS closed standards aka "quirks mode".

    As it is, it is bit rich for MS to claim this as a virtue, yes, but what would expect from this company with such a tarnished reputation. Anyone ask a web developer about purely IE only "quirks", but only do so if your not offended by strong language and also note the tortured expression on their face as they explain how IE only "quirks" affect their work as web developers.

    Just a bit of spin from MS that any politician would be proud off.

  19. Defiant
    Alert

    Rubbish

    I don't know anyone who believes this green rubbish so it looks like the hype worked

  20. Defiant
    Flame

    Hard of hearing

    "*Splutter*

    I'm sorry, say that again please. I'll try to keep a straight face this time."

    Linux fans have trouble reading too ?

  21. mmiied

    @ greg j preece

    probley right it works with all normal sites (eventley) and it works with all thouse sites that are microsfot only massups

  22. N2

    @ AC "Feature comparison "

    FireFox has around 47% of the market + Microsoft losing market share = desperation

  23. Chewy

    possible

    "According to Microsoft, the "facts" show IE 8 beats Firefox 3.0 and Chrome 2.0 in a number of areas and features" - bugs perhaps? I've definitely had IE8 crash on me a few times now which didn't happen in IE7.

  24. Eponymous Cowherd
    Thumb Down

    Re:*Splutter*

    Microsoft's marketing muppets aren't any different to anyone else's. They give you the 'facts' but not the context of those 'facts'.

    In this case, when they say "Internet Explorer 8 is more compatible with more sites on the Internet than any other browser." they are including all of the non W3C compliant, IE only, sites as well.

    So what they are saying is true only because of the legacy of IE 5/6 and the number of poorly written sites that are only compatible with those steaming piles of donkey doo-doo.

    And that's being distantly unfair to donkey poo.

  25. Ken Hagan Gold badge

    Failed already

    "All applications must consume Bing..."

    ...without bringing him back up again?

    ...rather than taking a facial?

    Sorry, MS, but this is on a par with "All your base are belong to us". If your grasp of other languages is a poor as this example of English (I'm guessing here, by the way), then maybe the reason that the web doesn't belong to you is that normal people think you smell of nerd.

  26. frank ly

    @Jasmine Strong re.Misappropriation of terms

    "In the SF Bay area, "will code for green" means something quite different."

    Does it mean "I'll develop software for cash."? I enjoy puzzles :)

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not exactly philathropy

    If it was they would just give the money anyway.

    Instead - it's an unbelievably cynical stunt to gain market share.

    And that's not anti-MS ... I would be skeptical of anyone doing this.

  28. Ray0x6

    Don't use IE8 and you are killing the environment

    A positive message indeed, but I thought the point of being in business was to provide a product people need in return for money as opposed to providing a product nobody needs and paying them to take it.

    I guess it just proves that Adam Smith and I know f*ck all about modern business.

  29. Toastan Buttar
    Go

    I talk to the trees...

    ...and they tell me they like nothing better than to snack on sunlight and CO2. To improve the ecology, I propose to encourage tree growth by raising the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere. I'll use Bing to look up how this can be acomplished...

    ...oh.

  30. Neil Lewis

    Microsoft? Green?

    If ever a company was the antithesis of "green", MS would be it. Their whole business model depends on forcing people to use ever more bloated software that needs ever more power hungry hardware to do the exact same things as before. They and Intel between them are responsible for huge quantities of unnecessary emissions. Hmmm. That could sound like a juvenile joke about pr0n but it's not.

  31. Toastan Buttar

    @Eponymous Cowherd

    "In this case, when they say "Internet Explorer 8 is more compatible with more sites on the Internet than any other browser." they are including all of the non W3C compliant, IE only, sites as well."

    Of course they are ! After all, they are 'websites' on the 'Internet'. Like it or not, there are a huge number of tuned-for-IE sites making up the WWW and you're more likely to have it rendered as intended by using IE. You also have the option with IE8 to toggle between compatibility and legacy modes to see which works best.

    MS's statement is fact, whatever the reasons for the situation existing.

  32. James Pickett

    Spin

    "get the facts"

    You just know that anyone using that phrase means the precise opposite (and if uttered by Steve Ballmer, it also means 'hide the chairs')

  33. CorpusCani

    MS web dominance...

    ------------------

    Since when was the web Microsoft's? Never. They've tried enough times to move in and take it over, but they failed and what with the growing importance of little internet dohickeys that don't run windows the lock-out tactic they favour is looking more pathetic than ever.

    ------------------

    They've not given up yet though... they're still trying to dominate the web; but from both sides, server and client:

    http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2009/06/17/june_2009_web_server_survey.html

  34. DiskJunky

    "Disputed claims"

    Did anyone browse to the comparison site with FireFox? I nearly fell off my seat laughing. Nice to see FireFox developers one step ahead :-D

  35. Toastan Buttar
    Gates Halo

    Bing

    I do all my Googling using Bing these days.

  36. Anonymous Coward
    Linux

    Classic Greenwashing

    MS is trying to pass something is ecologically sound when not. Vista and their OS, not to mention their applications, following Moore's law are so power hungry they can keep a room warm in the Winter. The OLPC/Sugar Sanpdragon netboohs and reduced OSes and apps that can run off a solar cell...now that's Green

  37. Goat Jam
    Gates Horns

    If Microsoft were interested in green

    Then they wouldn't be busy stamping on all the ultra low power ARM netbooks to make sure consumers never get a chance to buy them.

    http://www.vanwensveen.nl/rants/microsoft/IhateMS.html

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