“Microsoft is skewering Google again with scathing ads that say as much about the dramatic shift in the technology industry’s competitive landscape as they do about the animosity between the two rivals,” Michael Liedtke reports for The Associated Press. “The missive that began Tuesday marks the third phase in a 5-month-old marketing campaign that Microsoft Corp. derisively calls ‘Scroogled.’ The ads, which have appeared online, on television and in print, depict Google as a duplicitous company more interested in increasing profits and power than protecting people’s privacy and providing unbiased search results.”
“This time, Microsoft is vilifying Google Inc. for sharing some of the personal information that it gathers about people who buy applications designed to run on smartphones and tablet computers powered by Google’s Android software,” Liedtke reports. “arlier ads have skewered Google’s long-running practice of electronically scanning the contents of people’s Gmail accounts to help sell ads and attacked a recently introduced policy that requires retailers to pay to appear in the shopping section of Google’s dominant search engine.”
“”We think we have a better alternative that doesn’t do these kinds of nefarious things,” said Greg Sullivan, Microsoft’s senior manager for Windows Phone, the business taking aim at Google’s distribution of personal information about buyers of Android apps,” Liedtke reports. “Google has evolved from an endearing Internet startup to an imposing giant running Web and mobile services that vacuum intimate details about people’s lives. Despite repeated management assurances about respecting personal privacy, Google has experienced several lapses that have resulted in regulatory fines, settlements and scorn around the world. Beyond privacy, Google has been the subject of complaints that its practices are anti-competitive.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take:
Push as many new customers Apple’s way as your marketing budget will allow, Microsoft.
Concerned consumers will gravitate even more to iPads, iPad minis, iPhones, and iPod touches, not to beleaguered Nokia’s phones or Microsoft’s GWAK tablets. After all, those toting around Windows Phones or Surface tablets make even Android settlers look like rocket scientists instead of unprincipled and/or clueless skinflints.
Hey, Ballmer: We like your strategy. We like it a lot.
Related articles:
Analyst: Microsoft’s Surface RT on track to join Zune and Kin in the great consumer electronics discount rack in the sky – March 13, 2013
Microsoft’s ‘Surface Pro’ tablet slammed by negative reviews – February 7, 2013
9 out of 10 businesses support Apple iPhones and iPads – February 6, 2013
Apple’s iPad dominates tablets with 81% Web usage share; Amazon Kindle Fire distant 2nd with 7.7% – February 6, 2013
The Verge reviews Microsoft’s Surface Pro: Too big, too fat, frustratingly poor battery life; it just feels limiting – February 6, 2013
Microsoft’s Windows RT: Circling the bowl – February 5, 2013
Windows 8 bloat: Microsoft’s 64GB Surface Pro will offer users only 23GB of available storage space – January 29, 2013
Microsoft doesn’t reveal Surface sales, and probably never will – January 24, 2013
Microsoft blames PC makers for Windows 8 flop – January 24, 2013
Fujitsu President: Weak demand for Microsoft’s Windows 8 killing PC Sales – December 28, 2012
Philip Greenspun: Microsoft’s Windows 8 is a Christmas gift for someone you hate – December 7, 2012
MKM Partners cuts Microsoft price target, estimates on lower than expected Surface, Windows 8 sales – December 5, 2012
Why Microsoft’s Surface tablet is doomed – December 5, 2012
App developers shun Microsoft’s Surface tablet – December 4, 2012
Microsoft Surface Pro to offer only half the battery life of Apple’s latest iPad with Retina display – November 30, 2012
Microsoft’s Surface Pro iPad killer to start at $899 – November 29, 2012
Microsoft’s Surface tablet flops, orders reportedly cut in half – November 29, 2012
TechCrunch’s Siegler reviews Microsoft Surface RT: ‘It’s time for a drop test – right into the garbage can’ – November 19, 2012
Slate reviews Microsoft’s Surface tablet: Too slow, mercilessly buggy; why is it so bad? – November 6, 2012
InfoWorld reviews Microsoft Surface RT: A disappointment; you’re better off with Apple’s iPad – October 31, 2012
Gizmodo reviews Microsoft Surface RT: Do not buy; inferior to Apple’s iPad; the worst of both worlds – October 25, 2012
The Verge reviews Microsoft Surface RT tablet: ‘The whole thing is honestly perplexing; who is this for?’ – October 24, 2012
ZDNet’s Kingsley-Hughes: Microsoft’s Windows 8 is an awful, horrible, painful design disaster – June 8, 2012
Analyst meets with big computer maker, finds ‘general lack of enthusiasm’ for Windows 8 – June 8, 2012
Dvorak: Windows 8 an unmitigated disaster; unusable and annoying; it makes your teeth itch – June 3, 2012
The Guardian: Microsoft’s Windows 8 is confusing as hell; an appalling user experience – March 5, 2012
More good news for Apple: Microsoft previews Windows 8 (with video) – June 1, 2011
Good for Microsoft. At least they can do something right. Although I guess there stock isn’t in the toilet for the last six months. And Balmer, isn’t he a funny looking guy? I’d hate to see them get rid of him. Who’d give the crazy on stage presentations? I like to replay the one where he pulls a muscle as he’s bouncing around the stage yelling “I love this company”. It doesn’t get much better than that!
Paid FUD ConTroll
How interesting is to see mafiasoft complaining about Google’s strategy for bundling products and sevices. Mafiasoft did and till does that, but as we can see, tasting their own poison seems not be so good!
I don’t use any services or products from those two compaies!
First rule of Marketing, one should not mention competitor by name or by association.
That’s only a rule for the market leader. Microsoft is nowhere near that, so they can mention names. Pepsi can mention Coke. Coke ignores Pepsi.
Avis doesn’t mention Hertz, just that “We try harder.”
It is amazing to me that any business would allow their employees to acces the Internet through any Google product, and in the process invite Google to mine all manner of the companies internal data. Business use of Gmail, from which Google mines data, seriously? Not to mention Google Patent search, web search, maps, etc…..
Good for Microsoft.
MDN, why attack the enemy of Apple’s enemy?
It’s nice to watch a fight between Microsloth and someone else for a change. Where’s the popcorn?
Oh sh!t. I missed phase 1 and 2. WTF. I guess I need to start following some MS blogs to know what ‘marketing’ campaign MS is pushing because this is the first I’ve heard of screwgled.
“Tuesday marks the third phase in a 5-month-old marketing campaign that Microsoft Corp. derisively calls ‘Scroogled.’”
” …a duplicitous company more interested in increasing profits and power than protecting people’s privacy and providing unbiased search results.” Isn’t Microsoft calling the kettle black?
Run “LittleSnitch”(tm) and see how Microsoft tracks YOUR activities, mines YOUR data (assuming you use MS Office, etc.)!
”We think we have a better alternative that doesn’t do these kinds of nefarious things,” said Greg Sullivan”
At least not openly. They’ve been doing it ever since MS Office began. Why do you think all governments use MS Office? So they can track data and blackmail the writers. This is not paranoia, this is fact. (Look at the code. NSA flags., etc.)
First, reporting back to Microsoft has NOT been in MS Office since the beginning. Pure, utter lie. I remember when the first version of Office shipped. (I may still have the hardbound PowerPoint user manual around!) AOL wasn’t even up and running on Apple’s internal network yet (yes, that’s where AOL started its life). Back then if you wanted ‘net access you went through either private services or dial up systems like GEnie or BIX.
MS Office reporting back did not pickup until Office 2001 and didn’t really get going until Office v.X.
Second, why have so many U.S. Government Agencies standardized on Office? It’s because those agencies gave their CTOs and IT Directors near absolute power to choose. Once this became known to Microsoft they pulled out all the stops to convince these people to go with MS products exclusively. There are many, many very well documented cases of how Microsoft spent tons of money to get these guys on their side. Just look of the case of the U.S. Navy’s decree several years ago (by the Navy CTO) that only Windows will be used as an OS unless the purchasing organization did one hell of a lot of justification (resulting in some ships being stranded in deep water when the entire network controlling everything from communications to propulsion went down and could not be rebooted) — all because Microsoft wined and dined and flew the Navy CTO to all kinds of exotic place for “product demonstrations”. The same can be said for NASA. One NASA official decreed that all Macs must be replaced with Windows based machines (even Macs less than a month old). This was after Microsoft wined and dined him and flew him to various places for “product demonstrations” and even featured him in several Microsoft produced videos. The U.S. DOE was not any better. In the early 90s Los Alamos was one the largest sites in the world for Mac usage. Then MS convinced the DOE that Windows was better and Macs quickly faded to the far also ran platform. The list goes on and on and on.
Were these actions illegal? No. Were they unethical? Yes. A few of those CTOs and IT Directors lost their jobs once MS’s actions became public. However, all those Windows boxes stayed and all the Macs stayed gone. The agencies were not going to spend even more money putting the Macs back after the world found out how much they spent to get rid of them.
None of these situations were based upon Microsoft reporting back information to the U.S. Government. None of them were base upon writing specific code into MS Office products so the U.S. Government can track what you put into your documents. Hell, that would have been an additional cost to Microsoft. Microsoft does not do anything that costs them more than the minimum.
If MS Office is reporting everything to the NSA and other U.S. Government Agencies then post a few snippets of that code here to prove it. Either that or everyone should understand you’re just spouting crap.