Free Stuff from Microsoft: What’s Your Take on It?
I’m a homemom and love getting free stuff, I also have a site online where I review books I’ve read. In return most of the author’s send me their books as a thank you and hope for a good review. I must admit, not all the time are they happy with the reviews, but they never ask for the books back and it adds to my growing library.
You may and may not have heard, but Microsoft is doing something similar and there is a huge debate going on throughout the blogosphere on it. Microsoft is sending popular bloggers an email asking them to review their products and are willing to part with their Ferrari 1000s and 5000s. These are more their review laptops but still very nice to own. Not everyone agrees with this idea though, I’m not 100% why.
Some believe it is Microsoft’s way of bribing them, but if they aren’t telling you to write a positive review I can’t see that being the case. I am looking at it as their way of getting more products out there in the blogosphere for people to talk about and generate word-of-mouth. After all isn’t that what the world has come to? People learn about products on the television and blogs. Not to mention even if it was a bad review people would still want to find out for themselves and it could also drive traffic to their website. It’s a win-win situation for Microsoft and a win for bloggers that agree to have the laptops sent to them. See Vista is coming out in less than a month and of course Microsoft needs people to be able to review the product. If a person doesn’t have the computer that is compatable how can they say yeah or nah on it?
I’ve also read that Microsoft is allowing the blogger to keep the computer forever, or return it after the reviews. I’m not sure if they are letting them keep these computers for free of after the review they plan on charging them. Maybe Microsoft can answer that question. But to me, it sounds like a nice PR scheme and a great review gift to receive…I didn’t get the email though so I guess I’ll be reading what other reviewers think about the product.
How has your luck been with Microsoft? I, myself love the company at least Microsoft Word, that’s my favorite thing to use when writing. I know there are many other things out there but that’s the one I use the most. I’ve had bad luck with one company though…DELL and let’s just say I’ll save that for another post. But never tell me a computer can’t blow up, they can.
I say as long as it is free and they don’t REQUIRE a positive review it gets a thumbs up. Especially for those of us that probably would never discover the product or just don’t have that kind of money to spend on it.
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