Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Rob Mayfield — Wed, 10 Jan 2007 22:15:14 GMT

Other than Windows itself, I wonder if the free Acers were preloaded with vulnerabilities ?

http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/archive-012007.html#00001073

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Rob Farley — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 23:52:08 GMT

:) I wasn't being all that serious. I figure that people who receive stuff like that are lucky, but that it's not worth trying to 'create' luck like that. If they want to offer me something, then great. But if not, so be it.

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Michael Walsh — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 11:07:45 GMT

Don't look at me... my reach doesn't stretch that far. Besides, last time I heard NOTHING gets out of Acer without a receipt LOL.

Give Edelman a ring before the unwanted ones all end up on eBay ;)

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Rob Farley — Mon, 08 Jan 2007 00:28:10 GMT

Ah, I see. Nice. Really what I need to do is find someone who works for Acer who would give me a nice desktop-replacement machine that I can use for training, presenting, that kind of thing. Something which will happily run Virtual Server with SQL2005 installed. ;)

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Michael Walsh — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 17:42:27 GMT

I know. You're thinking: there are hundreds of JMPs out there so why should this be any different?

What normally happens when MS rolls out a new software (it happened before with Windows XP Tablet Edition in 2002) is that they showcase it on fully-working machines (obviously).

Microsoft orders and pays for "x" number of notebooks from whatever PC vendor it chooses (Acer on both occasions can't be a bad sign LOL) and then demos them or sends them out to "a chosen few".

In this case the same happened with the Acer Ferraris but rather than go to journalists, they went to bloggers. Like I said, brilliant PR for Acer (heard ANY bad comments about the machines so far??). If only we'd known in advance....

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Rob Farley — Sat, 06 Jan 2007 00:36:15 GMT

Hmm... that's interesting. :)

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Michael Walsh — Fri, 05 Jan 2007 12:13:45 GMT

Hi Rob,

Sorry I’m late to the party but I thought you’d appreciate some input from Acer.

No, wait. FULL DISLOSURE: I work with Acer EMEA’s marketing team. I have my own independent blog with no official affiliation with Acer <A HREF=”http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/yada+yada”>yada yada</A>…

Sorry, Scoble-induced safety measures…

OK. The “free notebook” story is on everyone’s lips, so are the names involved, Microsoft, Edelman and Acer, not to mention Microsoft’s growing list of MVPs.

There are hundreds of conspiracy theories floating around (well one big one really) yet I just wanted to throw this spanner into the works.

Acer’s EMEA marketing team knew nothing about this. Sounds crazy I know but it’s true. In fact I’ll go so far as to say we only found out after <A HREF=http://scobleizer.com/2006/12/27/i-think-the-microsoft-vista-giveaway-is-an-awesome-idea/>Scoble</A> published!

Of course <I>someone</I> must have known, as that many Ferraris don’t get out the door that quietly in one go but whoever it was probably thought he’d just made his Christmas bonus.. For us, it was a great way to end the year.

Talk about free publicity…!

I’m not condoning or attacking these marketing tactics, but you’ve got to admit that from my standpoint, Acer couldn’t have asked for more.

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

the happy moose — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 20:11:37 GMT

reg has picked this up also ...

http://www.theregister.com/2007/01/02/microsoft_free_ferarri_pc/

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Rob Farley — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 01:44:53 GMT

Mitch, I agree. Some of my favourite feeds are ones that have many people contributing. But I also keep coming across blogs (I should say 'feeds', because they're certainly not always individuals) that I want to subscribe to. Technorati can be good, but often they can be way to broad in the number of posts they pick up.

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Jeff Wharton — Sat, 30 Dec 2006 02:04:31 GMT

Wow, talk about a storm in a tea cup! Sounds like a the only people complaining are those jealous people that didn't get one.

BTW - Australian IT even has a news article about it : http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,20986786%5E15306%5E%5Enbv%5E,00.html

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Mitch Denny — Fri, 29 Dec 2006 11:22:32 GMT

Hi Rob,

I think to be a successful blog READER you need to seek multiple opinions on the same subject. Don't just subscribe to one blog, subscribe to three or more, or even better a Technorati feed.

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Rob Farley — Fri, 29 Dec 2006 05:31:12 GMT

Oh, congrats Sandi. If you feel you can keep it, then do so. If you need suggestions about who to give it away to, let me know. ;)

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

Jay Furr — Fri, 29 Dec 2006 05:30:25 GMT

Rob,

Do they sell Velveeta in Australia? I've found that a lot of disappointments in life can be ameliorated by consuming melted Velveeta on taco chips, especially if you add a bit of salsa and maybe some jalapeño pepper slices.

re: Ok, who didn't get an Acer laptop?

sandi — Fri, 29 Dec 2006 05:23:33 GMT

And me...