Adam Orth leaves Microsoft

[kyrathaba]

http://www.theverge.com/2013/4/10/4210870/adam-orth-leaves-microsoft

Adam Orth, the Microsoft Studios creative director who came under fire for controversial comments on "always-on" consoles, has left the company. The news was first reported by Game Informer, and Polygon has independently confirmed his departure with two sources. It's unclear, however, whether Orth was fired or left his position voluntarily...

[40hz]

Interesting...

But if you read between the lines of Microsoft's terse 'apology,' I think his 'resignation' had more to do with his speaking specifics about the new XBox (before Microsoft was ready to talk about it) than it did with whatever ill will his comments on Twitter caused.

We apologize for the inappropriate comments made by an employee on Twitter yesterday. This person is not a spokesperson for Microsoft, and his personal views do not reflect the customer centric approach we take to our products or how we would communicate directly with our loyal consumers. We are very sorry if this offended anyone, however we have not made any announcements about our product roadmap, and have no further comment on this matter.

Oh well. Hope he kept his LinkedIn profile up to date.

[kyrathaba]

Oh well. Hope he kept his LinkedIn profile up to date.

Gotta be extremely careful in today's politically correct world.

[wraith808]

I didn't see that ending any other way.  I've always viewed twitter a bit like this...

Oh well. Hope he kept his LinkedIn profile up to date.

Gotta be extremely careful in today's politically correct world.

-kyrathaba (April 11, 2013, 02:10 PM)

Truthfully, don't think this had anything to do with being PC, but more about being stupid.

[40hz]

Truthfully, don't think this had anything to do with being PC, but more about being stupid.

-wraith808 (April 11, 2013, 02:21 PM)

Agree. Microsoft isn't shy about controversy or stepping on toes when it suits them. Ballmer made a career out of being offensive in public. Many IT managers still remember Microsoft's keynote at CeBIT where we were collectively told to either get on board with the game plan and 'vision' for Windows 8 - or plan on getting new jobs soon - because Microsoft was going to do this with, without, or even in spite of us if necessary.

Nope. Orth got bopped for opening up the XBox kimono a little too much without permission. That he did so in a rude fashion was just the icing that made his eventual booting by Microsoft look a lot more "for the customer" than it really was.

[wraith808]

Nope. Orth got bopped for opening up the XBox kimono a little too much without permission. That he did so in a rude fashion was just the icing that made his eventual booting by Microsoft look a lot more "for the customer" than it really was.

-40hz (April 11, 2013, 02:56 PM)

He also communicated it in a way that was anti-customer, which with the upcoming war coming, they don't want.  They want to phrase the conversation.  And from what I've seen, the phrasing is subtly different than Orth's, i.e. the always on is in the way of their cable presence and close partnership with Xfinity...  it looks like they're making the new xbox into a cable box.  It's an interesting strategy- but definitely one that can't be communicated like Orth did... or you'll get the response he did.

[kyrathaba]

That he did so in a rude fashion was just the icing that made his eventual booting by Microsoft look a lot more "for the customer" than it really was.

but definitely one that can't be communicated like Orth did... or you'll get the response he did.

Agreed.

[wraith808]

Your tweets are always on: Adam Orth leaving Microsoft proves personal twitter accounts are dead