One thing, though. I think hard and long about what I post here and I'm sure there will be long and hard discussions about some things. I never will maliciously hurt my employer. I might post some things that appear to hurt, though, and those will cause discussions, I'm sure. Will I continue to be able to link to Dan Shafer, for instance, who's an avowed Microsoft hater?

Well, consider what a link to Dan does. It tells him I'm watching. Listening. Learning. Understanding. Partnering. Sharing.

Are these values that Microsoft shares? Well, I guess we'll find out together, won't we? May 12 the fun starts.

Mike Amundsen in my comments: "already i see you posting items regarding msft culture. will that be allowed to continue unchecked? will be interesting."

My answer? "I sure hope so. If Microsoft wants to turn around its public perception, it'll need to."

Julia Lerman points out that Robert Wlodarczyk won the US round of a software contest (hey, that last name is harder to spell than my wife's last name: Ghaemmaghami). Congrats!

Steve Ivy loaded Fire, a multi-protocol IM client for Mac OSX, just for me! It all works great.

Diane says "I just liked being in a place where we trusted customers, and we treated them in ways that I wanted to be treated." She now works for Microsoft. I'm gonna buy her lunch. This is my motto. "It's the customers stupid."

Mike Sax says there's some big "gotcha's" with the Creative Commons license scheme.

John Porcaro: "The point was made that there are a number of customers of ours that hate our company."

Wang Jian Shuo says KFC is a Japanese fast food restaurant. Uh, no. When I was in Shanghai five years ago there was more than 100 KFC's there.

But, Wang's weblog gives you a good idea of what it's like to live with SARS.

Hey, Maryam, let's go to Shanghai. They have a new Ikea.

Steve Ivy wrote me "you suck." Why? Cause he thinks I'm gonna give up AIM and force him to use Windows Messenger on his Mac. Isn't there a program like Trillian on the Mac? Oh, OK, I'll keep using AIM too (and ICQ). Do they allow using AOL software at Microsoft? Oh, sure! I met some really smart AOL developers last time I was at Microsoft. Gotta make sure their software keeps working.

Wireless News: "Why Blogs Haven't Stormed the Business World."

This guy totally doesn't get why blogging isn't taking off in the corporate world.

It has nothing to do with the tools. It has everything to do with management, who see no value in having their employees writing to each other, or writing directly to customers.

Management doesn't want us to blog. They want control. They want their lawyers, and highly-paid execs, and PR people to control the public speech. They don't understand communities. They don't understand networks. They even think there aren't real customers reading this weblog.

These are social problems, not technology ones.

Oh, oh, our favorite "anti-blogger" Andrew Orlowski over at the Register asks "Will we be able to trust [Joi] Ito's ongoing research analysis about his investment?" (Article about bubbles and how to spot them).

I know I'm gonna get some "negative email" on this one, but I just don't get iMusic. Why is this better than Pressplay or eMusic? It's yet another new music format that no one but Apple customers can play. I even find myself in agreement with that Register guy all of us webloggers are supposed to hate (hey, I'm in the cult, what can I say?).

JY via ICQ tells me "have you seen that Pierre Omidyar has a Weblog?"

"Who's he?" you ask. Oh, just the guy who started eBay.

Hey, Maryam, he's Iranian too! Hey, we should invite him over for some bademjoon (eggplant).

Hmm, there's a community (on Yahoo) that does nothing but talk about Microsoft communities. It's kept by Charles Carroll, who founded a bunch of ASP-focused mailing lists and has become more critical of Microsoft over the past few years. I like Charles, but know that his methods rub a lot of people the wrong way. I'll dive into this community and see where things go.

Tommy Williams explains why Microsoft holds lots of meetings. Sounds reasonable. I have learned the hard way to never send negative stuff via email. Always give bad news, or disagree with someone (other than what I do in my weblog, which is written for a public audience), face-to-face, or over the phone. If you deliver negative stuff via email, it is often misunderstood. Not to mention that person has the email to use against you anytime. I've thrown away hundreds of thousands of emails. I've kept every single negative one I've ever received. Yeah, I'm a masochist. Anytime I start thinking I'm mighty big I go back into the "crappy email" folder and reread them. That usually solves any ego problems I was working myself into.

Someday I just might publish them on my weblog. Heh. "Sucky emails Scoble has received." So, if you wanna tell me off in email, think about that one. Of course, you're welcome to tell me "you suck" via email at robertscoble@hotmail.com anytime.