[quote]Surface Pro The laptop in tablet form, built by Microsoft, ruins your favorite Windows desktop programs and includes a one month free trial of Office 365. Starting at $799 Learn more[/quote]
Wow. I count no less than 6 problems here.
[quote]To be eligible for trade-in, device should include power cord, if available, and device cannot be password protected.[/quote]
How much store credit will they give for a very "gently used" Surface?
I'm not sure how Microsoft defines "Gently Used" since they are always tossing the Surfaces around in their commercials.
I *might* spend up to $20 for a Surface Pro. I understand they make good bun warmers for the Thanksgiving Day table.
Poor Uncle Fester. Everyone knows he's a lame duck at Microsoft and gets no respect. Even in the mail room the employees elbow him and say things like, "Do that monkey boy dance again."
Obviously, Microsoft is trying to buy the iPad and put the Microsoft Logo on the home button and give it to the next customer with that buy back gift card! Voila~ Their tablet just works all of sudden!! Very clever Microsoft!
it sounds like a MS is now in the car business, who else buys buy competitor products so they can sell you their new product.
Remember MS can afford to do this since they already wrote off the inventory so giving out a credit to allow them to sell at full price will actually be money in the bank for them.
Poor Uncle Fester. Everyone knows he's a lame duck at Microsoft and gets no respect. Even in the mail room the employees elbow him and say things like, "Do that monkey boy dance again."
What will Uncle Fester do now that he's retiring? Run for Congress?
What if Microsoft gave a special offer and nobody came?
What will really be interesting is if Microsoft has the guts to release the stats on the number of people who take them up on this offer. I suspect it will be very few. This could wind up turning into a promotion for Apple.
You know the Surface COULD have been a decent machine for those who wanted to stay with a Microsoft OS, but they screwed it up. I went into the pop-up store that Microsoft set up in Times Square last holiday season and was so frustrated trying the machine out that I wanted to pick it up and slam it into the wall. The ancillary keyboard was so bad that I felt like it was a prize won in an arcade machine or something bought for pennies at a flea market.
The problem for Microsoft is they can’t offload their tablets by bundling them with tv sets or washing machines like our good friend Samsung. So they lose face with a very visible act of desperation (freebies aren’t always acts of desperation, so they are less hurtful for a brand). They really want to get rid of those Surfaces before the Surface 2 comes along.
For myself, I’m committed for about $200 on my iPad on the Appstore. Losing that and starting all over again on a noticeably less developed ecosystem negates the $200 that MS would offer me... So I would buy a printer, an HDD or something else with the money. So they might not even sell that many Surfaces from this promo.
After winning a Microsoft Surface at a happy hour raffle, I ended up with a $540 gift card to the Microsoft Store in NYC. I figured I could at least sell it on Craigslist for $400, or maybe use it online to buy 3rd party products from their online store. I was wrong. The best offer I've received on the gift card after 2 months of continuous listing on Craigslist was $250. Also, their gift cards are only usable in-store, they can't be used in their online store or in the X-Box store. What a joke.
Since when is it good business practice to try to hurt your competitor by going out and BUYING that competitor's product in a futile attempt to reduce their market share? Guess what: they'll make more!
The only time that would work is when your competitor is selling the product at below cost (such as every smartphone maker except Apple and Sammy). Even Amazon doesn't want to sell Kindles to landfills, they want to get them into the hands of folks who will buy e-books.
After winning a Microsoft Surface at a happy hour raffle, I ended up with a $540 gift card to the Microsoft Store in NYC.... The best offer I've received on the gift card after 2 months of continuous listing on Craigslist was $250.... What a joke.
The joke's on you, because YOU still have to pay income tax on the raffle prize's official value (many states like Calif. consider "raffles" to be gambling, and thus taxable). So if your federal marginal rate is 33%, and your state marginal rate is 7%, then you owe $540 x 40% = $216. If you sold it for $250, your net prize was $34. Congratulations!
What will Uncle Fester do now that he's retiring? Run for Congress?
The Bing on his shirt reminds me of a big box office store which presented me with a Bing Map to locate their store near me. OMG it was about 1/4 mile in error, pegging it at a location with absolutely no stores of any kind.
Another of my Bing experiences was on a demo Surface to locate my house. Sort of OK, was only about 500 ft off, but showed other roads which I know will NEVER be built as they would be in a dedicated green space ravine.
Comments
The laptop in tablet form, built by Microsoft, ruins your favorite Windows desktop programs and includes a one month free trial of Office 365.
Starting at $799
Learn more[/quote]
Wow. I count no less than 6 problems here.
[quote]To be eligible for trade-in, device should include power cord, if available, and device cannot be password protected.[/quote]
Hahahaha
I'm not sure how Microsoft defines "Gently Used" since they are always tossing the Surfaces around in their commercials.
I *might* spend up to $20 for a Surface Pro. I understand they make good bun warmers for the Thanksgiving Day table.
Poor Uncle Fester. Everyone knows he's a lame duck at Microsoft and gets no respect. Even in the mail room the employees elbow him and say things like, "Do that monkey boy dance again."
Obviously, Microsoft is trying to buy the iPad and put the Microsoft Logo on the home button and give it to the next customer with that buy back gift card! Voila~ Their tablet just works all of sudden!! Very clever Microsoft!
Surface Pro
The laptop in tablet form, built by Microsoft, ruins your favorite Windows desktop programs and includes a one month free trial of Office 365.
Starting at $799
Learn more
Wow. I count no less than 6 problems here.
Hahahaha
I counted only 5. What's the sixth?
Totally transparent act of desperation.
it sounds like a MS is now in the car business, who else buys buy competitor products so they can sell you their new product.
Remember MS can afford to do this since they already wrote off the inventory so giving out a credit to allow them to sell at full price will actually be money in the bank for them.
What will Uncle Fester do now that he's retiring? Run for Congress?
What will really be interesting is if Microsoft has the guts to release the stats on the number of people who take them up on this offer. I suspect it will be very few. This could wind up turning into a promotion for Apple.
You know the Surface COULD have been a decent machine for those who wanted to stay with a Microsoft OS, but they screwed it up. I went into the pop-up store that Microsoft set up in Times Square last holiday season and was so frustrated trying the machine out that I wanted to pick it up and slam it into the wall. The ancillary keyboard was so bad that I felt like it was a prize won in an arcade machine or something bought for pennies at a flea market.
The problem for Microsoft is they can’t offload their tablets by bundling them with tv sets or washing machines like our good friend Samsung. So they lose face with a very visible act of desperation (freebies aren’t always acts of desperation, so they are less hurtful for a brand). They really want to get rid of those Surfaces before the Surface 2 comes along.
For myself, I’m committed for about $200 on my iPad on the Appstore. Losing that and starting all over again on a noticeably less developed ecosystem negates the $200 that MS would offer me... So I would buy a printer, an HDD or something else with the money. So they might not even sell that many Surfaces from this promo.
Lol, that's pretty aggressive. They really, really want a toehold in this market.
After winning a Microsoft Surface at a happy hour raffle, I ended up with a $540 gift card to the Microsoft Store in NYC. I figured I could at least sell it on Craigslist for $400, or maybe use it online to buy 3rd party products from their online store. I was wrong. The best offer I've received on the gift card after 2 months of continuous listing on Craigslist was $250. Also, their gift cards are only usable in-store, they can't be used in their online store or in the X-Box store. What a joke.
Star Wars?
Since when is it good business practice to try to hurt your competitor by going out and BUYING that competitor's product in a futile attempt to reduce their market share? Guess what: they'll make more!
The only time that would work is when your competitor is selling the product at below cost (such as every smartphone maker except Apple and Sammy). Even Amazon doesn't want to sell Kindles to landfills, they want to get them into the hands of folks who will buy e-books.
After winning a Microsoft Surface at a happy hour raffle, I ended up with a $540 gift card to the Microsoft Store in NYC.... The best offer I've received on the gift card after 2 months of continuous listing on Craigslist was $250.... What a joke.
The joke's on you, because YOU still have to pay income tax on the raffle prize's official value (many states like Calif. consider "raffles" to be gambling, and thus taxable). So if your federal marginal rate is 33%, and your state marginal rate is 7%, then you owe $540 x 40% = $216. If you sold it for $250, your net prize was $34. Congratulations!
Is this a joke? If true it simply illustrates how out of touch MS is.
Now if they offered $200 for a netbook trade in they may get some bites.
Anyway MS doesn't have to worry about these "possible" iPad trade ins breaking their bank !
What will Uncle Fester do now that he's retiring? Run for Congress?
The Bing on his shirt reminds me of a big box office store which presented me with a Bing Map to locate their store near me. OMG it was about 1/4 mile in error, pegging it at a location with absolutely no stores of any kind.
Another of my Bing experiences was on a demo Surface to locate my house. Sort of OK, was only about 500 ft off, but showed other roads which I know will NEVER be built as they would be in a dedicated green space ravine.
Where in the hell does Bing gets it's maps?
If MS gave me a Surface for free I might...might...accept it. And then use it as a paperweight for the paper I no longer use because I have an iPad.