AP tracks down Microsoft's converted-Mac user...

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=528&ncid=528&e=15&u=/ap/20021
014/ap_on_hi_te/microsoft_ad

By TED BRIDIS
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - Who was that mysterious Windows user?

Red-faced executives at Microsoft Corp. on Monday pulled a breezy
advertisement purportedly by a free-lance writer who switched to using
Windows software from the rival Macintosh, amid questions about whether
the woman actually exists.

An employee at a public relations company hired by Microsoft, Valerie G.
Mallinson of Shoreline, Wash., later acknowledged she was Microsoft's
mysterious convert. The Associated Press tracked Mallinson by examining
personal data hidden within documents that Microsoft had published with
its controversial ad.

"I guess I can tell the truth," Mallinson said Monday. "It was me. I
made the switch." 

Microsoft's effort was an apparent response to a popular, national
campaign by Apple Computer Corp. featuring names, photographs and
testimonials from customers who began using Macintosh technology because
of frustration with Windows.

In Microsoft's ad volley, an unidentified woman wrote that she jumped to
Microsoft after eight years as a loyal Macintosh user and boasted that
the "process of switching was as easy as the marketing hype had
promised." 

Trouble erupted after amateur sleuths at a popular technology Web site,
Slashdot.org, noticed that a photograph showing the woman with a cup of
coffee was a stock image available for purchase elsewhere on the
Internet. 

Other Internet users picked out what few personal details they could
find hinting at the woman's identity. Unlike the Apple ads, which
prominently include customers' names, Microsoft's mentioned only that
the author was a 5-foot-3-inch free-lance writer who once rented a Lexus
and is married to a man who is 6 feet tall.

Microsoft acknowledged that the writer's anonymity and use of the stock
photograph contributed to suspicions whether it was making truthful
representations. Executives pulled the ad Monday but still would not
identify the author by name.

"It was an actual customer," spokeswoman Charmaine Gravning said. "We
kind of figured out that really isn't the best way to go about
communicating. We decided it was best to point customers to the Windows
XP home page." 

Documents accompanying the ad, which encouraged other Windows users to
tell Microsoft about their experiences, included hidden references to
Mallinson's name, public relations firm, Wes Rataushk & Associates Inc.,
and personal Web site.

Gravning confirmed Microsoft hired Rataushk for the ad.

A spokeswoman from Apple Computer would not comment.



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