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If you could go anywhere in the world and meet with any geek, executive, or company, who would it be?

That’s the question posted by the Scobelizer, in relation to the recent meta-flap over the launch of Cuil over the last few days. So here’s my answer:

Microsoft, and their product family leaders.

I would love to understand the inner workings of the monolith - how MS can continue to be ridiculously profitable on core products whose demise has been forecast as long as they have existed, and how MS can miss the mark so often on forays outside of their core - i.e.: WinMo vs. iphone, Live vs. Google, Origami, etc. How does the xBox division differ organizationally from the rest of the company such that they’re able to deliver market-leading products?

Perhaps its boring that I’m not really interested in the latest startup, but I’d take GM over Tesla for an interview any day too. What about you?

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Is Apple Paying for Product Placement in Paperbacks?

I really have to wonder after reading “The Book of the Dead” by Doug Preston and Lincoln Child, which contained this oddly sychophantic paragraph:

She plugged in her laptop and booted it up. At the insistence of her husband, Bill, she had recently switched from a PC to a Mac, and now the boot-up process took a tenth of the time - zero to sixty in 8.9 seconds instead of two and a half plodding minutes. It had been like trading up from a Ford Fiesta to a Mercedes SL. As she watched the Apple logo appear, she thought that at least one thing in her life was going right. [Book of the Dead, p95, Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child]

Hrm. Most of the book reads like the enjoyably light, fanciful mystery novel that it is, except for this jarring excerpt which reads like ill-conceived ad copy. Is this fawning, hyperbolic frippery literary filler, the author’s adoration for a product, or a publisher’s profitable side line in selling product placement? I hate to sound like a conspiracy nut, but stumbling across that was so jarring that I can’t help but think “paid.”

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