| Home > Technology > Definitive scientific evidence that Steve Ballmer truly is the Monkey Boy! |
| Definitive scientific evidence that Steve Ballmer truly is the Monkey Boy! | | Date Created: 20 Mar, 2007, 01:27 PM |
 Being one of the few practising psychologists who has an interest in IT and Consumer Electronics, and who writes about it in the public domain of the blogosphere, it might come as no surprise that I have a huge volume of information flowing into the Powerbook, from websites, through RSS feeds, and via the oldest form, professional discussion lists.
So every so often I see links where perhaps few others might because of this unusual juxtaposition of information torrents.
Now, think back for a moment to one of those seminal viral videos that, pre-YouTube, made the rounds on various websites, principally because of who was portrayed, how he was portrayed and the introduction of the mashup technique: taking various media and combining them in unique and creative ways for our amusement.
I'm thinking here of the Steve Ballmer "Dance Monkey Boy" video, also known as "Developers! Developers! Developers!" I'm thinking this video more than most prior to YouTube/GoogleVideo (or GooTube as some would have it) really made people sit up and notice what user generated content could bring.
The sight of a hot and sweaty and scary looking Ballmer prancing around on stage in front of thousands of waiting-to-be-inspired Microsoft developers earnt him the moniker "Monkey Boy". |
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One can but contrast his presentation to that of Steve Jobs at any recent WWDC to see the different ways leaders can inspire their platforms' developers.
So when I received the following newspaper story in one of my many discussion lists I just had to pass it on to you for your amusement. Here's a screenshot for you - the most prominent sentence is at the end of the first paragraph. |
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So I'm thinking that with the available evidence it's probably time to see another chair throwing or monkey dance effort, or at least another media interview dissing the iPod (in favour of the Zune) or the iPhone in favour of some lame Windows Mobile device.
As it turns out, while we can all have a laugh at obscenely rich people's curious ways, I have it on good authority from a friend who used to work for Anderson Consulting before it became Accenture, that he did some work with Microsoft and especially Ballmer, and he described him as a "really nice guy".
Still, one day Steve will cop plenty of rebellious anti-authority behaviour when his kids become adolescents and decide to get iPods instead of Zunes, as per Dad's directives: "My children--in many dimensions they're as poorly behaved as many other children, but at least on this dimension I've got my kids brainwashed: You don't use Google, and you don't use an iPod."
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