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Microsoft Social Networks

Steve Ballmer Reveals His Secret Twitter Account 166

Posted by CmdrTaco from the i-wanna-watch-the-steves-wrestle dept.
alphadogg writes "'Quietly' is not a word that would usually describe any action performed by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. But quietly is exactly how Ballmer has conducted himself on Twitter, a site he joined over a year ago unbeknownst to most of the technology world. Just a few days ago, Ballmer was speaking in Kiev, Ukraine, and according to a transcript on the Microsoft website, Ballmer responded to an audience member who asked 'when are you going to start tweeting?' Ballmer said: 'I have a Twitter account. I'm just very private about who I really am on Twitter.'"
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Steve Ballmer Reveals His Secret Twitter Account More

Steve Ballmer Reveals His Secret Twitter Account

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  • Inquiring minds want to know... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Locke2005 ( 849178 ) on Tuesday November 09, 2010 @01:29PM (#34176618)
    How many tweets has he sent out containing just the word "Developers!"???

    • Re:Inquiring minds want to know... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 09, 2010 @01:31PM (#34176656)
      Fortunately for us, he's limited to throwing 140 chars at a time.
    • None. [twitter.com]

  • Even more pointless (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Hatta ( 162192 ) on Tuesday November 09, 2010 @01:32PM (#34176670) Journal

    Isn't the entire point of twitter communicating with a large audience? If no one knows who you are, then what's the point?

    • Isn't the entire point of twitter communicating with a large audience? If no one knows who you are, then what's the point?

      Besides, Twitter supports private feeds if you're a user who don't want random people to read your tweets.

      I think he's missing the point if he's running an open twitter feed *and* want to be secret. WTF?

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by garcia ( 6573 )

      Isn't the entire point of twitter communicating with a large audience? If no one knows who you are, then what's the point?

      I don't care about the dude behind @ShitMyDadSays (the Twitter account, not the absolutely horrendous TV show) but I love what he puts out there (I follow him by RSS though). Hell, a lot of the people I follow on Twitter I don't know anything about but I find what they have to say interesting.

      YMMV.

      • Isn't the entire point of twitter communicating with a large audience? If no one knows who you are, then what's the point?

        I don't care about the dude behind @ShitMyDadSays (the Twitter account, not the absolutely horrendous TV show) but I love what he puts out there (I follow him by RSS though). Hell, a lot of the people I follow on Twitter I don't know anything about but I find what they have to say interesting.

        YMMV.

        I suspect that a lot of folks agree completely with what you said, but the guy you responded to was making the converse point -- if you are someone who a lot of people are interested in, and you use twitter, there is pretty much no point if you don't tell anyone. Reading through Steve Ballmer's tweets just reinforces the notion that the endeavor is completely pointless. He was probably just trying it out to "stay in touch with what the kids are doing." There is really nothing to see here.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mini me ( 132455 )

      Twitter's success has come from the fact that it has no one specific use-case. You can use it to communicate with millions of people, or you can use it to manage SMS broadcasts with only your closest friends, or you can use it in millions of other ways. It is up to you to determine how it best fits your needs, if at all.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by thethibs ( 882667 )
      The point is quietly following people who talk too much and using whatever information falls out.

    • If that were the case, then 99.9% of Twitter accounts would be pointless.

      (What I'm saying is, I agree.)

    • Isn't the entire point of twitter communicating with a large audience? If no one knows who you are, then what's the point?

      I always thought the point was narcissism.

    • Twitter is like email. It can be pointless and/or useful. It really depends how you use it.

      Take a look at your unfiltered email inbox, a lot of it is spam, a lot of it is announcements/mailing lists related, a lot of it is chit-chat (what your extended family did on vacation), a lot of it is someone carbon copying you on something (because they want to keep you in the loop just in case), and this is not to say that all these categories are completely pointless, they're not necessarily. It's just that if yo

    • Isn't the entire point of twitter communicating with a large audience? If no one knows who you are, then what's the point?

      No, the entire point of twitter is so wanna-be celebrities can let a large audience know they just took a shit 17 seconds ago.

      The sad part is there's actually a large audience there ready to receive said shitty news.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Locutus ( 9039 )
      and you thought Ballmer was _not_ clueless?

      if he really had a close knit group he wanted to stay in comms with as Twitter does, you'd think that he could have had one of his interns gen up something special for just them instead of using a 3rd party tool while using it incognito.

      it makes my head spin trying to figure out why he would do something like this but then again, I stopped trying to figure Ballmer out. He'snot really in touch with what's going on out in the field so it's best to disregard him as a

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Locutus ( 9039 )
        sorry, it's a noop IMO. someone setup an account for him in April and then someone handed him a Windows Phone 7 device with that account configured. wow, Ballmer is jumping around on stage in Kiev tapping out he loves Kiev every time his feet hit the stage floor. yawn.

        LoB

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sootman ( 158191 )

      No, the entire point of Twitter is to communicate to whoever the hell you want to. Most of the people I know in real life that use Twitter have their accounts set to totally private and have only a handful of friends and family as followers.

      Twitter's origins lie in a "daylong brainstorming session" that was held by board members of the podcasting company Odeo. While sitting in a park on a children's slide and eating Mexican food, Jack Dorsey introduced the idea of an individual using an SMS service to communicate with a small group.

      (Text from Wikipedia, [wikipedia.org] emphasis mine.)

      If anything, I'd expect Ballmer to have two twitter accounts, one public, one private. Or else I'd expect MS to release a clone of Twitter and he'd use that. [google.com]

  • ...Steve Ballmer, who is tech loser [bisinessinsider.com] #3?

  • So he is a rich CEO, he owns one of the biggest Tech companies. He likes tech, however everything he says is over analysed. Is it really that big of a deal. No. Like him, hate him, but he has a life outside of Microsoft PR too.

  • Note to self: that 16-year old blond model you've been flirting with online could actually be Steve Ballmer!

  • Ah, yes... (Score:2)

    by jd ( 1658 )

    "I'm just very private about who I really am"

    That's because being an extraterrestrial zombie with the desire to eat human brains softened by Windows and marinated in Aero would likely reduce his popularity.

  • ...The rumors that my twitter ID is "SweatyMonkeyBoy69", said Ballmer.

  • Actually twitter link (Score:4, Insightful)

    by iONiUM ( 530420 ) on Tuesday November 09, 2010 @01:37PM (#34176760) Journal

    Once again I find the summary lacking. I had to read TFA to find the actual link to his twitter: http://twitter.com/stevebmicrosoft [twitter.com]. There really isn't much there.. which explains why: a) he didn't announce it, and b) why we shouldn't care. Which of course leads to: c) why is this on slashdot?

    • Re:Actually twitter link (Score:5, Funny)

      by BadAnalogyGuy ( 945258 ) <BadAnalogyGuy@gmail.com> on Tuesday November 09, 2010 @01:43PM (#34176868)

      why is this on slashdot?

      Stockholm syndrome.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by CODiNE ( 27417 )

        The summary seemed a bit more on the "Hah hah" side than a fan boi newsflash or slashvertisement.

        Perhaps you were thinking of "Shadenfreude"?

    • Re:Actually twitter link (Score:4, Funny)

      by Locke2005 ( 849178 ) on Tuesday November 09, 2010 @01:47PM (#34176940)
      why is this on slashdot? Because it's a great jumping off point for stupid one-liners like "How could Steve use any service where he is confined to only throwing around 140 chars?"

      • why is this on slashdot? Because it's a great jumping off point for stupid one-liners like "How could Steve use any service where he is confined to only throwing around 140 chars?"

        in this case: s/stupid/clever/

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by yuhong ( 1378501 )

      And names like this is not really secret. It is obvious that SteveB at Microsoft stands for Steve Ballmer, even if it can't be confirmed that it is really him.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sco08y ( 615665 )

      Once again I find the summary lacking. I had to read TFA to find the actual link to his twitter: http://twitter.com/stevebmicrosoft [twitter.com]. There really isn't much there.. which explains why: a) he didn't announce it, and b) why we shouldn't care. Which of course leads to: c) why is this on slashdot?

      To keep the diversity up. After this, a Linux story, then five Google and fifteen Apple stories.

    • It involves Steve who everybody hates, who is the CEO of a company that everybody hates.

      Thus the entire purpose of the article being posted is to foment Microsoft/Windows/Steve hatred.

  • Really...? That more interesting than... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Nethemas the Great ( 909900 ) on Tuesday November 09, 2010 @01:38PM (#34176784)
    Ballmer selling off $1.3B worth of Microsoft [slashdot.org]? With plans to clear 75 million share before years end? I must say, I'm thoroughly confused...

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by thethibs ( 882667 )

      Your confusion probably stems from your ignorance of tax planning rule #1: Sell when capital gains taxes are low and likely to go high.

      What he's selling is a small fraction of his holdings. How do you think these guys pay for their toys?

      • My confusion isn't in the tax argument. I get the notion of reporting a loss to offset tax burdens. But selling roughly 20% or $2B of his stake in Microsoft isn't a "small fraction." Particularly with present discussions about Microsoft's future floating around.
        • Maybe he just wants to roll around in a mountain of cash. (Probably couldn't borrow it due the potential for sweat damage)
  • and all I can tell is that Steve is now Russia's biggest cheerleader. Maybe he is using them for botnet security testing?
  • "Developers... developers... developers... developers... developers... developers... developers... developers... developers... developers... developers..." wouldn't fit within a tweet. [slashdot.org]

  • ...that Steve Ballmer has a twitter account, but no idea what it is?

    Thanks, that almost tells me something useful...

    Seriously, what was the point of this? That's like finding out that Bill Gates likes to build PCs and buys his parts from an on-line vendor.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by kenh ( 9056 )

      Never mind - I failed to read TFA, my bad.

      Who knew that @stevebmicrosoft is Mr. Ballmer?

  • Didn't another CEO get in trouble over having a Twitter account and other social media? Perhaps the SEC needs to investigate Microsoft over the matter since Ballmer could potentially be giving advise or hinting at matters and cause insider trading to occur, even if unintentional.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jimicus ( 737525 )

      As far as any sufficiently large business is concerned, nothing is illegal until such time as you have been taken to court and exhausted all the appeal avenues you're prepared to follow.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by yuhong ( 1378501 )

      IMO public microblogging and Internet postings should be considered fair disclosure, espicially if the real name and company was disclosed.

  • Geek gossip at its best. Thank you Slashdot.

  • . . . BALMER TWEETS YOU!

  • just a thought....

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