Racial diversity, realism, and Poland



  • Witness link 1, wherein a flawlessly multicultural group of businessme-- businesspeople are pleased with Microsoft's ability to optimize their productivity:

     http://www.microsoft.com/businessproductivity/default.mspx

     ...and now witness the same scenario, but in Poland:

    http://www.microsoft.com/poland/businessproductivity/default.mspx

    Either those localising Microsoft's site for Poland felt that excessive racial diversity had no place in their homogenous country and would shock their customers, or wanted to further emphasize their inclusiveness by altering the image to portray a man with an enormously oversized head, a broken neck, and inverse vitiligo. As someone of Polish descent, I'd tend to prefer the latter, since at least it's creative and explains the bad photoshop job. But I'm not too optimistic.

     (No, I haven't taken screenshots. I'm jetlagged, exhausted, and just suffered through a pathetic British attempt at a hamburger which will probably kill me with either e coli, prions, or both. So there.)



  • @PeriSoft said:

    ...and inverse vitiligo

    Why would it have to be inverse vitiligo?

     

    @PeriSoft said:

     (No, I haven't taken screenshots. I'm jetlagged, exhausted, and just suffered through a pathetic British attempt at a hamburger which will probably kill me with either e coli, prions, or both. So there.)

    You could have just swiped them from Engadget when you swiped this story.



  • Hell, to my own eye they both look faked...

    I can't seem to get any other countries (using the first few that came to my mind as nearly obvious examples) but I don't know what the specific method of i18n is on these, so I'm curious what other sites they're using one or the other of these images on... anyone?



  • @PeriSoft said:

     (No, I haven't taken screenshots. I'm jetlagged, exhausted, and just suffered through a pathetic British attempt at a hamburger which will probably kill me with either e coli, prions, or both. So there.)

    Who needs screenshots when you have "View Background Image"?

    Exhibit A:

    Exhibit B:



  • @drachenstern said:

    Hell, to my own eye they both look faked...
    The black guy's head does look a little big for his body, but I'm willing to forgive it since it's on a black guy's body. 



  • @MiffTheFox said:

    Who needs screenshots when you have "View Background Image"?
    Your images link to MS's site.  I just opened them both and flipped back and forth and I've decided that someone needs to make an animated gif of the two images flipping back and forth.

    Here they are on my photobucket in case MS decides to fix them.




  • @belgariontheking said:

    I've decided that someone needs to make an animated gif of the two images flipping back and forth.

    Even better, it's now a YTMND. >:)



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    You could have just swiped them from Engadget when you swiped this story.
     

    Agreed, that way he could have mentioned the other two things as well. 

    - The ad agency apparently figured that a macbook pro would look good for this microsoft ad.

    - This is also the unveiling of dell's new wireless monitor.



  •  

    Man, I can't wait to download the new version of Microsoft Diversity!



  •  @belgariontheking said:

    Here they are on my photobucket in case MS decides to fix them.

    Thanks. They fixed it and I was wondering what the hell everybody was talking about until your post.



  • I like how the white guy has a black hand.



  • @lolwtf said:

    I like how the white guy has a black hand.

    Hence the reference to vitiligo in the OP.



  •  TRWTF is that I could do a better photoshop than that!

     (To start with, I'd use a donor image of someone who is looking in the same direction!)



  •  In an episode of Snuff Box, Matt Berry teaches how to play guitar. Everybody sees his disturbingly huge finger, yet only a few people notice that his entire right arm becomes black at one moment.

    I think Microsoft is giving homage to Matt Berry here.



  • I think somebody noticed the problem with picture:
    Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us



  • @stratos said:

    - The ad agency apparently figured that a macbook pro would look good for this microsoft ad.

    - This is also the unveiling of dell's new wireless monitor.

     

    I thought it was just the standard MacBooks that came in white? Either way, if it were switched on there'd be the illuminated logo on the back of the lid.

    The keyboard also doesn't appear to be plugged into anything either - the wire is neatly draped over the back of the desk going nowhere.



  • @robbak said:

     TRWTF is that I could do a better photoshop than that!

     (To start with, I'd use a donor image of someone who is looking in the same direction!)

     

    That and at LEAST change the color of his hand.  I mean ffs, IT"S STILL BLACK!



  • Nice job on the cloning of the window sill behind the white guy's head.



  • Also, notice how the white guy has a bunch of light on his head, totally inconsistent with the original photo, as well as the rest of the room.



  •  @stratos said:

    @morbiuswilters said:

    You could have just swiped them from Engadget when you swiped this story.
     

    Agreed, that way he could have mentioned the other two things as well. 

    - The ad agency apparently figured that a macbook pro would look good for this microsoft ad.

    - This is also the unveiling of dell's new wireless monitor.

    Also note the position of the woman's right hand on the keyboard.



  •  Does anyone else think the white guy looks a little bit like Bruce Campbell?







  • @pitchingchris said:

     

     

    That's helarious!  I never noticed that the black guy was using a Mac Notebook!  They probably photoshopped him out for this reason, certainly not because he was black...



  • @Zecc said:

    @pitchingchris said:
    http://www.informationweek.com/news/windows/operatingsystems/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=219500114
    The path component of that URL is a WTF.

    Have you noticed the other sub-categories of "Windows"?

    # Windows Security # Open Source # Microsoft Company News # Operating System # Windows Reviews # All Windows Stories # Windows Blog # Windows Discussions
    I'ld suggest they change this into
    # House # Car # Operating System # X Window System # Movie # Band # Song


  • Clearly "Operating Systems" is the best category for this article. I mean, it's not like they have categories "Microsoft Company News" or "All Windows Stories". Oh wait...

    Also, I love the (currently timeout'ing for me) link from the word table



  •  There's actually a good reason for this change.  Showing a black persion in Poland is problematic.  Here in the U.S. they are referred to as "African-American".  But "African-Pollock" would probably be considered offensive.



  •  She's seems pretty happy for someone who is pressing the escape button.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    @PeriSoft said:

    ...and inverse vitiligo

    Why would it have to be inverse vitiligo?

     

    @PeriSoft said:

     (No, I haven't taken screenshots. I'm jetlagged, exhausted, and just suffered through a pathetic British attempt at a hamburger which will probably kill me with either e coli, prions, or both. So there.)

    You could have just swiped them from Engadget when you swiped this story.

     

    Yeah, if I'd originally seen it on Engadget, that's true. But I swiped it from some dude on IRC, which is much more honorable.



  • @PeriSoft said:

    Yeah, if I'd originally seen it on Engadget, that's true. But I swiped it from some dude on IRC, which is much more honorable.

    Fair enough.



  • Being Polish myself, all I can tell that Microsoft screwed lots of things doing this job, but replacing a face in question might not be one of them. Here in Poland, racial diversity is not as strong as in civilized areas of the world. Actually, there is none. All we got here are Commies, which come in red, of course. And there is only a few of them left. No Afro-Europeans. No Asians. Seeing person of another colour of skin is still somewhat unusual, and, IMO, no wonder that someone at MS decided, that original image does not picture its target in this specific geographical region. Still, you could ask if it really matters. Or why they did not remove Asian guy. Or why there are no polar bears outside. Or why this image is photoshopped in so disturbing way.

    Just as a side note: some people might consider this as a racism, but I believe that it's not that. Polish people are just not familiar with variety of cultures, because there is really few people of exotic descent here in Poland. Seriously, just tell me by yourself: woud YOU like to come here? Yeah, I thought so. OTOH we think all your political correctnes, with all this avoiding colours, feminoamericans, "Baa baa black sheep" being banned from nurseries is really exaggerated. But still, I haven't been there.

    PS. As I mentioned before, English is not my native language. All spelling and grammar errors you found, you can keep them for yourself.



  • @Hobson said:

    OTOH we think all your political correctnes, with all this avoiding colours, feminoamericans, "Baa baa black sheep" being banned from nurseries is really exaggerated. But still, I haven't been there.

    Plenty of us think it's stupid as well.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @Hobson said:

    "Baa baa black sheep" being banned from nurseries is really exaggerated.
    Urban ledgend? Not that I can be bothered with the current site for "'xx' has gone missing please pray to cthulu for her, is it real?" site


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