> unlike other pranks our prank didn’t just say ‘Microsoft is successful but nerdy’. Instead, it fed the idea that Microsoft kind of sucked as a company in some way; a lazy copycat.

> [...] Usually Microsoft was happy to take credit for clever pranks from employees, because it showed we played hard besides working hard.

> [...] BillG said, in effect, that the prank was not in good taste, and that it made Microsoft look stupid rather than clever - especially as a catch-up to Sun Microsystems. We learned he was repeatedly calling the prank “in poor judgement” in meeting and internal memos.

I'm kind of flabbergasted that the authors, Microsoft employees it seems, were surprised that their prank wasn't perceived well, and lay the blame squarely on "PR flacks."

(Or maybe I'm 25 years younger in a corporate environment that has thoroughly taken control of this kind of thing.)