Windows crashes during Bill Gates' presentation

[westofyou]

Originally Posted by Roy Tucker
I feel for whoever did the support for the demo.

I've had my s/w demo'ed by CEO-level guys before and its no picnic. You pray to Lord God Above that it all goes well because you sure as shootin' don't want the Big Guys to look bad in front of thousands. And you spend weeks going back over things (and back and back) to make sure it all goes well. And when the demo occurs, you hold your breath for 15 minutes.

As someone who has had demos go wrong I feel for Gates, as someone who lived in the Valley from the moment Apple went up and down to back up I laugh that folks think it's only ever happened to Windows users.

[REDREAD]

Originally Posted by Roy Tucker

. And when the demo occurs, you hold your breath for 15 minutes.
.

Yeah, tell me about it.. You spend 60 hours testing and testing, but you're still nervous the entire time. Even if something minor goes wrong, or something due to their error, you know your entire career with the company will be defined by that mistake..

[Spring~Fields]

Amazing that he did not do a trial run through before doing the presentation.

[Roy Tucker]

Originally Posted by SpringfieldFan

Amazing that he did not do a trial run through before doing the presentation.

If they are worth their salt, I'm sure they did. But sometimes, unaticipated things happen.

You try to cover all your bases, all the contingencies, but you can't think of everything. And sometimes you're forced to do the demo when things just aren't quite ready.

A ways back when I gave a pitch, I said "hi, my name is ..." and the power in the room blinked. Locked up my laptop solid. Wouldn't boot, wouldn't even power up. Roy said "oh darn". Had to do the talk from a backup (and out of date) set of slides I had emailed to my boss.

Found out later it had fried my laptop battery. I now put the slides on a USB memory fob and put it in my pocket.

And yeah, I've seen Mac demos go south too.

[Spring~Fields]

Ouch! Murphys Law.

I guess that I am not the only one that sometimes has a black cloud hanging over head in wait to embarrass me.

[REDREAD]

Originally Posted by SpringfieldFan

Amazing that he did not do a trial run through before doing the presentation.

There's always the chance that the presenter does things just a little bit differently than the tester, as well as other things. It's really hard to make something "idiot proof" for upper management :MandJ: