Karl Seguin

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I'm a sensitive MVP

Even though it's been more than a month and a half, I'm still bothered by the fact that a room full of ASP.NET MVPs applauded Scott Guthrie when he showed off the new color picker in Orcas.

I was P/O'd because Scott wasted our time with that (and countless other trivialities), and P/O'd that the MVPs weren't taking the opportunity to provide meaningful feedback.

Over the past Months I've gotten the sad sense that Microsoft sees MVPs as people who can lead, directly and indirectly, to sales and little else. Talking to MS evangelist is actually more about listening than being listened to.

I didn't want to blog about this, but it's been bothering for too long. Hopefully I'll get a couple comments of sympathy and the couple of "you suck" comments - both of which would be helpful at this point.



Posted 05-25-2007 9:25 AM by karl
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Comments

Jeremy D. Miller wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-25-2007 10:52 AM

I mean, Karl, you're a nice guy and all, but I wouldn't go so far as to say you're an MVP of Sensitivity yet.

I think I'm gonna stay out of this conversation this time.

David Starr wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-25-2007 11:27 AM

You suck.

Dude, you are totally right on.

Color pickers rock.

Color pickers suck, you should just memorize the RGB values like I did.

Eber Irigoyen wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-25-2007 11:42 AM

you're getting old... or are jealous... or both =oP

Joe wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-25-2007 11:51 AM

How was the new font dialog?  Any breakthroughs in File | Save As...?  

Joe Montegna wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-25-2007 11:55 AM

Dude, I've met a LOT of MVP's in my life and there are very few of them who actually continue to think for themselves instead of kiss MS's ass all the way. 90% of those are on codebetter.com (Scott Bellaware you da man!).

So, yeah, I'd be pretty P/O'd too. But considering an MVP has to be renewed each year, many of them need to kiss ass, instead of actually show what they know and share that knowledge and help people. many of them become MVP's and think they are superior individuals.

karl wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-25-2007 12:12 PM

Joe, you skated around something I've seen in play. One of the fundamental issue with the MVP program is that MVPs profit greatly from being MVPs. Not from Microsoft, but in their private jobs. This is especially true for consultants.

I'm not a consultant - but I _was_ able to leverage being an MVP when I switched jobs...and I _would_ do it again.

Under those conditions, the _need_ for renewal can be significant.

Joe Montegna wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-25-2007 3:03 PM

Karl, obviously they profit from it. I'm sure not all of them do it just to get limo rides at the MVP summit. The point here isn't what benefits they get but by what means the gain and renew their status.  The whole point of what the MVP program is meant to be comes under judgement when they blindly follow and suck up to MS.

Mike Gale wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-28-2007 5:00 PM

Let's face it MVP's do a great service.

Depending on who you are and what they know in the current area they might know less than you.  So what.

BUT if MS only wants cheering yes men then there's trouble.  In the long run an MS like that could fold.  So I suggest that if you're worried and have specific issues, use feedback, use existing fora and if that's not good enough find or create other options.

The fact you feel you're not in control of feedback is itself a problem.  (Maybe a presentation which is largely one way "presentation" is itself a problem.)

lb wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-28-2007 6:43 PM

Good point Karl.

I don't think they give out an MVP for "providing honest and valuable feedback, so insightful that it hurts just to say it".

So if you ever see good feedback coming from MVPs it's incidental/orthogonal to their role as MVP.

MVPs are frontline footsoldiers -- even though they're intelligent, you can't expect them to go against command. Intelligence doesn't correlate with ethics or honesty.

lb

Jack wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-29-2007 7:45 AM

Dude... I stopped going to the Ottawa MS .NET Users Group for that exact reason: the damn color picker. It was just before the release of 2.0 framework, most people knew what was coming down the pipe. Anyway, they didn`t order enough pizza, they started the demo, the color options in the intellisense were first on the feature tour. As soon as they hit Aqua, I got up and left. Some MS guy stopped me on my way out and asked why i was leaving - eesh.... get a clue.

Kevin Jensen wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-29-2007 10:09 AM

Thanks for the post Karl!  I'm not an MVP, so I wouldn't have thought about this topic before reading your post.

Andreas wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 05-29-2007 5:19 PM

You suck!

You're welcome...

Colin Jack wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 06-03-2007 9:09 AM

Interesting.

I don't know much about the MVP program but I have noticed that some bloggers that I used to respect massively have changed the tone of their blog entries after becoming MVP's. Equally I've also noticed that a few MVP's aren't, how can I put it, that impressive. They post a lot of content, and have a view on everything, but do not seem to be pushing things forward.

Of course there are many great MVPs but at the moment I tend to view the whole MVP thing with a lot of skepticism.

015 - MVP Summit 2007 - Seven Parties and….The one with the “Exclusive Book Signing” at The Social Programmer wrote 015 - MVP Summit 2007 - Seven Parties and….The one with the “Exclusive Book Signing” at The Social Programmer
on 08-28-2007 7:34 PM

Pingback from  015 - MVP Summit 2007 - Seven Parties and….The one with the “Exclusive Book Signing” at The Social Programmer

ASP.NET MVP wrote re: I'm a sensitive MVP
on 06-14-2009 9:04 AM

I was an MVP for ASP.NET at the past and during that time I recognized how many people who got that title doing some strange things. There are some people in newsgroups who post daily really helpless answers, argue with posters, and so on. I did not receive the title again after a while because I was not doing the same stuff... A color picker by Scott? Bullshit

Good point Karl.

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