back to article What do you call megabucks Microsoft? No really, it's not a joke. El Reg needs you

It is no secret that we like to use the odd bit of shorthand at The Register when biting the hand that feeds IT. Now we need a fresh one for Microsoft. We know that Google has a deep and abiding love for our "Chocolate Factory" sobriquet. Everybody knows "Big Blue" = IBM and caring, sharing Larry Ellison's Oracle is known and …

  1. chivo243 Silver badge
    Coat

    I'll give it a go...

    MicroStalker

    Micro$haft

    1. monty75

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      Microsh*t

      1. Mark 85

        Re: I'll give it a go...

        Microsloth.

        1. Someone Else Silver badge

          Re: I'll give it a go...

          OK, so it is a bit outdated, but still...Micros~1 is my vote.

          1. GrumpenKraut
            Thumb Up

            Re: I'll give it a go...

            After reading all comments so far (yes, I am bored), Micros~1 should be it.

        2. BillG
          Megaphone

          Re: I'll give it a go...

          Microslurp.

          Any name for MS should have some passing reference to the data slurping of Windows 10.

          1. J27

            Re: I'll give it a go...

            Any slurp references to anyone but Google are irrelvant. Google is watching you... ALWAYS.

    2. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      Purveyor of BSODs?

      1. robidy

        Re: I'll give it a go...

        The "Purveyor of blue screens"

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      BloatyMcSurface.Sub pronounced BloatyMcSurface<dot>sub.

      shortened to just BloatyMcSurface.

      (And yes, it too, operates stealthily in the Antarctic to study Penguins)

    4. Pen-y-gors

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      We've been using variations on Micro$oft for years. And they still make money. But now we have to rent all there stuff from a cloudy place which isn't always available.

      So maybe Micro$haft362

    5. happydavid

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      It's Madge, surely

    6. Simon Reed
      Big Brother

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      They've always been Micro$oft to me.

      1. Daniel von Asmuth
        Windows

        Re: I'll give it a go...

        So many things fly through my mind like the Blue Screen Brothers or Little Blue or the Windowcleaners or even The Quilt for its many patches. No more Citizen Gates or Big Balmer, perhaps Satyayoga or Little Cortana is listening on you. To me, they remain The Monopoly. But then the name is enough in itself: TinyDuctile (American English), NietigZacht (Dutch), WinzigSanft (German).

        1. What_Does_Not_Kill_You_Makes_You_Stronger

          Re: I'll give it a go...

          To expand on a Daniel von Asmuth idea ......

          'The Quilt Factory' for its many patches which are also 'soft'.

          (Fits with the 'The Chocolate Factory' for the other well known behemoth)

          :)

      2. ThePhantom

        Re: I'll give it a go...

        Hmmm. Micro$loth to me. Too lazy to actually freaking fix their holier than anything code.

    7. bombastic bob Silver badge
      Devil

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      1. "The Blob" (absorbing everything in its path and growing bigger and bigger and bigger)

      [and along with it, the theme song by Burt Bacharach]

      2. "MesS" (ok that's lame)

      3. "Redmond Overlords"

      4. 'Megashaft' <-- an oldie but still valid

      5. ok "Megabucks" but with a slightly altered Starbucks logo

      6. Semprini [/me ducks]

      7. "Cult of Redmond" <-- I've used this one before

      8. "Umbrella Corporation"

      9. "Maleficent Overlords/Overseers"

      10. "Big Brother's Evil Cousin"

      probably enough for now. hopefully spawns derivative names, one of which will be settled on as "the official one"

      Ok - one more - 2D FLATTY FLATSO McFLATFACE (that was obligatory, heh)

      1. Daniel von Asmuth
        Devil

        Re: I'll give it a go...

        I think The (Holey) Redmond Empire should be enough. Alternatives: the Patchworks, Mission Incompatible, the Feature Factory, the Industry Standard, Satanic Mill, MoneySpinners, Muggle Stuff, MicroSieve (for their holes), Magic Smoke or Mirrors & Smoke, Mister Satya.

    8. J. R. Hartley

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      Microslurp

      1. Cave-Homme

        Re: I'll give it a go...

        “Microslurp”

        Logically yes, but in reality they’ve become Macroslurp, even Macroslurp 360.

        The 360 signifying the number of trouble free day per year it software works, and also 360 degrees which signifies its pervasive reach.

    9. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      M1kr0$h1te.

    10. binary
      Linux

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      I use Linux so why should I give a sh*t?

    11. MyffyW Silver badge

      How about...

      The number two of Cloudiness?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: How about...

        Who is number one?

        1. MyffyW Silver badge

          Re: How about...

          You are ... number 6

    12. deadlockvictim

      Re: I'll give it a go...

      Since SatNad's ascent to the top, Microsoft has been pushing anything and everything into their big data-centres around the world.

      My suggestion is: «Purveyors of Head-in-the-Clouds Thinking».

  2. JassMan

    The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

    Just liks the wolf in sheeps clothing: a means to infiltrate, then consume.

    Buying GitHub was just the start.

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

      I like it but it needs to be shortened: Wolf Hall

      1. DenonDJ DN-2500F

        Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

        I would have said Bad Wolf but apparently its a real TV company now

        1. bombastic bob Silver badge
          Devil

          Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

          "Bad Wolf" - https://tardis.fandom.com/wiki/Bad_Wolf_meme

          When you read through some of those (including the futuristic 'Bad Wolf Corporation' being run by Daleks) it all makes sense...

          [I had the pleasure of re-watching all of the Doctor #9 episodes recently]

      2. JassMan
        Linux

        Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

        Tux Munchers Inc.

      3. JassMan

        Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

        OK Slightly shorter:

        the Penguin feathered Beast of EEE.

        This brings in the fact they are trying to appeal to penguinistas, but underneath they are more like the ravenous bugblatter beast of Traal and that their philosophy is Embrace, Extend, Extinguish.

    2. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
      Linux

      Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

      To fit your brief, how about The Trojan Penguin?

      1. JassMan
        Facepalm

        Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

        On a tangent:

        BloatMeisters R Us

      2. Muscleguy

        Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

        I'm trying to get my head around how flummoxed the Bronze Age Trojans would have been if they were faced with a large wooden model of a Southern Hemisphere only animal. It would have to be in swimming/tobogganing mode as standing would be too top heavy for wheels/sled.

        It would have to be painted as well and there is nothing in Homer about the Horse being painted.

    3. low_resolution_foxxes

      Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

      The start?

      As a US company holding your code in a "private" directory, the US govt now has an admin backdoor to any code published on Github.

      I'm sure it will only be used for "terrorism", but imagine the MPAA-type lawsuits once they can scan your code for patent violations.

    4. Anomalous Cowshed

      Blue Screen

      Microblue ?

      MicroBSOD ?

    5. A. N. Other 1

      Re: The wolf enrobed in penguin feathers.

      "Buying GitHub was just the start."

      Excellent point - so how about MicroGit - includes both Windows and Linux users!

  3. thondwe

    Love 'em or hate 'em - "MicroMite" - Comes complete with hijacked branding - Marmite or Yegemite - choose your poison?

    1. Psmo

      Re: MicroMite

      Like it.

      For me it reflects that you can like some products and use cases, while avoiding anything touched by others.

      1. thondwe

        Re: MicroMite

        Whatever choosen needs to work with 365 suffix - "MicroMite 365"

        1. Rol

          Re: MicroMite

          Sodomites! F'ing you up the a, since Dr Dos lost his license to practice.

        2. Chromelollipop

          Re: MicroMite

          Or better still MicroMite 362 because it doesn't work ALL the time.

  4. Bottle_Cap

    Triple E.

    1. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

      Re: Triple E.

      How about BareHug?

      Bare as in what you're left with at the end of it.

    2. Chris Evans

      Please show your workings.

    3. Robert Moore

      Had the same thought.

      Embrace.

      Extend.

      Extinguish.

      At least that was my thought process.

  5. Julz

    How

    About:

    vampire juggernaut.

    Or

    micro minions

  6. Andy Non Silver badge

    Given their lack of direction and failed initiatives.

    Microlost.

    1. oiseau
      Facepalm

      Re: Given their lack of direction and failed initiatives.

      Microlost?

      Not so much.

      I think MicroVir would be better.

      Because of the registry, its ideological twin now foisted on Linux (systemd) and last but not least, the embrace, engulf and destroy action it has shown to be so proficient at for so many years.

      O.

  7. Captain Scarlet Silver badge
    Windows

    Microsoft naming

    As Microsoft like renaming every single product every year, are you going to do this on a yearly basis?

    1. skizzerz

      Re: Microsoft naming

      Why settle for yearly? Once we choose a base name our esteemed hacks can change it up every paragraph or two!

      As an example (going with another commentard's example of Edge Lords because it got a chuckle out of me):

      First mention plays it straight, simply say Edge Lords.

      Next time you need to mention it in the article, Edge Lords for Business. Then Edge Lords 365. Then Visual Edge Lords. And so on.

      Should work with most of the name suggestions here honestly. If there's a couple favourites can even rotate between them, win-win!

      1. Rol

        Re: Microsoft naming

        I represent Stewart Lee and hereby summons you, for use of his long running Boris nomenclature joke, to appear before your peers one quiet Sunday afternoon on the appropriate comments section of The Grauniad.

        Bring a change of briefs, as there's a chance they might get shredded.

    2. eromana

      Re: Microsoft naming

      Clippy

  8. Jolyon Ralph

    Got to be something about Clippy

    Team Clippy

    Clippy Clippy Shake

    Clipsters

    etc etc

    1. MiguelC Silver badge

      Re: Got to be something about Clippy

      Clippity McClippyFace?

      1. Daedalus

        Re: Got to be something about Clippy

        Clippyzilla

        1. Someone Else Silver badge

          Re: Got to be something about Clippy

          Clippyzilla.../me likes!

        2. Jolyon Ralph

          Re: Got to be something about Clippy

          Clippyzilla! That's got to be it.

  9. Olius

    How about "Microshaft", which is *of course* a reference to all the good work they do in battling the criminal underbelly of IT, facing down both criminals and cops who want it dead, against fantastic odds.

    1. Jedit Silver badge
      Angel

      "How about "Microshaft""

      Who's the Redmond software firm that's less a virus than a germ?

      (Microshaft!)

      Damn right.

      1. Unep Eurobats

        Re: "How about "Microshaft""

        I like the Shaft reference. Or how about:

        Who's the Redmond software peeps who're a hit with all the geeks?

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: "How about "Microshaft""

        Sat Nad be setting his Sat Nav

        checkin his net and makin a bet.

        keeping on creeping up to Balmer da Baller

        who's using his Fusion to break the illusion

        the new kid is usin to think that he's movin

        up on big B and his legacy.

        Sat's shoes may rest neath the desk

        BfG only sees a speck that recedes

        Taycan the lead, and unless he proceeds

        to take a long rest that is all that poor Sat Nad sees...

        Cause he's stuck in a mirage, you'd think he'd cry in his Mirai,

        no, and i'll tell you all why. Here's the facts, he's got stacks

        piled up high as the sky and the stock price is high.

        Last place is fine I'll be frank when there's bronze in the bank.

    2. Chris G

      The term Microshaft is well known by quite a few in the curcles I frequent, is fairly obvious to whom it refers to and slips off the tongue well.

      Shaft can refer to a deep entrance to, for example, a mine wherein the riches if the Earth lie or it could refer to being screwed either financially or interms of being able to continue in some way (BSOD?) etc.

      Or The Defenesters, they sell you windows and the frequently throw you out of them.

      1. Prst. V.Jeltz Silver badge

        bin there

        Microshaft !

        On the other hand , its a bit old , predictable , boring and childish.

        1. jake Silver badge

          Re: bin there

          "On the other hand , its a bit old , predictable , boring and childish."

          You say that like it's a bad thing ...

          1. robidy

            Re: bin there

            It's a parody computer game about the purveyor of blue screens and Win 95 released in the 90's or maybe early 2000's.

    3. jake Silver badge

      Nah.

      The shaft of blaxploitation fame is a hero, of sorts. Redmond isn't, wasn't, and never will have that status. (Ever read the book? Shaft was originally white ... Surprised me, anyway. Now you know why I always read the book before watching the Hollywood hackjob.)

      ANYway, the "shaft" in Microshaft is more of the she got the goldmine variety ...

    4. bofh1961

      Doesn't "Microshaft" date back to the days of DPM's diary in Computer Weekly?

  10. imcdnzl

    How about the Big Softie?

    It incorporates the size, employee nicknames etc

    1. Mister Dubious
      Childcatcher

      Re: How about the Big Softie?

      Years ago I heard the then CEO of Sun Microsystems opine that you're really in trouble when your wife starts calling you "micro" and "soft."

      1. sev.monster Silver badge
        Gimp

        Re: How about the Big Softie?

        That's why they went with Big Red.

  11. baud
    Terminator

    borg still works rather well no?

    1. Paul Kinsler

      hmm

      They are pushing this thing called "Edge", so maybe Edge Lords --> Edge Borgs?

      1. baud

        Re: hmm

        or borgs on the edge

      2. Roml0k

        Re: hmm

        In articles about the web and web technologies, I do like the idea of referring to them as just "the Edge Lords".

        1. jake Silver badge

          Re: hmm

          Any reference to Edge will be seen by the marketards at Redmond as free advertising. Stop using it. Likewise, don't encourage their delusions of grandeur by even hinting they might be lords of anything.

    2. Fungus Bob

      Bork! Bork! Bork!

      1. Someone Else Silver badge
        Coffee/keyboard

        Re: Bork! Bork! Bork!

        - - - - ->

        (The only problem with that is that it preempts a semi-regular (and quite enjoyable) Reg feature of the same name.)

        1. Shady

          Re: Bork! Bork! Bork!

          The Bork Collective? As a Trekkie this works for me

      2. Nunyabiznes

        The Borkage.

        WinBork.

        MegaBork

        MicroBork

        Yes, I have a theme. And if I repeated someone's submission, please excuse me. There were 382 comments when I started typing - Nobody got time to read all that.

    3. ITS Retired

      borg shaft. Best or worst of both worlds.

  12. John Hawkins

    Bob

    A nice short name with a history.

    1. Captain Scarlet Silver badge

      Re: Bob

      But Bob doesn't like Pie and doesn't have a sidekick named Weebl!

    2. GrumpenKraut
      Mushroom

      Re: Bob

      What about "bombastic bob's gods"? Cue some all capitals head explosion around here.

      1. jake Silver badge

        Re: Bob

        Hey! Leave our bob out of it! What did he ever do to you?

        1. sev.monster Silver badge
          Gimp

          Re: Bob

          Have you not seen the video? I tell you man, some people just ain't right.

    3. Not Enough Coffee

      Re: Bob

      How about The Bob Squad?

      1. Rol

        Re: Bob

        Reminds anyone of the "Hand built by Roberts" sketch?

        1. navidier

          Re: Bob

          > Reminds anyone of the "Hand built by Roberts" sketch?

          Ho, yuss. But another comment upthread also reminded me of a certain Bob in a Blackadder episode.

    4. logicalextreme

      Re: Bob

      Bing a Bob for a Big BSOD Bork.

      1. Rob 15

        Re: Bob

        Microbob

    5. N2

      Re: Bob

      Bob360 ?

  13. Shadow Systems

    Good taste?

    Fuck that, we wanna know what he was almost called! =-D

    (I have good taste... I've been told I taste like chicken.)

    1. Greybearded old scrote Silver badge

      Re: Good taste?

      I don't believe that good taste came into it at all. Fear that he'd let slip the dogs of law on the other hand...

      1. sabroni Silver badge

        Re: Good taste?

        Pedo guy, surely?

    2. Arthur the cat Silver badge

      Re: Good taste?

      Fuck that, we wanna know what he was almost called!

      For some reason I have a mental image of Jeff Bezos in a loose roll neck shirt.

      I wish I didn't.

    3. jake Silver badge

      Re: Good taste?

      Like most humans, you probably taste like pork that has been on a junkfood diet.

      1. Joe W Silver badge

        Re: Good taste?

        Judging from what you get at most supermarkets, is there another kind of pork? (fnar fnar)

    4. Sulky

      Re: Good taste?

      Just look at the logo

  14. Whitter

    Tricky

    Been playing with Has Been, Yesterday's Man, Once Mattered and suchlike. Not really getting anywhere however, my best shot being:

    The-Once-And-Future-Borg

    which is a tad long IMO.

    Then got onto How the mighty have fallen which led to the more succinct

    The Fallen

    which has a nice Lucifer Morningstar ring to it.

    1. teknopaul

      Re: Tricky

      "The ex-glaziers"

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Tricky

      The Fallen is a bit tricky since they often vie for planet's most valuable company.

  15. Philip Storry

    "The Monopolist Formerly Known As Evil"?

    1. BGatez

      EvilCorp

    2. Whitter
      Joke

      Can we also change Google to "The Monopolist Formerly Known As Not-Evil"?

  16. dave 81

    I always use Microsux Windblows.

  17. viscount

    Shub-Niggurath

    1. jason_derp

      Yes please. Shub-Niggurath

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Megahard (with or without suffix "on")

  19. cbars Bronze badge

    Wilson & Kelling?

    You know, the ones that invented the broken Windows theory

    1. Daedalus

      Wilson, Kepple and Betty?

    2. Sgt_Oddball

      No reference to Babage then?

      He has a thing for broken windows before he even invented the computer...

      1. jake Silver badge

        Re: No reference to Babage then?

        Oh, our Ada ...

  20. bonkers
    Pint

    I'm so angry I can't think

    Oh the joy of the challenge, to somehow encapsulate all the frustration, annoyance, anger that MS continues to deliver, into one phrase.

    Shitflake sprinklers comes to mind, an unkind reference to the absurd and entirely juvenile re-modelling of Excel and Word, with thousands of choices of "sprinkles" - different styles each more ghastly and lurid - reminiscent of the cultural imposition of chemical flavouring "shots" and said shitflake adornments by the big-name coffee shops.

    Perhaps their other superpowers ought to get a mention, "Processor heating engineers", "Renowned cycle stealers" - even as i speak, their "MS Teams" is busy consuming 50% of my 5000 MIPs - testing some poor register bit to beyond death - in order to find out whether I've offered call quality feedback yet, or not. How can starving children program that badly?

    Oh, and the whole "you said you didn't want your room tidied, so I did it when you weren't looking, and all your stuff is in the garden" approach to updates - which combines all their previous skills, the fatuous functionality, hogging the processor till you submit to their will, and adds deliberately breaking autosave - which now only works if you store onto MS cloud, rather than disk - and deliberately deleting or hiding documents you were working on.

    Maybe "productivity assassins", "teletype tinkerers" - given that most of it is tinkerage now, Excel 2003 was the high point, and the teletype is nearly as old - and it's what they started on.

    I don't know, maybe they should also be lambasted for the cringing "world" adverts, making shit office software and pretending it's saving the world? - "Teletype visionaries" - any sort of mash-up of the above?

    Have to agree with Reg though, it's best sorted out over a long lunch.

    1. Roger Greenwood

      Re: I'm so angry I can't think

      I think all the above can be summed up in one word:- MegaSoft

    2. Yorick

      Re: I'm so angry I can't think

      I fear I am lacking all couth. I cannot summon ire at Windows. I actually like Win 10 - for some reason, it behaves itself on my machine, runs fast even on 8 year old gear, doesn’t get in the way of my apps, definitely doesn’t throw any unwanted pop ups in my face. Unlike much of the web.

      And is actually easier to use than Ubuntu. That may just be the learning curve. While in Windows I can browse to SMB shares, in Ubuntu I get an unhelpful “nope, auth failed”, and no offer to type in a user / password. CLI allows me to mount a share with my Ubuntu username/password, so I know I got the user created right on the other end. Yet, no share browsing.

      Must be that lack of couth again. Why browse shares when you can mount them? I dunno, it seems convenient.

      I can RDP to Windows no problem, from anywhere. VNC to Ubuntu - not out of the box, or only with encryption off, if coming from Windows. “That’s the fault of your VNC client, peasant”. “You need to replace the Ubuntu-side server with TigerVNC, you noob”. I get it. Lack of couth. It can all be solved, and - is it asking too much to expect this stuff to, well, “just work”?

      1. Ian Johnston Silver badge

        Re: I'm so angry I can't think

        On the other hand, I can download and install a 300MB Ubuntu upgrade in ten minutes but the MS upgrade process can grind on for hours.

        1. jake Silver badge

          Re: I'm so angry I can't think

          "the MS upgrade process can grind on for hours."

          Days. I've personally seen it take over three days before the thing finally settled down into something resembling a working OS. Not exactly inspiring, that.

        2. robidy

          Re: I'm so angry I can't think

          The again, use Alpine, smaller foot print again and a smaller attack surface than a bloated consumer OS.

          Then again windows just works for the masses PC's and laptops.

      2. jake Silver badge

        Re: I'm so angry I can't think

        To be fair, Ubuntu has many of the same problems that Redmond and Cupertino have, and for the same reason. That reason? Trying to be all things to all people ... a task that not even one of the many "Gods" invented by humans have managed to do, even in myth and fable.

      3. KSM-AZ
        IT Angle

        Re: I'm so angry I can't think

        Ubuntu what?

        I got no issues with 18.04 / kubuntu. Win10 is ok as well, it's display handling is much better. KDE/plasma at least scales betwen 1 and 2 kn a high dpi display, But W10 is superior on the dynamic side.

        On the RDP front... why not just use . . . Well RDP, instead of VNC. Apt install xrdp. Viola, i can use msrdp from W10 to my ubu, or remmina from UBU to win. These days thats all pretty stable and seemless. Actually, for ubu server you can run LXDE skip the compositor, and use vanilla 16bit rdp, without beating up your client, or turn it up, use remoteFX, and have a pleasant experience if you've got the bandwdth. RDP on 2008+ is abysmal without a modern rdp client and good bandwidth.

        W10/2012+ is decidedly more polished though, and even though I do run it, setting up openldap, and PAM, makes AD/fsmo roles, and cruft, look simple. At least until it breaks ;).

        Most of the xrdp server stuff, fixed and got stable 3ish years ago. RDP accel is still hit or miss, on BOTH. Multi-display is cli invocation only.

      4. cutterman

        Re: I'm so angry I can't think

        Yep. You would have thought that after all these years that distros would have learned to make Samba "just work". Cupertino managed it seamlessly but every Linux distro needs tinkering with or magical incantations before Samba sort of does what it was supposed to do.

        Ferkin' irritating. Apart from that I just love Linux.

        But Samba :-o

        Mac

    3. dave 81

      Re: I'm so angry I can't think

      I agree with all the reasons there. And that ribbon, still drives me nuts today

      1. Down not across

        Re: I'm so angry I can't think

        Ribbon Factory

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I'm so angry I can't think

      "productivity assassins" has my vote. Oh, the number of days I've lost just trying to get their stuff to work. Even this week, having Win10 lock solid when I disconnect from VPN, requiring a forced power-down and losing all unsaved work (Word's autosave didn't!) - what OS is so bad as to allow a single user process to halt the whole machine? Oh, that's right, Windows...

      1. Prst. V.Jeltz Silver badge

        Re: I'm so angry I can't think

        methink you windows is not set up very well by your company software slingers.

    5. Olius

      Re: I'm so angry I can't think

      Oh come on, what could be more productive than being able to embed a live stock-ticker in your Word document..? I've been desperate for that feature since Computer Concepts forgot to put it in Wordwise.

    6. jake Silver badge

      Re: I'm so angry I can't think

      "to somehow encapsulate all the frustration, annoyance, anger that MS continues to deliver"

      Or, you could just stop using their bÖrkenware. Cleaner that way.

      Yes, you can. I stopped all work on Redmond products over 10 years ago. My health, pocketbook and sanity are much better now.

      1. Someone Else Silver badge
        Thumb Up

        Re: I'm so angry I can't think

        Hey! bÖrkenware (with the lowercase 'b')! Covers the very clever "Bork! Bork! Bork!" from earlier in this forum without impinging on El Reg's not-quite-copyright. The lower-case b accurately references the quality of the average Microsoft product as, well...lower-case. The uppercase umlauted O is brand-worthy. And even the most innocent of Reg readers will immediately know of whom you are speaking!

        Ship it!

    7. This post has been deleted by its author

  21. LeoP

    Only one possibility

    comes to mind, since I watch some random GoT episode yesterday:

    Neverlearn Livebane

  22. Dippywood

    If only EE was not already taken. Embrace/Extend

    1. Flocke Kroes Silver badge

      Texting to the rescue

      Mbrace X10d

      1. Flocke Kroes Silver badge

        Re: Texting to the rescue

        Missed the edit window: M{&X10d

        1. FrogsAndChips Silver badge

          Re: Texting to the rescue

          Hey, that's my password!

          1. Flocke Kroes Silver badge

            Re: Texting to the rescue

            Time to change it. How about: Password'; DROP TABLE Passwords;--

  23. bonkers

    Redmond's besotted tinkerers

    "update junkies" "toystore tinkers" "Updates R us"

  24. chivo243 Silver badge
    Coat

    He didn't get rich writing checks!

    Compu-Global-Hyper-Mega-Net

    1. Rameses Niblick the Third Kerplunk Kerplunk Whoops Where's My Thribble?

      Re: He didn't get rich writing checks!

      Is the Junior Vice President available for comment?

  25. Robert Grant

    What about:

    • The Usability Graveyard
    • Embrace™, Extend™, Extinguish™, Enterprise Edition™
    • God's Gift to Ransomware Writers

    Or nice and simple and heartfelt:

    • The Anguish

    There are too many! I think you need a list of them, and you use them at random from that list.

  26. Jason Bloomberg Silver badge
    Trollface

    What to call Microsoft?

    I'm going to go with "Sir" so they like me while hating the rest of you.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      I'm afraid you need to follow that with "...and here's lots and lots of money" if you want them to pretend to like you.

      Aaaand...back to the point.

      Azure cloud would suggest "Sky Blue", but Coventry City FC might have some objections.

      I always think of them as 'Pernicious Purveyors of PowerHell' myself...

  27. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge

    You will obey!

    and install this download.

    MS seem to be acting more and more like Daleks in recent times.

    YOU WILL OBEY!

    Seems about right.

    {proudly MS free since Sept 2016}

    1. Greybearded old scrote Silver badge

      Re: You will obey!

      Right, so I've not been a fan since I first tried Linux but I don't get this.

      How did we get from complaining that the 'mundanes' never kept their PCs up to date (and so threatened everyone's security) to complaining that doing it for them makes us update too? One or the other, please.

      Besides, they've done much worse. Such as the data slurping.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: You will obey!

        It's more the "I'm applying this update right now whether you want me to or not, and it'll break things you've been using for years, and it'll require a reboot? You say you're busy? Not near as busy as in half an hour when you're trying to get your computer to actually boot again..." kind of update.

        Updates that FIX things are good. Updates that BREAK things are really, really bad. Updates you can't stop that break things are like being tied to the railroad tracks and watching the oncoming train.

        1. Flocke Kroes Silver badge

          Re: You will obey!

          You don't have to obey. Microsoft give you choices:

          Click here to upgrade to Windows 10 now.

          Click here to schedule an upgrade to Windows 10 when you are not looking.

          Close this window to upgrade to Windows 10.

        2. DenonDJ DN-2500F

          Re: You will obey!

          So few Windows breakages down to updates over the last few years. Last problem was down to a colleague pushing out stuff via sccm in the wrong order for our soon to be decommissioned Svr2008 machines recently. My (big name) droid phone has more problems (but no crapware like many) and the manufacturer will give up on my 6 month old hardware in 28 months. At least MS somehow keep supporting the majority of old kit for 10+ years.

          1. Someone Else Silver badge

            Re: You will obey!

            1809 FTW!

        3. Chris G

          Re: You will obey!

          Updates that break things?

          You must be talking about WinD'ohs

        4. gotes

          Re: You will obey!

          Oh don't get me started with the unwelcome reboots... It drives me nuts when I go to the PC in the morning to discover that it has been rebooted overnight, without a care for my unsaved documents.

          Perhaps I am a little foolish for not saving my documents, but they are just random notes in Notepad. I would have no problem with losing the data if it were entirely my fault, but this is completely avoidable. How about you just present me with a message saying it was unable to reboot last night due to to unsaved documents, and let me decide when the thing restarts? Grr

          1. robidy

            Re: You will obey!

            I use Notepad++ for this very reason...found using Bing...search engines can also find it ;)

        5. jake Silver badge

          Re: You will obey!

          Updates that break userspace are one of the deadly sins of computing. Microsoft has been guilty of breaking userspace at least once a month for over thirty years ... and yet STILL people insist on using it? What the fuck?

          As Anthony Weldon wrote in the 1651 tome The Court and Character of King James "The Italians having a Proverb, ‘He that deceives me once, its his fault; but if twice, its my fault.'.

  28. Woza
    Big Brother

    Zero Wing

    All your windows boxes are belong to us.

    (Aka subscription model).

  29. Woza

    MicroMaud

    Won't somebody please think of the children!

  30. John Robson Silver badge

    The Redmond Ring

    I like the alliteration and the dual meaning of ring, both seem appropriate.

    - A mafia ring

    - Ring of power from LotR

    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: The Redmond Ring

      ...and not forgetting the Red Ring Of Death.

      1. John Robson Silver badge

        Re: The Redmond Ring

        Are you suggesting the Redmond Red Ring?

  31. dervheid

    how about

    Crappy Valley...

    Patchit & Pray...

    The Windowland Zoo...

    Ahayweh...

    1. henklaak

      Re: how about

      Patch & Pray covers it.

  32. Dinanziame Silver badge

    The Windowmaker

    The Windows seller

    The other cloud company

    The Binged one

    ... It's a bit hard, they kind of lack personality these days.

  33. Khaptain Silver badge

    The Bill Shop

    How about :

    The Bill Shop

    Bill as in Bill Gates

    Bill as in Dollar Bills

    Bill as in Bildergate

    Billiness as in Bullyness

    Bill as in similar to bile

  34. Yorick

    How about something along the lines of “Office Hipsters”? “Corporate Hipsters”? “Enterprise Hipsters”? They got all this wannabe-Apple stuff going on, Surface devices, ear pods now, and it’s all decent enough gear and at the same eye-watering prices.

    And at the same time, it all feels ever so slightly stuffy, with Word and Excel and productivity tools.

    Similar story with Teams, and now Github - look the cool kids are doing Slack, let’s make one, call it Teams, and make sure it feels just as fresh and fun as a motivational speaker during a sales conference.

    1. Mark 85

      I don't think they're hipsters anymore since they use India a lot for workers. So maybe Software Currry.

  35. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    Given the way they keep redoing the user interface, changing the branding everywhere and now profess themselves to be in favour of open source I offer you (roll of drums)

    The Shape Shifter.

    (Looks carefully - yes the f key is still working.)

  36. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    Now that IBM has reversed itself into Red Hat do we need to replace "Big Blue" as well?

    My offering for that is Wearing Purple. It's how they've always seen themselves but the real reference is "When I an old woman I shall wear purple/With a red hat that doesn't go."

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Surely, Big Blue + Red Hat = Purple Helmet ?

  37. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Small and soft, and not as industry dominating these days

    DetuMeScent.

  38. Big G
    Gimp

    How about

    MiCrO-VID - because it's everywhere, and extremely difficult to get rid of

  39. TeeCee Gold badge

    Redmond Glazing.

  40. Danie

    MegaHard

    Micro$oft

    MIcroIllusions

    1. Apprentice Human

      I've been using Micro$oft and Micro$sloth for ages. Now, with an expanded character set I've started to use Mi¢ro$oft.

      In usage:

      Mi¢ro$oft - bringing you cutting edge OS technology from the 60's, only a decade behind linux.

      1. This post has been deleted by its author

  41. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Bright Eyes?

    As in, “Every now and then I fall apart (Turn around, bright eyes)...”

    1. Fungus Bob

      That was unkind to Bonnie Tyler.

      1. jake Silver badge

        And so you heartily approve?

  42. imjustme

    The License Factory

    That is all

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: The License Factory

      Somebody else has prior art on that.

  43. Skynet_Knows

    I was thinking Sinister Corp, possibly Dewey Cheatem and Howe or maybe even Bloatsoft

  44. Geoff May (no relation)

    May I suggest "Standard Setters"?

    Very often when they release new versions, they change the standards set in previous incarnation and set up new "standards" ...

    1. jake Silver badge

      Nah.

      That describes all the big players.

      "The nice thing about standards is that there are so many of them to choose from." —Andrew S. Tanenbaum

  45. aregross

    BorgSoft

    BorkSoft

    Borgenstein

    I'll come up with more as the coffee starts werkin

  46. RSnijder

    Pane pusher

    I still associate them with windows, hence "pane pusher". This also sounds suspiciously like a not so nice drugs seller. But that's a coincidence.

  47. aregross

    PlanetBorg

    AssimilateU

  48. Lush At The Bar

    A slightly sporting theme

    Seattle Clouders

  49. Curious

    Peeping Windows 365

  50. Ms. P. Dogbreath

    The Bank of Wunch

    Office364

    Thems that heart Linux

  51. chris@martin.cc

    Glass house

    Because windows

  52. clp

    The Dairy Farm

    (full of cash cows?)

  53. Hol314

    Bugocraft

    aka "The global smog company".

    I certainly hope all these efforts will be rewarded by the unveiling of Jeff Bezos' nickname even though it’s only of slightly poor taste, I'm sure it'll do fine.

  54. aregross

    Ha, forgot the obvious one....

    BorgyMcBorkface

    1. Hol314

      Shouldn't it be BorgyNotaMacBorkface?

    2. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Channelling Bombastic Bob, how about FLATY McFLATFACE

      (All CAPS of course, because...BOB)

  55. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Linux Latecomers? Apple Wannabe? The Vuln Factory?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Ooh, "The Vuln Factory". Very nice.

      How about "The Bork Factory"?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Vuln Factory. Yes.

      Or BorkZilla

      1. Pascal Monett Silver badge
        Pint

        I'll drink to that.

        I think Borkzilla is actually extremely appropriate.

  56. Bibbit
    Linux

    Given its approach to Linux...

    The Smiling Assassin seems appropriate.

  57. jamie m

    office + licensing => off-licence => oddbins

    As title

  58. macjules
    Meh

    Chocolate Factory alternative?

    I would favour The Onion Factory. Microsoft never seem to know one division is doing from the other, like layers upon layers of incompetence.

    1. Stumpy

      Re: Chocolate Factory alternative?

      Plus, exposing yourself to their APIs is enough to make anyone cry ...

    2. jake Silver badge

      Re: Chocolate Factory alternative?

      The Onion already exists.

    3. Fungus Bob

      Re: Chocolate Factory alternative?

      But onions are good for you

  59. lglethal Silver badge
    Trollface

    How about "Micky" as in Taking the Micky.

    Because with each new release you think they must be taking the micky...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Already in common use with Disney.

  60. Greybearded old scrote Silver badge

    How about

    Holly

    Because http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=19990329

    1. jake Silver badge

      Re: How about

      But ... but ... but ... We LIKE ol' Hol!

      (I know, TINW ... but I'm pretty sure I'm speaking for most around these here parts.)

  61. Scoured Frisbee

    No one has proffered "Bitzilla", the software monster?

  62. The BigYin

    Ideas

    * Macroshaft

    * ₼ikro$oƒt

    * The Redmond Devourer

    * The Great Pretender

    * The Nutella Factory

  63. jonathan keith

    Metro

    In honour of their greatest achievement, how about The Organisation Formerly Known As Microsoft, which conveniently reduces down to the handy acronym TOFKAM?

  64. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The Beast Of Borkage

    IT Phoning Home

    Pwn$hop

    MonopolySystems

    MicroparasiticSoftware

    MafiaSoftware

    MiscreantSoftware, MalignSoftware (etc etc)

  65. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Ribbon Wranglers?

    nt

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Devil

      Re: Ribbon Wranglers?

      After reading through, much as I like Redmond's ribbon wranglers it's probably better suited to the Office team, so I'm going to go with Patchzilla.

      Chipzilla ... Switchzilla ... Patchzilla ... an unholy trinity from the same era.

  66. Frederic Bloggs

    M$

    What's wrong with M$? It's short and and descriptive.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: M$

      Beat me to it ;)

    2. Pat 9

      Re: M$

      That's what I always call them, I have to slow down when I'm writing a work email about it so I don't write it there.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: M$

      But out of date because nowadays it's G$.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Terminator

        Re: M$

        > But out of date because nowadays it's G$.

        Nah. Out of date is Dosferatu the Vampyr

  67. Captain Hogwash

    Big Grey

    See title.

    1. Brewster's Angle Grinder Silver badge
      Pint

      Re: Big Grey

      I was going to say "Big Flaccid".

      But "Bit Flaccid" is almost a direct translation of their name and a summary of their current corporate position.

  68. Dr. Vagmeister
    Happy

    Descriptive and Slightly Shortened

    Bunch of Funts

  69. ivan itchybutt

    Contoso.com

    obviously

    1. Mimisss

      Re: Contoso.com

      Cornetto

      ...as in Core-.NET, maybe?

      Plus their projects always end up melting like ice cream.

  70. Spanners Silver badge
    Go

    I used to see then called - Micro$oft

    This had the dual features of showing money being a nearly central interest and that they are specifically USian.

    There used to be a website www.microsith.com but it seems to have turned into a gambling site, or so my filters tell me. That explored the link between them and a secretive sociopathic and dangerous group and some people from Star Wars...

  71. sdjones2001
    Go

    Following The Register Standard Naming Convention, 'Borgzilla' seems an appropriate choice.

    Veering into gaming territory, you could go for 'All Your Boxen Belong To Us'.

    Keeping it topical, there's always 'Beyond Bill' or 'EaaS' (Everything as a Service).

    Finally, going old-school and providing a link to the glory days, why not coin the term ' The Beige Factory'.

    1. GrumpenKraut

      > 'EaaS' (Everything as a Service).

      More specific, 'DaaS' (Desperation as a Service).

      1. Joe W Silver badge

        > 'EaaS' (Everything as a Service).

        Evil as a Service - but that would also be The Chocolate Factory [TM]

  72. x 7

    Macroshaft

    or Macroshite

  73. x 7

    Gatesville

  74. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Munch

    As in Edvard Munch - search "The Scream". Which is what I do every time the Mrs has an(other) issue with her Win10 box.

    And Munch as in data munch - when it updates.

    And Munch - as in munching your personal data for it's own use

  75. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The Redmond Redwood

    ... although try repeating that 10 times in a hurry and you will probably find yourself muttering "the Redwood Redmond."

    1. jake Silver badge

      Re: The Redmond Redwood

      Nah. Redwoods are useful.

    2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: The Redmond Redwood

      "try repeating that 10 times in a hurry"

      You'll probably conjure up a 5 reboot update.

  76. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The name 'GitHub' always used to amuse me, as it conjures up the image of a meeting place for total gits. Now that Microsoft owns GitHub, maybe The Reg should just call it that?

    1. Daedalus

      Gitzilla?

    2. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
      Windows

      A bunch of crusty old gits with ribbons in their hair, in a desperate attempt to still look cool, like in the good old days. But probably smelling slightly of wee...

      How about Grandad? Grandad Redmond? As in:

      Oh Grandad! You’ve made me reboot the computer! AGAIN!

      1. jake Silver badge

        "Oh Grandad! You’ve made me reboot the computer! AGAIN!"

        In the voice of Rocket J. Squirrel, of course.

  77. scrubber

    nom de plume

    Desktop Doyens

    Big Plastic

    Zune Slingers

    Deskzilla

    Xerox Copiers

  78. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Borkzilla?

    How many broken updates is it now???

    1. SysKoll

      Re: Borkzilla?

      BorkZilla.

      Also fits in with Pokemon memes: Ransomware vs. Clooless!

      Clooless: BorkZilla, I choose you!

      Announcer: Ransomware uses Buggalore! It's very effective.

      BorkZilla fainted! Ransomware wins!

  79. bazmcd

    Blue Screen Software Purveyors

  80. aregross
    Thumb Up

    I got this....

    Magra-Soft

  81. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Blue Screen Meanies.

  82. Martipar

    Some suggestions

    Monopolysoft.

    They who shall not be named.

    Failsoft.

  83. H-O Petard

    Maxi-me

    Inspired by the picture at the top of the request, I propose:

    Maxi-me

    ---After all, W10 and its issues did have a very emphatic predecessor, the (M)illenium (E)dition . . . .

  84. Mimisss

    MicroMalako

    because Malako means Soft in Greek but it means as*hole, too. Plus they get to have a Greek-based name; how cool is that?

    Ah, well, just name them M$ otherwise.

  85. ChrisFJ

    Micro$oft

  86. AllTheseClickyThings

    LaRedmond Tar Pit

    ...in honor of the unfortunates immortalized on the cover of The Mythical Man-Month, who either wandered of their own free will or were driven by forces beyond their control into the nigh-inescapable embrace of doom. Refuge, sustenance, or simply safe passage to the sunlit uplands beyond... who can say what they sought? All shared the common fate: first a lack of progress, an inability to move forward... imperceptibly but inexorably, they sink; the more they struggle, the more they are trapped... perhaps at the end they roar, knowing they cannot save themselves but hoping still to warn their kin... then they are gone.

    And yet they still come.

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: LaRedmond Tar Pit

      Welcome.

      Top quality first post.

  87. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The Orifice

    As in Soft Orifice

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The Orifice

      I remember when the security crisis was at a peak and someone suggested renaming the suite Open Orifice in contrast to Open Office.

  88. TMMITW
    Coat

    SoftSquatch

    From the wild forests of the Pacific Northwest

  89. DCdave
    Facepalm

    Big Azure, surely?

    Big Azure, surely?

  90. Jim T

    The Opensource Embracers.

    Just to niggle those at the company who don't like it, and nod to the Embrace, Extend, Extinguish cycle ...

  91. Anonymous Coward
    Windows

    Some (not so) humble suggestions...

    "Deskzilla"

    "Dude, Where's my VAR"?

    "The Monster That Ate Seattle"

    "Windows World"

    1. IanJSeattle

      Re: Some (not so) humble suggestions...

      Nah, The Monster That Ate Seattle is definitely Amazon.

  92. Charlie van Becelaere

    Historical

    reasons for this one:

    FUDCo.

    Cheers

  93. JakeMS

    Subscriptions "R" Us

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge
  94. Wingtech

    Double Glaziers

    Kind of refers to Windoze and the fact that it takes more than one go to get anything right

  95. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge

    EEE$$$slurp

    naturally.

  96. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Moistnessoft

    {My mind is on something else... but related to what they are....}

  97. Stumpy

    Big Beige ... they always wanted to be like IBM, but somehow lacked any of the charisma.

    ... or the Seattle Shitehawks.

    1. dvhamme

      Short, powerful, fitting. Beige just really suits the corporate image I have of Microsoft.

  98. Forget It

    Window Pain

    Window Pain

  99. philmck

    Nanosludge

    How about... Nanosludge

  100. Arthur the cat Silver badge

    Remembering history

    Uncle Fester's droppings.

  101. Azamino
    Windows

    From Beast of Redmond to ...

    With a hat tip to the recent past - Neo-Beast.

  102. 23n

    Something along the line of “House of Co-Dependance” for how the tech industry and customers are in a co-dependant relationship with them, or “RandomSoft” for their ever-shifting program features and overall roadmaps.

    Although I did always love the Pinky & The Brain parody moniker of “MicroSloth”.

  103. Dave K

    Thunderstorm

    Because they used to create software for microcomputers (hence Microsoft), but have gone all cloud lately. And when you move everything and more into the clouds, you'll eventually end up with a thunderstorm.

    Plus using Microsoft products often gives you that dark grumbly feeling when they keep changing/renaming everything every 5 seconds.

  104. aroundM21

    NINA --- Not IBM, Not AWS.

    Or may

    FIFA -- Fleeced IBM; Followed AWS.

  105. paul@inthecanopy.com

    De or Dis

    M$ has long been known in my orgo as "the defunctionality shop".

  106. Cederic Silver badge

    hmm

    Perpetual patchers? (every Tuesday)

    Monopolysoft? (but which monopoly)

    Blue cloud provider? (see also: Azure)

    Leap year denialists? (office 365 et al)

    Global musicians? (instrumentation all over the planet)

  107. ukgnome

    Ian Patch

    Dead Horse Sales

    acquisitions incorporated

    Stolen Property

  108. Gnarfle

    This post has no title

    MothraSoft - flailing at Windows while seeking the light.

  109. tk666

    mingocoughed

  110. jake Silver badge

    They are hardly necessary, so ...

    ... The Irrelevant.

  111. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
    Linux

    What about a name to

    reflect the company they've been over the past few years and looking ahead to the company they will be in the next few years

    "Fumbles"

  112. newspuppy

    Blue Screen Bandits

    kind of explains it all...

    lack of quality.. and ... mafia like behavior...

  113. Throatwarbler Mangrove Silver badge
    Windows

    How about "Redmond Blue Screen Factory"?

  114. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    ...

    DOSsers?

  115. Is AC used?
    Devil

    Bloody Microsoft!!!

    There, that should sum up everyone's feelings nicely.

  116. lowwall

    Microsofter

    Or keep the name, but reduce the font: <small>Microsoft</small> to indicate its relative importance these days.

  117. Fungus Bob

    Big Bland

    The Gods of Ennui

    Zune Warriors

    Breaks For Sure

  118. Daedalus

    ObPratchett

    B. S. Johnson Inc.

  119. Not Enough Coffee

    In the old days I used Billshit when referring to their software.

  120. mevets

    stabs...

    CrashZilla -- speaks for itself.

    MZika -- virus mashup.

    But there is an old python classic: Let's not call them anything, lets just ignore them. This twisted path leads to:

    Belgians!

    1. mevets

      Re: stabs...

      Duh....

      Tesla is obviously CrashZilla

      1. Joe W Silver badge
        Pint

        Re: stabs...

        Bad taste, mate -> have one of those

    2. ovation1357

      Re: stabs...

      Belgians!

      I don't remember this Python reference but it would certainly get Douglas Adams a bit animated...

      A couple of years ago I had a shocking experience in the international terminal of Brussels airport: After paying something like €5 for a cup of tea I discovered that there was no milk! They don't put it in tea! Shock! Horror!

      Recently, amidst a list of proper questions, I jokingly asked a tech support guy from Belgium:

      Why don't you guys put milk in your tea? It's delicious!

      His response was classic:

      It's an island thing don't you know - it only tastes good in England - a bit like how beer only tastes good here.

      Well, touché! He got me there.

      Perhaps Microsoft stuff is only Amazing in Redmond?

  121. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Leaving-so-Zune?

    DOSzooky

    Ol' Blue Screens

    LockedIn

  122. Grikath

    Redmond Ribbon.

    With the possible pictorial of a noose topped by a bow-tie..

  123. cd

    Get back to Gates

    School lunch money absconders

  124. jonnypowell

    MS =

    Fauxpen source HQ

  125. ranchhand

    MSLinux kernel

    MS has announced that W10 is the last Windows. No clue as to the name of the next OS they put out.

    They are hampered by the tiny remains of dos in their so called kernel.

    They have a MS Linux kernel in use.

    They are moving as much as they can to the 'cloud' for greater control.

    They - in my view - have to be working to create an OS based on that Linux kernel of theirs. Much more usable for cloud deployment - is actually a multi user system and all that implies. Also much better platform for actually spying on your users. Think about the possibilities and - again to me - this is the obvious route to take for them.

    So this brings me back to the 'slurp' zone for

    MacroSlurp

  126. ranchhand
    Linux

    MacroSlurp

    MS has announced that W10 is the last "Windows" version. Has an EOL of 2025.

    They have their own Linux kernel version now.

    They want to shift everything possible - including the OS itself to the cloud.

    Linux is a multi user system - obviously a better fit for that cloud deployment as it is much more flexible and easier to secure.

    Also - in the hands of the wrong sort of developers - Linux offers much greater functionality for slurping up everything done on the system.

    All this has me convinced that MS is actively developing the next OS (name has not been hinted at yet) to run on a Linux base. This brings me back to the use of Slurp.

    MacroSlurp

  127. BlueShiftNZ

    The Azure Behemoth

    Its in keeping with the colourful names of some of the other monster outfits.

    And fits their inability to change direction with less than 40 acres of maneuvering room...

    1. Mark 110

      Re: The Azure Behemoth

      Azgard?

  128. User McUser

    If I may humbly suggest...

    • Seattle Desktop Botherers
    • The Great Beige Bloat
    • Sysadmin Job Securers
    • Paterson's Regret (perhaps a bit too obscure?)

  129. Someone Else Silver badge

    Awww, c'mon guys....

    [...] and good taste forbids us from revealing what Amazon boss Jeff Bezos' nickname almost was.

    Since when has El Reg ever been associated with good taste? C'mon, gents. Give us a look-see.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: good taste

      Good taste should never raise its fugly head here!

  130. HamVE3

    OS of Sauron

    One OS to rule them all

    One OS to mine them

    One OS to hook them all

    and in the dot net bind them

  131. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    SurfyMcSurface

    ^How aboat that?

  132. conscience

    Off the top of my head...

    Shitzilla, Mankysoft, Microshite, Microbork, Microslurp, Microbroke, Weinersoft, Microspent Force, MicrOSSoft Extinguishers, MicrOSSoftware Killers, Trojansoft, Redmond Workflow Discontinuers, Microlast Chance Saloon...

    Products:

    Microsoft Turd, Microsoft Feckswell, Microsoft Taxess / Taccess, Microsoft Reams, Windoesn't, Winblows, Windozey, Edge of the Abyss, Towering Winferno, Clitty says would you like a subscription with that...

  133. Rol

    The Doughnut Factory

    Cos it's software is shot through with security holes.

  134. Rol

    Kerching unlimited

    I think that needs little explanation

  135. Rol

    Rodeo Rentals

    Well, it's my favourite so far.

    Reminds me of the days families had to put 50p into a meter so they could watch TV, and it would always run out at the worst time, and no one had a 50p piece to get it working again.

  136. BillGatesOfHell

    microslurp

    bloatzilla

    pseudopenguin

    migrainesoft

  137. Don The Elder
    Pint

    Been M$ for years around here

    Even though I'm 15 hours late in proposing it, It can't be beat as a shortcut!

    Show of hands?

  138. cbars Bronze badge

    The Any Key

    As in, whatever you do they just continue (updating, slurping, whatever your gripe is)

    As in, a formless mythical solution that doesnt really exist

  139. Anal Leakage

    Howabout

    No One Gives A Fuck About Psion?

  140. Herby

    Magic names...

    To me they are the "Redmond Robbers!"

  141. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    BloatyMcSurface.Sub pronounced 'BloatyMcSurface<dot>Sub'

    The thinking here is the three themes.

    McBloaty, McSurface and McSub, incorporating Microsoft 360 Subscriptions.

    McBloatMcSurfaceMcSub.

    McSurfaceMcSub.

    McSubMcSurface

    But the best is long version / short version:

    BloatyMcSurface.Sub

    Pronounced 'BloatyMcSurface<dot>Sub.

    shortened to 'BloatyMcSurface'

  142. Bilious

    If Chocolate Factory is OK for Google and Big Blue is OK for IMB, then

    The WinDos Empire

    could be OK for Microsoft.

  143. Chronos
    Devil

    Millisoft

    They're a order of magnitude or three bigger since they pinched DR-DOS but you still need a magnifying glass to see their contribution to general purpose computing, unless it's the interminable wait for "Windows Updates" (Evergreen needs to die in a fire) and then the downtime in man-hours can probably be seen from space. Most of their "innovations," including that of the current business model of "data data everywhere" have been begged, borrowed or outright stolen from other innovators. There's a thought: The Borg. Your stuff will be assimilated.

    It is often quipped that should Microsoft ever make a vacuum cleaner it would be the only thing that didn't suck. This is probably a bit unfair; their hardware is generally, excluding the RROD X Boxen, quite good quality, especially their input peripherals. Not a patch on a decent Cherry brown or Model M, of course...

  144. Chairo

    I think the name should point out more that they heavily rely on being installed on every PC by default:

    the default one

    the lazy choice

    creeper factory

    bluescreen maker

    preinstalled SAAS maker

    your choice chooser

    the preinstalled one

    Just some thoughts...

    Oh "Home of Bob" also comes to mind.

  145. zapgadget
    Flame

    Brokensoft

    as in "if it's not broken yet, we'll fix that in the next mandatory update".

  146. NickTheGeek

    BADmond, Lords of The Bings, BotNet Framework, Bucksingham Palace, Big Glue, Racket Science,...

    BADmond, Lords of The Bings, BotNet Framework, Bucksingham Palace, Big Glue, Racket Science, EEE-PissSee, MorphoSoft, VaccineSoft, Build Gates, Billy the Bid, BidOne (see the italian translation...),...

    I had many other ideas but were already written by other people. :-)

    But you dont't really need to call Microsoft. Your Windows PC has been doing it on regular basis.

  147. TheMaskedMan Silver badge
    Coat

    What about...

    Nad's Army?

  148. tho7m

    In the post-Bill era

    now that we should "shut the horse, the Gates have bolted", how about the Mare's Shi(p)ful, or MS for short?

  149. Phunk33Phr3sh

    Some I thought of was "Gates Foundation Software Divison" or "Balmer's Gate/Baldur's Gates"

  150. steelpillow Silver badge

    Mobile Wannabees

    The main strand that strikes me as a continuous theme ever since Bill Gates realized that he had missed the Internet has been its failure to conquer the mobile market.

    Microsoft are the definitive mobile wannabees.

    Has a nice, deflating ring to it as a monicker, I feel.

  151. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Happy

    Something quite simple

    Nemesis

    dictionary definitions:

    1. a source or cause of harm or failure.

    2. an unconquerable opponent or rival.

  152. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Purveyors of Windows..

    ... should be known as The Double Glazing Factory.

  153. steviebuk Silver badge

    Microsoft640k or just 640k.

    In reference to Bill Gated memory comment all those years back.

    1. jake Silver badge

      Gates never made the 640K comment.

      The supposed "640K limit" was an IBM hardware limit, not an MS software limit. The IBM hardware spec was already firmly in place before Gates even heard about the project, so even if he had made the comment (which is extremely doubtful), he would have just been agreeing with IBM. And it wasn't really 640K, it was more like 704K, if you knew what you were doing. I find it absolutely amazing that this piece of incorrect trivia is still being parroted as fact after all these years ...

      OTOH, I personally remember Steve Jobs saying that "128K ought to be more than enough for home users", at a meeting of the Homebrew Computer Club in late 1983, as he was demonstrating the original Macintosh, just before the public unveiling. At the time, he had a point ... people were running flight simulators in 64K ...

      On the gripping hand, none of this matters any more. It's all just an accident of history.

      1. dajames

        Re: Gates never made the 640K comment.

        The supposed "640K limit" was an IBM hardware limit, not an MS software limit. The IBM hardware spec was already firmly in place before Gates even heard about the project, so even if he had made the comment (which is extremely doubtful), he would have just been agreeing with IBM. And it wasn't really 640K, it was more like 704K, if you knew what you were doing. I find it absolutely amazing that this piece of incorrect trivia is still being parroted as fact after all these years ...

        I think the words attributed to Bill Gates refer to the fact that the IBM PC's design placed the video memory at A0000H, leaving only the address space below that (640k) for RAM accessible to the OS (or to an OS that required its address space to be continuous). The 8086 could address 1MB, and some MS-DOS computers (I'm looking at you, Apricot) were designed to allow RAM to use as much as 896k of that (at the cost of reduced compatibility with IBM), but IBM's design limited the RAM to 640k.

        The original IBM PC was available with 64k and a cassette deck. IBM didn't foresee that PCs would be used for applications that required more.

        It was 640k, on the original unexpanded PC. The hardware/firmware didn't support anything more.

        1. jake Silver badge

          Re: Gates never made the 640K comment.

          "The hardware/firmware didn't support anything more."

          Or so said IBM. My original 5150 runs 704K, with the "extra" memory coming from space allocated for my non-existant EGA card. I know a couple people who added another 64K to that, but I had no real need. Hacking around with memory & hardware was a normal part of the personal computing world back the day. Modifying and/or fooling the BIOS was/is trivial. Remember, IBM published the extremely detailed " IBM PC Technical Reference Manual " (36 bucks), making these kinds of hacks fairly easy. Having access to the brains at The Homebrew Computer Club probably colo(u)rs my memories of how easy this stuff actually was ... or wasn't.

          Note that games often barfed on the various mods, but most of the important business software of the day ran just fine with the extra memory. Also note that DOS would happily use as much contiguous conventional memory (the RAM between the LMA and the first populated portion of the UMA) as the system reported. DOS itself had no 640K limit baked into it.

          And of course there were cards like Tall Tree JRAM that could take the PC up to 2 megs ... but that didn't come out until the PC had been on the market for 8 or 9 months. I rode my bike over to Elwell Court in Palo Alto to get mine direct from Tall Tree ... which I only remember because the "shortcut" alongside Adobe Creek under Hwy 101 flooded out due to high tide and I had to take the long way home, over San Antonio Road.

  154. Uplink

    Everest.

    They sell windows and charge an arm and a leg.

  155. Sam Therapy

    Tiny Unhard

  156. YeahRight

    Micro$oft - the uppers of fuck

  157. Forum McForumface

    I haven’t read all of these; has anyone suggested ‘Bingpiece’ yet?

    Describing them as a ‘Minecraft purveyor’ would work for me.

  158. RB_

    Some more

    The desktop patch slinger

    The 365 trouser pocket partner

    The penguin-clad wolf of Redmond (variation on another contributor)

    The cloud-veined wallet stabber

    The ginger-haired corp at the cloud party, Microsoft.

    The beast in the cloud

    The King that lost its crown

    The open-source lube applicator, Microsoft

  159. rtspam

    The only child of Thanos

    Seeks out information so that they can use it to control and destroy civilisation as we know it.

  160. adam eyeball

    Call it what it is

    Microsoft = former dos-er

  161. Bloakey1

    How about BADASS 365

    Following the basis below;

    If the answer is Microsoft, then you have misunderstood the question.

    Which leads to;

    BAD Answer Sun Shine and 365 for obvious reasons.

  162. BrownishMonstr

    Something to do with their fucking indecisiveness, always changing course, fucking up the stuff people love (Windows Phone), and then prematurely ejaculating and cancelling the stuff people love.

    Something like Doubt Corp, Doubt Factory, WhatMart (though this sounds more like Stack Exchange), but better.

    Come on people think, group effort.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      FUD Factory

      Surely you were reaching for 'FUD' Factory? With the alliteration and everything?

      Or FUDzilla to emphasize their really big into FUD?

      1. BrownishMonstr

        Re: FUD Factory

        Certainly better than what I was thinking of

      2. Richie 1

        Re: FUD Factory

        Oh, yeah, "FUDge Factory" would work well with Google's "Chocolate Factory".

  163. dvhamme

    "Redmond cloud and crud peddlers"

  164. low_resolution_foxxes

    Kardashian Softcorp™ (omnipresent yet unwanted).

    LCD bloatcorp™ (lowest common denominator)

    Internet ExploderCorp™

    IR35 Grudgetax Boutique™

  165. Wraith Black
    Devil

    The Tomato Sauce Dispenser

    Because ever since Mosaic they have been trying to ketchup?

  166. Bubba Von Braun

    Simple but effective..

    M$

    As we all know this is whats its all about how to screw the very last penny out of everyone.

    BvB

  167. Lunatic Looking For Asylum

    The Assimilators

    Assimilation Central

    Cuddly Shark

    Bill's Old Bunch (fits nicely with Bob) :-)

  168. This post has been deleted by its author

  169. MCMLXV
    Gimp

    How about...

    An AC above suggested "The Bork Factory". How about shorter and simpler, yet retaining a cheery hint of assimilation: The Bork

  170. iainw
  171. a pressbutton

    MS is what you think it is

    © - formerly known as Microsoft

    Sadly, the prince symbol is not in a standard keyboard

    However, C can mean anything you want to project

  172. Stuart Moore

    Uptime363

  173. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Everything is a subscription model ...

    Micro$cription

    Everything is broken model...

    The Downtime Factory

    Downtime 362

    Purveyor of Downtime

  174. Locomotion69
    Pint

    Pane

    Just "Pane". As in Window pane.

    It wants to be regarded as a "transparant" company. And in most cases, they start that way but soon the dirt settles.

    And it sounds similar to "Pain" which is also applicable.

    Cheers.

  175. Claptrap314 Silver badge

    u$

    See, I'm too lazy to figure out how to get a micron character. And MS -> micron$ is a reasonable thing. And their products are not good enough for them to rate a capital letter.

  176. Alan Ferris

    Rename

    Clippit Killers

    I used to really like Clippit

  177. Javc

    Bing Bing Bing

    We have a winner. The edge lords of Mbrace.

  178. Walkingbeard

    Mubuntu

    I tend to just call them MS, because I know that, if they ever heard me say, it would be the one thing that would probably enrage the MS marketing department.

    However, I offer up Mubuntu, for hopefully obvious reasons. Although, now I think about it, it's also slightly reminiscent of Mugatu, another brand known for its dubious fashion statements.

  179. Patched Out

    Borkmongers

    Or variants:

    Borkage Mongers

    Purveyors of Borkage

  180. Primus Secundus Tertius

    Opposite view

    Makrotuf

    Someone has to tease them.

  181. kraftdinner

    Big Bill

    In the spirit of "Big" - Big Bill. It works on many levels. In fact, I just got a big bill from Big Bill last week. Man they can bury their fees...

  182. Citizens untied

    Bing Slingers

  183. InITForTheMoney

    OfficeZilla

    One constant all this time... Office. Still lacklustre after all these years.

    Alternatively: Patch Tuesday Corp.

  184. a_yank_lurker

    In honor

    In honor of what Slurp causes:

    MigraineSoft

    By the way I use Slurp to refer to their TOS allowing them to slurp up user date willy-nilly.

  185. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    call it Westworld

    run by 'hosts' who co-opt your personal data to fuck you over at your expense.

  186. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Mouse & Keyboard manufacturer?

  187. kraftdinner

    Open Farce

    Big Bill promoting his OpenFarce software....

  188. nagyeger

    EmbraceExtinguish

    Or maybe Extinguish$oft?

  189. Sanford Olson

    NanoSoft

    I like "NanoSoft".

  190. bpfh

    BSODZilla.

    My 0.02p

  191. comorain

    PearlyGates

  192. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Crudzilla

  193. redpawn

    Hide and $eek

    Mine $weeper

    Calvin Ball

    Ten O' Clunk

  194. Deimos

    Perhaps..

    Microflaccid - it starts with an identifier but ends with a word that describes the company perfectly.

    Their products were always middle of the road, weak, insipid and never advanced computing or the world in general.

    When they did try to be bleeding edge, it was always the customer who bled (win95, windows fista and of course generations of subsurface slabs and windows phones). They abandon products faster than bojo forgets children and only have two real skills, hyperbole and paying lawyers.

    Perhaps their greatest failure has been the inability to even remain as the evil tech giant of choice.

    My favourite irony in all this is that Billy boy spent decades profiting from making virus friendly pc’s and then spent much of those profits fighting viruses in the human world. Go figure.

  195. Version 1.0 Silver badge

    MicroCloudy, it rains sometimes.

  196. Tigger_MK

    Alwasys selling dodgy stuff....

    First thing that popped into my he'd

    Double Glazing sales men

    Unscrupulous people selling Windows!

  197. Forest Dwelling Luddite

    Back in the Day...

    Win 95 and 98 days to be exact, in our household it became MicroSmurf, mostly because of the BSOD, but also smurfs are blue and we deemed the cartoon to be a kind of creeping evil, it was not outright banned like the purple dinosaur or bloody whining Carebears, but attempts were made to divert to something more in keeping with our views like Ivor the Engine or Bagpuss, lol

  198. xxthrockmorton

    Big Pane

    or BIG Pane

  199. dbernhar

    new nickname for Micro$soft

    MicroScrouge

  200. vastspace91

    Anagram Inspiration

    Formic Sot

    Foci Storm

    Micros Oft

    Sitcom For

    Scoot Firm

    Coots Firm

    Coot Firms

    Scrim Of To

    Coots If Mr

    Coot If Mrs

    Cost From I

    Cost Of Rim

    Cost For Mi

    1. Cave-Homme

      Re: Anagram Inspiration

      Try Bill Gates: Legal Bits

  201. Chewgaloo
    Meh

    Me humble offerings..

    Malware Magnet Machine

    Random Number Generator

    Redmond Malware Magnet

    Middle Managers' Safebet

  202. syro

    Micro-tit$

    noun (plural)

    A good mash of classic Micro$oft and TITSUP.

    Suggested in consideration of how many Win 10 devices & cloudy services have been relatively unreliable. Recent example: all the systems that danced with the BSOD due to the 1809 build.

  203. RSchune

    SNOTSOFT

    Got the itch but not the cojones to sneak into the backdoor, speakeasy pub in the corner to steal someone else's inspired suggestion for ElReg's Microsoft alias?

    Look at yourself in the mirror instead, pick your booger...

    BOOGERSOFT, direct translation of Mocosoft in geekspeak Spanish.

  204. Xalran

    Bringer of Software Obviously Demented.

    nuf said. Obviouslt the Acronym will be fittingly BSOD

  205. WorriedAboutThis Nation

    MicroObfuscate - to confuse and control Windows10

    definition ---

    verb (used with object), ob·fus·cat·ed, ob·fus·cat·ing.

    to confuse, bewilder, or stupefy.

    to make obscure or unclear: to obfuscate a problem with extraneous information.

    to darken.

  206. slowandeasy

    How about

    Bing Borg

  207. Account34567

    Azure Blue?

  208. A. Ott

    MS Moniker

    MS.Warbucks

  209. A. Ott

    MS Moniker

    MS.Warbuck$

  210. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Azure

    MS seems to make a tidy bundle on Azure cloud services these days, so how about ...

    Azureholes?

  211. Craig 2

    In honour of their penchant for reinventing themselves every 5 minutes, you should change their moniker likewise and just use everyone's suggestions.

  212. MrDamage Silver badge

    My submissions

    Microsofton - Because of how excited we all are with each Windows release.

    Mozziesoft - Cortana's voice is as welcome as a mosquito in your ear at 2am.

  213. Richie 1

    Big Sky Blue

    The Wi(n)dow Makers

    The Glass blowers

    Azure Screens of Death

  214. Klimt's Beast Would

    The Circle Square?

    i.e. it's impossible mission to be all things to all bodies. Aka 'Not for want of trying'.

  215. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge

    The Bitter Lemon Factory

    The Bitter Sweet Lemon Factory

  216. fobobob

    Handicapper General

    Handicapper General?

    Seems almost everything they've done in the past 10 years has made my job/general use more difficult than it needs to be.

  217. AbeSapian

    What's in a Name

    My preferred handle is Microshaft.

    "He Who Must Not Be Named" was taken. Besides, it's too wordy.

    Land Where Ideas Go To Die

    Not A Bug It's A Feature.

    Smithfield for Software

  218. xjy
    Paris Hilton

    M$ FUD

    M$ FUD

    Expensive lady friend who turns fun into fud as the dollars get sucked in/engulfed and digested in the belly of the beast.

  219. jonnycando

    Well, it's still the Borg Mothership.....so I dunno what else to call it.....

  220. json

    In emails or pm..I've almost always referred to it in shorthand ie M$.

  221. Doctor Evil

    Thanks!

    I don't know monikers. I just really like the photo you've chosen to accompany the article.

  222. JustWondering

    Windex? Because it turns your screen blue and wipes everything off of it?

  223. Phones Sheridan Silver badge

    Almost 365

    I'd call it Almost 365. Because it's never quite achieved it!

  224. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    micro:(pick one below and glue it on the end)

    trust

    value

    freedom

    freedom

    effifency

    security

    governmentpimp

    governmentbrothel

    digitalpusher

  225. Anthidote

    The poesy of the absurd

    As perhaps one of the most Dadaistic platform companies I think the Microsoft Corporation deserves a poetic moniker. Here are some suggestions:

    Forests of Azure

    (Smelly) Trolls of Nootka Sound

    Soft and Small

    Here's a good one for the Chinese data giant you vultures may feast upon:

    Terradata Army

  226. asgalon

    The Gates of Hell...

    We used to call them Kleinstweich at the university, which is german for "smallest soft one", sort of... this one is about 30 years old, if I remember correctly, from the times of everybody from my family going for DOS boxes against my advice and then nagging me for help...

  227. henklaak

    The Company That Gave You Edlin

  228. Bloognoo
    Linux

    To try and encapsulate their future plans...

    One with some possibility of in-article extension - The Redmond Penguin <verb/noun>(s)

    ... colony

    ... thieves

    ... chokers

    ... frotterers

    ... feckers

    ... huggers

    ... consumers

    I had wanted something ridiculing that they can't get platform dominance on their own cloud service but all snow/eskimo variants are too cumbersome

  229. henklaak

    The FUDerati

  230. henklaak

    "Broken By Design ™"

  231. henklaak

    "Seems like you are doing important work right now!

    Want to reboot and do 2 hours of patches right now.

    Don't say it, I'm already on it."

  232. Morpho Devilpepper
    Alien

    On so many levels

    Apophis 365

  233. Mafu

    The all seeing eye of Redmond

    Sons of BOB

  234. nautica Silver badge
    Boffin

    The Artful Dodger

    "The Artful Dodger".

    You know, from the character in 'Oliver Twist'.

    Here are some of Artful's more endearing characteristics--all of which fit--from Wikipedia:

    "...The Dodger is a pickpocket, so called for his skill and cunning in that occupation. He is the leader of the gang of child criminals...The Artful Dodger is characterized as a child who acts like an adult...was of a rather saturnine disposition...seldom gave way to merriment when it interfered with business...as dirty a juvenile as one would wish to see..."

    Works for me...

  235. luminous

    KB-VOMITERS365

  236. Cranky_Yank
    Facepalm

    Has anybody suggested this? (My scroller's broken)

    Big Mu

  237. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Micro and soft????

    In my country we use it to describe a man who cannot perform. You can take it from there...

  238. GraXXoR

    MicroSoft?

    That’s what she said.

  239. Zoli

    No, it's not that...

    I just wonder: how a discovery of an another (now defunct)forum's member doesn't came up so far:

    TinyFlaccid?

  240. StevenGS

    A few suggestions

    I have always typed them as Micro$soft but I guess that is too well known and not very catchy.

    PatchMond - play on the large number of patches coming form Redmond.

    The First Order - They have reborn and emerged from the Evil Empire they were before

    Big Brother - no explanation needed.

  241. Peppy Crandle
    FAIL

    Microborkborkbork

  242. Mike 125

    'Micropoly'

    "One thing we have got to change in our strategy - allowing Office documents to be rendered very well by other peoples browsers is one of the most destructive things we could do to the company. We have to stop putting any effort into this and make sure that Office documents very well depends on PROPRIETARY IE capabilities," Gates wrote in a memo to Microsoft in 1998.

    And nothing's changed.

  243. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

    MICROSOFT-19

    Spreads indiscriminately throughout the world, leaving a trail of fear and destruction in its wake.

  244. ovation1357
    IT Angle

    Why do we need a new name for them?

    There's too many comments for me to read them all so there's a chance someone's already said this:

    Why do we need a new name for them?

    I must admit that until this article cropped up, I'd never realised that their full, honourable title is, "The beast of Redmond". Must articles and comments just refer to Redmond and that's plenty... The term has become somewhat ubiquitous - I sometimes hear it used by folks at work and, for example, in the Linux MATE (formerly GNOME 2) desktop, the Windows-esque layout is called 'Redmond' and the Mac style layout is "Cupertino".

    So I just don't know how successful El Reg will be at coining a new name and gaining wide scale adoption of it's use.

  245. Rob 15

    how about

    Zune Corp

    The Patch Factory

  246. Forget It
    Coffee/keyboard

    the Tile factory (Win8 a start menu)

    Hubris-As-A-Service

    (you are the beta-tester)

  247. Nano nano

    40,000 licences every day ...

    The Blue Azure Cult ...

  248. volsano

    Call them for what they are

    The Office Boys.

  249. tygrus.au

    MegaSoft

    .. Their software just keeps getting bigger.

  250. Blackjack Silver badge

    What kind of candy is blue?

    Blue has been a color associated with Microsoft since long ago. Blue Screens of death might or not be still blue but Windows still uses blue a lot.

    Blue Sucker

    Because it sucks in so many many ways...

  251. Joe Gurman

    The Cloud....

    ....without a silver lining, or even an Azure one.

  252. pctechxp

    Considering they've called the cloud service Azure........

    .........which is related to a gem so they consider it precious and they seem open to running anything on it these days

    Surely there has to be a Lord of the Rings reference.

    Lord of the clouds?

    One cloud to rule them all, one Bing to try and find them, one cloud to host them all and in the time consuming hassle of cloud data transfer bind them

  253. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I would go with Ecosystem Terrorist, but...

    SaaSquatch.

  254. Authentic Name

    The Marketing Cult

    The Marketing Cult. Colourful CEOs and product lines may come and go. But like Amway, the faithful do not waiver no matter how much the dogma changes. One Microsoft Way is not just an address.

  255. Anonymous Coward
    Pint

    Go full Elon

    M Æ W-10

  256. Fred Fallacy

    Gates Motel

    The post is required, and must contain letters.

  257. Friendly Neighbourhood Coder Dan

    The Kins of Zune

  258. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge

    The Cradle To The Grave IT Vendor

    Catch 'em young, keep them hooked for the rest of their life.

    Minecraft, X-Box, Office, Windows OS, DB, Dev Tools, Mobile, Hardware, Search, Voice Assistance, Cloud etc

  259. Altrux

    The New Borg

    WinZilla / OffZilla365? TweedleDumb?

    Speaking of which, is AWS now officially CloudZilla?

  260. 7teven 4ect

    Psycholoft

    Lazy spoonerization and grimm's law m->l makes this one

    For those who missed the title, 'PsychoLoft' seems apt now they are in the open source penthouse party mood.

  261. skeptical i
    Devil

    respectfully suggest Sta-Puft Marshmallow Man

    My current experience with a Windows 10 laptop (oy vey) leads me to believe that Microsoft's MO seems to be: cross a bunch of idea/concept streams at various stages of viability/usefulness and hope something coheres. Perhaps someone more clever than I can work 'Microsoft' into 'Sta-Puft Marshmallow Man' ('Sta-Cruft Bloatwallow Man'? sorry) better than I can.

  262. WillbeIT

    There can be only one

    The Redmond blue screen of death flasher

  263. CountCadaver Silver badge

    Crash Gordon (due to all the BSODs)

  264. Jared Vanderbilt

    They chose their name decades ago

    Bob

  265. doggybreath

    McSlurp

  266. mikale

    What's in a name?

    Microfleece

  267. mikale

    Defenestrator of Chairs

    Dictionary might be required.

  268. DeathSquid

    The Clouded Leopard. Because they never change their spots.

  269. 20TC

    Flingers of Fenestration ?

    or Phlingers of Fenestration

    (Keeps the spellcheck busy whichever you try!)

  270. El blissett

    Another vote for Edge Lords from me.

  271. anthonyhegedus Silver badge

    Yes, I think Winzilla is good, I second that.

  272. Lotaresco

    Work is a big M$ only shop and we cubicle dwellers tend to use M$ and Seattle Cowboys as terms for the company. Recently given their woes with security vulnerabilities they have become "GIF-prone". Although that's more descriptive than a name, as in "Yes we would use their products but not for secure work because they have been rather gif-prone of late."

  273. IareFlash

    Tiny little hamlet of Chigley

    Something so diametrically opposite of what the Cash Factory is.

    For those of you under 40 or over the pond, Chigley was one of the three imaginary hamlets - Trumpton, Camberwick Green and Chigley used to make a stop go animation childrens series in the late 60s and was just delightful and enchanting. Everything that the Cash Factory isn't.

  274. IareFlash

    Rectoplasty

    N:surgical repair of the anus and rectum

    Need I say more.

  275. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Bob

    It really needs to be Bob. Microsoft Bob and of course the Church of Bob should make that clear

  276. Greg Dolph

    Given they can't decide what market they fit in

    Given M$ can't figure out what market they want to be in, and they keep changing their minds on direction I think the "Waffle House" would be appropriate.

  277. Dataflake99

    Brookside

    The name always brings to mind the final credits of brookside. So obviously

    Phil Redmond

    Big Phil

    Etc

  278. faiugnarej

    "New Blue" - because the suggestion that they're the new IBM would really annoy them

    "The number 2 cloud company" - again, this would annoy them

    1. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

      Re: "The number 2 cloud company"

      The Maltese for "it is raining" is "Ix-xita". You can guess the pronunciation.

  279. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Microso-and-so

  280. JohnJacob

    Micro-sloughed trying to get rid of their proprietary skin by buying throwing their money into open source. a bit sleazy feeling, just like the name sounds.

  281. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The Red(mond) Barron unfortunately there's no iron cross emoji to be had

  282. SiliconSupe

    "Gagnam soft"

  283. janjust

    my precioussss

    how about 'SmeagolSoft' or 'GollumWorks' ? it seems Microsoft is getting a bit two-faced about open source versus guarding its family jewels like Windows, Office etc. ("yessssss the people wants it but the people can't have it. They've tricksed us, oh yes they have")

    Also, 'RedmondTwoFace' would apply then, I guess

  284. Gazolba

    How about the SOUP FACTORY (as in Software Of Uncertain Pedigree)

  285. mvillion

    The Borg

    or the Borg cube

    Or "Redmond Borg"

  286. Roger Kynaston

    It may have already been suggested

    There are too many to wade through to verify.

    My suggestion is: Winzilla

  287. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Well a window is a hole in a wall..

    ..and now they have you over a barrel in to giving them money, how about

    The Hole-In-the-Wall Gang

    Which serves well when you read about the actual Hole-In-The-Wall gang https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hole-in-the-Wall_Gang

  288. Majack

    Not *

    Talking about azure, Not Amazon.

    About bing. Not Google

    Surface, Not apple

    Xbox, Not Sony

    Windows, Not Linux

    Edge, Not Netscape (for the oldies)

    Mssql, Not Oracle

    Phone, Not Blackberry

    Microsoft these days is all about aping their competitors, despiratley trying to out pace them to be the leader in that sector.

    Of course office suite might be more difficult, maybe just calling them Microsoft in relation to those products is deserved.

  289. Dunelm

    Consistency pays.

    The Constant Patcher.

    1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge

      Re: Consistency pays.

      That would equally apply to Adobe too.

  290. El Dred

    1. Oliver? As in "can I have some more" money Mr customer!

    2. "Maybe late but dominate" (excluding phones obvs)

    3. The double glazing salesman (Play on Windows) - not above similar tactics.

    3. (b) Bill's conservatories and double glazing.

    4. Narcosoft - get you hooked and then make you pay. V difficult to go cold turkey on MS.

    5. Mañanasoft - the bugs will be fixed tomorrow - honestly.

    6. At Least We Are Not As Nasty as Amazon, Facebook and Google (Alwananaafag)

    7. Didn't you read the contract?

    (Bored in Lock down!)

  291. QaosTheory

    Surely it's either

    - Porty-McPortalFace

    Because is it even a Microsoft product if they haven't released-yet-another new portal to cover it?

    - Billy Wonka's

    Self explanatory I think?

  292. Denarius
    Coat

    Options, so many options

    BABB Bashing Android Big Brother

    BABS Boasting All Blue Screens

    WILT Windows Intimidating Linux Traders

    BUY Ballsed Up Yanks

    A slightly more convoluted one from the huge infrastructure of support firms and individuals needed to keep MS products working roughly as hoped for

    MEM Massive Ecosystem Manglers.

    Perhaps a description of what usually happens in an IT monoculture.

    NWD New World Disorder

    I would suggest a cultural reference like a Borg derivative but it is inappropriate. Borg stuff usually works better than Federation hardware to the point the Feds copy or steal Borg technology. How about a few suggestions from the viewpoint of the Borg, referring the MS habit of being just close enough to common standards to confuse the gullible, but different enough to break the existing standards ?

    NIHSI Not Invented Here, Steal It.

    TMC Tomorrow Never Comes or is that a movie title already, referring the the Next Big Thing, which inevitably disappoints. Or is that IBM ?

    Back to the fencing. A much more visible and useful post. Those broken wires can be seen at least. Mines the one with mud stains

  293. Denarius

    From a Lucas joke

    Vacuum since their products usually suck so much

  294. Mike the Owl

    Sirius Cybernetics Corporation ?

  295. gvp

    yet more

    Desperate of Redmond.

    Tuesday Weld (patch Tuesday reference)

    24/7 In My Cloud Cloud Cloud (anyone remember the Vengaboys?)

    The Cult of Exchange. ADzure365.

    The Groke of Redmond. (If only the Moomintrolls were more widely known!) In fact, just "The Groke" will do.

  296. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Trashfire 365

  297. Jenny Pink

    Dos slinger

    Dos slinger as that's basically what they've been doing all this while - probably not acidic enough though?

  298. Something Old

    Nyarlathosoft

    It must inspire fear - in support I refer you to...

    "he wanders the Earth, seemingly gathering legions of followers, the narrator of the story among them, through his demonstrations of strange and seemingly magical instruments. These followers lose awareness of the world around them, and through the narrator's increasingly unreliable accounts, the reader gets an impression of the world's collapse." from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyarlathotep

  299. Bobbly

    "Cockup365 Limited"

  300. Catfoodsadvisor

    Cat Foods Advisor

    They have always been Micro$oft to me.

  301. Catfoodsadvisor
    Go

    Cat Foods Advisor

    They've always been Micro$oft to me.

  302. GeoNoob

    OpenSewer

    It's "Open", but still full of ....

    or maybe a play on GitHub : TwatHub ?

  303. gautam

    Micromuggers.

    As per title.

  304. Toni the terrible Bronze badge

    Currently...

    MicroVid-19

  305. gnuless

    It's surprisingly hard to come up with a bon mot. Let's try: Emma's Dross

    And with their headquarters fully open for business, it's time to take another swipe at Apple: the Silver Sphincter or the Pewter Pucker

    1. gnuless

      Even better: Emma's Dross Shop

  306. Chris 239

    Bit late to this party but...

    Redmond Turd Polishers

    CPU Performance Destroyers Inc

    BSods-r-us

  307. Mike Zulu

    My thoughts on the matter

    How about Microbad hand job? For those who are often left unsatisfied.

  308. Semper Phoenix
    Flame

    Berkeley Breathed...

    ...christened them MicroSquash, in Bloom County / Outland.

    I like the idea of homaging the Kaleds, especially because then fun can be hand with Davros / Davos. But more so for changing "EXTERMINATE" to "DEFENESTRATE" :) Or Skaro?

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon

Other stories you might like