Hotel Microsoft is DOA
Some time back, I wrote about the Google Hotel in Mountain View, CA. Say what you want about it, fact remains that Google and all things associated, are cool. Not so with Microsoft, it seems. Eric Gwinn, Chicago Tribune, points out the obvious. Microsoft has no clue what geek friendly lodging means. He’s reviewing a get-to-know-me party at the Hotel Sax Chicago, which sees itself as a playground for tech-savvy travelers, with Microsoft technology hardwired throughout the 16-story building in a pilot project for the software giant. But was it me, or did I miss something? But despite the party’s dainty appetizers, the hotel’s contemporary-without-being-austere decor and the silhouetted female dancers gyrating to throbbing music, I still couldn’t connect “sleek, sexy fun” with the company whose big claim to fame is computer operating systems.
Let’s face it. Gyrating dancers aside, hip and cool is just not wired into Microsoft’s DNA. In fact, it’s kinda painful to watch them try to match Google’s enthusiasm and youthful bounce.
For the record, the highlight is supposed to a kind of lounge at the Sax, called the Studio, which is powered by Microsoft technology, and allows free guest access to five XBox 360 Elite® game stations with wireless controllers,five Microsoft Zune® MP3 players, pre loaded with music and movies, two HP laptop computers, connected to the Internet, and a Microsoft Windows home entertainment PC, driven by Windows® Vista Media Center.
They just don’t get it. Being geek friendly is not about providing a room with an overload of glowing screens or swanky panels or gizmos. It’s about providing the atmosphere and environment and motivation so geeks will flock there with their own glowing screens. Microsoft is like an ageing has-been actress trying to play the role of a sophomore. You can make her wear the clothes, but can’t do nothing about the total disconnect in lingo or the sagging, umm…accessories.
Info: Hotel Sax, 333 N. Dearborn St. Chicago, IL 60610; (312) 245-0333
Posted on March 24th, 2008 by PLing
Filed under: Hotels
Ya, cause a room full of macs and ipods would be so much better.
[…] this post (well… that too), but because it involves the Sax hotel. Sometime back, I wrote a review about it which probably made the hotel’s management weep. That had more to do with their […]