From: Jeff Barr (jeff@vertexdev.com)
Date: Tue Nov 28 2000 - 18:43:22 PST
There are no official free snacks at Microsoft.
However, if you know about the right hallways to wander, you can
almost always rustle up some M&M's. Some of these are bought using
the so-called "morale budget" and others are used as a part of a
bizarre and wonderful ritual peculiar to certain Microsoft groups.
Every year, on the anniversary of your hire date, you buy 1 pound of
M&M's for each year that you've been there and leave them outside
for your co-workers.
So, Using a carefully designed cache (e.g. a large paper cup) it
was possible to stay well-supplied with M&M's without actually
having to ever buy any.
Certain groups would bring in dinner when deadlines loomed. Rumor
had it that Win2K group was in "dinner mode" for several years.
Jeff;
-----Original Message-----
From: Matt Jensen [mailto:mattj@newsblip.com]
Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2000 5:56 PM
To: Gregory Alan Bolcer
Cc: FoRK
Subject: RE: Linux Developer gets Gong from Microsoft
MSFT employees and contractors get free drinks (around twenty kinds of
juices, sodas, milks, and sparkling waters), but not free snacks. Unless
you count packets of instant chicken noodle soup, and other minor items
next to the sugar and creamer containers.
(Although some kitchens have movie theatre-style popcorn poppers, and I
think they are mostly free. Lattes are generally not free.)
-Matt Jensen
NewsBlip.com
Seattle
On Tue, 28 Nov 2000, Gregory Alan Bolcer wrote:
> Don't ruin it for me. I always imagined MSFT employees all
> got free drinks and goodies. Are you saying the Web startup
> culture is truly dead??
>
> Greg
>
> > Nope, it's not a Sacagawea dollar coin on top (I have plenty of golden
> > dollars, bought them at the bank). It's a gold/bronze-colored disk with
a
> > nondescript woman's head facing to the right. I don't know what's on the
> > underside, if anything, because I've never pried one of mine out of its
> > cube.
> >
> > One of the patent paralegals told me the company switched from the SBA
cubes
> > to these cubes because recipients were prying the dollar coins out to
use in
> > the vending machines late at night. The cubes cost ~$90/each and the
> > company didn't like to see them defaced for pocket change.
> >
>
> --
> Gregory Alan Bolcer | gbolcer@endtech.com | work: 949.833.2800
> Chief Technology Officer | http://www.endtech.com | cell: 714.928.5476
> Endeavors Technology, Inc. | efax: 603.994.0516 | wap: 949.278.2805
>
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