MSN Doesn’t Love Me Anymore

Posted by Greg on January 18th, 2006

I just received a "Dear John" letter from my buddies at MSN Search:

Greg,

Thank you for expressing interest in attending MSN Search Champs v4. Unfortunately, due to a huge amount of very qualified responses, we are unable to extend invitations to everyone that wanted to attend. However we are already planning for Champs v5, so keep an eye out for future opportunities to join us in Redmond.

As we noted in our privacy policy, we are not keeping your survey information on file for any future events or contact.

Again, thanks for your interest and we hope to see you at a future Champs!

Now, I’m not really upset that they found somone to replace me. But I do think as a 2-time Search Champ I could have at least received a personal email telling me they don’t love me anymore. Getting the same auto-genrated rejection notice that was sent out to the hundreds of new people who applied just hurts. I thought our relationship was deeper than that…. :(

Work

Comments

11 Responses to “ MSN Doesn’t Love Me Anymore ”

  1. randfish on January 18th, 2006 6:17 pm

    Greg - no way! You too! I got asked by someone at MSN to apply back in November (I think), then received that same email today… Weird…

    Oh well, if you come to Seattle, I’ll take you out on the town anyway. Less glamorous than Microsoft, but I just can’t roll with the Gates’ quite yet :D

  2. WebGuerrilla on January 18th, 2006 6:31 pm

    I’m thinking we should organize an ex-Chimp gathering in Seattle the same week. While all the new chimps get the “we’re going to be great someday” talk at the compund, we can be drinking beer in a seedy Irish pub talking about how easy it is tp Spam MSN… :)

  3. Sebastian on January 18th, 2006 6:40 pm

    They’ve invited opinion makers this time, not search geeks.

  4. Jenstar on January 18th, 2006 9:58 pm

    >> an ex-Chimp gathering

    Ooh, count me in :)
    >> opinion makers

    I don’t know, Greg is the maker of many strong opinions!!

  5. Jeremy Zawodny on January 18th, 2006 10:35 pm

    Heh. They rejected me too! The nerve… :-)

  6. Dixon on January 19th, 2006 7:25 am

    The problem with inviting opinion makers is the NDA. I looked at it and decided I could hardly moderate the MSN forum on WMW and sign the NDA at the same time - so couldn’t fill in the form.

    I also had trouble believing that MSN would use search monkey for a questionnaire!

  7. Aaron Pratt on January 19th, 2006 8:02 am

    *a door slams*

  8. WebGuerrilla on January 19th, 2006 12:34 pm

    I also had trouble believing that MSN would use search monkey for a questionnaire!

    It’s right up there with using a Hotmail account to send out the invites for SCV2 and then not understanding why so many people didn’t respond…..

  9. randfish on January 19th, 2006 6:56 pm

    seedy, eh?… I’m a big fan of Fado (pronounced fffdoh) and Kell’s in Pike Place Market rocks, too. I’m not down with the Irish Emmigrant though (on Univ. Way). That place is all frat guys trying to get into fights (just not my scene anymore).

  10. Bill Hartzer on January 20th, 2006 1:32 pm

    Interesting stuff. I cannot believe that I got that same rejection letter, too. And I’ve been SEOing sites since ‘96. And I have a hard time believing that they used Search Monkey as well. Maybe they should have used Perseus (http://www.perseus.com/survey/news/studies/microsoft_study.html) since they’ve used it before.

  11. Klaus on February 2nd, 2006 5:35 pm

    I stumbled in here, some days later. It’s really encouraging to read i’am not the only one, who was rejected. I was (from Germany) with Greg, Jenstar and all the other smart people in Redmond at the Search Champs v2 and i also received the original above posted “Dear John” at January 18th. Not to mention, my feeling was the same as Gregs and your others.

    Greg, Jenstar, randfish, Jeremy, Bill, don’t be worried. Keep in mind you are strong authorities, even without your attendance in Redmond!

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