Microsoft Apologises for it’s Rather Large Linux Based Breasts
Wait, before you ask, we’ve not been hacked – and the story is real!
Microsoft has managed to get itself in trouble with the Linux community again after inserting it’s ‘big boobs’ into Microsoft’s Hyper-V virtualisation software every time a Linux OS is loaded up into it.
A little storm and outrage seems to be snowballing into a bit of a public relations nightmare for Microsoft after Paolo Bonzini reported finding the hex code ‘0xB16B00B5’ (aka ‘Big Boobs’ hex) .
Matthew Garrett, a linux developer, stated in his blog post “At the most basic level it’s just straightforward childish humour, and the use of vaguely-English strings in magic hex constants is hardly uncommon. But it’s also specifically male childish humour. Puerile sniggering at breasts contributes to the continuing impression that software development is a boys club where girls aren’t welcome. It’s especially irritating in this case because Azure may depend on this constant, so changing it will break things.”
So it looks like ‘Big Boobs’ is here to stay – well that is until Microsoft release the patch that they have promised after receiving multiple complaints.
Microsoft, after being made aware of the issue (as if they didn’t know ;)), quickly issued an apology and promised to rectify the error in judgement. Although just speculation at the moment, it is likely to have been a bit of a childish joke by one of the programmers at Microsoft.
Microsoft issued a short statement saying “We thank the community for reporting this issue and apologise for the offensive string”. It is believed that a patch to remove their ‘Big Boobs’ out of Linux was released two days ago.
This comes barely a month after the previous Microsoft gaffe, a dance routine and song performed before its Windows Azure presentation in Norway which included several references to illegal Class A drugs and the phrase “The words Micro and Soft don’t apply to my penis (or vagina)”.
You can watch the “Developer Song” from the Microsoft conference in full below. Please be aware that some viewers may be offended by the content of this video.
