Five Companies That Dropped The Ball This Week

Microsoft Vague On BPOS Customers' Path To Office 365

Microsoft is still basking in the glow of its Office 365 launch, but BPOS customers could be forgiven for feeling a bit left out. That's because Microsoft isn't allowing existing customers of BPOS, the clumsily named predecessor to Office 365, to transition to the new offering at the moment. Worse, Microsoft is being vague as to when BPOS customers will be able to switch over.

The issue, first reported by the blog Talkin' Cloud, is rankling customers and channel partners, and members of both groups are venting their frustration on Microsoft's Online Service support forums.

"It's too bad that Microsoft can't help out their partners that sell the product. I would love to transition BPOS over so I can give prospective clients a demo of a production Office365 environment. As of now, it looks like my only options are to sign up for a trial each time I want to do a demo or set up a separate company in Office365 and pay for demo licenses," wrote one disgruntled Microsoft partner.

HP TouchPad Debut Gets Tepid Reception

HP's TouchPad launch last week marked the culmination of months of hype, some generated by HP's marketing teams, and some generated by the small-yet-vocal Palm enthusiast community. To hear HP tell it, the TouchPad is going to quickly show the world all of the iPad's flaws -- and eventually become the tablet of choice in the enterprise.

This lofty goal may yet be realized, but for the time being, HP's TouchPad can't be considered a serious challenger to the iPad. While reviewers are impressed with the features and functionality of WebOS, HP received lower marks for its TouchPad hardware. Consensus opinion at this point is that HP rushed the TouchPad to market and still has a lot of fine-tuning to do in hardware design and applications.

Dropbox Digs Deeper Hole After Customer Data Blunder

Dropbox this week tossed some fuel on the fire of users' anger by changing its terms of service in a way that led folks to believe the cloud storage company was asserting ownership rights over customer data.

Originally, Dropbox wrote: "By submitting your stuff to the Services, you grant us (and those we work with to provide the Services) worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sub-licensable rights to use, copy, distribute, prepare derivative works (such as translations or format conversions) of, perform, or publicly display that stuff to the extent reasonably necessary for the Service."

Dropbox execs tried to clarify the legalese and assured customers that this was a misunderstanding, but this fell on deaf ears for users that were already up in arms about Dropbox's recent authentication bug snafu, which has triggered a class-action lawsuit from customers.

Oracle Rebate Program Changes Send VARs Into Tizzy

Oracle's recent changes to its Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) program had some partners wondering about potential rebate delays and the impact on their businesses. Under the OPN Incentive Program, Oracle is offering rebates to solution providers and value-added distributors (VADs) that sell combined Oracle hardware and software products in registered deals outside of the 2,000 top accounts Oracle sells to directly.

Hardware solution providers are concerned the changes could hurt their profitability. One suggested that Oracle may take as long as two quarters to actually pay rebates once they're earned. "So they're telling our sales reps they can get an extra 8 points," the solution provider told CRN. "Guess what? You need to fill out a bunch of forms, and then wait a quarter or two to get paid. And Oracle expects us to manage this while our people are screaming for their money."

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RIM's Woes Continues As Executives Voice Pleas To Co-CEOs

To say it was another rough week for Research In Motion would be like observing that it was another hot week on the sun: Both are equally self-evident. RIM executives have begun anonymously voicing their frustrations with the state of affairs at the company, and suggestions on how to improve things, directly to RIM co-CEOs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie. And other RIM employees have chimed in to support these anonymous execs.

Meanwhile, the bad news keeps drumming down like a summer hailstorm: RIM has lost 1 million users over the past three months, according recent data from Comscore. And HTC may soon surpass RIM for the fourth spot in the global smartphone market, according to Taiwan-based research firm Market Intelligence Center.