Scoble The Exit Interview
Microsoft tech evangelist and alpha blogger Robert Scoble talks about everything from his tensest moments at Microsoft, to what Microsoft could have done to keep him, as he prepares to leave the Redmond software maker and join startup PodTech.Net.
Context & Ripple Effects
The prospect of Robert Scoble leaving Microsoft had been discussed in January, before June coverage confirmed his departure from Microsoft. His blogging had become an unofficial corporate voice that changed how outsiders viewed the company, making the exit more consequential than a routine evangelist move.
Scoble's move to PodTech transfers that individual audience and credibility from a large software maker to a startup media outlet, while his account of tensions and retention offers a public test of Microsoft's approach to independent employee voices.
First-order effects
- Microsoft loses a prominent tech evangelist whose blog served as an unofficial public voice, while PodTech gains Scoble as he joins the startup.
- Scoble's exit account puts Microsoft's ability to retain high-profile employee bloggers under public scrutiny.
Second-order effects
- Microsoft's technical outreach must rely less on Scoble's personal credibility and more on a broader bench of spokespeople if it wants to preserve the openness associated with his blog.
- PodTech can use Scoble's established audience to compete for attention in technology media, where the personality behind the coverage is part of the product.
Third-order effects
- The episode points to corporate blogging becoming a strategic communications asset that companies can encourage but cannot fully own when the audience's loyalty is attached to an individual.
- As employee voices become unofficial brand representatives, employers face a durable trade-off between giving them independence and retaining the reputational value they create.
The trend: Technology companies are learning that influential employee bloggers can humanize a corporate brand, but the audience and credibility they build remain portable talent assets.