Crabby Office Lady

Inside Office Online is your one stop shopping resource for all things Office. Now, the folks responsible for creating the content on this site are blogging their way into your hearts.

When you think of Office or even of Microsoft, you probably don't think "personal." (Of course, that is one of the basic tenets of the Crabby Office Lady: Be personal; human-like, even.)

And when you're reading a Help topic or an assistance article, or when you're taking a free online training course or even downloading a template, you're probably not thinking about the people behind the content that helps you so much with your work. And honestly, it's not why we do the things we do. We're not in it for the fame and glory. (Well, my coworkers aren't anyway. Me? That's a different story.)

But, you can trust me: There are real, live people over here — people working hard to make sure that you are getting the most from the tools at your disposal (namely, Office). In fact, some of these folks have started a blog in order to connect with you, our customers, in a more personal fashion. (Hey, did I start a trend?)

Refresh your brain: What is a "blog?"

In August of 2005, I wrote a column called I came, I saw, I blogged: Crabby demystifies blogs. In the column I explained that a blog, while embodying certain qualities of a personal home page, is more like a diary or a commentary, a core upon which a virtual community can form. The Inside Office Online blog, which is designed, written, and published by the people who edit, build, and publish the U.S. version of Office Online (the site you're on this very moment, by the way), is a collection of news, opinions, funny remarks, and even funnier customer comments. And, although the blogging team does have a good time with this blog (it sure seems so), they also spend a good deal of time trying to help you, the customer, by answering questions that they see popping up frequently in the newsgroups or in feedback, by letting you know about new releases coming up, and even by posting jobs! ("Rain? I love rain!" — or so you say.) In fact, from this blog you can learn about the next version of Office that is screaming down the pike, get the inside scoop on current updates and why we think they're so important, and even get an insider's peek into the people that work here.

Who are these bloggers?

The majority of posts on the Inside Office Online blog are written by the Office Online managing editor, Mark Talkington. I've been thinking about this for a while, and I came to the conclusion that Mark really is the best person to write this kind of blog: He knows the products, he is on top of what's going on in the world of productivity software, and, perhaps most importantly, he has a feel for the people (that'd be you and me). Why did Mark think a blog would be a good idea? Did he think Office customers would be open to the idea? This is what he had to say:

"I wanted to promote a two-way communication with our readers. A blog is a great way to do that since we cannot respond to each of the 7 million people a year who leave us a comment. It has been a slow start, but the idea is catching on, both around the office and with readers. Most people who comment do so in messages directly to me, and a lot of them are looking for product support. My goal is to expand those conversations in the comments area and to continue addressing topics about the site."

 Note   I agree with everything Mark has to say, and in fact, I want to add something here: Please spend some time adding your own comments to Mark's blog. We can't know what you're thinking or feeling (or even doing) if you don't tell us. We here in the Office group can have as many meetings and sit-downs and conferences as we want, but I speak the truth when I tell you that we learn the most from our customers. With this blog, we've offered you our attention and the opportunity to listen as well as talk to us, one-on-one, so please: spill it.

Although there have been other bloggers, including Matthew Hosek, from the Office Online Templates team, and Rob Toeppner, the Canadian Office Online site manager, it's Mark that is doing most of the yapping, and he is on a roll. Let me give you some examples of the type of content you're likely to find on the Office Online blog:

• July 28: Meet Jim St. George, 16-year Microsoft veteran and creator of the Crabby Office Lady caricature.
• July 21: Discover that you can now get Office demos and quizzes delivered via RSS.
• June 13: Learn how you can now convert Office documents to PDFs (and vice versa). Mark knows that being able to do such conversions has always been a very popular request...and he tells you where to get the download that will work for you.
• May 11: Read some interesting information about the strong language some of our customers send us when offering their, um, insightful feedback.

Rather than blather on about what you can find in the Office Online blog, I suggest you head on over there, or better yet, subscribe to the RSS feed so that you can stay on top of what's new, what's coming, and what's on Mark's mind this week. (You never know what will crop up...)

"You can be a rank insider as well as a rank outsider." — Robert Frost

About the author

Annik Stahl, the Crabby Office Lady columnist, takes all of your complaints, compliments, and knee-jerk reactions to heart. Therefore, she graciously asks that you let her know whether this column was useful to you — or not — by entering your feedback using the Was this information helpful? tool below. And remember: If you don't vote, you can't complain.