He needed to test his NDA.

The evil empire we know as microsoft they will keep selling defective software and hardware if people keep buying it and thats sad.

My,I think Microsoft have outflopped themselves

I doubt it.

Don't let the door hit you on the way out! You break NDA and flap your mouth you got what you deserved.

It's still no excuse for MS lack of transparency on the RROD problems.

There have been many an employee fired over spilling the beans about some corporate stuff. Thing is, this generation is all about the everyday joe finding out about it thanks in part to the power of the internet.

I am sure sega and sony and nintendo, chevy, ford and any other big name company has fired people. You just never heard about it before...until now. Thanks to the internet, secrets arent secret anymore.

...Wow Microsoft, just wow.

You fire the man because he exposed your dirty little secret? Then on top of that, you sue him?

I'm sure he will expose you for your disgusting ways one way or another.

It doesn't matter what he broke. What matters is that he could have been telling the truth. But of course, a corporation like Microsoft has a reputation to uphold.

Whistle blowing is a crime ... at M$

Now he's blacklisted everywhere for breaking company rules :(

he'll be lucky to find work at McDonalds. that is...if he doesn't start blabbing the secret sauce recipe.

Microsuck fires this guy for exposing their crap system?

WHAT A LOADA CRAP!

[[Poor Microsoft]]

contract specifically says "cannot tell anyone that our product breaks most of the time" lol

tuesday at gamecrazy *my job we sent out another 9 defective 360's lol

But suing him for telling the truth? you got to be kidding me.

I hope this blows into a huge case, i like to see M$ coming out of the scandal.

NDA's aside (who in the hell DOESN'T know that the RRoD EXISTS by now?), this is a serious issue.

Actually, on second thought, yeah, let's bring an NDA into this, because, seriously, why would you want to have an NDA about a PROBLEM that the 360 has? If MS knows that there is a defect in the 360, why not try to FIX it instead of telling your employees to not discuss it with anyone and if anyone says they do have those issues, deny it like your lives depended on it (apparently, their jobs DO).

This is disgusting because it makes the case to people that MS has something to hide that they don't want for people to know. They are essentially hoping that they can sweep these hardware reliability issues under the rug and pretend they don't exists. What does that say to the consumer that would be wanting to buy a 360 but just happens to want to do more research first? What do they HOPE to accomplish that would HELP their reputation to the common consumer by pulling this crap? I'm sorry, but the NDA stuff, to me, is just an excuse to condone THIS action. Sorry if you disagree, but I think it's the truth.

You know, if they FIX the problems, like, seriously fix the problems, they would not HAVE that issue TO deal with in the first place and wouldn't have to force people to shut up about their woes. Instead of firing the people who say this stuff, listen to them and actually fix the problems they're talking about (with the hardware, not with the employees "exposing" something that we all know exists. I know some people will try that argument that the problem WAS the employee and the fix WAS to fire him) instead of taking the easy way out.

EDIT@11.1: But there is a high road MS could've taken here. Liken this to the Wal-Mart/Debra Shank mess that happened recently. There could always be exceptions to the rules, and there could always be ways that a company could say "see, we LISTEN to our employees and we WANT to make a better product for you to use." They could've used this to their advantage and let this one go. Instead, they go and give everyone a reason to say "see, MS knows something is not right with the hardware in the 360 and they don't want us to know it exists," since it's already known that such things are an issue in the 360 since it's been covered since the system first launched by the gaming media. This might have been the right thing to do if you're playing to the letter of the contracts, but they need to know what battles they want to fight, and when is the right and wrong time to enforce such things. There are always exceptions and times when companies will be careful with clauses like that.

Plus, enacting that type of NDA enforcement over the RRoD is a bad move, anyway, since it insults people's intelligen before this guy said something about them? What else did he say that was SO bad that MS felt the need to enact that clause. Again, they could've made an exception here and they instead take a low road and use the clause as some sort of weapon to keep people quiet.

Again, bringing up clauses is a poor way to ignore the real issue here, in my opinion.

Honestly tho....the dude had to be a moron....jeez I worked for a big comp company a few years back and my contract said I wasnt even allowed to tell people really who I was working for or what iw as doing..........so ya know companies are all the same and if you dont like it dont sign a contract to work for them

have touched on it, as long as he was acting in the public interest they pretty much have no case. NDA's are not the end all be all of American Law. Contract is the highest form of law in America ONLY WHEN it is deemed not harmful to the public at large.

I don't think he will have a hard time making a case against these vampires.

.. evil, evil things, they are... just ask my boy, Jeff...

It's Microshaftm what did you expect?

"The Truth Will Set You Free" and this poor bastard is teh proof bc he is now job-free.

MS sucks, they never make the customer happy, the only things they want is the money and now fired that guy because he tell the truth of that company

Its about good honest people and good honest businesses. I personally congradulate this man for telling the truth. We need more people like him. Screw the damn NDA. If your product is crap then spread the word. Itll save fans of gaming money instead of being pissed because some unfortunate crap happened to him later. Damn anyone who damns people like this because people like this whether you know it or not, are looking out for people like us NOT getting a bad product. End of story. Quit being ignorant asses. (Not directed at all of you here of course. Just generally speaking)

This story is Bullshit!

All Robert Delaware's reported problems come from 2005 and 2006. Yet he waits until the price cut of 2008 to make a story about this.

This story is even more dubious, when you consider the fact that as an employee of Excell he was back at Microsoft this summer. As a tester, yet he had no new material for this crap.

Sorry Microsoft. They should send out an offical apology to all 360 owners and promise they will not make the same mistake again, i would think better of microsoft if thay did that. ive got through 4 360s the last one was the new 60gig modle 3 weeks old . no looking back ive had enough and will never buy a 360 again, 720 maybe if they get it right next time.

To "blow the wistle" that MUST be in regard po peoples health or security.

This was about internal problems regarding manufacturing..
As the Employer, you can not do anything BUT fire him.

You can symphatize with him, as most do. But he cannot be trusted again.
I would as a vd have felt i had no other choice then to fire him, but i wouldn´t have sued.

just slap him with a 3 year warranty and it'll be like it never happened. lol

It's called an NDA (non-disclosure agreement).. he's lucky he didn't get sued.

For something that isn't already known by the vast majority of the public, I would understand. But now they're just destroying their own public image and painting themselves as an 'evil empire'. Great job, MS.

That image is WIN.

If this isn't a reason why the 360 sucks i don't know what is.