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Category: Odd stuff

When Photoshopping goes bad

Microsoft is taking heat for a pair of promotional photos found on the net in which an African-American man's head was swapped out for a caucasian's, apparently to tweak the photo for the company's Polish web site.

The photo appeared on the company's U.S. Web site and depicted three businesspeople: one black, one white, and one Asian, as part of a pitch for Microsoft's business productivity software. But when the 'same' photo was also published on the site of Microsoft's Polish subsidiary, a white head was cut-and-pasted over the black man's body. His hand remains unchanged.

Microsoft gave no explanation for the edit, but quickly apologized online and via the company's Twitterfeed after the online buzz began to grow. The photos were to be pulled from the websites, but you can still see them here at Cnet, where screen grabs have been saved and posted.