Company meeting today

I have a love-hate relationship with the company meeting.  Microsoft has three big company-wide events each year, the holiday party, picnic and the company meeting.  I usually make it to two a year.  If I don't I really miss it because I always walk away from the big events with the feeling that I work for a really great company.  That is the love part of the equation.  The hate part is that the company meetings are, frankly, boring.  There is a well established formula.  It starts with a review of the financials, moves to a bunch of execs bragging about their latest releases and demos of about to be released products then finishes with cheer leading from Bill and Steve.  Steve alternates between, you're doing great work, don't let bad press discourage you, keep the faith and this sucks, we have to do better, we have to work harder, our competetion is killing us, our customers are pissed.  It leans to one side or the other depending on the current mood of the company and the industry.  Today I'm expecting a tilt to the keep the faith side.  Anyway, there is usually little substance.  I don't get much from the cheer leading but just the fact that a company of this size goes to the extent it does to get as many of its employees in one place at one time and the CEO and other top execs use the time to speek frankly leaves me energized and excited about working at Microsoft.