Corporate blogger Robert Scoble, said to have helped introduce a kinder, gentler Microsoft to the outside world, is leaving to join startup PodTech.net, which earlier this year began podcasting video interviews recorded with tech industry personalities, writes Reuters. Scoble will become PodTech vice-president of content, in charge of creating TV-like interviews for the web.

In a post late Saturday on his Scobleizer blog, Scoble said he is leaving Microsoft on good terms. "I love Microsoft, and Microsoft did not lose me - at least as a supporter and friend," Scoble wrote. "It is the best big company in the world."

Scoble said he had told Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer that he wanted to "put a human face on Microsoft and he took me up on that."