Just watched the video on YouTube, I’ve embedded it below, and it’s fantastic. The boys on Redmond really have gone all out for this one and it really shows. Great job on the advertising. Now lets hope the product is equally as good.

Microsoft Office 2010 Movie

Labels: Microsoft, Microsoft Office

Labels: Apple, iPod, Microsoft, Zune, Zune HD

Microsoft have been attempting to brand their online experience for months and years now and things appear to be getting worse. I am personally a fan of the Windows Live brand. I think it completely captures the one product Microsoft is best known for and conjures the image of Windows being online and available. So why not stick with it?

The fact is that they do not seem keen on sticking with this brand and there are many rumours about rebranding of Live Search. So what about simply going back to the best known online brand Microsoft have, MSN. I was on a call with Microsoft today and while I was on hold I was listening to an ad for spaces.msn.com. That sounds much better than anything Microsoft have managed to come up with lately and the portal that is currently in place is very well known and developed.

So my question to Microsoft and Softies everywhere is this, why not bring back and support MSN? Or if you don’t want it then give it to me.

Labels: Microsoft, msn, Windows, Windows Live

Microsoft have released their second ad and it’s another good one. Nice to see the Redmond guys starting to take good jabs at Apple at last.

Microsoft Ad 2

Labels: Apple, Giampaolo, Microsoft

According to Neowin Microsoft are going to introduce the world to their MobileMe compeditor next month:

"SkyBox" is a service for users to sync a phones information with the web. Microsoft will be offering automatic backup and restore services, access and management of phone data and provide easy communication and sharing with others. The service will also allow syncing of contacts, email/SMS, calendar items and pictures into the cloud, similar to Apple's MobileMe. The difference from Apple's offering is Microsoft could be set to offer this out to non Windows Mobile devices.

"SkyLine" will be aimed at small businesses. Offering similar functionality to SkyBox, businesses will be able to setup their phones with Microsoft's Exchange hosting with their own domain names.

"SkyMarket" was originally discovered in September 2008 when Microsoft advertised several external job positions. SkyMarket is the codename for Microsoft's mobile marketplace, a competitor to Apple's AppStore and RIM's Blackberry application center. This service will only be available on Windows Mobile devices and will showcase the 1000s of Windows Mobile applications available today.

Labels: Microsoft, Mobile Me, SkyBox, SkyLine, SkyMarket

Well the CES keynote is approaching and after the disappointment of the Macworld keynote we’re hoping that Microsoft can make the most of this opportunity. On the Apple keynote I thought Phil did an excellent job considering the products he was introducing. I would like to see how he would deliver an iPhone level announcement. I suspect tonight’s keynote is going to focus on integration. Hopefully they’re going to show us how Microsoft products fit together and how they fit in with future products such as Windows 7.

1. Windows 7. This has got to play a major role in today’s keynote. Showing the integration with Windows Live, ability to run on Netbooks and finally the availability of the beta to testers.

2. Zune Phone. If this product is ever going to be announced then this has got to be the time to do it. The HTC Touch HD is getting great reviews even though it is running Windows Mobile 6.1 and Macworld had nothing that the media can really get it’s teeth into. This new competitive Windows Mobile to be available in Q2 would be perfect.

3. Live Framework. To keep developers happy we’ll probably see the introduction of Live Framework giving integration with Live services as well as Live Mesh and Azure. We will also hopefully be able to get our hands on the online Office applications. If they are released now for free they’ll wipe the floor with iWork.com.

4. XBox360. Considering the success of this console it would be hard to believe that it won’t make an appearance. Closer integration with the Live services and probably a few new games.

image from microsoft.com

Labels: CES 2009, Microsoft, Microsoft Office 2007, Steve Ballmer, Windows 7, Windows Live, XBox360, Zune

I understand the desire to get headlines in media land and beating on Microsoft seems to be regarded as easy headlines at the moment but I couldn’t believe that I was seeing reviews of Windows 7 appearing across the net. We’re talking about an Operating System that isn’t even in beta yet. This is the same as reviewing Android based on the first simulator and not the phone itself. To hear negative reviews of Windows 7 at this stage borders on a joke.

In the interest of getting a good headline therefore I’m going to review Windows 8 now. I’m thinking it’s going to be based on the Windows Vista architecture and therefore it’s going to be a total disaster. In fact based on this one thought alone the whole Windows line is probably doomed, Apple will capture the desktop market and Microsoft will be out of business within the next ten years.

Well that should have the anti-Microsoft crowd happy. For everyone else I would tell you to look forward to the upcoming Windows 7 release. The Vista architecture gives stability and security while the Redmond team are obviously listening to users and have massively improved the UI and usability of 7. Microsoft are moving in the right direction and with the Windows Live platform to go along with it I can see Microsoft holding onto it’s crown for many years to come.

Labels: Microsoft, Windows 7, Windows Vista

I was watching TV tonight and the Advert for UTV Broadband came on. Now this is advertising a broadband service. Except it wasn’t. In fact not even close. You see each person in the ad was getting a BSOD, blue screen of death, and one of the promises was for a better computer experience. How can the broadband service possibly offer this? The BSOD is usually caused by something like a badly written driver doing something it isn’t meant to do and therefore crashing the OS. Unless of course every crash is caused by other broadband providers, which is highly unlikely since any BSOD I’ve had comes from nVidia drivers and I don’t have UTV.

It seems to me that the UTV ads are about as believable as the Apple ads and that’s saying something.

Labels: Microsoft, UTV

After reading an article in PC Pro about Microsoft’s upcoming doom I had an interesting thought. You see the article talked about Linux being installed on netbooks from Asus and how this would leave Microsoft having to retreat to the corporate world as Linux becomes the major consumer OS. I don’t think that’s going to happen. Microsoft will, most likely, produce a version of Windows 7 that is trimmed down and perfectly suited to the netbook world. There is one company however that should be concerned with the tiny tiny tiny rise of Linux.

Apple have no competitor to the Asus netbooks. They have nothing to offer to Asus in the way Microsoft can offer up Windows XP and their cheapest notebook is $999. In the current economy are people going to choose to buy the Apple laptop that still has the difficulties of switching associated with it in the public consciousness or will they go the the cheaper notebooks offering old reliable, Windows XP. You see Vista may be perceived as unpopular but I’ve yet to hear anyone talk about the fact that these people, in choosing XP, are still handing money to the folks from Redmond. Microsoft will happily maintain their dominant market position even if everyone who buys a new laptop decides to downgrade to XP.

I don’t honestly believe that Linux is going to threaten either Windows or OSX but if it does then it’s the 8% Apple have in the American market that’s going to be under the most threat and when your share is that small any loss can do a lot of damage.

Is it time for Apple to license OSX? Or produce some sort of MultiTouch netbook? What do you think?

Labels: Apple, ASUS, Microsoft, Windows

Labels: Apple, Apple TV, iMac, iPhone, iPod Touch, Microsoft, Nintendo, Sega

Labels: Apple, Microsoft, Nasdaq, Yahoo

Labels: "The Brick", Apple, Macbook, Microsoft, N96, Nokia, Nokia 5800

Labels: Microsoft, XBox Live, XBox360

Firstly, apologies for the shortage of posts recently but I’ve been out of the country for the last three weeks. I spent the last week or so in Florida and loved every minute of it. While I was there I was taking a look in Best Buy at the MP3 players and considered replacing my old Zune with the new blue one. I was then reminded of problems I had a few months ago trying to get my current Zune repaired.

I bought the Zune 30Gb while I was in New York last summer and had no problems with it for the first few months. Then one morning I plugged it into charge and nothing happened. I tried resets and everything with no luck so I eventually decided to give Microsoft a ring. Now bare in mind that I live outside the US and the Zune isn’t supported here but also remember that you’re talking about an MP3 player with a 3% market share and a company with a base in Ireland. So I gave them a ring and after a few minutes of describing and re-describing the issue to a support rep he told me that the Zune needed fixed and I could post it from my home. However they won’t post it back. They’ll happily fix it as it’s still in warranty but I have to get a US postal address in order to get it it back. I was even willing to pay postage on it but they were having none of it. This leaves me with a $200+ paper weight!

So this brings me back to last week and Best Buy. If I had picked up the nice shiny Zune and it had failed me, again, I wasn’t going to get any help from Redmond. So why should I bother? Well I didn’t. The Zune remained on the Best Buy shelf with so many others and I walked out with a Nintendo DS instead. While I understand what “not supported” means it would be a nice gesture if Microsoft could give the supporters of their device some sort of help when they’re outside the US. After all if they had been able to help a few months ago they would’ve gained an extra sale they now don’t have.

Labels: Microsoft, Nintendo, Zune

Labels: Microsoft, Mojave experiment, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Labels: Apple, Enterprise, Microsoft, Steve Jobs

Labels: Microsoft, Windows Vista, Windows XP

I've just been watching the trailer for the new XBox 360 Dashboard and it's looking good, it's looking very very good. This is one of the first time's I've seen Microsoft really get the concept of style nailed. The new dashboard seems to use a coverflow style to show different TV shows, films and games that can be viewed/downloaded. An example of the new style can now be seen on the http:\\www.xbox.com home page. I wonder will the new media centre look anything like this?

Another change is going to be the creation of Avatars. These are the little characters that you create on the Nintendo Wii who are then included in some games and online and basically it's a digital version of yourself. The 360 versions seem to be exactly the same and could be quite and interesting new feature depending on whether or not games actually bother to support them.

The third change will be the ability to rip a game to your 360 hard drive. This will turn off the DVD-Drive and allow the game to run directly from the HDD. The feature will allow games to run a little faster but more importantly they will silence the 360 and make it welcome in bedrooms once more.

The final change that I find exciting is the deal with Netflix that will allow 360 users to rent a film from Netflix through the dashboard and then watch them on your 360. This is an excellent new feature that adds tremendous functionality and once we see television shows here in the UK on the 360 this will really start to put the pressure on iTunes.

There's obviously a long way to go yet for Microsoft to bring all it's services up to this kind of level but if Steve Ballmer follows through on his promises to improve the mobile and windows platforms, I have to assume that means the Zune too, then there could be some great things to come.

Image from oxm.co.uk

Labels: Microsoft, Netflix, Wii, XBox360, Zune

Syncing contacts is the first major issue. If I sync with Windows Contacts then everything works perfectly and the contacts appear. If I use Outlook however OutlookSyncDevice crashes every single time. I'm going to hook in and debug it but I suspect it's linked to Outlook Connector and MobileMe not playing nice. I've no intention of turning off Outlook Connector so that could mean bye bye MobileMe.

Before I jump however lets look at the calendar. Well it's awful. I've tested multiple scenarios with it and so far I'm having no joy with Outlook. In this case I can't even test it with Windows Calendar because for some reason Apple won't support it. I'm now looking at Windows Live Calendar and the cost of using it seems to be perfectly justifiable compared with the cost of using a badly substandard MobileMe.

On a quick note what about the online applications? Well I first used them on OSX and found them pretty useful and responsive. There's nothing really new in what they offer but they are simple enough to use. Move over to Windows and again there's issues. The service doesn't work properly with IE7, I'm very interested to test it with IE8 to see how well it works. You even get an arrogant warning that blames this on IE7 but remember that if Google can develop for IE then you would expect Apple to be able to. So what are the services like on Firefox? Well they work but they're slow and if you're a Firefox user then I'm afraid you can't get your bookmarks synced even though it's one of the support Windows browsers. Weird? Well not really because there's a browser that happens to display the services and let you sync the bookmarks, guess which one? That's right the downright hideous Safari. MobileMe is not a good reason to use Safari, nothing is a good reason to use it in fact. So the online services aren't sitting well for Windows either even though they are meant to be platform independent, kinda the point of the "cloud" concept I would've thought.

The final scenario and the realisation I had was that if I wanted MobileMe to work even a little on the Windows side then I would probably have to abandon my current email accounts and make sure that Outlook is only hooked up MobileMe. I'm not doing it. I've no interest in doing it. I'm sticking with my Windows Live address and services so I'm guessing it's going to have to be goodbye to MobileMe. Let's face it Live Mesh offers a great online storage option along with Office Live Workspace and SkyDrive. There's nothing at all wrong with Live Mail and if I ever decide to sign up to MSN Premium account I'll get calendar sync but lets face it, is it really that important? What about push? Well since it's on a 15 minute delay I can get my Live Mail forwarded to my GMail account and get my N95 to sync every 15 minutes for free. That's a Microsoft flaw however. I shouldn't have to. Live Mail needs IMAP or POP asap.

So what's the lesson from all this? Well I think it's pretty obvious. Computers are still not even close to being user friendly. There's so much infighting and "nerdy" arguments between Microsoft and Apple users, to name but two, that we can't simply get an integrated system that is user friendly. Users don't want to have to understand all the stuff that's going on under the hood. They simply want to be able to sign up to their email, select what they want to sync with and when they look at their Nokia phone they want the same contact list as their email account has and at the moment that is not being offered. It's not just Apple, Google and Microsoft that are to blame for this but they have a lot to answer for. There's room for more than one company in the technology world but only when the systems easily integrate. There's plenty of car companies making money why can't the same be true for IT? Imagine a world were there was a different driving test for each make of car. Then one company would dominate simply due to people not wanting the hassle. I want to see real system integration between the major companies because one will never win out over the rest and the bitter cat fighting is just hurting the consumer. Also lets face it people are sticking to Microsoft because it's familiar and that's a hard habit to break. It's no coincidence that Apple released Boot Camp and Apple hardware sales really started to rise. MobileMe was in the position to really breakdown a few barriers and show that Apple can develop quality software for a different platform in the same way as Microsoft have built Office and Messenger for Mac. I'm not sure they actually can. iTunes is weak as is MobileMe. Lets see something better guys because I'm getting fed up waiting around for you.

Labels: Apple, iPhone, iPod Touch, iTunes, Live Mesh, Mac OS X, Microsoft, Mobile Me, N95, Nokia, Office Live, Windows Live, Windows Vista

Labels: Apple, iPhone, Microsoft, Paul Thurrott

I've been quite complimentary to Apple over the last few days and I was fully ready to accept that perhaps they had their game together. Today however has been an absolute nightmare for me in terms of Apple software. I signed up to Mobile Me when I got my first opportunity and got it setup on the Mac with virtually no problems. Everything seemed to sync and play ball. Then I discovered that the web apps were down. Well no big deal it's the first day and they're probably being pounded so I'm happy to wait and decided to get my PC setup. This is where the trouble started.

Trying to sync Outlook 2007, a supported application, with Mobile Me was a horrible experience. The Outlook Sync Client kept crashing and therefore failing to sync correctly. After some investigation I discovered that this was down to an issue with my contacts. So I wiped my Outlook, and therefore Windows Live, contact list under the impression that I could sync again from Mobile Me. After all it did have the most up-to-date version of the contact list. That didn't happen. Instead the contacts did not sync back. Neither did the calendar for that matter. I was left with the task of recovering my contact list from my Windows Contacts. Thankfully the nice people in Redmond have made this task easy with the Windows Live Contacts importer tools. Maybe they foresaw the disaster Apple would have trying to play with the big boys and knew we'd coming running back to them.

Anyway back to the issues. With a newly repaired contact list I switched the Macbook back on to see if the iPod Touch update is out yet, it's not by the way and it's getting frustrating. The Macbook then chirped up with it's list of syncs that had to be done and most of them were blanks! They seemed to be failures from the feeble attempts to sync with Outlook and they remained in the sync log waiting to be written to somewhere. Anyway I'll clear them in a bit and then I have to give some real consideration to the idea of abandoning Mobile Me until the issues are sorted.

I don't want to come across completely negative though so I will say that some of the stuff that has been done with Mobile Me so far is excellent. The Web Apps look fantastic now they are up and running and really are a pleasure to use. The push functionality is something I look forward to testing on the iPod Touch when it gets it's new update, hopefully tomorrow and there are some great looking apps in the app store. It's extremely unfortunate that the teething problems of today have overshadowed an extremely promising service but for £60+ I want something that will operate when I need it and today it didn't.

Now how do I actually go about uninstalling Mobile Me from Vista anyway??

Labels: Apple, Live Mesh, Macbook, Microsoft, Microsoft Office 2007, Mobile Me, Windows Vista

Labels: Apple, Microsoft, Mobile Me, Vista, Windows Home Server, Windows XP

Labels: Apple, Google, Mac, Microsoft, Mobile Me, Orkut, Windows, Windows Live, Windows Live Spaces

A few interesting points to take away from the interview are:
1) Windows 7 release is penciled in for 2010, baring that in mind we are in the very early stages of development and this may not actually be a cone of silence just the lack of a hard feature list.
2) The approach now appears to be, under-promise then over-deliver. A good strategy.
3) Windows 7 is a 'manor' release, i.e. not quite a major release but more than a minor release.

Paul concludes by saying:

This makes me wonder: Is the major release wording a hint that major new end user functionality is coming? Or are they simply pulling an Apple and claiming that every release is a major release now?

I think it's a hint at major new functionality being built on the existing code base. The integration with Cloud Computing, altered security (I have to believe UAC will get an overhaul even though I don't believe it should), new UI and a deeper integration of virtualisation with the desktop environment could lead to a feature list that could be argued as a major upgrade.

Another reason i don't think Windows 7 will be a major upgrade is the close relationship between Server 2008 and Windows Vista. The work that went into bringing these two systems closer will not be thrown away. 7 will have the same Core as Vista but it'll feel very different.

Labels: CNET, Microsoft, Paul Thurrott, Steven Sinofsky, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista

Mace, a onetime Apple executive, parses the company’s most recent earnings report to point out that iPod unit growth has essentially ground to a halt–up only 1% from the same quarter the prior year. (Mac unit growth was 51%.) He adds that it’s risky for Apple to rely on the relatively mature PC market for such a big part of its growth.

Labels: Apple, Cloud Computing, Google, Microsoft, Wall Street Journal

The enemy of my enemy is my friend: Google co-founder Larry Page thinks a Google-Yahoo deal is the best idea ever. In further news, he still hates Microsoft with an intensity hotter than a thousand burning suns.

And for those who are interested this earth shattering conclusion is drawn from this article in the Mercury News where he said:

"If you put 90 percent of communications in one company, that's really a big risk, especially one (Microsoft) that has a history of doing bad stuff,"

...

"There are ways to structure a deal with Yahoo that are reasonable, for us and for Yahoo to remain independent," Page said. "We would support that."

Labels: Google, Mercury News, Microsoft, Wall Street Journal, Yahoo

Well things are quite quiet on the tech news front which gives me the opportunity to look at the Windows 7 debate again. I read Ed Bott's artcle on Windows 7 here. He makes a two points regarding beta cycles and feedback that I don't agree with.

[Update: After re-reading the post it appears that I misread it. I agree with what's being said in these points. Suppose that's what happens when I post after a late night]

I suppose this comes down to how much of a failure you believe Vista is but for those who do believe Vista failed to deliver I ask them to remember that the features you saw in the final release is only a small subset of the features that were supposed to be in it. It was the large amount of public [Update: Not public, private testing] testing that told Microsoft that the new features were too complicated and too far from what the users understood and Microsoft had to remove them. The Vista that would've been released if it hadn't been for the comprehensive testing and feedback might've been a little more complicated but it certainly would've been feature rich and different enough from XP to make it a must have. Microsoft seemed to be saying at the time that the features that were removed would be slowly added over the next few OS versions to make the transition easier on the end user. I don't think added user feedback would help Windows 7, actually the opposite.

Labels: Ed Bott, Microsoft, Windows 7, Windows Vista

Labels: Adobe, IBM, Microsoft, Microsoft Office 2007, ODF, OOXML, Open Office, PDF, Sun Microsystems

“In light of developments since the withdrawal of the Microsoft proposal to acquire Yahoo! Inc., Microsoft announced that it is continuing to explore and pursue its alternatives to improve and expand its online services and advertising business. Microsoft is considering and has raised with Yahoo! an alternative that would involve a transaction with Yahoo! but not an acquisition of all of Yahoo! Microsoft is not proposing to make a new bid to acquire all of Yahoo! at this time, but reserves the right to reconsider that alternative depending on future developments and discussions that may take place with Yahoo! or discussions with shareholders of Yahoo! or Microsoft or with other third parties. “There of course can be no assurance that any transaction will result from these discussions.”

I haven't blogged about it until now because i've been, a) bored with Yahoo/Microsoft deal talk and b) waiting for more information to come out. Now however I'm starting to think that this deal is being underestimated. The best guess so far appears to be that Microsoft is going to buy Yahoo's Search technology and I think they're wrong with more details being due on Wednesday because at the same time as that accouncement was being made Microsoft's President of Platform and Services was emailing his department saying:

Is this a nice way of saying, "Thanks for the hard work guys but our Search is still seen as crap so it's time to buy in better"? Tell me what you think.

Labels: Microsoft, Yahoo

Labels: EU Commission, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Microsoft, Windows 7, Windows Live

Labels: AMD, Intel, Microsoft, The Register, Windows 98, Windows Vista, Windows XP SP3

Labels: Apple, Mac OS X, Microsoft, Microsoft Office

Windows Live Messenger TV has signed EMI and Channel 4. The service is now available and through it you can watch music videos as well as clips from shows like Skins. The Live Messenger site states:

Labels: Channel 4, EMI, Microsoft, MTV, Windows Live Messenger TV

Here's what Chief Strategy Officer Mundie told Reuters in Indonesia:
"The market may wish that the Yahoo deal may come back
together, but Microsoft at least at this point assumes it's over."

"At least at this point." "Assumes." Those weren't the words Microsoft was using two days ago. And Mundie was just getting warmed up:
"Yahoo could always come back again and say please buy us for $33 (a share) and I'm sure we might reconsider it but we're not assuming that's going to happen," added Mundie, who took over as Microsoft's lead visionary on technology from co-founder Bill Gates in 2006.

Translation: We reiterate our bid of $33. We're done with begging, but
if Jerry is tired of getting his fanny spanked by Gordon Crawford and other huge shareholders and wants to bring the deal papers up to Redmond, we'll sign them.

I honestly cannot believe that they're looking at this deal again. I believe that if they are reconsidering it's down to Google's reaction yesterday to the deal being called off. They basically said that they were glad the deal didn't go through and with all the talk about Google playing a winning role in bringing down the deal it might prick Ballmer's Google hatred nerve. If that happens we could see a deal due to ego.

I sincerely hope that is not going to happen. I'll say it again, Microsoft need to take a few billion and:
1) Buy a social network company like Facebook. One Windows Live ID allowing you to access a huge number of services and social sites but even more importantly think of all those eyeballs looking at Microsoft delivered ads. Even more importantly though would be Microsoft's ability to create applications for Facebook that are actually useful and attention grabbing. Get advertisement for Microsoft software.

2) Buy a true blogger site like WordPress. While Live Spaces are a nice wee profile some people, like myself, wanted a proper blog. I looked for a Microsoft delivered option and there were none. Buy or introduce a blogging service that only does blogging and that can be hosted from a remote site.

3) Bring Live Calendar out of beta and allow people to sync with their desktop mail application for free.

4) Promote the use of their API's and try to enhance the developer community. Tying the API's more closely to Vista's Gadget sidebar allowing the development of one gadget that can work on Live.com and Vista with no alteration needed. NB last time i heard one gadget could not work easily on both but I could be wrong and will need to develop one to confirm.

5) Bring the Live Applications closer together and tie them into Vista more efficiently. For example the ability to map SkyDrive to your Windows Explorer drive list and be able to simply save to it like any local drive would be great and make it much more usable.

6) Split the Windows 7 code into two streams, one for business and one for consumers. This would at least allow them to provide features that a specific to home users and not have many versions of the OS that only have slight differences.

7) It's time to see a Microsoft branded PC. I want to see Vista running on a machine that has drivers and hardware optimised for Windows Vista/7. Bring in proper designers, don't copy Apple's look and produce something stylish and lightening fast.

8) Microsoft really need an ad-sense engine. Google ads are being placed on millions of sites because everyone makes on it and you can place them for free. Again I was looking for Microsoft sponsored ads but couldn't find anything similar. While I'm not keen on copying everything Google does there are still some things they do that are genuinely useful and really do need to be copied.

9) Kill live.com. I'll come back to this in a later post because I'd look to look into this in a little more detail first.

10) Buy Twitter, and 22hundred ;)

Labels: Ad-Sense, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter, Windows 7, Windows Live, Windows Vista, WordPress, Yahoo

As of Saturday afternoon, Steve Ballmer no longer wanted to do this deal at any price.
That's why the $33 offer seemed "purposely vague"--because Steve
wasn't really committed to it. That's why Microsoft walked just after Yahoo finally came to its senses and started to move on price. That's why Yahoo is now telling this story to anyone who will listen--because the mercurial Ballmer really did get over this deal.
(What Yahoo isn't saying, as it rolls out its global don't-blame-us campaign, is that OF COURSE Steve Ballmer is over this deal. For this merger to have a chance of working, both companies have to charge into it with 100% enthusiasm. For the past three months, however, Steve Ballmer has watched as:
1. Microsoft's shareholders and employees have peed all over the
deal.
2. Yahoo has peed all over the deal.
3. Yahoo has done everything short of auctioning off the furniture to concoct ANY FUTURE BUT the deal.
None of which is conducive to 100% enthusiasm. If you were Steve Ballmer, wouldn't you have lost interest, too?

For Steve and Microsoft this was the deal that could not fail. They were placing all their eggs and the chickens that laid them into the one basket and it had to work out. With Yahoo's woeful handling of the deal it was obvious that this was never going to be a success. There's nothing wrong with using negotiating tactics espeically in Yahoo's position but you better make sure you know what you're doing. The threat of leaving Microsoft with a company that was a shadow of the shadow it was in January when the offer was made was absolute stupidity. Jerry cannot talk about being willing to sell when he was pushing deals with Google a mere days before the withdrawl. Yahoo got what it deserved and I can see much worse on the horizon. Steve needs to look elsewhere on the net for a different style of company. A company that can bring real innovation and enthusiasm into the Microsoft family.

Labels: Google, Jerry Yang, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, Yahoo

I don't like to blow my own trumpet but it happened exactly as I said it would here. Microsoft offered the $33 increase and Yahoo were nice enough to reject it. This gave Microsoft the opportunity to walk and when Yahoo started talking about outsourcing to Google Steve knew he could without losing face. A Yahoo that's been decimated by Jerry is not worth fighting over. It's become obvious to many that Jerry would rather kill his baby than see it thrive under Microsoft ownership. Make no mistake Yahoo would've become the web brand for Microsoft and would've been allowed to thrive. Steve would have to ensure it did because shareholders would not let them waste such a massive expenditure.

So what's next? Well for Yahoo we might see the end of Jerry. The AGM will probably be called very soon and assuming the shareholders aren't too upset at a management team that put their personal feelings in front of what's good for business then Yahoo will continue as is for a while longer. I can see a Q2 and Q3 full of problems and a possible new Microsoft offer next year after Jerry loses his job at the AGM.

Microsoft now need to seriously consider buying up companies like Twitter and perhaps looking at a deal with AOL. Time-Warner will be happy to get rid of AOL and Microsoft will gain a useful entity, user-base and engineers who will be more open to Microsoft being their masters. I think it's time to get rid of MSN or certainly redesign it. The site needs to start incorporating more things for users to do and start becoming more social. The Live and MSN brands have fragmented Microsoft's offerings too much, it's time to bring them together. Microsoft can use the $44billion to produce a much better product than they would've bought but they need to start now.

Labels: Google, Jerry Yang, Microsoft, Steve Ballmer, Yahoo

Microsoft has reportedly developed a USB key that allows investigators to
extract forensic data from PCs.
COFEE (Computer Online Forensic Evidence
Extractor) comes in a USB key form factor, and was distributed to a small number
of law-enforcement agencies last June, the Seattle Times reports. The device includes 150 tools that allow
investigators to extract internet history files, for example, or "decrypt
passwords".

The 150 tools are simply based on the 150 commands that forensic experts must enter anyway and that normally take 4+ hours. Microsoft claim that they are simply making this stage easier.

Rather than pointing to the existence of a backdoor

There are people that have climed that this tool circumvents security such as BitLocker and exploits backdoors in the system. It doesn't! Never did, that's just anti-Microsoft propaganda. Nice to see The Register rubbishing it.

the decrypting password
feature appears to relate to password auditing tools. COFEE also allows
investigators to upload data for analysis.
The device is used by more than
2,000 officers in at least 15 countries, including Germany and the US. Microsoft
supplies the technology to law enforcement agencies without charge. The tool
reportedly allows investigators to scan for evidence on site without necessarily
having to cart PCs back to a lab.
Computer forensics is a painstaking process
carefully designed to make sure data on a suspect computer isn't changed -
simply plugging a device into a computer to extract data seems like a quick and
dirty fix. The admissibility of such data in court in debatable even before we
get into considering the possibility that the USB key might harbour
malware.

Do we honestly think that this is a revelation to the people who designed the tool or consulted on the tool? I honestly do not believe that there is a room in Redmond where someone is now thinking, "I wonder should we have asked a computer forensic professional about this stuff before we built this. The fact that the Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith has commented about it makes me think that they've done a lot of research into the legal viability of the evidence the tool will produce. Anyway, I suspect the tool is meant to indicate the presence of evidence and produce passwords rather than actually produce the evidence. It's not designed to replace forensic experts just make their lives a bit easier.

Another, even greater concern is that the kit will get into the
hands of hackers. The form factor for COFEE would be just their cup of
tea.

To start with hackers would need to actually gain physical access to the machine they are trying to attack for this to be a real threat. Secondly do you think they don't have similar tools already? Anyone heard of Switchblade?

The extraction and analysis of digital evidence features in the
investigation of more on more crimes, not just those specific to computers such
as internet fraud and child abuse investigations. UK specialists we've spoken to
tell us they're struggling to cope with the volume of work from law enforcement
clients. There's a genuine problem here, but we're not convinced COFEE is the
solution.
Law enforcement officials from forces in 35 countries are meeting
in Redmond this week to talk about the role of technology in combating crime. A
similar event two years ago led to the development of COFEE, the Seattle Times
reports. ®

So the industry has been involved in this tool for while then?

My only problem with it is that by the time law enforcement agencies have finished testing it and ensuring it's going to work in virtually all conditions there'll be a new set of technologies out there and it'll have to be updated again anyway. Great place to start though so I say well done Microsoft. Reading the comments on Ed's blog, as well as on the Seattle Times site, though it's obvious that there are people out there that are willing to believe anything anti-Microsoft and no matter how sensationalist and obviously false the story they want to believe it.

Labels: COFEE, Ed Bott, Microsoft, Seattle Times, The Register

Labels: Apple., Cisco, Fortune, Google, HP, IBM, Intel, Microsoft

Labels: Cloud Computing, GMail, Google, Google Docs, Microsoft, Microsoft Office, SkyDrive, Yahoo

A study by SearchIgnite has shown that Yahoo's search and ad business grew faster than Google's in Q1. While it's easy to jump to conclusions and say that Yahoo's plan to fend off Microsoft is working perfectly and business is back on track it's difficult for me to look past the possibility that advertisers are backing Yahoo because of the Microsoft deal. With everyone talking about this deal, traffic to Yahoo must be increasing as people visit to have a look at what Yahoo have to offer. The idea that Microsoft are interested therefore Yahoo must have something of quality has to have occurred to other people. Is there anyone else out there who is visiting Yahoo more since the deal was talked about because I know I am. Leave a comment if you are.

Labels: Microsoft, Yahoo

Microsoft has released it's Security Intelligence Report for July through December.  There are some interesting conclusions in this report such as

During 2H07 the MSRT proportionally cleaned malware from 60% less Windows Vista-based computers compared to computers running Windows XP Service Pack 2.
Similarly, the MSRT proportionally cleaned malware from 87% less Windows Vista-based computers than from computers running Windows XP with Service Pack 1 installed, and 91.5% less than from computers running Windows XP without any Service Pack
installed.

The most significant statistic in this report however is the increase in the number of Trojans.

During the second half of 2007 there was a 300% increase in the number of trojan downloaders and droppers detected and removed. The increase observed in 2H07 is vastly larger than the already large increase observed between 2H06 and 1H07. Clearly this category of malware has become a tool of choice for some attackers. IT Professionals and Security Professionals alike should become familiar with this type of malware so that they can better protect their networks from attacks that leverage it.

Be careful everyone and make sure your anti-virus is up-to-date and you do not open email attachments or visit sites you do not trust or know.

Labels: Malware, Microsoft, Trojan

Labels: Google, Microsoft, Windows Live

Yahoo! announced their Q1 results today and as expected they are strong, not amazing but string none the less. Now the ball arrives back into Microsoft's court and we wait to see when they will up their offer for Yahoo, I suspect to $35 per share. I would feel however that this is now the time for Microsoft to withdraw from the deal completely. A final offer from Microsoft for about $33 per share would be a good next move. Once that bid is rejected the next step will be to either attempt to replace the Yahoo! board if they're that desperate to take them over or withdraw from the bid altogether. Within a couple of days I hope to take a full look at Yahoo! and MSN offerings and see just how far away from being truly competitive Microsoft actually are but I suspect if the money being spent trying to take over Yahoo! was spent on R&D and hiring new blood Microsoft wouldn't have to worry so much.

Labels: Microsoft, msn, Yahoo

At a Seattle event on Thursday Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer talked about areas Microsoft will focus on in the future. While much is being made of the comments he's made about Windows Vista many people seem to be disregarding the comment he made regarding hardware. He talked about Paul Allen approaching Bill Gates in the early days and talking to him about building computers and each time Bill would say no, Microsoft are a software company not a hardware company. At the end he said, "We're on that same strategy 30 years later ... but we do have an expansive vision." While we could assume that he's talking about the Zune and the XBox I personally don't believe he is. Apple have been given credit for how efficiently their OS runs and a major reason for this efficiency is the fact that the hardware and software are so closely tied. If Microsoft started to build own brand PC's optimised to run Windows 7 and Windows Vista as well as offering the OS to other PC makers they should be able to open up a new revenue stream and I know I would personally buy a Microsoft branded PC if I knew it was as well optimised as the Macs are.

The XBox should've been the perfect live experiment to get the problems ironed out of their hardware designs. Hopefully the overheating problems will be solved in the new desktops because they will realistically get one shot at this release. It must be well designed, must be at least comparable to the iMacs, as well as performing better than the majority of vendor PC's currently on the market. I know these goals are high but as this is a tough market with Apple slowly gaining ground and most PC's lacking in aesthetic pleasure Microsoft will be expected to produce or risk getting lost in the market.

Labels: Microsoft, Steve Ballmer

The more times I visit the .com version of major US company's websites the more I feel that we are being shortchanged here in the UK. For example today on the Microsoft.com site there were links to downloads and deals for Vista owners, free help to setup a new business and ways to work with slower Internet connections. The Microsoft.co.uk site on the other hand had a pixilated looking set of Vista graphics with the headline "Introducing Windows Vista" and then links to a security updates and a trial for Office 2007. You can't seriously be telling me that the same amount of effort goes into the two sites. Windows Vista has been out for over a year! We don't need introduced to it yet again. Come on Microsoft give us the same level of effort at least on your site, it's bad enough that we have yet to see any sign of the Zune over here and those of  us who do own it can't get any help with problems. There's a reason I now own an iPod Touch and Shuffle.

This isn't limited to Microsoft however. There are other companies that have a difference between the US and UK version of the sites and the UK versions are nearly always lacking the information and quality of the .com site.

Looking beyond site differences and to prices and we saw from Apple's iTunes the overcharging that was going on at this side of the pond. The basic Macbook comes in at $1099 (£550 approximately) from the Apple.com store. The same Macbook on the Apple.com\uk store comes in at a surprising $1395 (£699 approximately).

It's difficult not to get fed up with uneven pricing, differing standards in websites and lack of assistance and I wonder just how many other people over here feel the same way as I do.

Labels: Apple, iPod, iTunes, Macbook, Microsoft, Vista, Zune

Just a short post to let readers know that over the next few weeks I'm going to publish articles on 22hundred.net for newcomers to the IT world. I'm going to try to clearly explain the terms and as much as possible use clear English. Over the last few weeks I've watched TV shows and read articles about the dangers of the Internet but none of these have actually tried to give people proper step by step advice on how to stay safe. I'm also going to answer some questions users may have regarding their current PC, new PC and future PC's. Stay tuned for the first article and please feel free to submit any ideas or questions you may have. Since graduation I've worked almost exclusively in Microsoft products, from a development position and also helping friends and family to setup their systems, so I hope I can help with your queries.

Labels: Guides, Microsoft, Step-by-step

A story on the WWE website shows how far Microsoft will go when it has made a mistake.

After accidentally removing WWE Superstars’ signatures from a 9-year-old boy’s XBox game console that he sent in for repairs, Microsoft officials contacted WWE in an attempt to work something out, reports the Nottingham Evening Post on April 7. The outcome is more than the boy could have ever hoped for. He and his mother will now receive another chance to meet with the Superstars and to get the console resigned at a WWE live event at the Nottingham Arena on April 13.

While many will just say that it's Microsoft's mistake and they should be making up for it, I say well done MS.

Labels: Microsoft, WWE

Microsoft sent Yahoo a letter yesterday, April 5th, that expressed the Redmond company's frustration with the way Yahoo have been handling the offer Microsoft made two months ago. The letter can be found here. Microsoft have given Yahoo 3 weeks for the two companies to come to a deal before they will take the offer directly to the shareholders and try to replace the Yahoo board.

It's about time this letter was sent. Yahoo have made Microsoft look like a fool over the last couple of months and it's been embarrassing to watch. Personally though I don't think Microsoft should conclude any deal at this stage. They need to pull out of the deal, let Yahoo sink and then move back in with a lower offer if they really want to purchase the company. The better choice however would be to pull out and not move back in. Keep the war chest intact, especially in this growing time of economic unrest, and bare in mind that if the Google numbers are correct and the money from online ads is decreasing then this deal may not be as big a money making idea as it was in February.

Labels: Microsoft, Yahoo

Mary Jo Foley talks about the release date of Windows 7 in her latest blog. A lot of what she says makes good sense. Personally I can't see 7 arriving in 2009. I suspect the most likely scenario is a delay influenced release in mid-2010. I also can't see Windows 7 being massively different from Windows Vista. The new kernel, an enhanced security model and much closer ties to the Windows Live Suite will be the most notable differences but I suspect the UI and the experience in general will not change substantially. I look forward to seeing the first beta release in the last few months of 2008 and will be keeping close tabs on Windows 7 news as it becomes available.

Labels: Microsoft, Windows 7

News has leaked out about a new interface for Windows 7, the next OS from Microsoft and it's massive. As we know Microsoft have been taking a lot of flack over the years regarding a perceived lack of innovation so they've gone out to do something about it. With Apple claiming touch and gesture technology, Microsoft is introducing thought technology. A Microsoft insider stated, "We've been working on this for a number of years now and since the public's perception of Vista was weak and Apple had cornered the touch market it was decided that this is the perfect moment to announce this new innovation."

When asked how the technology is used the insider would not go into too many specifics but he did state, "This works in the same way as a mouse cursor. You put on a specially designed Hat-Thought Interface and look at a particular part of the screen. The HTT picks up the location and the cursor moves there automatically. You then think 'click' 'click' and the interface interprets this as a double click and accesses the application. We see this as the next major step forward in computer human interaction. We also hope to one day make it possible for users to download information directly from the Internet into their brains through this same HTT."

This technology is set to be released as part of the Windows 7 OS and Microsoft hope that it will then be able to regain some of the market share that it lost to Linux and Apple because of the disastrous Vista.

Labels: Apple, Hat-Thought Interface, Linux, Microsoft, Windows 7

The Register's Tony Smith has posted an interesting piece, here, regarding the causes of Vista crashes in 2007. According to Microsoft internal mail Nvidia drivers were to blame for 28.8% of the reported Vista crashes in 2007 with Microsoft's own software accounting for 17.9% of the crashes.

Vista Crashes by Organisation, 2007

Source: Microsoft

This is actually quite interesting to me because since I started using Vista over a year ago I've had two crashes. Both of these, one only a few days ago, were down to Nvidia drivers. It's nice to see I'm not exactly alone in this one.

Labels: AMD, Intel, Microsoft, Nvidia, Vista

A nice wee blog post by Rodney Buike:

You know you are a geek......

If you can identify various cell phones by model by their unique sounds (And are visibly irritated when you CAN'T!)

Setting up the Bluetooth system to tie the GPS, Laptop, MP3 player and hands free system is a piece of cake.  Changing the tire isn't.

If you had to genuinely think twice about paying for that new gadget or paying your hydro bill.  REALLY had to think.

When your kids were born, if you considered (at least for a blink of an eye) naming the kid Bill, Steve or Jack (because of CERTAIN computer guys)

If you tried and bothered arguing with your wife about it.

If you have at least two boxes of "useful electronic stuff" you can't bear to part with and won't throw away.

If you paid to courier those boxes to your new house for your new job.

If you recommend to clients to buy new equipment but you'll get buy on slapping an old laptop together from bits and pieces.

If you seriously have considered or have had a breakfast comprised of Cookies, Soda pop and potato chips.

If you are on a one to one basis with the cashier at the local McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, Taco Bell.

If The local Pizza shop is on speed dial.

If you can insulate your basement with all the used pizza boxes.

If you can genuinely imitate either Kirk, Scotty, Bones or McCoy or "Ensign Red Shirt"

If you are dreaming to this day of "Transporter" technology or having a phaser handy to take out the driver that cut you off.

You were a member of at least ONE of the following in ANY school.   Chess Club, Dungeons and Dragons, Computer Club, A/V club, Band.

You can understand 90% of the acronyms out there.  You can't spell Mississsauga or Missisisippi.

You walk about wearing at least ONE (if not more) memory keys.

You carry at least two gadgets at any point in time.

You own your own cable testing, probing, punch down and crimping equipment.

You have at least two stickers on your laptop.

You collect "Swag" for a hobby.

If you have ever tried to impress people with an emulator on your cell phone.

If you have ever trolled Goodwill for old computer hardware.

If you've ever installed Linux from floppy disks.

If your Digital camera has Wifi.

If you've ever owned a Vectrex.

Labels: Geek, Microsoft, Rodney Buike

Silicon Alley Insider is reporting that Microsoft are currently looking at the iPhone SDK and deciding what to build. The likeliest application suite to be built is Microsoft Office and in my opinion a version of the Windows Live suite is just as likely and this option would put Microsoft into direct competition with Google on the platform.

Microsoft is checking out the new iPhone software developers kit and is deciding what, if anything, they want to build for it, exec Tom Gibbons tells Fortune. One obvious possibility: A mobile version of Office, which Microsoft (MSFT) already offers for devices running its Windows Mobile operating system.

And unlike Office for Macs, the iPhone version might be a leader. Word and Excel for Apple's (AAPL) Macs have always trailed the Windows editions in features and usefulness. But because the iPhone's hardware and operating system are miles ahead of any phone Microsoft offers, Office for the iPhone could conceivably become the model for future Windows Mobile editions. Imagine that.

Labels: iPhone, Microsoft

Labels: Google, Microsoft, Yahoo

Microsoft Office Live has gone, erm, live today for many users and it's an excellent product. For all those people out there who are saying that Microsoft do not get the web you are wrong. I think Microsoft now gets exactly what the web is all about in terms of keeping it's customer base happy while keeping it's revenue streams intact.

Live Office lets you create your docs in Office, which I imagine will be Live soon enough, save it through a small plugin and then access it from anywhere and share it with your colleagues. What's more you can work on it with a colleague, save versions and track changes. This is a great application for small and medium businesses and for the average home user.

Live Small Business allows a business to quickly and easily get a web presence. With simple web creation tools, reports and advertising. It also lets you track customers and employees and keep pretty good records on both. This is exactly what every business that can't afford a web developer and a large IT infrastructure needs.

I think Microsoft are starting to show their teeth in the online market. The competition from Google, and no offence to Apple but it's the only real competition Microsoft has had in the last few years, may at last be waking the giant from it's slumber. Those people who are saying that Microsoft are simply playing catchup and are copying what others have already done should remember that that's what Google did when it first arrived on the search scene and that's what Microsoft itself did when it created Windows 3.1 with the GUI interface, copied from Apple I and II. Both of them copied an idea that was already there but they did it better and they succeeded. Who's to say that's not going to happen again.

Labels: Microsoft, Office Live

Microsoft are expanding the online services being offered to businesses to include all businesses. In an announcement made today Microsoft are offering Exchange Online, SharePoint Online and Live Meeting as well as Microsoft CRM4.0. The SharePoint offering will go into direct competition with Google's new baby, Google Sites and seems to show that Microsoft is taking the online battle seriously at last.

Based on the proven, business-class software available in Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007, the new services enable businesses to access e-mail, calendaring, contacts, shared workspaces, and webconferencing and videoconferencing over the Web. The new services are managed through a  single Web-based interface, designed to meet the needs of IT professionals. Through this security-enhanced interface, IT professionals can monitor the performance of the services, add and configure users, submit and track support requests, and manage users and licenses.

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/mar08/03-02AllSizeBusinessesPR.mspx

While a beta version is currently only on offer to a limited number of US customers this marks a major move for the Microsoft and perhaps we're seeing the first step  in the realisation of the Software plus Services strategy that has been touted around for so long. 

Labels: Microsoft, Software + Services

According to a number of sources, including the Wall Street Journal, Microsoft are briefing corporations in preparation for the expansion of their online services. It appears as if the software giant is about to take on Google Apps directly at last. However this is a rumour we have heard many times out of Redmond, I distinctly remember looking forward to Microsoft Works Online for a while. It'll be interesting to see if we see any actual movement on this over the next couple of weeks.

Labels: Google, Microsoft, Works Online

Well another day and another fine for the software giant. The EU once again felt it was necessary to slap a fine on Microsoft for anti-competitive behavior, this time to the tune of $1.3 billion. I fully understand the necessity of keeping up monitoring of Microsoft and the necessity to investigate any and all attempts the company might make to unfairly use it's position however this really is starting to get ridiculous. The inclusion of Internet Explorer in Windows is not a major hindrance to the other browsers, what is a major hindrance is the lack of quality shown by these browsers and the lack of real variety. I have Firefox, Safari and IE installed and I really don't need or want a forth unless that browser can offer something drastically different from what's already on offer. The only browser showing that possibility is Flock. These browsers all compete in the same market and yet Opera can complain about unfair competition when Firefox, who is in the same position, is gaining ground on IE. But maybe I'm wrong. Lets take a quick look at Firefox and Safari. They are both bundled browsers. Firefox is bundled in Linux and Safari comes with OS X. Are we saying that we want all those browsers removed from the OS's? Of course not but we do want IE unbundled because it's in a monopoly position? Well I've seen brand new Windows laptops with Firefox bundled so I don't see that as an issue anymore.

As far as operability is concerned the decision should've been delayed until we were able to judge how successful the latest announcement on interoperability is.

To Microsoft I say this.....pull out of Europe! Not completely obviously but give the EU exactly what they want. Remove IE, Windows Media and all other additional software from XP now, after all it's only going to be supported for a few more months anyway. Then let the people who have just bought their shiny new OS try to use the damn thing without the bundled applications and ensure that the OEM's do not bundle software to make up for it. It's time to make the EU suffer. Microsoft must also make sure that every single complaint is forwarded to the EU commission and let them see just how much they are helping their citizens. On the plus side Vista sales should improve because XP will be worthless.

Labels: EU Commission, Firefox, Linux, Mac OS X, Microsoft, Opera, Safari, Windows

I read through a posting by Silicon Alley Insider today which offers a solution to the Microsoft-Yahoo standoff and it makes perfect sense, the full post can be found here.

Basically the plan is outlined in 10 steps:

1.  Jerry, fly up to Redmond this afternoon and have dinner with Steve. Just the two of you. No bankers, no lawyers, no colleagues, no advisers.

2.  Jerry and Steve: Agree on the following:

• Both of you are getting your butts kicked.
• Both of you have tried for years to change this situation and have failed to do so.
• Both of you need to do something radical.
• Combining forces is smart.

3. Jerry, persuade Steve that a straight acquisition of Yahoo by Microsoft would be a disaster for both companies. (Read this post if you'd like an outsider's perspective on this). This will be a tough sell: Steve will want to kill himself before he admits that he won't eventually be able to crush Google through money, power, energy, and relentless effort.  He will not want to hear that acquiring Yahoo will be a disaster. He will offer extremely compelling explanations about how Microsoft understands the integration and retention challenges, the morale challenges, the focus challenges, the internal-conflict challenges.  So it's time for some relentless persuasion of your own. Don't back down, Jerry. If you leave the dinner table without persuading Steve of this, your Yahoo baby (and Steve's Internet business) will be toast.

4. Jerry, float a better idea--a way to combine forces that avoids all of the problems of a straight acquisition:

• Microsoft and Yahoo combine their Internet forces and assets in a stand-alone company called "Yahoo"
• Microsoft will trade its Internet division and $10-$15 billion in cash for 51% of the combined company's stock (resulting in an overall valuation similar to Microsoft's $45 billion offer). 50/50 would make sense, but Steve won't agree unless he has control, and Steve holds more cards.
• Microsoft will control a majority of the board.
• The new board will immediately decide on the combined company's management team, and that team will immediately take control of the company. Not in early 2009. Now.
• Steve will be chairman of both boards.

5.  Jerry, persuade Steve that, for the following reasons, this is a far better idea than a straight acquisition:

• No deal purgatory
• Less dilution and risk for Microsoft shareholders
• Less of a tax hit for Yahoo shareholders.
• Stand-alone company will be free to do whatever is necessary to maximize the value of its own business, without having to worry about whether this hurts Microsoft's core business.
• Stand-alone company can grant stock options and hire and retain top talent who don't want to hitch their wagons to Windows and Office, be employees number 79,862 and 79,863, and work for Microsoft.
• Stand-alone company will avoid the bureaucratic nightmare of having to fight for resources from a senior team who are also worried about fate of Windows, Office, Xbox, etc.
• Stand-alone company won't have to compete with IBM, Oracle, Software-as-a-service vendors, Sony, Apple, and Research in Motion in addition to Google.
• Stand-alone company will have a massive war chest and will be able to compete with Google for acquisitions.
• Microsoft will have control and the ability to buy the rest of the stock if it later determines that a fully consolidated Yahoo is preferable.
• Microsoft and Yahoo will be able to share technology and expertise in ways that benefit both companies (senior Microsoft management can facilitate this).
• Microsoft doesn't need to do everything itself: Microsoft's shareholders will benefit from the success of this combined entity (as will Yahoo's), even if the entity ends up hurting Microsoft's core business.

7. Jerry, bring Steve a copy of The Innovator's Dilemma and ask him to read it before he goes to sleep. Suggest he focus on the chapter that describes how some companies have successfully resisted being disrupted (by creating stand-alone entities that are free to destroy the mothership).

8. Jerry and Steve: Shake hands and agree to hammer out such a deal.

9.  Go to sleep, wake up, call the lawyers/advisors, and tell them to smooth out the details.

10. Announce the deal.
Will this guarantee success? No. The new Yahoo will still have to execute superbly. But this arrangement, unlike a straight acquisition, will "maximize potential value" for both companies' shareholders.

Unfortunately it'll probably never happen, though in the tech world the strangest things have a habit of happening, but it really is a well thought out solution and would save both companies from the disastrous deal that is currently on the table. Personally I'd rather see News Corp. try to prop up the dead weight of Yahoo! than see Microsoft's online division collapse under it.

Labels: Jerry Yang, Microsoft, Silicon Alley Insider, Steve Ballmer, Yahoo

From Greg Matter's blog:

THE WORLD NEEDS ONLY FIVE COMPUTERS

And, no, I'm not paraphrasing something that I bet Thomas J. Watson never uttered in 1943 anyway. But he should have because, ultimately, he might turn out to have been right.

Let's see, the Google grid is one. Microsoft's live.com is two. Yahoo!, Amazon.com, eBay, Salesforce.com are three, four, five and six. (Well, that's O(5) ;)) Of course there are many, many more service providers but they will almost all go the way of YouTube; they'll get eaten by one of the majors. And, I'm not placing any wagers that any of these six will be one of the Five Computers (nor that, per the above examples, they are all U.S. West Coast based --- I'll bet at least one, maybe the largest, will be the Great Computer of China).

I'm just saying that there will be, more or less, five hyperscale, pan-global broadband computing services giants. There will be lots of regional players, of course; mostly, they will exist to meet national needs. That is, the network computing services business will look a lot like the energy business: a half-dozen global giants, a few dozen national and/or regional concerns, followed by wildcatters and specialists.

Let me back up and explain what I mean by a Computer, and then why I think this is inevitable. I mean "Computer" as in the "The Network is the ...". These Computers will comprise millions of processing, storage and networking elements, globally distributed into critical-mass clusters (likely somewhere around 5,000 nodes each). My point in labeling them a Computer is that there will be some organization, a corporation or government, that will ultimately control the software run on and, important to my argument below, the capitalization and economics of the global system.

These Computers will be large for a number of reasons. It seems that the successful services are most definitely growing faster than Moore's Law. That is, in addition to upgrading to faster systems they are adding more of them and the compound growth is getting pretty spectacular in several cases. A company like Salesforce.com sees hypergrowth not in the form of some intrinsic demand on CRM (within an average company, definitely not growing close to Moore's Law --- Enterprise CRM is overserved by systems performance improvements), but rather the sum of consolidation of CRM systems across thousands and thousands of companies. Live.com is likely to fall into this camp, too. The growth seen by a Google or Yahoo!, on the other hand, is more directly a function of their pipe-filling roles: the greater the end-user bandwidth, the greater the demand on their infrastructure.

Moreover, there is most definitely an economy of scale in computing. To the extent that there is a scalable architectural pattern (cluster, pod, etc.), the per-unit engineering expense gets amortized over increasing capital volume. So, more and more engineering can be invested in driving higher and higher efficiencies at scale.

Our bet (meaning Sun's) is that, like the energy, transportation, telecommunications and power utility businesses, most of these companies will realize that they can become even more efficient if they rely upon a few, highly competitive and deeply technical infrastructure suppliers (think GE, Siemens, ABB for power systems, Boeing and Airbus for commercial aircraft, Ericsson, Nortel, Lucent/Alcatel, Nokia for telecom, etc.).

All this being said, a large enough enterprise (say, a big financial services firm) still have some pretty compelling reasons to build their own Computers. My only advice here is to approach the problem as one of latent scale. That is, think that you are building one of the world's five, but you just haven't quite grown into it yet! Same advice goes to start-ups: because either you will grow to become one of the big Computers, or you'll be acquired and be Borg-ed into one of them!

Naturally, we aim to be the premier infrastructure supplier to the world's Computers. Blackbox is just the beginning (More on Blackbox in a previous entry). Whatever its form (or color!) the emerging infrastructure will be far more efficient than what we think of for conventional enterprise computing. And, just as a reminder, that doesn't mean its piles and piles of cheap boxes, any more than you'd design a power plant with piles and piles of cheap portable generators. In the latter case, the little problems of noise, pollution, reliability and conversion efficiency are scaled into some really nasty ones.

Similarly, the cheapest computing is not necessarily obtained by lashing together racks and racks of the cheapest computers you can find. Engineering for scale matters. Really matters.

It's a very interesting read and he makes some very interesting points but I have to wonder if this is the world the consumer really wants though? I'm not sure if I want my whole desktop online and more importantly I don't want to lose the choice. I want the option to choose email provider, office application, media players and other services and not have them thrust upon me by an overpowering force. It's not what the net is about and I can see the EU fighting such an idea tooth and nail. Here's a question to consider though, where does Apple fit into the grand plan above? I can't see Steve Jobs surrendering any time soon.

Labels: Apple, Google, Greg Matters, Microsoft, Steve Jobs, Sun Microsystems, Yahoo

A story from bbc.co.uk is reporting that Google are finding the Microsoft purchase of Yahoo, "troubling".

Google has criticised Microsoft's proposed bid for Yahoo

Google has said it finds Microsoft's $44.6bn ($22.65bn) bid to buy rival Yahoo "troubling" and wants regulators to scrutinise the proposed deal.

 

This is a very understandable reaction from a company that has been dominating the online application space for a number of years now. Google's business model relies heavily on advertising, as we know, and the revenue from advertising is directly linked to the amount of traffic visiting the sites. The Microsoft/Yahoo deal may decrease this number of users, hence decreasing the amount of advertising revenue ergo decreasing the amount of profits Google are making and with Wall Street already concerned about the amount of profits Google are going to be able to make during the economic slowdown this takeover has produced a very defensive response.

But lets forget Google for a moment and take a look at this from the only viewpoint that really matters, the consumers. The regulators must look at this as a benefit to the consumer. The Search giant really is not producing many online applications that are of a truly high standard or for the applications that are a high standard the opposition is just as good. Lets take a look at some examples:

1. Google Maps. There is no questioning the fact that this is an extremely high quality application which can now be installed on Nokia N95 as well as having it on iPhone and iPod Touch. It's impossible not to be impressed with the quality of the imaging. On the other hand I used the application last week on my iPod Touch to find a restaurant near to where I work. Wondering why the distance to the nearest one was over 5 miles I checked where Maps thought my location was and it placed me in the middle of the Irish Sea! Maybe this is just an unfortunate example but Nokia's Maps application on the N95 using GPS is fantastic. What does place Google's application above the competition is the high quality of aerial photographs of cities that aren't in the US. If all Google products were as good as Maps and Search they wouldn't be worrying about this deal, they wouldn't need to.

2. GMail. This is one of Google's flagship products, and in many ways a product that has caused the most headaches for their legal department over the last couple of years. GMail is another mail client needle in a massive stack of mail client needles. The support of POP3 and IMAP certainly makes it easier to receive your email while using a wide variety of devices and the GMail application for N95 is very handy. In the GMail client the grouping of emails into conversations and ability to categorise emails using labels makes it quite appealing. However to anyone familiar with Outlook, as many office workers will be, Live Mail will be very familiar and usable. This can either be a curse or a blessing but personally I believe that it's a blessing. For anyone not wanting to access their mail through the browser they can download the Live Mail desktop application which allows you to add numerous email accounts and support POP3, IMAP and HTTP, what more could you want. Due to the Outlook like interface users get familiarity and generally users like familiarity. In fact this leads onto a much larger point.

3. Google Docs vs. Microsoft Office vs. Open Office. Many of the future battles for users will be fought in the Online Office space so lets take a quick look at the competitors.
Google Docs is a growing online office application offering Spreadsheet, Presentation and Word Processing software. The applications allow you to work on your documents anywhere that has an Internet connection and save them online. No more installation of software and no more documents and charts taking up hard drive space that your family photos and music could be inhabiting.  However the applications do not have the breadth of features that Microsoft Office and Open Office has. Also, if you're not connected to the Internet you cannot access your documents so no working on the plane. Finally, many companies are not going to be enthusiastic about saving their official documents online.
Open Office has both online and offline applications now. Their online application offers similar functionality to the Google Docs Application but with the familiar Open Office interface. Once again I feel familiarity is deeply important. The offline application is a viable competitor to Microsoft. Considering this is a totally free application the feature depth is impressive. It's support of other file formats however is a little questionable and in a world were many of the documents you author will be read or edited using Microsoft Office this is going to be a disadvantage. Once again though for students or for home users Open Office is a viable alternative worth considering.
Microsoft Office. I don't want to sound bias but this is the King of Office Applications. The depth of features and the number of users world wide make this the Office application that every user should have. While Open Office is successful it feels like Microsoft Works in comparison to MS Office. The new Ribbon Interface on Windows machines is beautiful to use and with Outlook Connector installed there is no mail server you can't get mail from, that I have found anyway. Word is the best Word Processor in the World by a considerable distance and excluding Mac applications PowerPoint is the best presentation application in the World. Excel may have some bad points but many users will never see them and anyone needing it for calculations like their finances it is perfect. Office is getting a live feature which is going to be a method of uploading your documents to an Internet storage location thus giving it access to them from any machine that has Office installed. With the Office applications making a lot of money I cannot see MS producing Office applications online anytime soon.

Looking at the examples so far we can see that the share of quality is pretty even. While Microsoft dominates the Office and Desktop OS environments Google dominates the Online application and search environments. With the Mobile World still very much up for grabs, and baring in mind that Apple's well and truly battling for it, Microsoft needs the injection of energy that Yahoo would bring. But herein lies the question, what will Microsoft do with Yahoo? The best case scenario is that Microsoft fully incorporate Yahoo R&D into Windows Live and scrap the Yahoo brand. They then need to re-release the Yahoo applications as Windows Live applications while incorporating functionality from Yahoo Mail and Messenger into the Live Mail and Messenger services. Full support for all Yahoo addresses should be kept and incorporated into the Windows Live Authentication mechanism. The Windows Live team then needs to give the Yahoo guys a big say in the future of Windows Live services. Yahoo 'get' the Internet and its users and Microsoft 'get' success and how to maintain it. Let the Yahoo developers create the high quality applications they are used to producing and release them under Windows Live.

Finally Microsoft needs to take a look at Windows 7. Is this really going to be a desktop oriented OS that's going to be rushed out because they can't handle the marketing of Vista, seriously guys the OS is excellent it should be an easy sell, or are they going to think about creating a hybrid OS. Fully incorporating applications created by the semi-independent, Yahoo driven developers into the OS and making it feel like your working in the Cloud as well as on your machine could open the door to the future of computing. A mobile driven, cloud driven, freedom driven OS that lets you work on anything, anywhere and at any time using tools developed by the Yahoo and Windows Live R&D team could be the Platform to re-launch Microsoft into a new Era. It's time to rebuild the brand and this deal is the way to do it.

Labels: Google, Microsoft, Windows 7, Yahoo

Labels: Google, Microsoft, Yahoo

I noticed this on www.live-documents.com and thought I'd mention it. Read in particular the part in italics at the bottom,

Statutory Disclaimer: While our products are built primarily around the Microsoft Office suite, Microsoft Corporation was not involved in any way in the development of these solutions and does not endorse them in any formal way. Please see our IP Disclaimer for more information.
(Note: That said, since Sabeer Bhatia is a co-founder, a very small part of the millions that he received from Microsoft for Hotmail.com funded our development efforts - so thank you Microsoft!).

I wonder will they be saying thank you when the inevitable court case with Microsoft ends.

Labels: Live Documents, Microsoft

Yet more anti-competitive cases opened by the EU. I wonder how many chairs Steve threw through the Redmond Windows, glass versions, when he heard about these newest ones.

European regulation continues to be a thorn in Microsoft’s side. After years of investigations over alleged anti-competitive practices, the European Commission now has a large body of experienced prosecutors only too ready and willing to take up the cudgels on behalf of European entities, and others. And organisations like Opera Software, the Norway-based web browser company, are only too willing to pick up the Bat-phone to the Commissioner in Brussels. It must be on speed-dial by now.

The latest twist is the launch of two new Microsoft antitrust investigations by the Commission, one of which involves products and technologies for which Microsoft allegedly is withholding interoperability information, including its .Net framework, Office Open XML (OOXML) document format and various server products. The European Commission also has officially started its antitrust investigation into Microsoft’s tying of Internet Explorer to Windows, lodged by - guess who? - Opera Software in mid-December. Not only this, but US firms are happy to lodge complaints with the Commission, including Google, helping the slow down the progress of the Redmond giant.

Microsoft says it will “cooperate fully with the Commission’s investigation”. You can see the guys in Redmond now - just sitting back in their chairs with yet another sigh of resignation…

http://uk.techcrunch.com/2008/01/14/european-regulation-is-the-one-bug-microsoft-just-cant-nuke/

Just a little point to remember, Linux is bundled with Firefox and Leopard is bundled with Safari. What's the difference?

Labels: Anti-Competitive, EU Commission, IE, Microsoft, Windows

Just goes to show that Microsoft do care.....eventually,

Here's a call you never expect to get: a customer service followup from Microsoft… ten years after the first call. That's exactly what happened to a guy who had called the big M way back on January 7, 1998. On the 8th of this month, he got a followup call to make sure everything was going OK......The real reason for the delayed call is pretty simple: a typo. Yep, they put in '08 instead of '98. Understandable, I suppose.

Mistakes: Microsoft Customer Service Makes a Follow-Up Call 10 Years Too Late

Labels: Microsoft, Support

This is something that obviously affects all Xbox LIVE users.

Xbox Live Accounts at risk! Account thieves using Pre-texting methods to gain access to your Xbox Account.

read more | digg story

The end of the article claims that Microsoft won't react unless something is a huge PR issue so this needs to be blogged and dugg by as many people as possible. Lets force them to get it fixed.

Labels: Microsoft, XBox Live, XBox360

This has got to be one of the finest marketing campaigns to come out of Redmond.

Once I was almost famous. For years, my friends and I were on the front lines: we were the Windows Server 2003 servers that powered Microsoft.com, one of the hottest Web sites in the world. Then, early last summer, everything changed. Quietly, without warning, the new kids took over. Windows Server 2008.

read more | digg story

See the Lone Server's Facebook and Linked In pages for more information on him. Apparently he's a Seahawks fan. Go Seahawks!

Labels: Marketing, Microsoft, Server2003

Microsoft always keep their backs covered in this sort of format war and HD-DVD v Blu-ray appears to be no different.

The latest company to possibly jump on the Blu-ray bandwagon is none other than Microsoft itself, the backers of the rival HD-DVD format.According to BetaNews, Albert Penello, director for global marketing at Microsoft, revealed that while his company will continue to back the HD-DVD for the 360, that because of the external drive capability of the Xbox, that it would be also possible to ship a Blu-ray drive for the game machine if HD-DVD didn't survive the battle against Blu-ray.

read more | digg story

A point to note for Sony is that a 360 with Blu-ray means I can play all my movies on my big Samsung/Panasonic tele with no need to buy a PS3 or a Blu-ray player. Microsoft should produce this drive and finish the PS3 off.

Labels: Blu-ray, HD-DVD, Microsoft, PS3, Sony, XBox360