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Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) is now acknowledging it screwed up with its initial launch of Windows Vista, and is ready to try again. "We broke a lot of things. We know that, and we know it caused you a lot of pain. It got customers thinking, hey, is Windows Vista a generation we want to get invested in?" So Brad Brooks, Microsoft's VP of Windows Vista consumer marketing, fessed up publicly this week. Speaking at a keynote address at Microsoft's annual Worldwide Partner Conference, Brooks signified that Microsoft was ready to admit mistakes and reposition itself to tell a better story...

Microsoft has given its new Office-based software-plus-service bundle a new name — “Equipt” — and a due date (mid-July), company officials said on July 2. Equipt is the product/service that was formerly codenamed “Albany” (and inside Microsoft, known as “ValueBox”). Equipt, which Microsoft describes as its “essential set of software and services for consumers,” includes a version of Office Home and Student 2007; Windows Live OneCare, Microsoft’s PC management/security bundle; a few Windows Live communication/collaboration services; and Office Live Workspace, Microsoft’s online-collaboration add-on to Office. Equipt will cost $69.99 annually (for a license that can be installed on three PCs...

Excerpt - Redmond, WA (AHN) - Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) is pulling the XP operating system from its product line come Monday. The move comes 18 months after the company launched the Vista operating system. Although Microsoft will not sell the XP program any longer, they will still generate revenue from providing support for the software as it will no longer be free. Microsoft will offer extended support packages for XP until at least 2014. ~ snip ~

A video spoof shown during the CES 2008 keynote by Bill Gates about his last full day at Microsoft in July starring himself, Brian Williams, Steve Ballmer, Matthew McConaugheyr, Robbie Bach, Jay-Z, Bono, Steven Spielberg, George Clooney, Jon Stewart, Kevin Turner, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Al Gore, Ray Ozzie and Craig Mundie,

Et Tu, Intel? Chip Giant Won’t Embrace Microsoft’s Windows Vista By Steve Lohr Intel, the giant chip maker and longtime partner of Microsoft, has decided against upgrading the computers of its own 80,000 employees to Microsoft’s Vista operating system, a person with direct knowledge of the company’s plans said. The person, who has been briefed on the situation but requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of Intel’s relationship with Microsoft, said the company made its decision after a lengthy analysis by its internal technology staff of the costs and potential benefits of moving to Windows Vista, which has drawn fire...

"For the opening piece in our series on Gates leaving daily life at Microsoft, one goal was to give a clear picture of the Microsoft co-founder's role inside the company, as a gauge of the impact his departure will have," Todd Bishop writes for The Seattle Post-Intelligencer's Microsoft Blog. "As part of that, I went back through the internal e-mails turned over in the antitrust suits against the company, looking for new insights into his personality." Bishop found a doozy, which also happens to illustrate perfectly why Mac users have such disdain for the "Windows experience." If you've ever...

That photo of 11 weirdos in '70s clothes you may have seen on the Internet really is the original Microsoft team, snapped Dec. 7, 1978, on the eve of the company's move from Albuquerque, N.M., to Seattle. Almost 30 years later, a few weeks before Bill Gates's departure from Microsoft, the group (looking better) reconvened. Bob Greenberg (center of old photo, in red sweater), then a programmer and now a tech and financial consultant, had won a photo portrait in a contest and used it to commemorate the soon-to-be disrupted group. The picture was shot in a shopping mall. ...

In an attempt to game Microsoft's new Live Search Cashback program, an eBayer has put a $714 price tag on $630 in cash. Here's the listing in all its glory: Pay cash for cash That's right, $630 in cash can be yours for $714. But if you access the page through a Live Search ad link that returns 35 per cent of the purchase price, you can make up the difference. And then some. So you make a profit, and so does the seller. At the expense of Microsoft and eBay. That's the theory, anyway. It's unclear whether this actually...

Steve Ballmer must be on crack. Or something. In a fascinating interview with the Financial Times, Ballmer has the cheek to call Google a one-trick pony (this from the company that has only managed two break-out successes so far), can't seem to come to grips with the fact that he hasn't budged his stock price in eight years, and takes solace in the fact that the company only has "one way to go, and it's up, baby, up, up, up, up, up!" Please pass the vial, Ballmer. One place where he comes down to earth is in his admission that...

A Harvard University dropout who ushered in the home computer age and made billions of dollars along the way will have his last official day of work at Microsoft on June 27. Three people will essentially fill the void left behind when Bill Gates retires from the company he and friend Paul Allen co-founded in 1975. Since Gate's began his transition from leading Microsoft to heading his personally-bankrolled charity, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation , his job as chief software architect has been handled by Ray Ozzie. Craig Mundie inherited Gate's chief research and strategy officer duties, while former...

SEATTLE — A group of prominent local businessmen, including an attorney representing this city, discussed a "poisoned well” plan aimed partly at forcing the Oklahoma City-based owners of the SuperSonics to sell the NBA team rather than move it to their hometown. 'Poisoned Well' strategy sought to bleed... Sonics cite struggles in Seattle Plan hatched to keep Sonics in Seattle ... Testimony in federal court here Friday also revealed that Wally Walker, a former star player and executive for the team, was given the duty of driving a "wedge” between the NBA and the Sonics' owners before a critical vote...

Microsoft Not Under Investigation In China--Yet Shu-Ching Jean Chen, 06.20.08, 2:26 AM ET hong kong - China’s intellectual property bureau issued a formal denial Friday of press reports that asserted it was conducting an anti-monopoly probe of Microsoft. But it is likely only a temporary reprieve for the global software giant. A new anti-monopoly law will take effect Aug. 1 that has a loosely defined and seemingly low threshold for the government to initiate an official investigation: upon receipt of a complaint from an institution or a lone individual.

IBM has obliterated the competition in the supercomputing stakes with the top 10 of the top 500 supercomputers in the world, but Microsoft has surprisingly scraped in at number 23 with its Windows HPC Server system. While Microsoft is an unlucky 13 numbers away from the top 10, does the wow start now? Microsoft can’t claim any particular ‘wow’ with its results until it can wrest a top 10 position, let alone the No.1 position away from IBM, but 23 isn’t too bad when we’re talking about a list of 500. But the real news isn’t about Microsoft, it’s about...

And to think Microsoft used to be popular with the developer crowd... Not anymore. A recent report from Evans Data shows fewer than one in 10 software developers writing applications for Windows Vista this year. Eight percent. This is perhaps made even worse by the corresponding data that shows 49 percent of developers writing applications for Windows XP. Such appreciation for history is not likely to warm the cockles of Microsoft's heart, especially when Linux is getting lots of love from developers (13 percent writing apps for it this year and 15.5 percent in 2009). The Mac? I don't have...

Joining the online outsourcing trend, Microsoft puts it hand out to grab a piece or perhaps all of the outsourcing pie. Together, Microsoft Research Asia (Beijing, China) and Microsoft Office Labs have launched Task Market. Task Market is an online marketplace for jobs where freelancers make themselves available to assist in their area of expertise. And buyers looking for a little extra help on a project post their job descriptions and await bids. Chinese fans of Microsoft will instantly recognize the design and concept of the “technical preview” site featuring colors, style and sections for ‘Buyers’ (Business) and ‘Providers’ (Freelancers)...

The VX-5000 features a square shaped camera body on top of a bendable, rubber stand, which makes it easy to position on your laptop, LCD, or desk. Underneath the hood, the VX-5000 received a new image sensor and lens that results in stellar image quality, particularly in low light.>>more...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Shares of Yahoo dropped more than 8 percent on Thursday after the Wall Street Journal reported that negotiations between the Internet media company and Microsoft Corp ended without reaching a deal. Yahoo shares fell 8.2 percent to $24 on the Nasdaq.

One of the most successful business partnerships in history was coming unraveled. It was early 2000, and Bill Gates had relinquished the chief executive's job at Microsoft Corp. to Steve Ballmer -- for the first time taking a back seat to his college pal and right-hand man of 20 years. Mr. Ballmer got the title. But Mr. Gates retained the power, triggering a yearlong struggle between the two men that until now has remained largely under wraps. Things became so bitter that, on one occasion, Mr. Gates stormed out of a meeting in a huff after a shouting match...

Microsoft has given another lease of life to Windows XP only days before PC makers have to stop selling it. Windows XP reaches its end of life on 30 June but Microsoft has now said it can continue being sold until June 2010 but only on cheap desktops. The decision follows one made in April to extend the life of XP on low cost laptops until the same date. It comes as Dell, HP and Lenovo exploit loopholes in Microsoft's licensing terms to keep putting XP on machines. Growing market In an announcement at the Computex trade show in...

Excerpt - Microsoft is in a bind. Windows Vista has sold 140 million copies, but it's such a resource hog with unreliable hardware drivers that users keep asking Redmond to extend the support for Windows XP. Many corporations refuse to upgrade their server farms and cubicle-bound desktops at all. It's not often that 140 million copies of a software package that costs hundreds of dollars can be called a disappointment, but this one seems to fit that bill. Vowing to release a new operating system every three years, the company now has about 20 months until the supposed release date...

CARLSBAD, Calif. (AP) - Microsoft Corp. said its next operating system will be made for touch- screen applications, an alternative to the computer mouse, and its top executives reaffirmed interest in joining forces with Yahoo Inc. Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer on Tuesday unveiled the iPhone-like touch-screen feature at The Wall Street Journal's "D: All Things Digital" conference, calling it "just the smallest snippet" of the Windows 7 operating system slated for release in late 2009. A Microsoft employee showed possible applications like enlarging and shrinking photos and navigating a map of San Diego by stroking the screen. Microsoft...

The Fall of Microsoft Office By Anders Bylund (TMF Zahrim) May 27, 2008 On the same day that the state of New York published a report supporting open formats for electronic documents, mighty Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) said that it would support the open-source ODF format in Office 2007. Redmond's own Open Office XML specification may be heading for the great Recycle Bin in the sky, never to come back. What happened? The twin developments are noteworthy to astute investors for multiple rasons. While several European countries, the EU itself, and the state of Massachusetts have distanced themselves from proprietary document...

Excerpt - Switching gears. Walt asks about Vista and the lousy reception it’s been given. Is Vista a failure? Ballmer: Vista is not a failure. Is it something we’d like to improve? Of course. Is it something that with 20/20 hindsight we’d do differently? Sure, he confesses. But Vista has sold a lot of copies, he adds. Walt jumps in and asks about the percentage of Vista sales that result in downgrades to XP. Ballmer dodges. Gates looking a little depressed. Walt asks if Vista has damaged with Windows brand. Gates says Microsoft’s philosophy is to “do things better.” And...

It's been more than 16 months since Windows Vista was first sold to consumers. Since then, Vista has developed a reputation that's been, um, less than stellar. Whether Vista is a success or a failure depends on who's making the assessment. Microsoft says it's sold more than 140 million copies — most of them preinstalled on new PCs — and that it's starting to gain a foothold in the traditionally conservative business market. Many tech bloggers and pundits will tell you it's a disaster, with users suffering through nasty bugs and poorly thought-out features. Some even blame Vista for the...

Just a couple of questions to people who have installed xp service pack 3. Is it worth the installation? What benifits are they? I did a little research and found a ton of info and a lot of people complaining about problems, would you recommend a person with mediocore pc problem solving skills install this?

I suggest Vista users pay attention. From time to time I help neighbors with their computer problems, and sometimes they have MS Vista systems. I have, so far, avoided Vista myself mostly because I see no reason to abandon XP and because of the bad press Vista has received. I have, or have had, a generally favorable impression of Microsoft; and my first instinct has been to blame the bad press on user ineptitude and/or extreme corner cases. BUT ... I got a call several weeks ago from a woman who couldn't log on to her system. She got a...

GameStop to stop selling Zunes Microsoft is in for more bad news regarding its Zune personal music players, as GameStop on Thursday announced it decided to stop selling the flash-memory digital music player in its stores. The video-game retailer said lack of consumer demand and the device's ill fit with its existing offerings prompted the decision, which was made about a month ago. The retail chain is made up of hundreds of stores across the US, and will not order new stock, clearing out existing inventory exclusively on its web store.

At this stage, the best thing that you can say about Microsoft's attempt to transition its users to a new, next-generation operating system is that nobody was actually killed. Even so, it might be appropriate to have a bronze plaque installed where the first copy of Vista was sold, so that visiting dignitaries will have a place to lay ceremonial wreaths. It's simply not competing well against XP. Worse, it's opening the door a crack to Mac OS and Linux. Resistance to Vista is so heavy that major makers like Dell are exploiting legal loopholes that will allow them to...

Excerpt - Speaking at the Hungarian University of Economy today, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer got egg on his face and not in the figurative sense. Hungary's government spends millions on licenses to use Microsoft software at its universities and this market lockdown is apparently so upsetting to some Hungarians — how will they ever learn to use Linux? — that during today's speech, one attendee stood-up, yelled at Ballmer: "Give back the money of the taxpayers!" and then started chucking eggs. We disapprove, but only because we know Ballmer prefers bananas. A nice banana-cream pie-ing would have made a European...

Excerpt - Microsoft Corp. said that it is considering an agreement with Yahoo Inc. and opened up the possibility that it would consider buying part of the Internet company. In a statement, Microsoft said that it is "considering and has raised with Yahoo an alternative that would involve a transaction with Yahoo but not an acquisition of all of Yahoo." The Redmond, Wash.-based software maker didn't provide details on the transaction being discussed. ~ snip ~

Computer users now can fly through the universe, viewing stars, planets and celestial bodies as an astronomer would, with Tuesday's introduction of the Worldwide Telescope by Microsoft. The virtual service combines images and databases from every major telescope and astronomical organization in the world. Microsoft says it is providing the resource for free in memory of Jim Gray, the Microsoft researcher who disappeared last year while sailing his boat to the Farallon Islands on a trip to scatter his mother's ashes. The project is an extension of Gray's work. "I never imagined (the telescope) would be so beautiful," said Alexander...

Researchers said Windows XP Service Pack 3 delivers a measurable performance boost when compared to Windows XP with Service Pack 2.Windows XP runs some applications up to 10% faster with the latest service pack installed, a research firm has found. "We were pleasantly surprised to discover that Windows XP Service Pack 3 (v.3244) delivers a measurable performance boost to this aging desktop OS," wrote staff at exo.performance.network, in a blog post. The researchers found that a PC loaded with Microsoft's XP SP3 completed the OfficeBench test suite in less than 50 seconds. A similarly configured system running Windows XP with...

Excerpt - If you like to download the latest episodes of “Heroes” or other NBC shows from BitTorrent, maybe you shouldn’t buy a Microsoft Zune to watch them on. A future update of the software for Microsoft’s portable media player may well include a feature that will block unauthorized copies of copyrighted videos from being played on it. ~ snip ~

SAN FRANCISCO -- Did Microsoft(MSFT - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr) start dating before or after it jilted Yahoo!(YHOO - Cramer's Take - Stockpickr) on Saturday? The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that the Redmond, Wash. software giant has contacted Facebook to gauge the social-networking site's willingness to be acquired. But discussions are not active, according to the report, begging the question of when the overture was made. Microsoft has already invested $240 million in the site, founded by Mark Zuckerberg, for a 1.6% stake, giving Facebook an estimated $15 billion valuation. In spite of that tie-up, the Wall Street Journal's...

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said there will be a vast shift in Internet technology over the next decade as he met Tuesday with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak. "We're approaching the second decade of (the) digital age," the software mogul and philanthropist told Lee at the start of their meeting at the presidential Blue House, according to a media pool report. "The Internet has been operating now for 10 years," Gates said. "The second 10 years will be very different." Microsoft Corp., the South Korean government and South Korean companies are investing $313 million in...

BREAKING NEWS: A Microsoft spokesman says the software giant is walking away from its offer to buy out online portal Yahoo, according to the Associated Press.

I thought this might be of interest to the FR community, since it involves rights (actually as I found out, a complete lack thereof) with regard to software we paid for and many of us thought we owned. This is a bit long – I apologize for that, but I felt it might be important to include the emails I received from ebay and from Microsoft with regard to my alleged or apparent copyright rights violations. I have italicized the referenced emails so you can scan through those if you like and read the non-italicized text, which is my story....

Last Summer, Microsoft Corporation quietly introduced a powerful tool for getting past security on laptops and PCs running the Windows operations system (which about 90 percent do). The device is a USB thumb drive called COFEE (Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor). When you capture an enemy computer, you plug in COFEE and then use over a hundred software to quickly get whatever information is on the machine. COFEE can quickly reveal passwords, decrypt files, reveal recent Internet activity and much more. A lot of this can be done without COFEE, but with the Microsoft device, intelligence collection is a lot...

The growing use of encryption software -- like Microsoft's own BitLocker -- by cyber criminals has led Microsoft to develop a set of tools that law enforcement agents can use to get around the software, executives at the company said...Microsoft first released the toolset, called the Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor (COFEE)...Microsoft gives the software to agents for free.

There's another round of mass SQL injections going on which has infected hundreds of thousands of websites. Performing a Google search results in over 510,000 modified pages. As more and more websites are using database back-ends to make them faster and more dynamic, it also means that it's crucial to verify what information gets stored in or requested from those databases — especially if you allow users to upload content themselves which happens all the time in discussion forums, blogs, feedback forms, et cetera. Unless that data is sanitized before it gets saved you can't control what the website will...

Comments by Steve Ballmer at a press conference in Europe today have led to speculation that Microsoft is reconsidering its June 30 deadline to stop selling most new Windows XP licenses. A spokeswoman from Microsoft's public relations firm said Thursday that there is no plan for a change in deadline, however. "Our plan for Windows XP availability is unchanged. We're confident that's the right thing to do based on the feedback we've heard from our customers and partners," the spokeswoman said, reading from a Microsoft statement. Ballmer's comments at a press conference at Louvain-la-Neuve University in Belgium led to a...

Remember a few years back when Microsoft launched a new type of DRM under the name "PlaysForSure"? The idea was to create a standard DRM that a bunch of different online music download stores could use, and which makers of digital music devices could build for. Except... like any DRM, it had its problems. And, like any DRM, its real purpose was to take away features, not add them, making all of the content hindered by it less valuable. Yet, because Microsoft was behind it, many people assumed that at least Microsoft would keep supporting it. Well, you've now learned...

Summary: Microsoft are disabling WebDAV access to all hotmail.com accounts. This means Hotmail Pop Links and Outlook Express access to hotmail.com accounts will stop working at the end of June 2008. {snip} ...Microsoft have changed to using a new protocol. Rather than offering an open and standard protocol such as POP or IMAP, they’re using a new one they call DeltaSync for their live.com and new hotmail.com accounts. This protocol is not an open or standardised protocol. It’s a Microsoft proprietary one and only works with their Windows Live Mail, Vista Mail and Outlook Office Outlook Connector.

Novell Inc. and Microsoft Corp., trying to expand the reach of their unusual alliance, say they plan to put a bigger emphasis on the Chinese market. The companies say they will make an extra investment to sell more support subscriptions for Novell's SUSE Linux Enterprise Server operating system in China. The idea is to court companies currently using Linux without any software support, often for free. China is "quite a large and growing market in terms of Linux," said Susan Heystee, Novell's vice president and general manager of global strategic alliances. There is "a very large nonpaid Linux market" in...

Microsoft Corp.'s operating systems run most personal computers around the globe and are a cash cow for the world's largest software maker. But you'd never confuse a Windows user with the passionate fans of Mac OS X or even the free Linux operating system. Unless it's someone running Windows XP, a version Microsoft wants to retire. Fans of the six-year-old operating system set to be pulled off store shelves in June have papered the Internet with blog posts, cartoons and petitions recently. They trumpet its superiority to Windows Vista, Microsoft's latest PC operating system, whose consumer launch last January was...

I'm running IE on VISTA with Adobe Flash Player. The only consistent problem I have is videos. They freeze up. Right now I'm trying to watch my nephew playing Amen Corner at the Masters and it's driving me CRAZY! Earlier, I uninstalled Flash Player and reinstalled. Didn't help a bit. Anyone have any suggestions?! Thx

TheStreet.com Video - Microsoft's Vista OS is just plain awful, says Michael Comeau. (Contains some profanity. Viewer discretion is advised.)

The researchers damn Windows in current form, urge radical changes Calling the situation "untenable" and describing Windows as "collapsing," a pair of Gartner analysts yesterday said Microsoft Corp. must make radical changes to its operating system or risk becoming a has-been. In a presentation at a Gartner-sponsored conference in Las Vegas, analysts Michael Silver and Neil MacDonald said Microsoft has not responded to the market, is overburdened by nearly two decades of legacy code and decisions, and faces serious competition on a whole host of fronts that will make Windows moot unless the software developer acts. "For Microsoft, its ecosystem...

Excerpt - Microsoft’s Windows juggernaut is collapsing as it tries to support 20 years of applications and becomes more complicated by the minute. Meanwhile, Windows has outgrown hardware and customers are pondering skipping Vista to wait for Windows 7. If Windows is going to remain relevant it will need radical changes. That sobering outlook comes courtesy of Gartner analysts Michael Silver and Neil MacDonald. Half of a full room of IT managers and executives raised their hands when asked whether Microsoft needed to radically change its approach to Windows. “Windows is too monolithic,” says Silver. ~ snip ~

SAN FRANCISCO: Yahoo reiterated Monday its rejection of a takeover offer from Microsoft, again calling the bid too low. The company was responding to a letter from Microsoft in which the software company threatened to lower the price of its buyout offer and take it directly to Yahoo shareholders. Although Microsoft's offer was initially valued at $31 a share, a drop in the price of Microsoft shares has reduced the offer to just more than $29 a share. Microsoft's chief executive, Steven Ballmer, raised the pressure on Yahoo's directors Saturday in a letter warning that Microsoft would begin a proxy...