Microsoft

Oh, Microsoft

Written by

Will Oremus, writing for Slate, points out the huge (read that in sarcastic tone, with air quotes) differences between the design of Microsoft’s new Manhattan flagship store and the Apple Store:

Oh, Microsoft

Written by

An inauspicious beginning to Microsoft’s Windows 10 launch. Yikes!

Play pong via Bing

Written by

Go to Bing, search for the term Pong. Click to start.

American Genius: Steve Jobs vs Bill Gates

Written by

The National Geographic channel is running a mini-series, starting tonight, subtitled “The Competition to Control the Personal Computer, 1974-1999”.

iPhone on the sidelines? In NFL, that’s not allowed

Written by

NBCNews:

The NFL experience is getting pretty high-tech — for everyone, that is, except players on the sidelines.

Russell Wilson might pick up a tablet on the sidelines in Super Bowl XLIX, but he won’t be able to use it to check his email, play “Angry Birds” or take a selfie. It’s a Microsoft Surface Pro 2 handicapped to perform one function and one function only: display photographs.

The thing Apple and Microsoft do not get about Gmail

Written by

Every time I hear about a new email client that will support multiple services, I get excited. Is this finally the one that will free me from gmail’s native iOS app? And time after time, I am disappointed, all because of one missing feature.

Barnes and Noble terminates Microsoft Nook agreement

Written by

Wall Street Journal:

Barnes & Noble Inc. has terminated its commercial agreement for its Nook e-reader with Microsoft Corp. , a move it said provides a clearer path toward the impending split of its business.

Independence Day

Written by

Great piece on Microsoft’s new pilot program that combines surround audio and iBeacons to help people with sight loss navigate their world.

What the guy from the time machine told Steve Ballmer

Written by

Last week, we posted about an article from Vanity Fair entitled, The Empire Reboots. Terrific article on Microsoft, with focus on the current relationship of Bill Gates and Satya Nadella and the longtime reign of CEO Steve Ballmer.

Matt Rosoff, from CITEworld, read the Vanity Fair piece and posted a tweet-storm based on the idea that a time traveler from today went back to 2004 and met Steve Ballmer, filling him in on ten years of tech advances. Great read.

Satya Nadella stirs up hornets nest, then apologizes with company wide letter

Written by

[VIDEO] Satya Nadella was speaking at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing conference on Wednesday. He was asked to offer advice to women who are uncomfortable asking for a raise. His response opened up a viral firestorm of criticism. Take a minute to listen to what Nadella actually said, starting at about 1:33:56 in the video below, then read the rest of this post.

The empire reboots

Written by

This Vanity Fair interview with Bill Gates and Satya Nadella for their upcoming November issue does a good job capturing both men’s personalities and, even more importantly, offers a sense of the nature of the challenge facing Microsoft 2.0.

Windows 95 running on an Android watch

Written by

[VIDEO] The Verge:

What happens when you give an Android Wear smartwatch to a 16-year-old with a bit too much time on his hands? You get Windows 95 on your wrist. Now, we frankly have no idea why you’d load a desktop operating system from twenty years ago onto a Samsung Gear Live smartwatch with a 1.63-inch display, but, hey, why not? Thanks to emulator software available for Android, this technology mishmash is a reality.

I am mesmerized! Watch the video.

Microsoft announces $2.5 billion Minecraft purchase

Written by

From the Microsoft press release:

Available across multiple platforms, “Minecraft” is one of the most popular video games in history, with more than 100 million downloads, on PC alone, by players since its launch in 2009. “Minecraft” is one of the top PC games of all time, the most popular online game on Xbox, and the top paid app for iOS and Android in the US. The “Minecraft” community is among the most active and passionate in the industry, with more than 2 billion hours played on Xbox 360 alone in the past two years. Minecraft fans are loyal, with nearly 90 percent of paid customers on the PC having signed in within the past 12 months.

Microsoft pays millions for NFL to use Surface, announcers call them iPads

Written by

[VIDEO] > Microsoft may be understandably peeved about this after committing to spend $400 million on an exclusive advertising and equipment deal with the NFL, but then the networks that cover the games aren’t under the league’s control. Educating their commentators may be as important to Microsoft as enlightening the rest of the world to the Surface’s advantages.

I disagree. These announcers are well educated. Watch the video below. They know an iPad-like device when they see one.

Steve Ballmer steps down from the Microsoft board

Written by

From Ballmer’s letter to Satya Nadella:

Given my confidence and the multitude of new commitments I am taking on now, I think it would be impractical for me to continue to serve on the board, and it is best for me to move off. The fall will be hectic between teaching a new class and the start of the NBA season so my departure from the board is effective immediately.

Understandable, and handled professionally.

Hyperlapse

Written by

[VIDEO] You’ve no doubt seen time lapse videos, where the action in a video is speeded up by trimming a video to show only one frame in ten, say. Time lapse videos are jumpy.

Microsoft’s research labs have introduced a new form of time lapse video, called Hyperlapse. Words don’t do it justice.

Microsoft suing Samsung for breach of contract

Written by

From Microsoft’s blog post:

As you may have seen, on Friday Microsoft filed legal action against Samsung in U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York. Today’s legal action is simply to enforce our contract with Samsung.

We don’t take lightly filing a legal action, especially against a company with which we’ve enjoyed a long and productive partnership. Unfortunately, even partners sometimes disagree. After spending months trying to resolve our disagreement, Samsung has made clear in a series of letters and discussions that we have a fundamental disagreement as to the meaning of our contract.

Oh, Samsung. Keep behaving like this and no one’s going to want to play with you anymore.