Cat-and-mouse game begins: Microsoft blacklists leaked Windows 7 key
The Lenovo OEM key that leaked earlier this week and allowed Windows 7 Ultimate to be cracked is being blacklisted, according to a blog post last night from Alex Kochis, Director of Genuine Windows at Microsoft.
Kochis says, "Yesterday we were alerted to reports of a leak of a special product key issued to an OEM partner of ours. The key is for use with Windows 7 Ultimate RTM product that is meant to be pre-installed by the OEM on new PCs to be shipped later this year. As such, the use of this key requires having a PC from the manufacturer it was issued to. We've worked with that manufacturer so that customers who purchase genuine copies of Windows 7 from this manufacturer will experience no issues validating their copy of Windows 7. At the same time we will seek to alert customers who are using the leaked key that they are running a non-genuine copy of Windows. It's important to note that no PCs will be sold that will use this key."
Windows 7 Family Pack priced at $150
Microsoft has placed a $149.99 price tag on the Windows 7 Family Pack, which lets as many as three PCs in a single household upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium edition. Users in Canada will pay $199.99.
Microsoft's official blogger Brandon LeBlanc confirmed the three-license pack last week, but did not include the price.
Firefox hits 1 billion downloads!
Firefox total downloads: millions
Firefox has hit its milestone billionth download of all time. To celebrate the occasion, Mozilla will be launching onebillionplusyou.com on Monday, a hub for information about the achievement, and a place for Firefox users to show their love for the browser by uploading pictures of themselves representing Firefox across the globe (though they'll have a tough time beating this guy.)
British hacker will be extradited to US for trial
A British hacker who broke into 97 military and NASA computer systems -- looking, he claims, for evidence about UFOs -- will be tried in America, where if convicted he may face a sentence of up to 70 years. Gary McKinnon has been appealing in the British judicial system to avoid extradition to these shores.
Mr. McKinnon doesn't deny that he hacked into the computers in 2001-02, but has stated that he wasn't attempting to compromise US security but to find secret information on unidentified flying objects -- a particular obsession for the 43-year-old man, who has been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome. He asked instead for trial in the UK, stating that trial and incarceration in the US could be highly debilitating due to his condition.
Amazon's Orwell deletion garners a lawsuit
A Michigan teen has filed suit in Seattle against Amazon, maker of the Kindle eReader, for deleting a copy of 1984 on which he was keeping notes for his AP English coursework. Justin Gawronski is suing in order to impress on Amazon the importance of not simply deleting purchased texts -- whatever their copyright or licensing status.
The suit, which seeks class-action status for those affected by the deletion several weeks ago, also names Antoine J. Bruguier, a Kindle owner from Milpitas, California. KamberEdelson is the Chicago-based legal team handling the suit.
Joel Tenenbaum admits downloading music, found guilty of copyright infringement
Thursday was a far more lively day in the Joel Tenenbaum copyright infringement case, as the defendant admitted that he had downloaded -- and that he had not been forthright in his written discovery responses about having done so. Mr. Tenenbaum also took responsibility for uploading and downloading from multiple peer-to-peer services, confirmed that he'd listened to all 30 now-no-longer-contested songs (nuking his own legal team's earlier assertion that some of the 30 might have been spoofed files), and suggested that his mom -- a lawyer -- might have given him some shaky advice on how to answer RIAA fact-finding efforts.
It was, in other words, defeat-- defeat to such a degree that the Joel Fights Back group blog run by the defense team is currently headed by a post titled "Joel FOUGHT back." In that post, Debbie Rosenbaum, one of the students who stuck with the case to its bitter end, writes that "Although we could not win this case, we are proud to have highlighted the abuses and the inefficiency with which the music industry burdens the court system."
Yahoo deserved to die
It's not nice to speak ill of the dead, even if they're very much alive and only dead in the business sense of the word. But it's super easy these days to look at Yahoo's co-founder and ex-CEO Jerry Yang and laugh out loud at how he squandered tens of billions of dollars --and his company's very future as an Internet powerhouse-- because he thought he knew better.
The short strokes of this week's Microsoft-Yahoo Internet search partnership must make Mr. Yang sick to his stomach: What Microsoft was willing to spend upwards of $45 billion for barely 18 months ago it has now won for…nothing. Sure, Microsoft didn't swallow the company whole. It's just a partnership, after all. But that matters little in a search market where the two players were doomed to an eternity of irrelevance if they didn't get together at some point. Living together, marriage, whatever we call it, Microsoft figured out a cheap way to gain access to a much larger search audience, and Yahoo had no choice but to sign the papers and move in.
Is Apple attending CES or not? (Well, not.)
January's Consumer Electronics Show books up fast, as would-be congregants know well. But it seems that one potential attendee is still not committed as we roll into August -- interesting, since the world already knows what the fellow won't be attending in early 2010.
The erstwhile guest is Steve Jobs, of course, and with Apple already declining to take part in MacWorld next January, speculation has been rampant that Apple and its rock-star CEO would make the jaunt to Vegas. That speculation seemed to be strengthened by a post by Ben Charny for the Wall Street Journal, which claimed that Mr. Jobs would be not just attending but speaking.
Secret slide reveals Microsoft will lose $300 million on Yahoo deal before making $1
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer gave a little more information to financial analysts than perhaps he planned. There are two versions of his slide presentation -- one with a slide he didn't present this morning. I downloaded the PowerPoint file, and then noticed it had disappeared from Microsoft's investor website. That was so Microsoft could remove the errant, and quite revealing, slide.
The slide is surprising counter-commentary to Ballmer's opening presentation. He spent much of the early portion of his talk explaining why Microsoft cut the search deal with Yahoo, and why the costs were minimal to both companies. He told financial analysts:
The state of Microsoft's Business and Server & Tools divisions
Stephen Elop and Bob Muglia delivered two of the more difficult presentations during Microsoft's annual Financial Analyst Meeting. Elop runs the Business division, which had been a consistent performer until fiscal fourth quarter, when revenue fell 13 percent year over year. Server and Tools did better, but still took a revenue hit in fourth quarter.
The two divisions share several important attributes, and the businesses are highly entwined. With the 2003 release cycle, Microsoft started aggressively increasing integration along the vertical applications stack between Office and server software. The integration creates sales pull for Office and newer server software, like SharePoint Server. I leave out Exchange Server, since Microsoft long ago established applications stack integration with Outlook.
Time Warner to sell WiMAX in Charlotte, Dallas
Time Warner will become the next Clearwire WiMAX reseller, CEO Glenn Britt said in the company's second quarter earnings call on Wednesday, making the cable company the third major reseller of Clear 4G wireless.
Time Warner invested in Sprint and Clearwire's consolidation into the Clear 4G wireless network along with Intel, Google and fellow cable companies Bright House Networks and Comcast.
Craig Mundie: The future of the PC is 'a room'
Craig Mundie, Microsoft's chief research & strategy officer, is charged with anticipating the future and the computing technologies people will need in the future. Early this afternoon, during Microsoft's annual Financial Analyst Meeting, Mundie spoke about the importance of natural user interfaces. He described one user interface I would never have imagined -- or perhaps you won't.
The successor to the PC is "a room," Mundie told FAM attendees. Apparently, Microsoft's big-ass Surface computer is even too small for Microsoft's vision leader. He demoed the room, too. Mundie described his desktop as a Surface computer, but the real user interface was the wall.
Microsoft confirms 'Windows Phone' branding, but OS will still be Windows Mobile
Last night, the UK's Inquirer announced that Windows Mobile will be changing its name to "Windows Phone". Microsoft confirmed the Windows Phone branding to Betanews today, but said that "Windows Mobile" is not going anywhere.
"Microsoft started using the term, Windows Phone, within the industry at Mobile World Congress on February 16, 2009," a spokesman noted today. "It is a simple way for consumers to identify the new generation of Windows phones that will be available this fall through our mobile partners; and will include new services on them such as My Phone and Windows Marketplace for Mobile."
Ballmer: Apple market share gains are a 'rounding error'
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was in surprisingly good form this morning, as he kicked off the company's annual Financial Analysts Meeting. His presentation was one of the best in years. The economy may be cool, but Ballmer is hot.
Perhaps his most piercing comments were about Apple, a competitor that has nipped away Windows PC market share and proved to be a formidable opponent in mobile devices markets.
Invite-only Windows 7 beta testers get their free copies after all
Microsoft's support for a public "eager to begin using Windows 7" has now extended to Technical beta testers, who will be getting a free full version of the operating system.
Earlier this month, word got out that Windows 7 tech beta testers would actually not be receiving a free copy of Windows 7 as testers of Vista did, which elicited the expected amount of criticism.
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