Wayne Williams

Yahoo is a media and technology giant. It is claimed that around 700 million people still visit Yahoo websites every month, and yet I personally can’t remember the last time I went to a Yahoo site, and I don’t know anyone who uses Yahoo for search, email, or news -- or visits the fabled Yahoo home page.

To me Yahoo mostly exists in the past, largely forgotten and gathering dust. I have photos stored on Flickr, but I haven’t uploaded anything there for ages. The last time I tried Yahoo -- following a lackluster revamp of the site -- I stumbled across broken link after broken link and gave up.

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NetShelter, a digital advertising network that focuses on tech publications, has been purchased by Ziff Davis for an undisclosed sum.

The name and activities of the company may not be familiar to you, but it’s responsible for delivering nearly 16 billion ad impressions per year on 150 consumer and business tech sites, including BetaNews, SlashGear, TechSpot, CrackBerry, Android Central, MacRumors and Neowin.

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Speaking to the New York Times a couple of weeks ago, Tami Reller, Windows division CFO, admitted that the Windows 8 "learning curve is real" and said that Microsoft will be addressing the issue in Windows 8.1.

Perhaps in response to that public admission, Microsoft has released a video showing how to use the polarizing operating system. Called "Get To Know Windows 8" it’s aimed at anyone who might be thinking of upgrading, or who needs a little guidance.

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Microsoft is working on an update to Windows 8 and RT and will be releasing a preview version of it in June (in time for the Build developer conference), with the full release expected before the year’s end. The software giant has confirmed three things for definite about the update: its name (Windows 8.1), its price (free), and where you’ll be able to get it from (the Windows Store).

But thanks to early build leaks and statements from Microsoft, we also know quite a bit about the many changes the new release will bring to the polarizing operating system. Here’s a rundown of what to expect.

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It’s been a while coming. Two weeks ago my colleague Alan Buckingham wrote that Apple was fast closing in on a remarkable milestone -- 50 billion unique downloads (excluding re-downloads and updates) from the App Store -- and said the "big event seems destined to take place within the next 24 hours".

It actually took around 14 days from that point for the 50 billionth download to happen (or be announced at least), and for the winner of the $10,000 App Store gift card Apple put up as a prize to be revealed.

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Google has just announced a new on-demand subscription music service called Google Play Music All Access. The service, which is available on Android and the web, gives users access to a massive library of millions of tracks. Google’s Chris Yerga calls it "radio without rules".

It allows you to explore songs from all of the major record labels, listen to it like a radio station, provides Google-powered recommendations, charts and playlists, and blends your personal library with Google's. Everything from your Google Music locker is pulled into the new service.

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Google is holding its Google I/O day 1 keynote at 9am PT and you can watch it right here on BetaNews.

We will of course be bringing you stories covering all the big announcements as they happen.
Rumors of what to expect include a revamped Google Maps, Android 4.3, a new music service set to rival Spotify, and even a Google branded Galaxy S4. Let’s see which of those comes true.

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If you live in the UK and are thinking of purchasing Microsoft’s Surface RT tablet, now is the time. Pick up one through the Microsoft Store or a participating retailer (which in terms of brick and mortar sellers means John Lewis) and you’ll get a Touch or Type Cover thrown in for free.

It’s a very good deal, as you’d be looking to pay around £100 if you were to buy a cover separately. You can pick up the 32GB tablet-only version of Surface for £399 at the moment.

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On Monday I said Windows 8’s ‘failure’ is still a win for Microsoft and talked about the upcoming update -- codenamed Windows Blue -- speculating that it would be priced cheaply like a Mac OS-style upgrade, rather than be given away for free.

Turns out I was wrong. Today Tami Reller, Windows division CFO announced at the JP Morgan Technology, Media & Telecom Conference in Boston that the update will be called Windows 8.1 and be entirely free for existing Windows 8 users, as a download through the Windows Store.

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After nearly two months of using Microsoft’s services almost exclusively, I made the painful decision to switch back to Google for most of my web needs. I say "most" because I’m still using, and enjoying, Outlook.com.

My decision to stick with Microsoft’s webmail service seems well founded, as the company is adding more features all the time. It introduced Skype support two weeks ago, and from today is rolling out the ability to directly message your Gmail-using contacts. Or "friends stuck on Gmail" as Microsoft amusingly phrases it.

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Raspberry Pi, the popular credit card-sized ARM GNU/Linux computer, now has a camera add-on. A year in the making, the camera board consists of a small lens on a chip around the size of a postage stamp, attached to a flex cable.

Connecting the module is just a matter of opening the camera port on the Raspberry Pi (it’s situated between the Ethernet and HDMI ports) and inserting the flex. The process is a little fiddly, but easy enough.

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I was in Dubrovnik, Croatia (or King’s Landing for Game of Thrones fans) when Tami Reller, Windows division CFO announced that Windows 8 had sold 100 million licenses. Since I’ve been back in the UK I’ve had a chance to catch up on what the internet thinks, and it’s fair to say Windows 8’s accomplishments continue to divide opinion.

Some pundits claim the big number proves the doubters wrong, and shows Windows 8 is a roaring success. Others, like my colleague Joe Wilcox, argue 100 million is nothing. I have my own view, and it’s somewhere in-between.

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Four weeks ago, Microsoft flicked the switch and officially merged Windows Live Messenger with Skype. Users of the popular IM tool were greeted with a message stating "A newer version is available. You must install the newer version in order to continue.  Would you like to do this now?"

Although Skype is a great tool, many fans of Messenger were up in arms about the forced change, and I know people who still pine for the old chat application. Fortunately, there’s a very simple way to get it back.

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I’ve been using Bing as my primary search engine for nearly two months now, and I like it. While I personally think it still lags behind Google in some areas, it’s definitely improving. It delivers decent results, offers some great features and does an excellent job of integrating social sources like Facebook and Twitter.

I chatted with Bill Hankes, a director at Bing, to find out more about the service and the division's future plans, and also asked him about that divisive Scroogled campaign...

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Fifth in a series. Nearly two months ago I gave up Google and switched to Microsoft. Although I tried not to have any preconceptions, I’ll be honest and say I thought (based on past experience), I’d be swapping a set of mostly superb products and services for a collection of inferior alternatives and hate every moment I was away from Google.

That turned out not to be the case. Now my experiment is over, I find myself impressed with some elements of Microsoft’s offerings, but frustrated with others. So here’s a summary of my overall experience.

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