UPDATE: The contest is now over! View the winners here. Want a copy of Windows Vista Ultimate or Office 2007, but don't want to fork over the cash? You're in luck: we're giving away one copy of each! All you need to do is come up with a witty caption for the following two pictures from the Vista Launch event in New York City.

Leave your caption ideas in a comment below, but only leave a single comment. We will select the best caption for each picture. The user with the best Bill Gates caption will win a retail copy of Windows Vista Ultimate, while the best Steve Ballmer caption will win Office 2007 Student and Teacher Edition. More giveaways will follow, so keep checking back in the coming weeks.

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Aiming to encourage its customers to keep their landlines, Verizon is offering package deals including up to four services from the company. For the first time, wireless service would join the bundle deals of television, Internet and landline phone service.

The nation's largest telecommunications company had already been offering packages that allowed consumers to save money by bundling DirecTV satellite service, Verizon DSL, and a landline number for substantial savings.

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The hope of computer vendors and OEMs everywhere is that Windows Vista's graphical capabilities, which include the performance of its DirectX 10 drivers, will drive PC sales to the point where market growth resumes the comfortable 12% growth pattern from which it's fallen in recent months. Part of Vista's appeal is that it's the first Windows edition in well over a decade to show off the capabilities of what the processing power of its host computer can actually do - not even XP, for all its value, quite managed that feat even at launch.

In hopes there's a trend to capitalize on, graphics card manufacturer BFG is adding onto its add-on: specifically, tacking a water cooler onto its top-of-the-line nVidia 8800 GTX-based graphics card, then leveraging the water cooler's presence as an excuse to crank up the volume even further. If a BFG 8800 GTX OC-equipped system ranks a "5" on the new Vista WSPR scale, then maybe it's the company's hope that your computer currently ranks about a "2."

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Monday night marked the public launch of Windows Vista, and both Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer were on hand in New York City to officiate the festivities. A number of stores held "midnight madness" events, but did consumers bite?

Not yet. Unlike the launches of Sony's PlayStation 3 and the Nintendo Wii, those interested in being the first to install Vista were few and far between. A handful of stores around the country reported late-night lines, but most customers said they showed up for the other discounts being offered alongside Vista. Low temperatures on the East coast likely didn't help either.

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Shortly before the operating systems' launch Monday night, Microsoft posted the first of what it expects to be many added extras for consumers that have purchased its top-of-the-line version of Windows Vista, dubbed "Ultimate." Among the first add-ons released are the game "Texas Hold'em Poker," and enhancements for both the BitLocker and EFS functionality.

"This is just the beginning," Windows Vista product manager Nick White posted to the official Vista blog Tuesday. Vista Ultimate is available as the full version for $399.95 USD or in upgrade form for $259.95 USD. However, OEM copies of the software are available for $199.99 USD from electronics retail sites like NewEgg.com.

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Sony BMG has settled with the Federal Trade Commission, agreeing to reimburse consumers up to $150 for damage to the computers caused by the label's use of rootkits to prevent piracy of its discs.

The company had settled a similar case with 39 states and the state of California late last year. Like those settlements, Sony BMG admits no wrongdoing, and must provide tools to help uninstall the rootkit software. In addition, it would be required to post notices of the settlement on its Web site for two years.

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Apple was ordered to pay the legal fees in a case involving two Apple enthusiast sites, seven months after a judgment in its favor was overturned, essentially giving bloggers the same protection as traditional journalists in the state of California.

The case involved Apple rumor sites AppleInsider and PowerPage.org. At issue was the disclosure on both sides of a confidential product code named "Asteroid." The device was never released, but the Cupertino company sued anyway.

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The sharp rise in demand for high-definition televisions and steady uptick in digital cameras more than offset what would otherwise have been bad news for Sony Corp. yesterday, precipitated by its computer gaming division: Over the holiday quarter, the company shipped 71.7% fewer PlayStation Portable units and 23.3% fewer PlayStation 2 consoles worldwide than during the 2005 holiday season, while at the same time it was ramping up PlayStation 3 shipments to North America, Japan, and Asia.

Sony's PS3 shipment goals may have been adjusted once or twice, but the company finally did manage to ship 1.84 million units before the end of the year.

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Apple has begun offering a $1.99 USD software patch that would enable use of 802.11n wireless networking on select Intel-based Mac models. However, the update has not come without controversy.

The Cupertino company claims that it had to offer the capabilities in this manner due to finance laws, commonly referred to as GAAP, which they say require a charge for significant feature enhancements. But many Wall Street analysts have said that is not the case.

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Hoping to continue the success of its entry-level iPod Shuffle player, Apple on Tuesday introduced four colored versions of its popular music device that would sell alongside the original silver version. The new colors will sell for the same price as the original, $79 USD, and include blue, pink, green and orange.

The new players are available immediately online and through stores, the company said. "iPod shuffle is the world's most wearable digital music player," said Greg Joswiak, Apple's vice president of Worldwide iPod Product Marketing. "Music fans can now choose iPod shuffle in one of five brilliant colors, or they can buy one of each."

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While news of Adobe's submission of its Portable Document Format standard to an agency that works with the International Standards Organization (ISO) is being interpreted today as a response to Microsoft's move to standardize its Office Open XML suite of document formats, Adobe's efforts with the AIIM group to entrench PDF extend back to 2002.

And today, the company's Director of Product Management confirmed to BetaNews that the actual PDF standardization process - requests, meetings, submissions, discussions, revisions, etc. - actually began in 1995.

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Many computer users prefer to install their operating system "clean" by simply using their old Windows disc to verify they own a copy of the software. However, that appears to no longer be possible using an Upgrade version of Windows Vista.

The Redmond company has apparently taken out the option to do so from upgrade versions of its new operating system, meaning a user would need to purchase a full copy of the OS in order to perform a clean installation. Upgrade discs would only work if a copy of either Windows 2000 or XP is already on the system.

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Traditionally, virtual items are banned from eBay; however, the company said Monday that it would exempt items from the popular Second Life virtual world. The change in policy comes from a reconsideration of what the company considers a "game." An eBay spokesperson says that there is a question as to whether or not Second Life is actually a game, so it will refrain from pulling listings for the time being.

Don't take this as a change in the online auction site's policies. Still banned are gaming items from virtual worlds like World of Warcraft and Everquest. eBay made no additional statements on whether it planned to change its policies regarding those popular massively multiplayer online games.

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Microsoft has given the go ahead for users to buy the low-cost OEM copies of Windows Vista now appearing on sites like Newegg.com; however, they would be expected to adhere to the licensing terms just like any other computer manufacturer.

This could mean that support for those computers with this version of Windows installed would be the responsibility of the end-users themselves. Microsoft also noted that like with standard copies of Vista, a user running the OEM version would still be forced to reactivate if he or she substantially alters the computer's hardware configuration.

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They're still being called the "ATI Catalyst" drivers - the reference drivers containing the latest programming and techniques for graphics cards bearing the ATI logo. But today, one day ahead of Microsoft's consumer edition Windows Vista rollout, the first Catalyst drivers for Vista are being released. They're officially numbered 7.1 (version 8.31 for XP is already in the field). But for the first time, they're being released by AMD, and this afternoon, AMD is accepting a great deal of the credit.

"One of the biggest reasons that AMD aligned with ATI for the future of computing where graphics and the orientation becomes a more meaningful part of everybody's experience," AMD Vice President for Global Marketing Pat Moorhead told BetaNews, "not limited to the enthusiast or the high end or the mainstream, where you typically find discrete cards."

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