Microsoft on CNBC TV shows
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Angry online shoppers
A recent survey of more than 2,400 web users has found that Britain is becoming a nation of angry online shoppers.
The report, commissioned by MoreComputers.com, found that 93 per cent of UK users are annoyed by 'sneaky' website charges.
Hidden delivery charges provoke the most anger, with 64 per cent saying they would not buy from sites engaging in the practice.
The growing practice of so-called 'philfing' describes online stores holding back the real cost of 'extras' until the last minute.
Brian Trevaskiss, operations manager at MoreComputers.com, said: ''Shopping online is without doubt quick and convenient. But this growing trend of 'philfing' is so annoying for consumers that they abandon their baskets and shop elsewhere.''
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Microsoft and Open Source
Microsoft's approach toward licensing as it applies to open source software is not an attack, but a response to the demands of customers, a senior company executive said Wednesday.
Bob Muglia, senior vice president of Microsoft's server and tools business, told attendees at the Interop business technology conference that controversy revolving around the company's claim that Linux and other open source software infringe on more than 200 Microsoft patents compelled him to "clarify our position on this, and where we're going."
Muglia said Microsoft was focused on interoperability with open source software, not on challenging the use of its intellectual property in court. "Our approach is a licensing based one," Muglia said. "It's a real issue for customers, and one that Microsoft is addressing proactively."
Microsoft has addressed the issue by offering licensing deals to open-source distributors. Novell, for example, entered a two-way deal last year that protects its customers from potential patent claims by Microsoft, while giving the software maker's customers the same protection in regards to Novell's intellectual property. The deal has been severely criticized by the open source community.
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Software piracy
A software pirate who sold illegal copies of Symantec Corp. software on the online auction site eBay Inc. has agreed to pay a $205,000 fine.
In an announcement today, the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) trade group, which filed suit in the case on behalf of Symantec -- a SIIA member -- said the defendant has also agreed to assist authorities in identifying the parties who actually made and distributed the illegal software that was sold.
Keith Kupferschmid, senior vice president of intellectual property for the Washington-based SIIA, said the name and location of the defendant is being kept secret under the terms of the settlement.
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A Linux computer everywhere
A U.S. government- and industry-led coalition aiming to equip every car and roadside in America with wirelessly connected computers has tapped Linux for a prototype design. The Vehicle Infrastructure Integration Consortium (VII-C) hopes to lower driver death rates, reduce traffic jams, and media-enable cars before 2017.
The VII-C is funded by the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), along with AASHTO, ten State Departments of Transportation, and seven vehicle manufacturers already involved in the U.S. DOT's Intelligent Vehicle Initiative: BMW, DaimlerChrysler, Ford, GM, Honda, Nissan, and Toyota.
The VII-C says that 21,000 of the 43,000 traffic fatalities in 2003 were caused by vehicles leaving the road or entering intersections when they should not have. It hopes a massive network connecting cars to each other and to roadsides can help.
Like a lot of large-scale government projects, VII is a long-term effort that, if all goes well, will roll out between 2015 and 2017. Closer at hand is the deployment decision, which looms in late 2008 or early 2009.
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Protect Office 2003 from malware attacks
Microsoft officials have released a much-anticipated tool to help protect Office 2003 from malware attacks.
"One of the things we noticed is that when we converted an exploit document to the new Office 2007 'Metro' format, it would either fail the conversion, emit a non-exploitable file or the converter itself would crash," Microsoft Senior Software Development Engineer David LeBlanc wrote in a blog post earlier this month. "Thus," he continued later, "if we could pre-process documents coming from untrusted sources from the older format to the new format, and then get an older version of Office to use its converter to read in the new file format, the customer is going to end up safer."
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Google launches 'Hot Trends'
"Hot Trends is Google's newest tool for users who want to keep their finger on the pulse of what the world is searching for," Google said in the statement.
Because of this new feature, Google said it will discontinue producing the weekly Google Zeitgeist, a manually compiled list of popular searches.
However, Google said it will still produce a year-end Zeitgeist for users.
Google said results for each Hot Trends report will include information from the associated Google News, blog searches and Google Web search results, putting the information in context for users.
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Attend LIVE Webcasts on Graphics & Multimedia!
 | Attend the Webcasts on Windows Embedded CE 6.0 Graphics Pipeline and Multimedia Architecture. First, learn the basics of GDI, DirectDraw and Direct3D interfaces, and how you can use them in your device applications, fully exploiting the power of the CE 6 graphics architecture. Then, take a tour of the enhanced multimedia features supported by CE 6 and the underlying architecture that makes it all possible. The Webcast covers DirectShow and its extensible filter graph mechanism for handling media streams, an overview of the relevant device drivers, as well as performance turning of multimedia devices using CE.
Webcasts: Windows Embedded CE 6.0: Graphics Pipeline & Multimedia Architecture |
