For awhile there it seemed as if Microsoft had forgotten who butters its bread. It's businesses of course! The enthusiasm around the Windows 7 beta largely involved consumery UI features such as the nifty taskbar, Aero Peek navigation feature and clickable mouse-over thumbnails.
It looks like the Windows 7 team has been pretty busy over the past month and a half.
The reaction to Microsoft's plan to open retail stores from bloggers and pundits has been mostly negative. It's likely to fail, they say. Why? Because Microsoft doesn't offer an "experience" or a "lifestyle" or that special, personality-defining, everything's gonna be OK allure that Apple stores offer.
You knew it would happen eventually. The faltering economy finally caught up to Apple, as Mac retail sales dropped 6 percent in January compared to January 2008, according to research firm The NPD Group.
The lion's share of attention about the Windows 7 beta has been on consumer features. The new taskbar with its jumplists, mouse-hover features, easy navigation and the more controllable user account control are the immediate attention-grabbers. But the under-the-hood, less "sexy" enterprise features of Windows 7 are not as well known.
Coming soon to a mall near you: The Microsoft Store.
IT managers are facing a perfect storm of Windows upgrade options.
With the just-released Windows 7 beta, Microsoft is touting the OS's ease of use and ability to run on all types of computers. But it's an open question whether Microsoft can convince its most skeptical critics: Windows XP holdouts.
Microsoft generated plenty of negative headlines in 2008. We watched as it struck out in its attempts to acquire Yahoo. And Microsoft-haters grew smug when the confusing Seinfeld-Gates commercials were quickly pulled and replaced with the "I'm a PC" campaign. Microsoft's attempts to out-market Apple and reverse the negative press of Windows Vista simply didn't work out.
Users' desire to stick with Windows XP combined with Microsoft's strategy of charging XP downgrade fees are keeping the software giant from moving forward, say industry analysts.
Forgive the writer's embellishment, but there's a NETBOOK REVOLUTION GOING ON! Somebody should tell Apple.
News that Windows 7 beta 1 will be available on or around Jan. 13 got me thinking about the new look and feel of the OS and Microsoft's deliberate effort to have a cooler-looking interface.
Microsoft and Yahoo are reportedly at it again. No matter how firmly Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer says there will be no acquisition of Yahoo, it seems these two lovebirds can't stop flirting.
We may never know why Microsoft waited so long to respond to Apple's snarky but effective "I'm a Mac, I'm a PC" television ads.
I suppose if Microsoft could turn back time, it would not have allowed Intel's 915 graphics chipset to qualify for its "Vista Capable" marketing campaign given all the trouble it caused them during the early days of Vista and is causing them now in a class-action lawsuit.