Yesterday Microsoft made its latest wave of redundancies. The software giant is declining to specify how many were laid off exactly though it has revealed that half of the cuts were from inside the US with the other half coming from Microsoft offices and interests around the globe. The company also revealed that a further 1,200 staff will be lost within the US thanks to a Worker Adjustment and Retirement Notice (WARN). (more…)

A while ago we blogged about a Microsoft advert in which a red headed actress extolled the values of PCs over Macs (mainly price and value for money), this week it seems Apple have answered back. The new Apple campaign is called ‘Get a Mac’ and attacks the perceived issues with PCs that don’t occur with macs. The relationship between the Microsoft and Apple marketing departments has never been cordial exactly but the tone has become increasingly aggressive recently with the recession only adding to the desperate scrabble for customers. (more…)

Now there’s a name I bet you haven’t heard in a while! It may surprise you to know this but up until this year Encarta was still being manufactured and sold by Microsoft. Even in the age of Wikipedia it seems that the world’s premier software manufacturer thought there was a place for the CD Rom Encyclopaedia.
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Apple and Apple supporters are very annoyed about an advert unveiled in the US last week which shows an affable woman named Lauren shopping for a laptop computer. She looks at Apple products but fails to find anything within her budget of $1000 dollars that meets her requirements – ‘Speed, Comfortable keyboard, 17-inch screen.’ Proclaiming, ‘I would have to double my budget, which isn’t feasible,’ Lauren instead decides to buy a $699 dollar HP laptop.
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Early testers of Windows 7 are finding that as well as myriad new and improved features, there will also be an option to opt out of some of Windows more tiresome elements. The biggest news is the option not to have Internet Explorer installed on the system however, the options to opt out are far from limited to just that. Windows 7 will boast a Windows Features menu which will give you a list of Windows programmes to either have available or not, as well as IE the list includes Windows stalwarts like Media Player, Windows Search and Games features like minesweeper.
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Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer was on the receiving end of a corporate tongue-lashing from attendees of Microsoft’s Public Sector CIO summit in Washington. Frank and forthright opinions were offered regarding Microsoft’s progress regarding turning Windows Mobile into the sort of product that can rival the other mobile operating systems on the market.
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Microsoft is internally testing their new online search system named kumo, say Microsoft spokespersons. It is hoped that kumo will finally provide Microsoft with a viable way in which to compete with Google, or more realistically, Yahoo in the coming months. People beyond the company are not yet able to test the system.

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Windows 7 will offer easily distracted workers three brand new versions of their time-wasting games to enjoy while avoiding work, it has been revealed today. Okay, I know it’s not exactly the most important newsflash you’ll ever read but don’t try to pretend like you’re not interested…
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According to various reports, software giant, Microsoft, is asking recently laid off employees to return a portion of their severance package. Apparently the company overpaid the latest tranche of workers to be shown the door at Microsoft.
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I seem to write every day about how competitive the SmartPhone market is, and every time I type it, it gets no less true. Microsoft’s attempt to not only break into the market but to become a major player is audacious in the extreme. However, if any company is positioned to make it work it’s them.
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In a striking testament to exactly how many innovations Microsoft has made in its 34 year history, the company has this month received its 10,000th patent from the US Patent and Trademark office. The patent concerns the company’s surface computing technology, partly masterminded by long-time employee, Curtis Wong, the same researcher behind the company’s 5,000th patent.

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n some ways it would be fitting for Windows to finally make some headway in the Mobile market, Microsoft was after all one of the early proponents of the SmartPhone. It has however, little of the cache enjoyed by Apple (who does) and, to a lesser extent, Blackberry, a fact freely admitted by Entertainment and Devices Division, president, Robby Bach, “We haven’t done a good job of positioning [our mobile products], period.”
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Considering the burgeoning commercial and critical successes of the mobile phone operating systems produced by Apple, RIM, Google and Palm, it’s not going too far right now to say that Microsoft, and its Windows Mobile OS is on its way to being very much the poor cousin of mobile telephony software. That however, may be set to change. At least, that’s what Microsoft would have you believe.
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Did you think that the glowing reports on Windows 7 were a little too good to be true? If so, it appears you were right, or at least half right. All the gadgets and innovations we’ve raved about for the last few months are still going to be there but it appears that Microsoft plan to release the OS in a baffling array of different versions, seven to be precise. This over complication has left many in the industry scratching their heads fretfully.
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