The way people interact with computers is going to dramatically change in the next five years, Microsoft chief Bill Gates has told BBC News.

He predicted that the keyboard and mouse would gradually give way to more intuitive and natural technologies.

In particular, he said, touch, vision and speech interfaces would become increasingly important.

BBC NEWS | Technology | Gates hails age of digital senses

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Tags: Microsoft, Bill Gates, YeahOnAMac

Microsoft admits to having some trouble over the holidays with Xbox Live, the online service it offers for users of its Xbox 360 video game console. To make amends the company will offer Xbox Live users a free game from Xbox Live Arcade.

In a statement posted to the service, Xbox Live general manager Marc Whitten said that the problems with Xbox Live downtime were caused by an influx of new users who had gotten an Xbox 360 over the holidays. It’s been a record-setting season for Xbox Live.

PC World - Microsoft Offers Free Game for Xbox Live Holiday problems

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Tags: Microsoft, Xbox 360, Xbox Live

The honeymoon between Microsoft and the partners and customers who’ve been gleefully awaiting the arrival of Windows Home Server may be over, thanks to a serious data corruption glitch in the software.

Using certain applications to save digital files to Windows Home Server could cause files to become corrupted, according to Microsoft, which last week said the issue had affected “a few people” on its community forums, and posted a Knowledge Base article outlining the issue.

Microsoft didn’t offer a timetable for a fix, but recommended that users not use the following applications to save data to Windows Home Server: Windows Vista Photo Gallery, Windows Live Photo Gallery, Microsoft Office OneNote 2007, Microsoft Office OneNote 2003, Microsoft Office Outlook 2007, Microsoft Money 2007, and SyncToy 2.0 Beta.

File Corruption Bug Bites Windows Home Server - Software - IT Channel News by CRN and VARBusiness

I thought people knew better than to use the first version of a Microsoft Product?

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Tags: Microsoft, Windows, NoSurprise, Software, Bugs

“Given AOL’s current business focus and the success the Mozilla Foundation has had in developing critically acclaimed products, we feel it’s the right time to end development of Netscape-branded browsers, hand the reins fully to Mozilla, and encourage Netscape users to adopt Firefox,” Drapeau said.

As of November 2007, IE accounted for 77.35% of the market, and Firefox 16.01%, according to Internet metrics firm Net Applications. Netscape had 0.6%.

AOL Kills Netscape’s Future, Leaves Firefox To Battle IE — Browser Wars — InformationWeek

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Tags: Firefox, IE, BrowserWars, Netscape

New York Times looks at blogging for profit.

But while blogs may be useful to many more small businesses, even blogging experts do not recommend it for the majority.

But some companies are suited to blogging. The most obvious candidates, said Aliza Sherman Risdahl, author of “The Everything Blogging Book” (Adams Media 2006), are consultants. “They are experts in their fields and are in the business of telling people what to do.”

“As a consultant, blogging clearly helps you get hired,” she said. “If you are selling a product, you have to be much more creative because people don’t want to read a commercial.”

Blogging’s a Low-Cost, High Return Marketing Tool - New York Times

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Tags: blog, blogging, career, LookAtMe

OLPC off to a slow, but positive start.

At breakfast, they’re already powering up the combination library/videocam/audio recorder/music maker/drawing kits.

At night, they’re dozing off in front of them — if they’ve managed to keep older siblings from waylaying the coveted machines.

Peru made the single biggest order to date — more than 272,000 machines — in its quest to turn around a primary education system that the World Economic Forum recently ranked last among 131 countries surveyed. Uruguay was the No. 2 buyers of the laptops, inking a contract for 100,000.

FYI, the give one, get one promotion is still going on until December 31, 2007.

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Tags: OLPC, One Laptop Per Child, Education

The spreadfirefox website is reporting that the number of downloads of Firefox has surpassed 200 million.

Today the Firefox download counter crossed the 200 million mark.

We know that this number doesn’t represent actual users because this number includes both Firefox 1.0 and Firefox 1.5 (soon Firefox 2,) because not every one completes every download, and because not every download results in a new Firefox user.

That being said, 200 million people seeking Firefox is a huge accomplishment and we’re right to celebrate our role in driving that number.

Firefox reportedly holds a 15% market share, while Internet Explorer is down to 80%.

Yesterday’s Coding4Fun on MSDN was Introduction to Programming Lego Mindstorms, with .NET none the less.

Today Microsoft is showing off their new Robotics Studio at the RoboBusiness Conference and Exposition 2006.

PITTSBURGH— June 20, 2006 — Today at RoboBusiness Conference and Exposition 2006, Microsoft Corp. showcased the community technology preview (CTP) of a new Windows®-based environment for academic, hobbyist and commercial developers to easily create robotic applications for a wide variety of computing platforms. In addition, early adopter companies, universities and research institutes offered demos and provided support for the new Microsoft® Robotics Studio development platform. The community technology preview of the Microsoft Robotics Studio is available for download at http://msdn.microsoft.com/robotics.

Read the full announcement…

What’s really fascinating with this technology is they allow you to simulate a robot and to run code without having to invest in hardware.

The creator of Lotus Notes and former CEO of Iris Associates is about to replace Bill Gates as Microsoft’s Chief Software Architect. Before joining Microsoft, Ozzie created a new groupware package called Groove. Microsoft aquired Groove in March 2005.

On June 15, Gates announced that he would step down from day-to-day operations and Microsoft. He will still remain part-time Chairman and technical advisor.

External Links:
Ray Ozzie Weblog
Profile

Recently Google has launched two new services for your mobile phone. The first is Gmail Mobile which lets you check your Gmail from anywhere.

Now you can access your Gmail messages from the web browser on your mobile phone or device. Read and reply to your Gmail messages any time, anywhere.

* It’s free. (But your wireless plan might still charge, so you might want to check with your provider first.)
* It’s smart. It can handle attachments like photos and .pdf files.
*

It also has these cool features:
• Automatically optimizes the interface for the phone you’re using
• Opens the attachments you receive in messages, including photos, Microsoft Word documents and .pdf files
• Lets you reply by call to people whose phone numbers are in your Gmail Contacts list

Google has also launched a second service that let’s you take Google Local to your phone.

Combining directions, maps, and satellite imagery, Google Local for mobile is a free download that lets you find local hangouts and businesses across town or across the country — right from your phone.

Detailed directions: Whether you plan to walk or drive, your route is displayed on the map itself, together with step-by-step directions.

Integrated search results: Local business locations and contact information appear all in one place, integrated on your map.

Easily movable maps: Interactive, draggable maps let you zoom in or out, and move in all directions so you can orient yourself visually.

Satellite imagery: Get a bird’s eye view of your desired location.