Microsoft tried to convince a federal judge Wednesday to toss out an antitrust penalty that would force the company to make a stripped-down version of its Windows operating system. Microsoft lawyer John Warden claimed that the nine states have not offered enough evidence to support their wish to let computer makers remove some features from Windows in order to swap in competitors' products. Warden said the states' case had "inadequate, wholly insufficient evidence of feasibility (and) no expert testimony on economic issues."
Warden said the states, who once had the Justice Department as a partner before the federal government reached a settlement last year, had previously argued that allowing computer makers to remove the icons needed to start Microsoft features would be a sufficient remedy. Warden accused the states of "bait and switch tactics."
Operating systems need to evolve from performing traditional file management and I/O tasks to learning and accommodating user behaviors, a Microsoft executive said Tuesday during a keynote presentation at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference here.
Under the user-centric computing scenario presented by Microsoft's Rick Rashid, senior vice president of Microsoft Research, the operating system will migrate toward human-oriented performance rather than forcing users to cope with rigid file structures. Natural-language interfaces are continuing to emerge and improvements in storage technology will enable operating systems to track user behaviors to accommodate future tasks.
AOL Time Warner Inc. was expected to announce a new round of executive reshuffling at its AOL Internet unit on Wednesday as it tries to revive growth at the online business, sources familiar with the situation said. The AOL unit, suffering from slower growth as it expands into high-speed services and anemic online advertising, has already announced some top-level changes. The shares were off 40 percent from the beginning of the year, underperforming its rivals, and down about 70 percent since AOL agreed to buy Time Warner in 2000.
Microsoft is finalizing plans for the next version of its Office business software, which will likely include new Web services, communication and collaboration features, said sources familiar with the company's plans. Moreover, many of the features once planned as part of Microsoft's .Net My Services consumer Web services strategy may now find their way into Office, sources said. Microsoft has not set a release date for the next version of the business software, which has been referred to internally as Office.Net or Next Generation Office. Microsoft shipped Office XP, the current version of the software package, one year ago this month. New versions typically follow the current release by 18 to 24 months.
Microsoft isn't standing still. For the next version of Office, the company is considering an optional subscription version tied to Web services based on Extensible Markup Language (XML). Those services, which could include some of the online calendaring and collaboration features envisioned for .Net My Services, would also be available separately for Office copies sold at retail or on new PCs, sources said.
Start-up Virtual Devices has developed a flashlight-size gadget that projects an image of a keyboard on any surface and lets people input data by typing on the image. The company's Virtual Keyboard is designed for anyone who's become frustrated with trying to peck information into a handheld but doesn't want to schlepp a notebook computer around. It uses cameras to track the location of a person's fingers in relation to a map of a full-sized keyboard. Handheld manufacturers "have saturated the market for people who just want address books," said Virtual Devices chief technical officer Steve Montellese. He thinks the Virtual Keyboard could help lift sales in the slowing PDA (personal digital assistant) market. Handheld makers, he said, will have to make it easier to enter data into a PDA before people will leave their notebook PCs behind and carry only a handheld.
Microsoft fired the second shot in the video game industry's growing price war, dropping its Xbox system from $299 to $199 in the United States, effective Wednesday. The cut follows by one day rival Sony's decision to make an identical cut in the North American price of its PlayStation 2. The move leaves all the major game consoles--PS2, Xbox and Nintendo's GameCube--at $199. Nintendo said Tuesday it has no plans to lower the GameCube's price. Microsoft said it would also make a similar cut in the Xbox price for Japan, where the console has met with a tepid reception. The machine will sell for about $193 (24,800 yen), down from the current $270.
Nine states suing Microsoft for antitrust violations want the federal judge overseeing the case to consider an internal Microsoft e-mail that advocated retaliation against "unfriendly" computer makers.
U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly had already decided that the e-mail wasn't relevant after Microsoft objected, but the states want her to reconsider.
In the August 2000 e-mail, Microsoft vice president Joachim Kempin complained that chipmaker Intel Corp. was contacting computer makers "who are not (Microsoft) friendly in the first place and ... encouraging them to go to Linux," a free operating system that competes with Microsoft's Windows.
Microsoft can now identify the person responsible for every single line of code in its Windows operating system. In the event of a bug or security breach, the company, as part of Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing security initiative, knows which staff member reviewed the code and can take appropriate action. For Brian Valentine, senior vice-president of Microsoft's Windows division, this is a major step forward as the company tries to improve the quality of its products. Valentine said that in the first stage of the initiative, every Windows employee - some 8,000 people in all - attended mandatory training.
Dell Computer has a new motto: "Dude, you're getting a T-shirt!" Or a baseball cap. Or a backpack. Or anything else with "Steven" and the "Dude, you're getting a Dell!" tag line. Dell, more known for gaining a larger share of PC market last year, has now set its sights on apparel, unveiling on Tuesday a line of "Dude Gear" accessories including T-shirts, caps, notebook backpacks and CD cases. Apparently, the successful TV commercials and the Steven Web site just weren't enough. The PC maker said its foray into Dude Gear is a natural extension of the commercials, which have made Dell more recognizable to consumers.
It's amazing how many different ways people can find to avoid saying, "We screwed up." I was reminded of this recently when I visited the Web site of a guy named Keith Teare. It was a good idea--but good ideas don't always make good businesses. In fact, the company doors will likely shut for good in a month or two. Why? Teare blames Microsoft. I disagree. Microsoft may have put the final nail in the coffin. But what really killed RealNames was a bad business model.
The fact of the matter is that, instead of making surfing more convenient, RealNames made it more confusing. Type "Pepsi" into the address bar in IE and you'll go to the Pepsi Web site, with a RealNames banner at the top of the window. Type in "Dr Pepper" or "AnchorDesk," and you'll go to the corresponding sites without the banner to tell you how you got there. Type in "Ford Motor," and you'll get a standard MSN search result. To be useful, RealNames had to be consistent and, to do that, it had to be nearly ubiquitous--nearly every logical keyword had to produce a useful result. But instead, I've run across RealNames-enabled sites so infrequently lately, I wasn't really sure the company was still in business.