WinInsider

If you thought the battle between the people who do and don't support the Hewlett-Packard (HP) and Compaq merger couldn't get any uglier, think again. With the clock ticking down to the March 19 shareholder vote on the merger at both companies, the opponents are unloading every trick in the book, from full-page national newspaper ads to publicity campaigns aimed at smearing leaders of the competing factions. The latest charge from Walter Hewlett--an HP board member, leader of the group that opposes the merger, and son of HP cofounder William Hewlett--is that HP CEO Carly Fiorina and Compaq CEO Michael Capellas will earn compensation packages worth more than $110 million if the deal goes through.

Microsoft announced a slew of new PC games Wednesday, including sequels to the popular role-playing game "Asheron's Call" and strategy game "Age of Empires." The software giant revealed its PC game plans through next year as part of its International Games Festival, a media and promotional event in Las Vegas.

Upcoming titles include
"Rise of Nations", "Age of Mythology", "Asheron's Call 2", "Combat Flight Simulator 3", "Zoo Tycoon: Dinosaur Digs", "Links 2003".

Intel plans to come out with a new version of the Pentium 4 next year and to push a slate of initiatives to make computers and phones sleeker and smaller. The next version of the Pentium 4, code-named Prescott, will enhance desktop performance through hyper-threading, among other changes, Intel's Louis Burns, vice president of the Desktop Platforms Group, said at the four-day Intel Developer Forum here. Burns also demonstrated a 4GHz Pentium 4, which should come out sometime next year.

Prescott was among a number of announcements Wednesday. Santa Clara, Calif.-based Intel also discussed improved power-management technologies that will come with Pentium 4 notebooks, expected to debut March 4, as well as integrated processors for next-generation cell phones.

Microsoft Corp. and the government will make "clarifications" to their proposed antitrust settlement, the software giant said on Wednesday. Microsoft will outline changes to the settlement in a legal filing with U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly later in the day, company spokesman Jim Desler said. Desler would not elaborate on what the changes would be, but said they came in response to public comments submitted to the Justice Department on the settlement. Microsoft has said in the past that any modifications to the settlement deal would probably be minor.

The computer maker on Tuesday announced the release of its first 19-inch LCD (liquid crystal display), the 1900FP, which is selling for $1,299. Dell's strategy of selling flat-panel monitors is aimed at improving margins and lifting PC sales, according to Tim Rhodes, chief executive at research firm Provizio.

"It doesn't just make money for them, but it also helps to differentiate them from their competitors," Rhodes said. He added that he wouldn't be surprised to see rivals, such as IBM, Hewlett-Packard and Compaq Computer, come out with similar 19-inch flat-panel screens to attract PC sales and improve margins.

With most small and midsize businesses already firmly in its camp when they outfit or update their office networks, Microsoft should find that its foray into the field of customer relationship management will be happily embraced by smaller businesses for its cozy familiarity. With its new CRM suite, Microsoft offers smaller businesses what they want--sales-force automation, customer service and marketing tools--but without the worries of handling a complex set of CRM tasks that they don't yet need to take on or aren't able to manage.

Gartner believes that Microsoft's CRM software will appeal to smaller businesses because it will be affordable, easy to use and fully integrated with other Microsoft suites (such as Office and Exchange). It will be sold and supported by an experienced marketer (Microsoft's Great Plains unit) that boasts expertise in the CRM field and that already has a potent sales and distribution channel in place. Its basic functions are more than enough to meet the customer acquisition needs of most smaller businesses.

I found interesting article by David Coursey on ZDNet, finally some decent scene is coming from ZDNet - I guess the Oracle ad campaign is near the end. Make sure you vote at the bottom of the article on ZDNet page.

If you took away Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, and Windows Media Player, would what remained still be Microsoft Windows? What would happen if those programs were replaced by Netscape's browser, Eudora's e-mail client, and RealNetworks's RealPlayer?

Of course, there's a big downside--for all of us. If the PC companies go too far afield, they risk eroding the Windows standard that has done so much to universalize the personal computing experience. Out-of-the-box thinking may be a good thing, but only in small doses. The chaos that could result from an unbundled Windows might do customers a lot more harm than good. I've yet to see the feds make any real case that Microsoft left consumers any worse off. There is a misguided notion that somehow consumers would be much better off had Netscape not suffered at Microsoft's hand. Or that we'd be that much closer to computing nirvana had Microsoft failed to weave so many features into its operating systems.

The idea of bringing additional elements into the operating system as a way to provide more value isn't Microsoft's concept alone. Does anyone remember the days when you had to buy--and install--memory cards, serial cards, modem cards, terminal adapter cards, and Ethernet adapters? How about sound cards and multimedia kits?

All these products used to be big business. This PC aftermarket shriveled when the hardware OEMs started adding all these components into the base package. Why did PC makers embrace this route? Gee, because it was easier for customers and, yes, it allowed them to obtain incremental revenues that otherwise might have gone directly to component makers. Did PC prices go up because of this? Don't make me laugh.

There is no doubt that Microsoft played hardball with Netscape. The Internet's sudden surge caught Microsoft flat-footed. It reacted at its competitive best. I don't question that abuses took place. But are customers worse off? Of course they aren't.

Microsoft integrated Internet Explorer into the operating system because it was the best thing for customers--as well as for Microsoft. It bundles an e-mail client for the same reason. The same is true for Windows Media Player.

Customers like the Windows bundle, and I hope it doesn't go away. Having a browser brought into the operating system is no different than building modems into new PCs. Both are excellent ways to serve--not screw--consumers. Microsoft's bundling, which hasn't cost customers a cent, has brought tremendous value to computing and made the widespread adoption of Internet technology possible. And for this Microsoft deserves praise, not scorn.

Microsoft's security jihad continued this week as the company issued a set of patches that address "critical flaws" in Internet Explorer, Commerce Server 2000, and SQL Server. The IE patches, which were issued through Windows Update and Auto Update late last week, address a previously unannounced VBScript-related vulnerability that affects all newer IE versions, and an IE 6.0 bug that was first revealed late last year.

Microsoft will test its business acumen by the end of this year with new software for automating customer-service functions. On Tuesday Microsoft is expected to detail plans for Microsoft Customer Relationship Management, or CRM, a new software package due in the fourth quarter of 2002, according to executives. The software will represent Microsoft's entry into a new market, which could potentially antagonize relationships it has fostered with business software makers such as Onyx Software and Siebel Systems.

For Microsoft, the CRM software is significant in that it represents one of the first of several server-based products to be built by the company using its .Net software framework, an initiative the company has championed as a means of writing programs for Internet computing, or Web services.

Microsoft and the US Department of Justice (DOJ) agreed late Friday that they won't oppose the nine nonsettling states' and the District of Columbia's bid to introduce an extra complaint in Microsoft's antitrust case. The nonsettling states believe that Microsoft is abusing its proposed DOJ settlement by issuing new Windows licenses that could potentially let the company steal PC makers' intellectual property. Because the public-comment period has already ended for the Microsoft settlement, the states need the court's permission to introduce this new complaint.