At a distinctive and stable growth rate of Blog users at an average of more than 100% within a researched 190 day cycle, the Internet should be ready for a “Blog Boom” anytime soon. Microsoft announced more than 4.5 million weblog spaces were created in MSN Spaces since 11 January 2005. On average, users are updating about 170,000 blogs on MSN Spaces every day and uploading about 1.9 million photos a day.
France music radio station SkyRock’s Skyblog is no exception. They will have an estimated 3.5 to 4 million blogs by year end. On average, more than 8,000 blogs are created daily, averaging out about 39 posts and 53 comments per blog.
Way back in the 90′s Microsoft rose to power with the brilliance of their Windows Operating system. It made using a computer easy to use and visually appealing.
In the late 90′s three guys from Stanford launched a tiny search engine called Back Rub, which finally became Google.
how is this going to change?
Today, in 2005, Both Google and Microsoft dominate their perspective business space. Google owns search, and Microsoft owns the Operating system market.
Consider how far the net has progressed in the past 10 years. Back then, the net was used for email, and for the Military and Universities alike to store information that could be accessed easily by anyone with a connection to the web.
Those who follow gaming news already know that Steve Ballmer unleashed a maelstrom of a controversy Thursday when he reportedly let slip some comments suggesting that Microsoft was going to release a new Xbox 360 console in 2010.
“The new device will be equipped with technology that is ‘really, really close’ to an actuality. The console, which was described as having a ‘natural interface,’ will have a built-in camera with the ability to recognize movement and voice.”
Microsoft announced on Thursday that it will sell a European version of Windows 7 sans Internet Explorer. The decision to ship these specialized “E” versions of Windows 7 arises from a January decision by the European Commission that determined the inclusion of Internet Explorer in Windows violated European competition law. The new E versions will be available in 23 different languages and are projected to launch at the same time as regular versions of Windows 7. One side benefit of this “un-bundling” is that computer manufacturers will be able to install their browser of choice on Windows 7 systems. Mozilla, Opera, Google; get to courting… Hooray for fair business practice, umm, if that’s what this is.
It’s no mystery that when it comes to computers and the Internet, you need protection. Maybe not the kind of protection ‘ole Harry here is packing, but the stronger the better in this day and age. Most agree that there are several good free anti-virus solutions available on the market and while they may offer decent protection against the various malware floating around, there’s no substitution for subscription services such as those offered by Symantec and McAfee. Apparently, Microsoft hopes to change that stance. Codenamed Morro, Microsoft is preparing to bring a new free anti-virus solution to market that could spell trouble for competing products in the AV industry. The company’s earlier attempt at an anti-virus solution, OneCare, was anything but a success following its launch in 2006 and subsequent benching. Since then however, Microsoft has stepped up its game where marcom is concerned and to say the company is on a roll is an understatement. Morro, poised to compete with free anti-virus and entry-level paid solutions, is expected to be released soon as a public beta with a full launch slated to follow before the year is out.
As Opera continues to chip away at its competition and gain mobile market share, you can bet it’s not resting on any laurels. The software company has just released its 9.7 Beta version for Windows Mobile and promises to render pages faster and with better compression. The new version also includes Opera Widgets manager. Do note that this is still in beta and will have some issues:
We’re not sure if Microsoft plans to get as deep into the mobile website business as Google but as of yesterday, the company’s new Bing mobile site is alive and ready for action. Bing, for those who took a long weekend, is Microsoft’s new search engine; a reincarnation of Microsoft Live Search that is infinitely more usable. Since its launch yesterday in preview form, Bing has definitely received a fair amount of acclaim from around the blogosphere and preliminary user feedback is pretty positive as well. In the short time we’ve tested the site so far, Bing mobile is no different. The site is nice and spry, results pages are laid out well with web, image, news and local breakdowns one click away, and Bing will format linked pages for your phone if you so choose — just like Google. Truth be told, we like Microsoft’s mobile formatting much, much better than Google’s so far. If you’re looking for a great new mobile search option, definitely check out m.bing.com from your handset.
Mark your calendars, Windows fans. Ballmer’s crew has just made the launch date for Windows 7 official: October 22nd, 2009. Since Microsoft first released Windows 7 to the public in beta form (and even well before then), feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. In fact, many were caught by surprise. Windows 7 is a breath of fresh air to those who were blindsided by a disastrous Vista launch and who didn’t bother to stick around to sample later, infinitely more stable/usable builds. Despite the fact that it has maintained its market share very well, Microsoft has been in a constant battle to revitalize its image since then. Efforts were hit and miss until the company’s latest effort, the Laptop Hunter campaign, which has been very well received. Apple’s “I’m a Mac” campaign simply rehashes the same jabs over and over at this point and with a global recession in full swing, shoppers seem much more receptive to Microsoft’s message of affordability and value than Apple’s recycled quips. If Redmond can ride the wave until October, Windows 7 could certainly be a death blow to Apple’s already-dwindling market share. That is, if we don’t see a more affordable option from Apple before then.
Microsoft’s new search engine Bing is now live for users to test drive. Though labeled a “preview”, the search site is fully functional and all live.com search requests are being re-directed to Bing. Using Bing is not nearly as bad as saying its name. The interface is clean, search options are easily accessible and the search results appear on point. Video search gets a nice improvement as well — place your mouse cursor over a video search result and Bing will play back the video in thumbnail mode within the search results page. Just a word of caution about those videos. Don’t turn the safe search option off at work as you may get an unintended eyeful that is very much nsfw. In the end, Bing is pretty and seemingly works well but will this new contender have the power to take even a small bite out of Google’s domination? Only time and an $80 million ad campaign will tell.
Now, we’ll preface this by saying that it is absolutely, positively, 100% impossible to draw any real conclusions about a product like a search engine without a fair amount of hands-on time. After viewing this preview video, we can also absolutely, positively, 100% say that the name “Bing” sounds more ridiculous each and every time it is uttered. Seriously, it’s a really bad name — to quote one of our commenters:
