Software utilities

Ole Billy Boy Gates has said that Windows 7 won’t be as bad as Windows Vista. (You’ve got to give it to the lil guy. At least he’s admitting it was crap).

I didn’t know Windows made computerized crystal balls too, though. If so, I want one….just so I can smash it on the floor Greek-wedding style. How does Billy Boy know MicroSoft(intheHead) Windows 7 won’t be as bad as Vista? I mean, there’s a first time for everything, isn’t there? I bet they had the same high hopes for baby Vista before it was born (until it came out with hair not quite the same colour as its dad’s).

Gates is apparently all excited about it as it’ll need ‘lower power, take less memory’ and ‘be more efficient’. I say: don’t count your 7.1’s before you 7’s, my friend.

I managed to totally avoid Windows Vista. I tend to take my time on version releases before using them. I’ve seen enough teething problems, sweaty palms and trauma in people’s eyes over sudden system/software failures – so I wait them out for as long as I can. Windows Vista will be one of those operating systems that I DEFINITELY won’t be on my deathbed wishing I’d used. I have no regrets whatsoever. None. Nada.

So, will I use Windows 7 when it comes sashaying along? Well…it depends on whether it’ll turn out to be Vista’s 1st cousin …or a very distant one. It would need to take the best of Vista (‘cos I’m sure Vista wasn’t entirely crappy) and add more jelly babies to it. I would need to see more people cart-wheeling down the street with flowers behind their ears, kitted out in pink ‘I Heart Windows 7’ t-shirts, to be convinced that Win 7 is worth buying (into).

Until then, I’ll just sit tight.

TV shows? Now watch them on Messenger TV. The project has just been launched through the creativity of the Italian team of Microsoft, which has united in a single instrument the two main activities of most web users: online videos and Windows Live Messenger chats. With the new TV, more than 12.5 million Italian Msn users, can experience a more “social” web tv on-demand, based exclusively on high-quality video. The range of content available includes the entire catalog of clips from MSN Video, the free video channel of the MSN portal.

For the occasion Microsoft has close some strategical partnerships.

Some time ago, I forgot my memory stick in an internet café. I was half-way home when I realised, but I ran back anyway in the hopes that, by some miracle, it’d still be there, that it would have grown sharp teeth and barked at anyone who tried to take it.

Did I find it? Erm, no.

I have now come to the conclusion that it’s my memory stick’s fault it got stolen. Because it wasn’t a MacBook. If it was a MacBook and someone stole it, I’d have much better luck getting my Mac back.

Let me explain:

In New York, there was a woman whose Macbook got stolen last month after thieves broke into her apartment. It wasn’t just her Macbook though – about $5000 worth of electrical equipment got stolen, too, including another Macbook, two iPods, two flat-screen DVD’s and game consoles.

The police had no luck tracing the thieves. However, Apple have this clever little feature on their Macs (called ‘Back to My Mac’) that allows you to access your Mac remotely (using another Mac).

The woman was able to tap into her stolen book remotely, activate its camera, take pictures of one of the thieves who was using it at the time and forward the pics on to the police. The two guys were subsequently caught and arrested and most of the items were recovered.

Turns out the guys were friends of friends who had shown up at a party the woman had held several weeks before the robbery.

Though ‘Back to My Mac’ wasn’t invented for the purposes of catching thieves (how could Apple have known?), it sure came in handy, didn’t it?! Very!

(p.s: I bet the woman won’t have another house party for some time to come).

I’m not sure if this is an anniversary worth commemorating (apart from the a**holes who send it out in the first place), but today is the 30th anniversary of the irritating phenomena that is ‘spam’. Yes, dear readers, break open a bottle of champagne, and munch on copious chunks of cheese, because 30 years ago, on the 3rd of May 1978, the first ever spam was sent out.

On that blessed day of our Lord, a ‘marketing message’ was sent to 400 people via Arpanet (a pre-internet network). Alas, if only 400 was still the magic number. Nowadays, it’s far more common for 400 spam mails to be sent to one person every day. My Yahoo account comes pretty close to half that every day and I know of people who get way more than that.

‘Spam’ was given its name in 1993 by a guy called Joel Furr who worked as an administrator for Usenet. Joel got his idea for the name after watching a Monty Python sketch in which a bunch of Vikings were shouting and chanting ‘Spam, Spam, Spam’ in a restaurant where too much meat was featured on the menu.

(It would be interesting to find out what ‘spam’ was called pre-1993)

Now sent out in their gazillions, 3rd of May 2008 marks the advancement of technology and more technically-sophisticated and persistently-irritating a**holes who either have nothing better to do, or are looking to scam you out of your money. Either way, these are geeks who really should, instead, be working for Microsoft so that the company never comes up with the disgrace that is Windows Vista EVER AGAIN (wishful thinking, I guess).

In any case, spam is unfortunately here to stay for now. I can only hope that in 2038, on the 60th anniversary of the first spam ever sent, that huge strides would have been made to eradicate it.

If you ask me, the whole Microsoft bid to takeover Yahoo is getting to be a bit of a joke, don’t you think?

After 3 months of negotiations, you’d think that the finest minds in the technology world would be able to wrap up a deal – but nope, Microsoft and Yahoo are right back where they started (which was where exactly? Maybe they were never anywhere in the first place. Maybe Yahoo was never interested in giving up their goodies and were merely interested in getting some inside information on Microsoft.)

First of all, there’s the embarrassment of looking ‘stoopid’ when things don’t go according to plan – which is exactly why Microsoft should have kept its pretty lil digital mouth firmly shut and not blubbered to the whole world and their mama that they were looking to buy Yahoo out (who does their PR for god’s sake?). I call it cockiness. Serves them right.

In terms of a super-duper advertising network, Yahoo is almost Google; almost, but not quite, but will do very nicely for Microsoft, because Google sure as hell ain’t gonna give up their golden jewels to Microsoft. (Maybe Microsoft was never really looking to take over Yahoo anyway, but were just trying to puff up their chests to Google, i.e. ‘We’ve still got the technical funk, itty bitty Google. And you’d do well to remember that, or else next time we try bedding Yahoo, we’ll win. WO-HA-HAAA.’)

As much as I don’t particularly like Google (or Microsoft, for that matter), I think Google should try stirring things up a bit with their pocket change and make a Yahoo bid of their own. That should take the heat off Britney for a while!

Ah well, I guess we’ll have to watch this space and see what ole’ four-eyed Billy boy’s next move will be.

(Update: Well, it looks like Microsoft have dropped their bid altogether. Apparently, Yahoo asked for a $55bn minimum to the $47.5bn Microsoft offered (up from the $44.6bn previously offered), but neither party could agree on a final figure. Oh well, Google, here’s your chance …if ya think you’re hard enough).