Microsoft News Tracker

Robert McMillan at InfoWorld:

Security software vendor Symantec Corp. has complained to European Commission antitrust regulators about Microsoft Corp.’s entrance into the security business, setting the stage for a possible antitrust case against the Redmond, Washington, software company, the Dow Jones Newswire reported Thursday.

The “informal” complaint allows the Commission to consider whether or not an antitrust case against Microsoft is merited, said the report, citing unnamed sources.

Reports differ on exactly what’s going on here. Some have it that the European Commission raised the issue first and asked Symantec for information.

Reuters via CNET:

Time Warner and Microsoft have restarted discussions about forming an alliance of their Internet units, America Online and MSN, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the situation.

The two companies are focused on combining AOL’s Web content with Microsoft’s search-engine technology, although other aspects of the talks are sketchy. It isn’t clear whether they are considering merging their Internet dial-up businesses, which generate lots of cash, the paper said.

The two companies originally began discussions about an Internet deal earlier this year. But the talks stalled in the late summer over a range of issues, including technical obstacles and questions about control.

Many obstacles remain to a deal, the paper said, citing people with knowledge of the discussions. Still, the latest talks have restarted in hopes of reaching an agreement by the end of the year.

More rumor by following the link.

(Via Bink.nu) Alessandro Perilli reports on Microsoft Virtualization Product Manager, Mike Neil’s October 4 webcast. Some high points:

- This year we get the Virtual Server 2005 R2 RTM with several features including x64 support for hosts (not VM’s) and Linux, Windows Server 2003 SP1, and Windows XP SP2 VM support

- A new Virtual Server version will beta in 1H06 with RTM in 2H06 and will provide performance improvements

- In the Longhorn Server timeframe, a new virtualization technology will debut and x64 VM support will be added

Follow the link for more details.

Cliff Edwards, Peter Burrows, and Ronald Grover at Business Week have all the details in Daggers Drawn Over DVDs: How Sony gained an edge in its fierce battle with Microsoft over video formats:

Every July, 400 of the most powerful media and tech industry chieftains meet at investment banker Herb Allen’s conference in Sun Valley, Idaho, for what are usually convivial discussions of megatrends and megamergers. But this year, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates III laid into Sony Chief Executive Howard Stringer, according to two sources, including one who witnessed the exchange in a private room.

Gates argued that Sony’s new high-definition DVD standard, called Blu-ray, needed to be changed so it would work smoothly with personal computers running on Microsoft’s Windows operating system. Stringer and two lieutenants defended the technology, insisting Blu-ray would work fine in PCs.

Yet Gates’s ire only grew. “There must be something much deeper going on,” Stringer said later, according to another person who heard the comment.

Skipping a number of juicy plot twists, the net is:

Behind the brinkmanship lie two vastly different views of where entertainment in the home is heading. Microsoft and Intel paint a futuristic picture of the digital home, with sleek PCs powered by their software and chips in the central role. The PC would shuttle music, photos, and video from room to room—and grab off the Web everything from the latest Tom Cruise blockbuster to a National Public Radio podcast.

Sony and its supporters are skittish about the latest movies being zipped around the house. Blu-ray disks can hold more content than today’s DVDs, but they would be used in much the same way. The new disks would be plopped into a DVD player, and copyrighted material, like Hollywood movies, couldn’t be ripped to a computer’s hard drive without a studio’s permission.

Blu-ray equipped devices are even designed to recognize and refuse to play pirated movies.

So far Sony has lined up the movie studios behind Blu-ray and things aren’t looking good for HD DVD despite the recent CPR attempt by Microsoft and Intel, but who knows what tomorrow’s episode will bring!