Microsoft News Tracker

Some Microsoft news items from this week that did not find a post of their own.

Microsoft’s Ben Fathi says Vista’s “no public codename” successor (until recently called Vienna) is coming in 2 to 2.5 years and will have some “fundamental piece of enabling technology” although Microsoft isn’t exactly sure what it is. There’s always WinFS! Update: Microsoft backpedals on 2/13 in a statement from Kevin Kutz, Director, Windows Client:

We are not giving official guidance to the public yet about the next version of Windows, other than we’re working on it.

If you’re collecting Vista compatibility glitches there were some doozies reported this week including Apple’s iTunes (and more), Nvidia graphics drivers, and MIT tech staff warning professors and administrators at the school “not to upgrade desktops or laptops to Microsoft’s new Windows Vista operating system because the software isn’t yet ready for ‘productive and safe computing,’” due to incompatibilities with their standard commercial and internal applications.

Aside from Nvidia who should have been better prepared for the launch, these are actually pretty much par for the course despite the adverse press. Commercial application owners like Apple have bigger fish to fry than tracking the exact ship schedule of a Microsoft operating system, but will generally catch up within 90 days of shipment. Internal institutional applications like those at MIT and elsewhere are unfortunately often treated as merely expense items and developers are forced to take a even more leisurely approach.

Microsoft Says They Like DRM in response to Steve Job’s open letter. Meanwhile, big four music publisher EMI appears to be testing the DRM free download waters.

Paddles, CLEAR! ……………THUMP! MSFTextrememakeover waxes indignant over the recent decline in Microsoft’s share price.

EC rebuffs Microsoft over open-source report:

The European Commission has resisted efforts by Microsoft to make it abandon its report into open-source software, it was revealed this week. But the Commission was swayed into allowing a 10-day period for feedback before completing the report.

Previously mentioned here.

Microsoft Speaks Out on Russian Piracy Prosecution and frankly they need to work on their story. So far Microsoft had avoided the headlines like “RIAA sues grandma” but that can’t last forever.

Microsoft to Share Ad Revenue With Casual Game Developers. Good idea.

Windows Live OneCare fails VB100 test.

Microsoft bumps support prices for Windows, Office.

The ink on last year’s Microsoft Zune press releases was barely dry when speculation started about a Zune Phone egged on by CEO Steve Ballmer. Now the rumors are heating up again after John Letzing at MarketWatch spotted a likely FCC filing. However, reading the fine print reveals a strange duck that is “an orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) device to be used for ‘consumer broadband access and networking.’” The general suspicion is that this means WiMAX which is a high bandwidth wireless technology that is just getting off the ground. To add to the mystery, Google, HP, and Intel are listed as a supporters of the FCC application.

However, Matt Hickey at CrunchGear fans the flames with the speculation that a Zune phone would run on a high speed 4G WiMAX network like the one to be built by Sprint/Nextel. This lash-up could provide a mobile VoIP offering plus the likely ability to use ordinary Wi-Fi hotspots. Even better, CrunchGear’s inside sources say that the Zune phone will be announced in March and shipped in May thus neatly upstaging Apple’s iPhone.

All of this is certainly exciting, but the idea of a Zune Phone brings up the more fundamental question of where it would leave Microsoft’s Windows Mobile partners who are ready to show off their new Windows Mobile 6 handsets next week at 3GSM. Microsoft’s Zune crew apparently has license to run roughshod over other parts of Microsoft and their partnerships as evidenced by the hapless PlaysForSure partners (e.g. Creative Technologies, iRiver, Samsung) who got blindsided by the Zune portable media player itself last year. A Zune Phone in whatever form hits right at the phone vendors who have signed up for Windows Mobile (e.g. Samsung, Palm, HTC, Motorola, LG) just when it was showing signs of success, at least in the USA. Beyond the technical particulars, the real Zune Phone question then is whether Microsoft is willing yet again to shutter one of their own projects and cannibalize their partners’ markets in favor of rolling their own.

Update: Microsoft says FCC filing not Zune-related. Fair enough, but as long as the Zune Phone remains a possibility there will still be an inherent conflict with Windows Mobile.