Microsoft News Tracker

It took them a while, but Microsoft’s adCenter will soon generally support (albeit in beta) US sales of contextual ads on Microsoft content pages as well as search results according to David Jakubowski, General Manager, adCenter:

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The week is ending on a very odd note, as witness my two prior posts from today, but here are some more bizarre Microsoft happenings from this week:

The Odd Case of the Ubuntu Download. Ubuntu Linux mysteriously appeared on Windows Marketplace where it became a very popular download, then less mysteriously it disappeared.

The Expensive Case of the Grand Theft Auto IV Add-ons. Take Two Interactive’s CFO let slip in an earnings conference call that someone was paying an extravagant $50 million fee for “episodic” content in the Xbox 360 version of the upcoming GTA IV and then stonewalled on providing details. Microsoft finally confessed and expressed the hope that fees for the downloadable add-ons would recoup at least part of the expense.

The Strange Case of the Vanishing Vista Virtualization License. Microsoft primed the press for an announcement this week on relaxing the arbitrary licensing restrictions on running Vista in a virtual machine and then canceled the whole thing at the last minute. Microsoft isn’t talking and theories abound, but the suspicion is that while permitting  the lower cost versions of Vista to run in VMs would help Windows developers, Microsoft balked at helping non-Windows users (i.e. Linux or Macintosh) who would also benefit.

The overwhelming majority of copies of Vista will be purchased preinstalled on new PCs, but that fact of life doesn’t keep hope from springing up on Wall Street or in Redmond. The latest illustration came late last night as Microsoft Unveiled New Ways for Consumers to Get Windows Vista:

Microsoft Corp. today detailed three new methods for customers looking to buy, upgrade or license multiple copies of Windows Vista™, the new operating system that will be available worldwide on Jan. 30. Windows Anytime Upgrade, Windows Vista Family Discount and Windows Marketplace will provide customers with greater flexibility in obtaining the new operating system and will ensure they have the edition of Windows Vista that matches their needs.

Taking them in a slightly different order:

Windows Anytime Upgrade

The general outline of Windows Anytime Upgrade has been known for sometime, but Microsoft confirmed that the PC vendors will act as middlemen in the upgrade purchase and will presumably get a cut as well as handle any service calls. The retail pricing is generally much the same as the delta in prices for retail boxed copies, which is hardly a bargain, but the Home Basic to Home Premium upgrade for $79 instead of $40 seems like an outrageous assault on the home user’s pocketbook. (The Business to Ultimate upgrade is pricey too - $139 instead of $100). It’s hard to figure if this is an incentive for OEMs to ship Premium preinstalled or part of the famous Vista upsell, but as I have observed before, the consumer who brings his shiny new PC home and finds out that he has to get out his credit card to get the glitzy Vista user interface isn’t going to be a happy camper.

Windows Marketplace

Microsoft launched their spiffed up Windows Marketplace in August, but it’s mostly been a venue for a little hardware and some games and smaller applications with the novelty that the latter were downloadable using their Digital Locker technology. Now however, they will be offering upgrade editions of Vista and full copies of Office 2007. I suspect that offering Vista is a waste of time and that offering Office upgrades might be a better plan, but there’s nothing wrong with digital delivery if you can persuade the customers of that fact.

Windows Vista Family Discount

Talk about a waste of time. If you are one of the odd ducks (in the US and Canada) who wants to ante up for a full price retail (complete or upgrade) copy of Vista Ultimate before June 30, you can also get two additional licenses of Vista Home Premium for other PCs in the home for $49.99 each. The price isn’t bad, but the number of folks with 3 fully Vista capable machines sitting about the house and a burning desire to upgrade has got to be limited to the fanboy contingent.

A selection of Microsoft goodies from Santa’s sack:

Visions of sugarplums danced in their heads - Merrill Bets On Yahoo!-AOL Merger, but they don’t rule out Microsoft. Most interesting part:

Merrill also highlights this tidbit: “our understanding is that AOL’s current contract with Google has a change in control clause that would allow either [Microsoft] or Yahoo! to move its traffic onto their platforms.”

And Apple must have been not naughty, but nice this year - Planned Home PC Purchases Surge, Apple Closes On HP. Also IDC says that while 3Q2006 US sales were flat, global sales are rising and laptops now outsell desktops. More on IDC’s report here.

More gifts - Microsoft Teams With Macrovision to Populate Windows Marketplace with over 1,000 games. I’d nearly forgotten about Windows Marketplace, Microsoft’s digital delivery store for PC software and more.

Mom’s Genuine Holiday Surprise - Microsoft no longer thinks Joe Wilcox’s mother is a software pirate.

Finally, a lump of coal for Windows Live Drive which may be DOA.

Wait, there’s more!

First Exploit Of Windows Vista Spotted. It doesn’t seem to be much of an exploit, but it’s notable for being the first admitted exploit for Vista. Microsoft is very precise these days on which security holes are attributable to Vista and which to programs that run on Vista.

Here it comes - Microsoft builds Vista buzz in Tokyo’s Akihabara.

Google edged out Yahoo to become the number 2 Web venue in term of worldwide visitors during November according to comScore. Microsoft is still number 1. Google results did not include YouTube which was 10th.

Microsoft fights Gmail in the workplace - it’s all about mailbox size.

Microsoft made available version 1.2 of the Team Foundation Server MSSCCI (Microsoft Source Code Control Interface) Provider which allows a range of IDEs to access Team Foundation Server, the collaboration component of the Visual Studio 2005 Team System platform.

Microsoft in legal battle over ‘Halo’ game for mobile phones. Follow the link for Todd Bishop’s explanation of why French game maker In-Fusio is suing Microsoft. I’m still trying to figure what playing Halo on a mobile phone could possibly be like.

There’s no formal announcement yet, but you can now check out Windows Marketplace for the new look at www.windowsmarketplace.com. Basically, Microsoft has mapped its Xbox Live Marketplace to the PC space and users can purchase a variety of software and other downloadable digital goodies using the Digital Locker technology announced last September. Liveside has more (including the as yet unrealized expectation of a renaming to Windows Live Marketplace), as does Ed Bott who came upon the link interestingly embedded in a beta Windows Vista setup screen and notes that it seems to be yet another stealth Microsoft announcement:

By my calculations, this site should be open for business at noon, Pacific Daylight Time, on Monday, August 28. It’s a curiously soft launch. No one from Microsoft has pitched this story to me, and the only mention I’ve seen online is this short blurb at LiveSide.