Lots of hot steam but no substance at all

Summary: Microsoft exploits children so as to pretend Internet Explorer 8 makes them secure/safe from exploiters; Huffington Post advertises Microsoft products that do not exist (vapourware)

Microsoft's publicity stunts that exploit children are nothing new and the latest such stunt is a promotion of Internet Explorer 8. We wrote about this stunt in [1, 2] and Sirius does that too:

At a click of a button on Microsoft Internet Explorer 8 (and only on Microsoft Internet Explorer 8) a secret code is launched which reports an individual to a Government organisation called CEOPS which in turn accesses the Police databases.

[...]

Guilty until proven innocent must be the default position. Prove me wrong Microsoft, give your code to your competitors, Open Source it and we can all help save children.

People ought to pay attention to this recurrence/theme. Microsoft uses children even in order to sell Vista 7. British television channels are full of evidence and a parents television council has already complained. But now, to make matters even worse, Vista 8 vapourware is being promoted in the UK (Ziff Davis [1, 2, 3]) and in Microsoft's new platform for shameless self-promotion, namely the Huffington Post [1, 2, 3, 4].

“Microsoft uses children even in order to sell Vista 7.”"Note that MS-Huffingtonpost is talking about Windows 8," told us a reader a few hours ago. It seems like any time Bill wants news printed, he can count on his good friend Arianna. Of course if they are talking about Windows 8, that means 7 is as big a disaster as we thought.

"Also note the BLING search box - but that if you use the search box at the top of the page Google is the search engine. Maybe Bling isn't capable of doing what HuffPost wants."

This coverage is just more vapourware with no details, not even vague ones. A few days ago we showed Windows Mobile 7 relying on similar tricks (fake "leaks" and "sneak previews" for hype). Vista 7 is just the same as Vista in many ways (almost no progress made in 3 years of development) and by all early indications, Vista 8 will be pretty much the same. Many of the Windows managers have quit the company, so this key product lacks vision, direction, and leadership. ⬆

"Well the initial impression is how much it [Windows 7] looks like Vista. Which I think is…uh…the thing I’m not supposed to say."

--Microsoft Jack Schofield