Microsoft News of Interest to the GNU/Linux Community
- Dr. Roy Schestowitz
- 2009-02-03 13:03:26 UTC
- Modified: 2009-02-03 13:03:26 UTC
Mobile
Calling the death of Windows Mobile
Fabrizio Capobianco, CEO of open-source mobile leader Funambol, has more or less declared that Windows Mobile is dying. Indeed, it's arguably the case that the proprietary software model, generally, is largely dead in mobile.
Moto Backing Away From Windows Mobile
Earlier this month reports emerged that Motorola would cut as much as 50 percent of its handset division, as it slashes down the number of phones it sells to a dozen and focus solely on Google’s Android Operating System. The decision, made us wonder if Microsoft’s Windows Mobile OS might be a big loser because of that focus on Android. The Wall Street Journal today reports that Motorola indeed might be saying sayonara to Windows.
XBox
Sony's David Reeves (Sony Manager Says Microsoft Lies About XBox360 Numbers)
Eurogamer: What's your reaction to the Q3 financial figures?
David Reeves: On PS3, the target is still 10 million sell-in. PS3 was the number one priority, and the Corporation is going to meet that target. We're very happy about it overall.
PSP was not hit so much by demand, but by economic factors. I can only talk specifically about Europe, but we've lost volume in Russia. A lot of retailers there have been sucked up by oligarchs, and they didn't have the financial support. They were not able to buy in the product, even though the demand was there.
DRM
Gears of War grinds to a halt... thanks to DRM snarl
The record industry has figured out that DRM doesn't work. The movie business is finally catching on to the idea. The gaming industry? No clue whatsoever.
Following the crush of grassroots vitriol that erupted when the highly-anticipated (and ultimately lackluster) game Spore shipped with a full mountain of DRM, one would have thought that other publishers might have learned from that game's mistakes. Nope. The latest flub comes from Epic and Microsoft, which loaded up the PC version of Gears of War with a supersized helping of digital rights management. (Though, in reality, the GoW DRM probably predates Spore's.)
XP/Vista
Microsoft warns that Vista, XP upgrade blockers set to expire
Microsoft Corp. is warning customers that tools for blocking automatic upgrades to the newest service packs of Windows Vista and Windows XP will expire in the coming months.
Zune
The case for saving the Microsoft Zune
If Microsoft is going to make any headway with the Zune, though, it has to stop playing catchup.
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