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Submission + - Microsoft to Offer New "Windows for IoT" version for Free to OEMs

Submitted by SmartAboutThings
SmartAboutThings writes: Microsoft today said it will make Windows free of charge for phones and tablets with screens smaller than nine inches, a move designed to help boost the company's market share. Microsoft didn't say what version or type of Windows is covered under this new policy— but most likely we're talking about a new Windows version. "Windows for Internet of Things" or "Windows on Devices" could be its name, as we've seen information on a "Windows on Devices" website offering a short glimpse this new version. Besides smartphones and smaller tablets, this new Windows version will also become available for IoT devices and other wearable gadgetry.

Submission + - How Microsoft brought Cortana to life (theverge.com)

Submitted by electronic convict
electronic convict writes: Named after an AI character in Halo , Microsoft's new 'personal assistant' Cortana aims to take on Siri and Google Now. This background story from The Verge explains how Cortana kept her name (narrowly avoiding something awful like 'Microsoft Personal Digital Assistant Home Premium,' why she keeps a 'notebook' of everything she knows about a Windows Phone user, and just how strong her ties to Halo are (they're surprisingly deep).

Submission + - Microsoft Finally Relents: Start Menu Returning in Windows 9

Submitted by JDG1980
JDG1980 writes: Microsoft's announcements at today's Build conference indicates that the change of leadership just might be having some effects on the company's flagship product. It looks like Windows 9 will bring back the Start Menu that so many users missed in Windows 8. It won't be exactly the same as the Windows 7 menu (there's a live tile section off to the right), but it will be a lot closer, and won't hog the whole screen.

Another common complaint about Windows 8 is that the full-screen paradigm for Metro apps – while it may work OK with a tablet or phone – doesn't fit well on a multi-tasking desktop with a large screen. To fix this, Microsoft will allow Metro apps to run within a window on Windows 9 – similar to what can currently be done with Stardock's ModernMix.

Submission + - Microsoft Announces Windows 8.1 Update

Submitted by SmartAboutThings
SmartAboutThings writes: As expected, at the Build 2014 event currently taking place in the Moscone Center, San Francisco, Microsoft has announced the first update to Windows 8.1. Albeit the update has leaked before, it now has become official. It comes with improvements especially for mouse and keyboard users, such as the minimize button that now works inside modern Windows apps. Also, switching between Win 32 and modern apps is now also possible form a single place. The Start center comes with a the PC Settings tiles and the power button. Right mouse click features have also been added to the Start screen. Also, the Windows Store will be redesigned in the coming days. Windows 8.1 Update will be made available on April 8, ironically, when support for Windows XP is discontinued.

Comment Re:Stupid (Score 4, Interesting) 49

by Missing.Matter (#46620939) Attached to: Facebook, Google Battle To Bring Internet To Remote Locations
I told my wife about the Google balloon idea and she said to me "What, you mean like in Gossip Girl?"

Apparently there is a story line in Gossip Girl (circa 2008) where one of the main characters is convinced to invest in a project to bring internet to Africa via balloons. In the end it turns out he's a scam artist and it was all a hoax. But I guess someone at Google saw it and said "Now wait a minute..."

Submission + - Enough Whining. San Francisco is the new Renaissance Florence. (xconomy.com)

Submitted by waderoush
waderoush writes: Despite legitimate concerns over sky-high rents, Ellis Act evictions, Google Bus traffic, and the like, the San Francisco Bay Area is perhaps the most prosperous, comfortable, enlightened, stimulating, and generative place to live in Western history. For satisfying parallels, you'd have to look to a place like Florence and a time like the Renaissance, argues an Xconomy essay entitled From Cosimo to Cosmos: The Medici Effect in Culture and Technology. Today's coder-kings are working to reinvent economic structures in much the same way Renaissance painters, poets, architects, and scientists were trying to extend the framework they'd inherited from classical Greece and Rome. And in the role of the Medici family, long Florence's most powerful rulers and art patrons, we have people like Mark Zuckerberg, Tim Cook, and Seth MacFarlane. Wait, what — Seth MacFarlane? Yes, the reboot of Carl Sagan's Cosmos starring Neil deGrasse Tyson (itself a tribute to the rise of science) wouldn't have happened without the involvement of a California media mogul. It's true that Silicon Valley can feel like Dante's Inferno if you're stuck in traffic on 101, or working 70-hour weeks as a code monkey at a doomed startup. But 'It would be unthinking, and ungrateful, to overlook the surplus we’re reaping from the tech boom,' the essay argues.

Submission + - Mark Zuckerberg calls Obama to complain about NSA (cnn.com)

Submitted by mpicpp
mpicpp writes: Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg called President Obama on Wednesday night to express frustration about the government's spying and hacking programs.

"When our engineers work tirelessly to improve security, we imagine we're protecting you against criminals, not our own government," Zuckerberg wrote in a Facebook post Thursday afternoon.

His concerns are based on the latest investigative report from The Intercept, which revealed that the National Security Agency has weaponized the Internet, making it possible to inject bad software into innocent peoples' computers en masse. Put simply, using the QUANTUM program, the NSA can sneak into someone's Web browser.
The report is based on documents provided by ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

Submission + - Sydney Brenner: How to Discourage Great Discoveries (sciencemag.org)

Submitted by Jim_Austin
Jim_Austin writes: Nobel Prize-winning geneticist Sydney Brenner equates grad school in the U.S. to slavery, and the postdoc to indentured servitude, and suggests that our system of academic research could hardly be designed more effectively--if the goal is to cripple innovation.

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