Microsoft Related News
Business Standard is carrying a PTI report on a judgement in the Delhi High Court [PDF] in favour of Microsoft in a suit against a Mumbai firm which was preloading pirated versions of Windows on the computers it sold.
Jeroen, this one is for you :P
I'm one of those paranoid "empty-trash-every-5_minutes/arrange-icons-by-type-every-5_minutes" freaks and funnily enough, I've never actually noticed the "Show desktop items" option :o Anyways, the Orion Nebula is now viewable in all its glory on my desktop.
-K
Bill Gates, in a speech in Bangalore, announced a talent search contest - 1337ly titled 'Code 4 Bill' - to recruit the best India has on offer. The contest is scheduled to commence in January and will feature eight stages that will include technical and analytical tests along with face-to-face interviews. The winners (20 of them) get to intern at Microsoft India and eventually get assimilated by Microsoft Redmond.
Full story: Times of India.
Just learned from their mailing list that Parikrama, India's lone flame in the land of rock, are apparently going to be writing and performing a song for Microsoft to help launch 3 new products - Visual Studio 2005, MSSQL server 2005 and BizTalk Server 2006. And there apparently might be a video made as well..
oh and apparently Gill Bates is going to be there with bells on for the show :P
-K
Microsoft have decided to price the localised Windows XP starter edition at Rs.1000 (minimum). This India-specific edition will (eventually) provide language support in nine Indian languages besides English.
Microsoft is of the view that the low price edition will help curb the rampant piracy in India (reported as 73%) and allow sub-10k computers to be shipped with a legal copy of Windows.
The Windows XP starter edition, while providing enhanced localisation, has not had much in the form of favourable press, due to the serious limitations placed upon it. A related story was covered on quillem last week.
Microsoft has announced the availability of its localised, low cost, stripped down version of Windows XP - Windows XP Starter Edition. The announcement came after discussions between the Redmond giant and a GOI delegation led by IT minister Dayanidhi Maran. Other points of note from the meetings included the bundling the Windows operating system along with broadband and PC packages not unlike this one.
Read more: Rediff, Economic Times.
Zone-H reports on the latest in a string of recent defacements of Microsoft sites. A Portuguese group who call themselves "Outlaw Group" yesterday defaced www.microsoft.com/mspress/uk/. The site has been unavailable until recently. The full report can be read here.
