Stuart J. Johnston

It’s been a year since Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates stepped away from the company full-time to focus on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Gates, however, retained his role as chairman of Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) board. That left long-time CEO Steve Ballmer on his own to make the myriad of decisions it takes to run […]

Users who thought sticking with the Windows 7 Beta would mean they’re good to go until the software’s commercial release in October will wake up to an unpleasant surprise on Wednesday. That’s the day that the beta will begin trying to drive testers to switch to the “Release Candidate” (RC). If they don’t, the beta […]

Six months after scaling back construction of some of its datacenters, Microsoft is back in gear and ready to open at least two of them next month. Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) officials had slowed work on a datacenter in Chicago and another facility planned in Des Moines, Iowa, late last year, as the economy sputtered. However, […]

A key Microsoft analyst criticized the company’s free upgrade program for Windows 7 for limiting free copies to only the first 25 PCs a purchaser buys. Meanwhile, early “pre-order” sales of Windows 7 seem to have taken off like a rocket on Friday, at least according to e-tailer Amazon. In a report, Friday, Gartner analyst […]

Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer presented an overview of his vision for the future of advertising to a gathering of global advertising professionals meeting on the French Riviera. His message laid out Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) vision of advertising in the future — and it’s not just about moving media from paper or television to online. It […]

After a grassroots group barraged Microsoft with tweets this week requesting that the upcoming Microsoft Office Outlook 2010 switch back to using Internet Explorer’s HTML engine to render e-mails instead of using Word, the software giant politely declined. Instead, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) has said that Outlook 2010 will follow Office 2007’s example by again using […]

With Windows 7’s commercial debut growing closer by the day, many users and some PC vendors have been worried that Microsoft may be planning price hikes for the new system. That could stall any tech recovery right when it’s starting to rebound. Instead of trending higher, Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) suggested prices for Windows 7 editions […]

Source: MicrosoftClick to enlarge Microsoft announced the beginning of beta testing for an energy-monitoring service that takes advantage of its Azure cloud computing platform and also ties to power companies’ data. The idea is to enable users to sync up data from their personal energy usage with recommendations on how to cut consumption and lower costs. Dubbed […]

Windows 7 coming to Sheraton Hotels. Source: Microsoft Windows 7 isn’t commercially available yet, but Microsoft is already recruiting highly-visible early adopters to put the pre-release code into production and show it off. That was the case Tuesday, when Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) and Sheraton Hotels & Resorts announced that the hotel chain will deploy Windows […]

With IT budgets on near-lockdown thanks to the recession, tech professionals around the world are struggling to find new ways to develop and refine new offerings. The trick is how to keep innovation going under the current tight budgetary situations, so that IT shops can capitalize on a rising economy when the recovery begins in […]

Microsoft is set to begin public beta testing of its free anti-malware engine Tuesday morning when the download site goes live. Originally codenamed “Morro” and now renamed Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE), the anti-malware engine is meant to at least partially replace Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) OneCare PC health package, subscriptions for which will no longer be […]

Perhaps a little like the old Johnny Cash song, where the main character works at an auto plant and steals a new car by taking it “One Piece at a Time,” Microsoft on Monday continued its gradual hiring away of key executives from rival Yahoo. After a failed takeover bid for the company last year, […]