Stuart J. Johnston

While Microsoft maintains that Windows Vista is the most successful version of its iconic operating system ever, that picture may be dimmed by a new report that found that almost half of corporate IT shops will skip it while waiting for the next major release — Windows 7. In an independently-funded survey, long-time industry analyst […]

The pre-beta version of Windows 7 that Microsoft handed out at two major conferences this fall was uploaded to BitTorrent sites almost immediately — enabling almost anyone with a little tech savvy to begin kicking the tires early. Now, it’s happened again, despite Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) vaunted tight-lipped policies regarding unreleased products. Last week, at […]

Former Yahoo executive Qi LuPhoto source: Microsoft

Microsoft plans to start handing out the first beta copies of Windows 7 on January 13, according to recent postings on three of the software giant’s blogs. The company already handed out pre-beta copies of the pending replacement for Windows Vista at two major developer conferences it held in Los Angeles in late October and […]

Microsoft announced on Tuesday it is shipping the first public beta of Windows Server 2008 Service Pack 2 and Vista Service Pack 2. For the next couple of days, the releases are only available to MSDN and TechNet subscribers. On Thursday, the company says it will expand that to anyone who wants to download it […]

Virtually any technology analyst will tell you that Microsoft has made a lot of mistakes and just plain dumb decisions over its 33 year history. So how did it get to be the largest software company in the world? Some would argue by conniving, cheating, and copping other companies’ innovations. Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) certainly has […]

Spamhaus.org, an organization that tracks and analyzes spam traffic, has fingered Microsoft as the fifth most spammer-friendly e-mail service in the world. The problem has to do with spammers using Microsoft’s Live services as a portal to send their unwanted messages. Spamhaus officials say they have repeatedly notified Microsoft that it should block those spam […]

Pre-trial discovery in the “Windows Vista Capable” lawsuit has ended – but that’s just the start of the legal maneuvering in what may be Microsoft’s most vexing case. Microsoft’s attorneys filed a pair of motions on Thursday asking the judge to decertify the case’s class action status as well as to dismiss the suit altogether, […]

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer at the company’s annual shareholder meeting today. Source: Microsoft “The best is yet to come.” While the words recall the melody of the syrupy ’60s Sinatra hit, those were the words that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer used to send a message to shareholders when he spoke at the company’s annual meeting this […]

Intel officials may have been pleased that Microsoft lowered standards for obtaining the company’s Windows Vista Capable logo program sticker, but the same can’t be said about HP’s execs. According to previously unseen e-mails unsealed late Friday by the judge in the ongoing class action lawsuit against Microsoft, HP (NYSE: HPQ) executives were hopping mad […]

A filing by plaintiff’s attorneys in the Microsoft “Vista Capable” lawsuit says that newly unsealed documents imply that the software titan’s CEO was aware that the company lowered technical requirements for Vista in order to save Intel, and some PC makers, billions of dollars in lost revenues. The documents were unsealed by federal judge Marsha […]

Twenty-five years ago this week, a youthful Bill Gates stood on stage at New York’s posh Helmsley Palace Hotel to announce the future of computing: the Windows 1.0 operating system. Later that month, Gates would take the stage at the Comdex show in Las Vegas to proclaim that the future of computing was with Windows […]