Bill Lindner

In yet another shining example of Microsoft having too much control of your PC, the company is reportedly up to its old tricks again by secretively updating files on Windows XP and Windows Vista without consent of the user. Even with automatic ... updates turned off, nine small executable files needed by Windows Update in Windows XP and Windows Vista were secretly altered by Microsoft. Companies requiring testing of patches before deployment are not happy about receiving the updates. For what it's worth, Microsoft claims that only consumer editions of Vista were affected. No mention of the ... (view more)

We've noted in the past how easy Windows Vista makes it to track your computing habits and all the information it maintains. Joe Wilcox from Microsoft Watch has a disturbing article that shows how dangerous the Windows Vista registry can be. After ... searching his Windows Vista registry he found some disturbing personal information such as his name, address and phone number, online account user names, software registration codes and some information that identified some of his online accounts. Needless to say, coming across that information didn't give him a warm and fuzzy feeling. This time, ... (view more)

A soon-to-be-released study from NPD Group reportedly shows that standalone unit sales of Windows Vista in its first six months significantly trail standalone unit sales of Windows XP in its first six months of release. Boxed sales of Windows XP ... outsold boxed sales of Windows Vista by almost 60 percent in their respective first six months of availability. Due to the over-inflated cost of Windows Vista, revenue from sales of boxed copies of Vista was only down by 41 percent. It's important to note though that Windows XP was released in October while Windows Vista was released in January, ... (view more)

In what's being described as the first case of its kind, a Seattle man has reportedly been arrested on 4 counts for using peer-to-peer (P2P) software to steal digital data and commit identity theft, alleging that he victimized at least 83 people. ... Gregory Thomas Kopiloff used Limewire, Soulseek and other P2P software to rummage other people's computers for financial, medical and tax information, which he would use to open credit cards and for online shopping sprees. He bought more than $73,000 worth of merchandise online, then turned around and resold them at steep discounts. "If you are ... (view more)

Ah, the modern wonders of 21st century technology. We live in a world where illegal wiretapping is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to violations of civil rights violations against U.S. citizens. Now, Germany reportedly wants to get ... involved in spying on citizens using tech, too. German officials want to use Trojan horse software to secretly monitor potential terror suspects' computing habits. German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble is trying to include using Trojan horses as part of a broader security law being considered by the German government, alleging that judicial approval ... (view more)

As recently reported by senior editor Brandon Dimmel, Microsoft has officially announced information about Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) and is reportedly scheduled to release it sometime in the first quarter of 2008. The official Vista white ... paper from the Windows Vista Blog offers some information about SP1. The white paper notes that "organizations do not need to wait for SP1 to deploy Windows Vista; they are encouraged to begin their Windows Vista evaluation and deployment now." Irregardless of the usual Microsoft epitomical marketing and explanations of the benefits and tradeoffs of ... (view more)

Once again Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) has gone awry, penalizing legitimate Windows XP and Vista users. The problem occurred when unspecified server problems caused by an unknown automatic update from Microsoft created a Windows Validation ... meltdown making Microsoft Windows Genuine Advantage servers incorrectly flag legitimate copies of Windows XP and Vista as pirated copies. The damage created quite a stir in the Microsoft Support Forums , with disruptions lasting for about 19 hours over this past weekend. Windows Vista users who rebooted their computers were blasted with WGA pop-ups, ... (view more)

A lot of things have been written about Windows Vista...some good, some bad. As with everything else, Vista has its good and bad points. Some have even compared Vista to the Ford Edsel, and to Windows Millenium (ME) at its worst. Now Vista has sunk ... to a new catastrophic low...it's now being referred to as the second Titanic, which if you'll recall, sank on its maiden voyage. Adrian Kingsley-Hughes made the comparison in an article published on Earthweb.com. He also writes for zdnet.com. "An operating system (OS) isn't a stand-alone item" he writes. "For an operating system to be successful it ... (view more)

Microsoft has reportedly begun showing U.S. automakers Tellme, an alternative software for in-car navigation and assistance currently being offered exclusively by General Motor Corp.'s OnStar communications service. The technology was obtained by ... Microsoft in May, when the company acquired Tellme Networks Inc., a phone software company. Microsoft recently displayed the voice-recognition software, which allows mobile phone users to receive spoken data from a database, at an auto industry conference. Please, 'Tellme': How does it work? The Tellme service would connect through a Bluetooth- ... (view more)

A new study by Forrester Research shows that businesses that had been thinking of making a quick move to Microsoft Windows Vista seem to be doing an about-face and delaying deployment. In a report issued this week, Forrester analyst Benjamin Gray ... said "IT managers are finding themselves pulling back their initial Windows Vista deployment plans." Forrester did note that it's not like most businesses are really going to skip over Vista. "For the vast majority of businesses, Windows Vista is a matter of when and how, not if. This is thanks in large part to Microsoft's dominance in the corporate ... (view more)