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Greetings readers! This is the first of a several posts and a number of videos from my experience at Microsoft's PDC for 2009. Disclosure: I am a Microsoft Student Insider (Find out a little bit more about this in one of my previous posts). Day 1 of PDC started off great despite the fact that a few minutes after arriving that I had forgot my camera back at the hotel (so no pictures from day one). Registration was as simple as handing them my ID and they gave me my badge. I found out the hard way that being there for Microsoft, I don't get any of the goodies like the Acer bag and whatever came in it. The big disappointment as far as free goodies came on Day 2 which I will talk about in the next post. Anyway, shortly after getting my badge, I followed the signs through the huge maze that is the Los Angeles Convention Center. For those that haven't been here, this is quite the huge, impressive structure and when you are going from hall to hall, you will be doing a fair bit of walking. I managed to find they hall for the keynote and jumped into the line that was weaving its way down the long halls. Despite the long line, once the doors were open everybody flooded in and took a seat rather quickly. After a short wait, Ray Ozzy, the top architect at Microsoft since the stepping down of Bill Gates, came on stage and presented us with the idea of "Three Screens and a Cloud." The keynote focused on having the same experience on a computer, mobile device and tv and using Microsoft's cloud OS, Azure, to do that. Since last year's Azure announcement was in fairly cloudy terms, I never really got excited about it but after seeing what it can do and how it can scale, I think if all goes as planned, it is going to be amazing. The major announcement in terms of Azure is that it goes into service at the first of the year and billing begins in February and that you only pay for what you use. If you have a company with a large web presence, this is definitely something to look into, especially if you have traffic spikes and want to be able to scale up to those spikes but not have all of the server overhead when you don't need all of the power.

After the keynote, I spent the rest of they day going to sessions, eating, and having fun with the vendors that were there. Although this was the case all three days, some of the sessions were interesting while others were so far above my head that I thought they were speaking in another language. Although there were some sessions throughout the event focused on aspects of Windows 7, compared to other topics like Azure, there was very little talk about Windows 7 which I found kind of disappointing since it just came out a few weeks ago. I also was disappointed but little to no mention of the next version of Windows. Apparently Microsoft sees the future as everybody having their head in the clouds.

For the sake of keeping these posts short and to the point, I will talk more about some of the sessions I attended and what I learned in a separate post from my daily summaries. I will post the happenings from day 2 at PDC in the next post to likely come out tonight or tomorrow and day 3 shortly after that. I also have a number of photos and videos to upload when I get home too. It might take a few days to get everything up as my school quarter started yesterday and now that this trip is coming to an end (I am sitting in LAX as I write this), I need to focus on making sure i don't fall behind in that. I also have a number of other things to talk about as well as soon as I get a chance including the new Chrome OS. Stay tuned!

Tagged as: Azure, day 1, keynote, Microsoft, Microsoft Student Insider, PDC 2009, Professional Developers Conference, Ray Ozzy, three screens and a cloud, Win 7, Windows 7 No Comments

17Nov/090

Microsoft’s PDC 2009 Coverage

Greetings Readers!

In the last post, I alluded to the fact that Microsoft has sent me to PDC 2009 (Professional Developers Conference) in LA since I am now a Student Insider and as part of that, I am going to be writing numerous blog posts throughout the week about the stuff that is being announced and talked about here. I have also been equipped with a Flip Ultra HD camcorder to take video of what I see. Since I got the Flip this afternoon, I will have to wait until tonight to charge it up and try it out but I should be able to shoot some video the next two days and I will likely have to wait until I return home on Friday to begin uploading them as internet speeds around here seem to vary somewhere between dial-up speeds during the keynote and around 1.5mbps at other times.

I am mainly focusing on Windows 7 stuff and various developer technologies that interest me and alter how I do my pet programming projects. If there is anything specifically that you would like me to report on, let me know in the comments. Feel free to check out the schedule at the PDC 2009 site and point me towards the sessions you would be most interested in me reporting on. Also, once I get the video working, I will be doing interviews as well, so expect some cool stuff from that. There are also a number of the Microsoft Surface tables here so I will get some videos of those too.

I am getting ready to go into another session so I will blog more tonight about what I saw today and just what I think about everything that is being shown off. Stay tuned!

Tagged as: Flip, Microsoft, PDC 2009, Windows 7 No Comments

13Nov/090

I am now a Microsoft Student Insider, changes are coming

Greetings Readers!

I have some absolutely amazing news to share with all of you. As of today, I am officially a Microsoft Student Insider. What is that you ask? Essentially, it is an unpaid job to blog about various topics that they would like me to blog about. There is one student insider to talk about a specific topic. In my case, I am the chosen one to speak about all things Windows 7. Normally, I wouldn't take an unpaid position, but the perks of the job are good enough that I don't mind it.

While I will be writing a minimum of 15 blog posts for Microsoft over the next year, I am also being sent, all expenses paid, to whatever conferences they want to send me to cover. While I don't yet know a schedule of everywhere I am going to be sent, I do know that I am being sent to cover PDC in LA all of next week. It seems a bit fast considering I just got the job today, but I don't think I can complain too much about a free trip to LA and entrance into an expensive conference and I am getting some awesome stuff too. As part of being a Student Insider, to help me cover the event and others like it, I am being given a Flip HD camcorder, an ASUS eee pc netbook, a Microsoft shirt and some various other things to help with cab fair and such. I am also told that I will have access to talk to higher up people within Microsoft like various product managers and stuff, possibly even some board members either next week or at other times.

I will tell the story of how I got the position in either another post or on the next episode of the podcast which is at a time to be determined since I will be en route to LA at our normal recording time, but I do want to address what this means for the blog.

Although I have wanted a sponsor for some time for the show or the blog or whatever, mainly to help pay for my hosting fees, domain fees and such, at the same time, I have always dreaded the idea. I have build the podcast and this blog on a goal of being 100% honest, 100% of the time with no BS. I have always dreaded the idea of the sponsor because I don't like the feeling that I can't say what I want to say about a topic because I don't want to worry about offending them. The last thing I want to do is open up my mouth and scare way people who want to throw money at me. When I found out more about this position, I hesitated for a bit because of this, but I have decided that despite what I am being given or where I am being sent, I will do everything I can not to allow it to influence my opinions so that I appear to be nothing but a mouthpiece for a company. I will gladly blog about the topics that they request I blog about, but in the end, I will express how I really feel. I will do my absolute best not to censor myself. I will allow Microsoft or anybody else to present their case to me and I will forward it on to my audience, but in the end, my opinion is my own.

If all goes the way I hope, the type of content on here and the podcast will not change, there will just be more Windows 7 related stuff and when it is something that Microsoft wants me to talk about, I will make that very clear so that you can factor that into your judgment of my writing when you read my posts.

I primarily see this as an opening door that I have been trying to work my way into for the past 2 years. As many know, I have been trying to get a job at Microsoft for nearly 2 years and I see this as my way in and I will do whatever I can to achieve my dream while keeping my integrity in regards to Global Geek News but I suppose we will see how it plays out. Anyway, there may or may not be a podcast next week. Since I will likely be in flight when the show is recorded, it will definitely not be released on Tuesday like normal. There is a small chance of recording on Wednesday but at this point, I am not holding my breath. It is most likely the case that we will end up skipping a weeks show but I don't yet know. I will keep you all informed.

More to come!

Don't forget to follow Global Geek News on Twitter and listen to the podcast!

Tagged as: blogging, conferences, honesty, integrity, Microsoft, opinions, PDC, Student Insider, trips, Windows 7 No Comments

23Jun/090

Reminder: Windows 7 Beta to begin bi-hourly shutdowns next week

Greetings Readers!

This is your friendly reminder that if you are still running the Windows 7 beta, you need up upgrade to the RC. Starting Monday, July 1st, the Windows 7 beta will begin shutting down every 2 hours as a way to alert you that it will expire soon and you should get all of you important data off before it does. The beta expires on August 1st, so if you don't upgrade by then, you could be in real trouble.

Windows 7 RC users won't have to worry about this until March 1st 2010 and expiration on June 1st 2010. That should give you plenty of time to get the retail version which ships in late October. If you aren't on the RC yet, I recommend it as it has several great features that the beta doesn't. I am running Windows 7 on all of my machines now and I don't think I could be happier.

-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray

Tagged as: Microsoft, shutdowns, Windows 7 beta, Windows 7 expiration date, Windows 7 RC, Windows 7 Retail No Comments

10Jun/091

E3, the best Electronics Entertainment Expo in years, mostly

Greetings Readers!

As promised, I am here to share my thoughts on this year's E3. I'm not going to address every game that was talked about, but more of my thoughts from the main press events, so here we go.

Lets start off with Microsoft. This event was mind blowing! I found myself sitting in my chair several hours after the event still saying "holy crap!" The past couple of years have been a rather big disappointment from all of the major companies but this even alone makes up for all of it. Before I address Project Natal, which was the main "holy crap!" moment from the event, lets talk games and Xbox functionality. There were a ton of great titles that were announced at this years Microsoft press event, including Forza Motorsport 3, Halo Reach, Left 4 Dead 2, Crackdown 2, Metal Gear Solid Rising and even a Beatles version of Rock Band. These were great announcements as many of the major titles including Halo Reach, Left 4 Dead 2 and Metal Gear Solid Rising were completely unexpected. In terms of games, it looks to be a very bright year for the Xbox 360. They also announced some great new additions to Xbox Live including Last.fm, Facebook and even Twitter integration. This will do wonders for making the 360 become apart of your social network life. They also announced better quality video streaming which is awesome too. Finally, the biggest announcement was Project Natal. This is Microsoft's one-up on the Wii motion controller. When this is released, you will be able to interact with your 360 and games with no controller at all, just by moving your body. If that wasn't cool enough, it can react to voice commands. I cant say enough about this, so head here to check out the demo of it.

Nintendo was the second person to present at this years E3 and it made for a great opportunity to take a nap. After the stellar event from Microsoft, Nintendo could have put just about anybody to sleep. The major problem with Nintendo's press event was that it was largely old news and not the announcements that people were hoping for. They spent a fair bit of time talking about the Wii Motion Plus which they announced and showed at length last year but doesn't come out until this week. Nothing spectacular was shown with this, just another demo of Wii Sports Resort which was also announced last year. The Wii Fit was also talked about at length and they announced a new expansion for the Wii Fit with some new exercises and stuff for those that still use the Wii Fit, all 2 of you. Other than those disappointments, this year was the year of Mario. A number of new Mario titles were announced including a new Super Mario Bros which allows up to 4 people to play at once and Mario Galaxy 2. Other than Mario which didn't seem to overly excite many people, the only other major announcement was a new Metroid game. While it looks interesting, I am not a Metroid fan so I can't say it had my jumping up and down and it didn't seem to get that big of reaction from the crowd. There was no news about a Zelda game or anything that people were expecting other than after the event, one of the Nintendo people said one was in the works. Generally, it was a complete snooze although a 4 player Mario does look interesting.

Finally, the last to present was Sony. Unlike Nintendo, this one was pretty exciting too although just slightly below the Microsoft event. They demo'd a bunch of major new games that nearly all look amazing including Assassins Creed 2, Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker and even my personal favorite, God of War 3. There were a ton of great looking games announced but they took a back seat to the two major announcements, the PSP Go which I have already blogged about here and here, as well as their own version of motion control that looks like the Wiimote's uglier, more powerful cousin. While it kicks the butt of the Wii motion control, its not quite as impressive as Project Natal. Overall, they put on a great event.

Between Microsoft and Sony, this was an amazing year at E3 which Nintendo gave everybody a great nap opportunity. This certainly looks to be an exciting time for gamers over the next year and I can't wait to play the many games that are coming out. What did you think of everything that happened at E3 this year?

-Jeremy “pcnerd37″ Bray

Tagged as: E3, Games, Gaming, Mario, Microsoft, Nintendo, Nintendo DS, press conferences, Project Natal, PS3, PSP, PSP Go, social media, Sony, Wii Fit, Xbox 360 1 Comment

4Jun/090

Russia launches anit-trust probe against Microsoft because it hates Vista

Greetings Readers!

Russia's state anti-monopoly service has decided to launch an antitrust probe of Microsoft because it hates Vista. Apparently Russia is complaining that Microsoft is cutting back on its shipments of Windows XP even though there is still demand for it. It seems Russia would rather use an old, far more insecure operating system than use Vista. They claim it is because there is still a demand for it which doesn't make a whole lot of sense because Microsoft certainly isn't the only company to have ever killed or in this case slowed down shipping a product that still had a demand for it. I have come up with two theories as to why this is happening. First, they really hate Vista. Despite the fact that it has been giving me trouble as of late, Vista isn't bad enough that it would warrant this kind of response. My second theory is that the botnet and virus writers have infiltrated the Russian anti-monopoly office and are doing everything they can to keep people on an insecure operating system they can more easily exploit. Personally, I favor the second option.

The hearing is set for July 24th so hopefully more will be revealed then. What is your theory?

-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray

Tagged as: anit-monopoly, anti-trust probe, Demand for XP, Microsoft, Russia, Vista hate, Windows Vista, Windows XP No Comments

4Jun/090

Microsoft launches Bing Travel for booking your next trip

Greetings Readers!

As part of its new Bing search engine, Microsoft has launched Bing Travel. Bing Travel seems to be very much like every other travel service out there just with a look that is pleasing to the eye. So far, I don't see anything that would make me jump from my favorite travel service (sidestep), but it does have some interesting selling points including price prediction, fare alerts and content from MSN Travel.

Bing Travel

I will hold of judgement on the service until I get a real chance to test it out, but if you are looking to make some travel plans in the near future, give Bing Travel a shot and let me know how you think it compares to services you have used before.

-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray

Tagged as: Bing, Bing Travel, flights, hotels, Microsoft, travel comparison, travel search engine No Comments

4Jun/090

Windows 7 to hit stores October 22nd

Greetings Readers!

Microsoft has announced on the Windows 7 Team Blog that Windows 7 will be in stores on October 22, 2009. Windows 7 should hit RTM (release to manufacturing) sometime in the second have of July. Half of the mystery still remains as we don't know what Windows 7 will cost other than the fact that it will be more expensive than Vista.

Personally, I can't wait for it to be released. As I stated on episode #25 of the Global Geek News Podcast, I have loved nearly every minute I have spent with Windows 7 (BSOD aside). I think it is by far the best OS that I have ever used and it is an amazing improvement over Vista. If I had to pick a favorite feature, it would be the new taskbar. Anyway, I hope time flies so I can replace the RC on my main computer with the retail version of Windows 7.

-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray

Tagged as: Microsoft, Vista, Windows 7, Windows 7 pricing, Windows 7 release date No Comments

12May/090

Microsoft finally advertises its biggest advantage over the iPod, cost