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robertogreco + microsoft   74

Redesigning the Windows Logo
"Paula asked us a simple question, “your name is Windows. Why are you a flag?”

…But if you look back to the origins of the logo you see that it really was meant to be a window. "Windows" really is a beautiful metaphor for computing and with the new logo we wanted to celebrate the idea of a window, in perspective. Microsoft and Windows are all about putting technology in people's hands to empower them to find their own perspectives. And that is what the new logo was meant to be. We did less of a re-design and more to return it to its original meaning and bringing Windows back to its roots – reimagining the Windows logo as just that – a window."
windows  history  pentagram  paulascher  microsoft  windows8  logo 
february 2012 by robertogreco
A Brief Rant on the Future of Interaction Design
"The next time you make breakfast, pay attention to the exquisitely intricate choreography of opening cupboards and pouring the milk — notice how your limbs move in space, how effortlessly you use your weight and balance. The only reason your mind doesn't explode every morning from the sheer awesomeness of your balletic achievement is that everyone else in the world can do this as well.

With an entire body at your command, do you seriously think the Future Of Interaction should be a single finger?"

[via: http://twitter.com/debcha/status/134055293440106497 ]

[follow-up: http://worrydream.com/ABriefRantOnTheFutureOfInteractionDesign/responses.html ]
interactiondesign  design  future  ux  ui  touch  apple  microsoft  haptic  senses  2011  hands  human  humans  complexity  bretvictor  from delicious
november 2011 by robertogreco
Why Microsoft's Vision Of The Future Is Dead On Arrival | Co. Design
"Futuristic interfaces are supposed to solve problems and make life easier. What good are they--besides being eye candy--if the future around them is picture-perfect already? The Microsoft video takes that conceit of perfection and carries it so far that the concepts begin to look ridiculous: You can pick out all kinds of clever touches, such as the way the images on a computer screen can be dragged off screen to become holograms--and then can be controlled with gestures. But by that point, we're way off in future land, where none of these clever touches feel rooted in life. They don't address problems we understand."
berg  berglondon  microsoft  future  problemsolving  realism  johnpavlus  johngruber  interfaces  minorityreport  conceptvideos  2011  interactiondesign  from delicious
october 2011 by robertogreco
FYIFV - Wikipedia
"FYIFV (standing for "Fuck You, I'm Fully Vested") or FYIV[1] is a piece of early Microsoft jargon that has become an urban legend: that employees whose stock options were fully vested (that is, could be exercised) would occasionally wear T-shirts or buttons with the initials "FYIFV" to indicate they were sufficiently financially independent to give their honest opinions and leave any time they wished.

In internal usage at Microsoft, it was meant metaphorically to describe intransigent co-workers. In press usage and popular culture, it is often used to imply a predatory business culture reaching even to the programmers."
microsoft  history  attitude  honesty  work  businessculture  behavior  money  wealth 
october 2011 by robertogreco
ChronoZoom
history  visualization  timelines  via:joguldi  microsoft  classideas  from delicious
august 2011 by robertogreco
The beginning of the end of Google, and why Apple is the creator's friend | Technology | guardian.co.uk
"He's extremely tough on Google, stating that the era of search is over because of the rise of specialist search through apps, that Google "about to get a taste of what the music industry has been dealing with for a decade" as the tech world changes around it. He makes the astute observation that it was the lack of differentiation, what appeared to be the equality of information online, that undermined credible brands…

He's evangelical about the iPad and iPhone as devices because of their massive adoption rate, but goes on to say that HTML5 is the greatest creative and business opportunity for content creators since Google and Microsoft began to monopolise and monetize the content of others over the past twelve years…

"Near term, focus your platform strategy on Apple," he advises musicians. "Long term, focus on HTML5. The sooner you commit to HTML5, the more likely you will produce something of economic value."
google  apple  technology  trends  html5  microsoft  applications  iphone  ipad  search  rogermcnamee  web  online  internet  from delicious
july 2011 by robertogreco
There Is One Apple, But Many Microsofts: The Company You Don’t Know | Epicenter | Wired.com
"But now, even as I (like most everyone else) use more of Apple’s stuff, I think I’m more fascinated by Microsoft — particularly the Microsoft that most of us don’t usually think about."
apple  microsoft  organizations  timcarmody  2011  business  software  revenue  hardware  from delicious
july 2011 by robertogreco
The Coming Cloud Wars: Google+ vs Microsoft (plus Facebook) | Epicenter | Wired.com
"Right now, it’s easy to share links, pictures, location and videos on Google+. Soon, it’ll be equally easy to share maps, office documents, news and shopping deals.<br />
That’s where things really get interesting — particularly if Google can turn its identity system into the kind of purchasing system that Apple and Amazon have, pairing it with its advertising power and ever-present mobile phones to create a virtual mobile wallet.<br />
If Silicon Valley were hosting a basketball tournament for consumer money and mindshare in the cloud, right now we’d be looking at a Final Four of Google, Apple (plus Twitter), Microsoft (plus Facebook) and Amazon (especially if they can make a compelling tablet). Apple just had its earnings call; Microsoft’s is tomorrow.<br />
The stakes are high, the players are ready. It’s a fun time to be a fan."
timcarmody  google+  google  amazon  apple  facebook  microsoft  skype  twitter  social  cloud  cloudcomputing  identity  sharing  notification  communication  bing  search  spotify  from delicious
july 2011 by robertogreco
prosthetic knowledge: Photosynth app out for iOS
"Just tried this photo panorama app out on the iPod Touch. Its free, and can take photos from all angles in a good interface, although the output is limited - quality is not as good as some of the other panorama apps out there. Also, images can be sent to Facebook, Photosynth or Bing Maps.<br />
<br />
Worth checking out, but far from perfect."<br />
<br />
[See also: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/photosynth_for_ios_build_panorama_images_integrate.php ]
photosynth  ios  iphone  applications  microsoft  images  photography  maps  mapping  bing  bingmaps  facebook  from delicious
april 2011 by robertogreco
Nokia’s Burning Ships strategy | asymco
"Leaders motivating followers by removing means to surrender or retreat is not uncommon. It’s harsh & brutal. It’s not a natural thing do do: destroying perfectly useful options is value destructive & generates outrage, even mutiny.<br />
<br />
In Nokia’s case, institutional inertia with a vestigial Symbian effort would compel the organization to maintain the current platform while treating the new alternative as a pathogen.<br />
<br />
Counter-distruption theory states that the response to a disruption requires a focused approach through an autonomous challenger protected from corporate antibodies by the CEO herself. In this case, the autonomous organization is outside the company (Microsoft). Protecting the new effort was not possible w/ a Chinese wall. The only alternative was to simply get rid of the old & start w/ a clean slate…<br />
<br />
…Nokia’s new CEO did not just jump off a “burning platform” but that once he jumped he made sure it kept burning so that nobody thought of going back on board."
microsoft  nokia  asymco  mobile  strategy  leadership  management  disruption  2011  symbian  administration  from delicious
february 2011 by robertogreco
What is Kodu | Projects | Fuse Labs
"What is Kodu: A visual programming language made specifically for creating games. Accessible for children and enjoyable for anyone."
programming  education  games  kodu  kids  edg  srg  microsoft  xbox360  from delicious
december 2010 by robertogreco
Microsoft Small Basic
"Mirosoft Small Basic puts the "fun" back into computer programming. W/ a friendly development environment that is very easy to master, it eases both kids & adults into the world of programming.<br />
<br />
Small Basic combines a friendly environment w/ a very simple language & a rich & engaging set of libraries to make your programs & games pop. In a matter of few lines of code, you will be well on your way to creating your very own game!<br />
<br />
Share your programs with your friends; let them import your published programs and run them on their computer. Using the Silverlight player, you can even post your games on your blogs and websites for them to play your creations in the browser.<br />
Gradual<br />
<br />
Learn the programming concepts starting with the fundamentals and move your way up. Small Basic is based on .NET & what you learn here could be easily applied to other .NET programming languages like Visual Basic…using a built-in conversion utility."
smallbasic  microsoft  coding  education  learning  howto  tutorials  edg  srg  windows  programming  basic  kids  visualbasic  from delicious
december 2010 by robertogreco
4 (More) Tools for Teaching Kids to Code
"We wrote a story earlier this fall with 4 suggestions for some of our favorite programming tools aimed at kids. And that list is worth repeating: the graphical programming language Scratch, the programmable robotics of Lego Mindstorms, the 3D programming environment Alice, and the Android App Inventor.<br />
<br />
But in the spirit of National Computer Education Week and the hopes that we can encourage more kids not just to use technology but to build technology, here's a list of 4 more: Kodu, Small Basic, Arduino, and Squeak"
programming  education  children  coding  tools  scratch  kodu  microsoft  arduino  android  edg  srg  tcsnmy  lego  legomindstorms  alice  androidappinventor  smallapp  squeak  glvo  xbox360  mac  windows  via:thelibrarianedge  from delicious
december 2010 by robertogreco
Comic Chat « Snarkmarket
"did not know that a thing called Microsoft Comic Chat ever existed, but now I want it to exist again. Ideally as a web app. Ideally with the option to save comic-chats and post them on your blog.<br />
<br />
Check out the expression selector in the lower right corner! Seriously—I love this."
microsoftcomicchat  comics  comicchat  microsoft  snarkmarket  chat  from delicious
december 2010 by robertogreco
Blaise Agüera y Arcas, the Mind Behind Bing Maps | Creating - WSJ.com
"applied a coat of blackboard paint to the wall himself because he dislikes odor of whiteboard marker…manages about 60 people…most stimulating meetings…are "jam sessions," in which people riff on each others' ideas…Prototypes are crucial…most productive moments often occur outside office, w/out distraction of meetings. After he has dinner & puts children to bed…he & wife, neuroscientist at UW, often sit side-by-side working on laptops late into night…Though…greater management responsibilities over years…still considers it vital to find time to develop projects on his own. "You see people who evolved in this way, & sometimes it looks like their brains died"…finds driving a car "deadening," so he takes a bus to work from his home, reading or working on his laptop…When young…dismantled things both animal & inanimate, from cameras to guinea pigs, so that he could see how they worked"
blaiseagüerayarcas  meetings  distraction  microsoft  bing  maps  mapping  nightowls  management  administration  leadership  brainstorming  iteration  prototyping  ommuting  cv  buses  cars  driving  howthingswork  detachment  attention  work  howwework  creativity  invention  from delicious
november 2010 by robertogreco
Points of control = Rents - O'Reilly Radar
"last night my Dad said to me: "I can't stand Microsoft and avoid it as much as I can. I've switched to Ubuntu because I got tired of paying Bill Gates a tax so he could run a charity." I thought that was funny."
billgates  microsoft  government  tax  charities  charity  economics  policy  us 
october 2010 by robertogreco
Dawn of a New Day « Ray Ozzie
"to cope with the inherent complexity of a world of devices, a world of websites, and a world of apps & personal data that is spread across myriad devices & websites, a simple conceptual model is taking shape that brings it all together. We’re moving toward a world of 1) cloud-based continuous services that connect us all and do our bidding, and 2) appliance-like connected devices enabling us to interact with those cloud-based services."
rayozzie  cloudcomputing  2010  2005  1939  mobile  technology  microsoft  computing  future  complexity  trends  cloud  connecteddevices  continuousservices  ubicomp  networkedurbanism  from delicious
october 2010 by robertogreco
Kodu Offers Pop-Up Computer Programming for Children - NYTimes.com
"Kodu, built by a team at Microsoft’s main campus outside Seattle, is a programming environment that runs on an Xbox 360, using the game console’s controller rather than a keyboard. Instead of typing if/then statements in a syntax that must be memorized — as adult programmers do — the student uses the Xbox controller to pop up menus that contain options from which to choose. Kodu itself resembles a video game, with a point-and-click interface instead of the thousand-lines-of-text coding tools used by grown-ups."
microsoft  xbox  xbox360  programming  scratch  education  learning  children  games  gaming  gamedesign  criticalthinking  edg  srg  tcsnmy  kodu  interface  iteration  computing  classideas  coding  from delicious
september 2010 by robertogreco
How Oracle might kill Google’s Android and software patents all at once — RoughlyDrafted Magazine
"Google doesn’t even have any experience in creating software platforms, having only ever launched a series of web apps and services that are supported by its single revenue machine: paid search, an idea that it appropriated from Overture! Recall that, in a “this all happened before” kind of way, Yahoo bought Overture and then used its new aggrieved subsidiary to demand 2.7 million shares of Google to license the rights to paid search. Google is nothing but a series of infringements snowballed together.<br />
<br />
Anyone who thinks Google looks before it leaps has forgotten that Google only ever leaps, buying up regular new companies on a schedule rather than with a strategy, and blowing out one failed project after another… Google acts like a white trash family who won the world’s largest lottery, which is why it behaves just like Microsoft. Some companies actually early their revenues in a competitive marketplace, and have for generations of technology, like say, Apple."
2010  android  apple  oracle  opensource  microsoft  java  technology  software  property  ip  google  patents  from delicious
august 2010 by robertogreco
Lessons from Google Wave and MSFT Kin « Scott Berkun [via: http://berglondon.com/blog/2010/08/13/friday-links/]
"Wave was weird, but cheap. Compared to Kin, which likely involved dozens of people & man-months, Wave was likely done by small team. That was biggest cost! If you’re going to have failures, even visible ones, better cheap & small, than expensive & large…<br />
<br />
easy metric of innovation culture is learning—are people at all levels learning, sharing & growing from whatever happens, good or bad. Not lip-service. But actual learning, where people admit mistakes or oversights & what they might have done differently (rather than witch-hunt many big companies confuse w/ learning).<br />
<br />
…starts w/ leaders, & leaders on Kin or Wave have much fodder to work w/. Are they going to share what they learned? Progress awaits if they do. But resentment, confusion & high odds for [repeating] will fester if they don’t.<br />
<br />
Anywhere people learn from success & failure will outpace places that lack courage to look at failures w/ eyes open & learn from it, as well as places that don’t learn anything at all."
tcsnmy  change  innovation  risks  risktaking  learning  organizations  business  google  googlewave  scale  experience  culture  management  progress  sharing  failure  microsoft  microsoftkin  kin  smallandcheap  leadership  administration  lcproject  cost  unschooling  deschooling  ownership  incentives  motivation  punishment  courage  success  from delicious
august 2010 by robertogreco
41Latitude - Bing Maps's Redesign: The Good, The Bad, & The Ugly
"As you can see from my examples, this was not some incremental improvement that Microsoft gave to Bing Maps—no, this was a vast overhaul. In truth, it seems as though Microsoft has left nothing unchanged in the “new” Bing Maps. And yet even though the “new” maps are unusually light on detail (especially in how few cities they seem to show), they’re now among the most aesthetically pleasing maps on the web.<br />
<br />
On an unrelated note, I find the similarities between Windows Phone 7’s UI and the “new” Bing Maps to be quite curious: both use Segoe fonts, both are unflinchingly minimalistic, and both are dramatic breaks from their predecessors. Maybe this really is a new direction for Microsoft."
via:migurski  maps  mapping  microsoft  cartography  design  aesthetics  bing  labels  from delicious
august 2010 by robertogreco
Entelligence: Let's get digital -- Engadget
"one of the things I like about WP7 is that it's not a digital UI pretending to be analog. The user interface is flat...no photorealistic depictions of real world items, no shading, & no 3D effects. Everything is conveyed through the use of fonts, shapes & color. It's digital & it's proud. Overall, I like it, & the more I use it, the more I prefer it. Returning to a more digital approach means Microsoft was able to rethink the nature of applications and services and create the concept of hubs, where like functions meet similar functions w/out need for separate applications. It takes some getting used to, but the more I use it, the more natural it feels."

[via: http://twitter.com/tcarmody/status/20098622824 ]
analog  digital  technology  design  wp7  windowsphone7  microsoft  ui  ux  skeumorphs  skeuomorph  windowsphonemetro 
august 2010 by robertogreco
SpeEdChange: What I wish Bill Gates had learned about education from Microsoft
"What most frustrates me is that Gates doesn't even seem to have learned the lessons which his company could have taught him. It is a classic case of a smart person letting what he doesn't know overwhelm what he does, which is turning out sad for all of us....
billgates  education  technology  microsoft  tcsnmy  lcproject  policy  influence  understanding  learning  experience  rttt  nclb  gatesfoundation  money  power  ignorance  tracking  standardization  agesegregation  standards  accountability  2010  open  cheating  choice  individualized  business  elitism  irasocol 
july 2010 by robertogreco
Microsoft Education Competencies: All Competencies
"Individual Excellence: Building Effective Teams, Compassion...Humor, Integrity & Trust, Interpersonal Skill, Listening, Managing Relationships, Managing Vision & Purpose, Motivating Others, Negotiating, Personal Learning & Development, Valuing Diversity"

[via: http://stevemiranda.wordpress.com/2010/06/28/what-big-companies-like-microsoft-are-looking-for-in-job-applicants/ ]
microsoft  development  education  training  hr  standards  competency  competencies  leadership  21stcenturyskills  management  skills  ambiguity  qualities  tcsnmy  learning  unschooling  deschooling  lcproject  whatmatters  administration 
june 2010 by robertogreco
Geek Power: Steven Levy Revisits Tech Titans, Hackers, Idealists | Magazine
"Unlike the original hackers, Zuckerberg’s generation didn’t have to start from scratch to get control of their machines. “I never wanted to take apart my computer,” he says. As a budding hacker in the late ’90s, Zuckerberg tinkered with the higher-level languages, allowing him to concentrate on systems rather than machines.
future  facebook  economics  microsoft  opensource  hackers  hacking  history  copyright  computing  computers  business  technology  programming  gamechanging  idealism  futurism  culture  books 
may 2010 by robertogreco
State of the Internet Operating System Part Two: Handicapping the Internet Platform Wars - O'Reilly Radar
"This post provides a conceptual framework for thinking about the strategic and tactical landscape ahead. Once you understand that we're building an Internet Operating System, that some players have most of the pieces assembled, while others are just getting started, that some have a plausible shot at a "go it alone" strategy while others are going to have to partner, you can begin to see the possibilities for future alliances, mergers and acquisitions, and the technologies that each player has to acquire in order to strengthen their hand.
amazon  facebook  google  twitter  apple  microsoft  yahoo  future  cloudcomputing  cloud  timoreilly  web  payment  infrastructure  mediaaccess  media  monetization  location  maps  mapping  claendars  scheduling  communication  chat  email  voice  video  speechrecognition  imagerecognition  mobile  iphone  nexusone  internet  browsers  safari  chrome  books  music  itunes  photography  content  advertising  ads  storage  computing  computation  hosting 
may 2010 by robertogreco
Ribbon Hero
"Ribbon Hero is a game for Word, PowerPoint, and Excel 2007 and 2010, designed to help you boost your Office skills and knowledge. Play games (aka "challenges"), score points, and compete with your friends while improving your productivity with Office. As a concept test, this add-in is not supported, but is an opportunity for you to try out an idea we are working on and let us know what you think. For additional challenges and the opportunity to earn more points, download Office 2010 Beta."

[via: http://www.sippey.com/2010/01/ribbon-hero.html ]
office2007  ribbon  playfulness  education  microsoft  games  development  training  powerpoint  office  excel  play 
january 2010 by robertogreco
ITL Research: Innovative Teaching and Learning
"ITL Research is a multiyear global research program designed to investigate the factors that promote the transformation of teaching practices and the impact those changes have on students’ learning outcomes across a broad range of country contexts."
teaching  learning  microsoft  education  research 
january 2010 by robertogreco
Tuttle SVC: The Pivotal Education "Innovation" of the Decade
"I'm generally of the view that there is nothing new under the sun when it comes to education, and a lot of standard discourse about "change" is really just pendulum-swinging. But I think there is at least one new thing from the past decade (in US public, primary and secondary education) which deserves special mention: schools completely and unabashedly optimized to increase the scores on two (or three or one) specific tests, especially new schools built from the ground up for that specific purpose....Honorable Mention #1: Broad Academy
innovation  education  testing  assessment  optimization  olpc  broadacademy  microsoft  tomhoffman  2009  00s  2008 
january 2010 by robertogreco
Tale of Tales» A bad year for dreams
Provocative post with many comments. "2009 Was another triumphant year for the Wii & DS. Nintendo has successfully introduced the general public to playing games on computer hardware... far from a triumph for the medium of videogames. ..Nintendo didn’t do much. ... Rather than trying to start a revolution with a brand new medium, they had a good look at the way people play today & made digital versions of those activities. They basically made it possible for people to play the kinds of games they were already enjoying, on their television sets. Some may celebrate this as the breakthrough of videogames into the mainstream. I don’t. I hope this is just a temporary setback in the evolution of the medium. I’m not a big fan of huge corporations, but I do share, to some extent, the dreams that Sony & Microsoft have about the interactive medium. With them, I see videogames as the great new art form of the new century. Videogames as the cinema, television & pop music of the young millennium."
games  gaming  videogames  art  sony  microsoft  nintendo  play  lifestyle  2009  genre 
december 2009 by robertogreco
Now Is It Facebook’s Microsoft Moment?
"I don’t have time for this. I don’t have time to try and figure out the myriad of ways that Facebook may or may not want to use my information. That’s why I almost shut down my entire account this week. It would be a hell of a lot easier than this mess.
via:preoccupations  facebook  socialmedia  future  privacy  internet  controversy  microsoft  socialnetworking  data  google  security  media  life 
december 2009 by robertogreco
Google Apps scores in LA, with assist from Microsoft - cloud computing, Google, google apps, GovCloud - CIO
"Los Angeles City Council approved a $US7.25 million five-year deal Tuesday in which the city will adopt Gmail and other Google Apps.
google  losangeles  cloudcomputing  googleapps  microsoft 
october 2009 by robertogreco
hello typepad: A Library to Last Forever
"The spectre of the spectre of lost books is horrifying. Google is in a better position to solve this problem then Amazon, but Google has squandered the public trust (even moreso than Apple and Microsoft, which is shocking). Sergey makes an impassioned defense of books and by proxy, of his company."
books  google  apple  microsoft  trust  amazon 
october 2009 by robertogreco
Project Tuva: Enhanced Video Player Home - Microsoft Research
education  science  richardfeynman  lectures  tuva  microsoft  billgates  physics  free  video  tutorials  learning 
july 2009 by robertogreco
Designtalks - Videos - Ben Cerveny - Play at creativity
"[1] exploring boundaries... [2] tweaking the knobs... [3] call and response [games]... [4] drawing boxes...main difference between play and a game is that you apply a metric to a game...[in a game] you quantize the results of play...you add a goal [to play creating a game]... [5] improvisation... experimentation... distilling patterns... play = understanding possibilities [exploring boundaries], game allows you to come to a systemic conclusion about goals... [6] forming the party... [7] finding the patterns... [8] incentive for interaction [project Natal]... [9] literacy in system models... [10] collaborative creativity... [legos at SXSW]"
bencerveny  play  creativity  collaboration  video  games  videogames  cognition  literacy  design  interaction  flickr  stamendesign  gne  metadata  visualization  rules  arg  observation  patterns  patternrecognition  experimentation  via:preoccupations  psychology  wow  set  natal  microsoft  simcity  systems  flow  modeling  conversation 
july 2009 by robertogreco
Xbox.com | Project Natal
See also: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/gamesblog/2009/jun/01/xbox-microsoft
microsoft  projectnatal  natal  augmentedreality  videogames  gaming  games  play  interactive  interface  interaction  body  design  future  xbox360  xbox  tracking  motion 
july 2009 by robertogreco
Procrastineering - Project blog for Johnny Chung Lee: Project Natal
"
johnnychunglee  microsoft  projectnatal  multitouch  interface  technology  future  games  interactive  gaming  videogames  xbox360  xbox  procrastineering  natal 
july 2009 by robertogreco
Blind Search
"Type in a search query above, hit search then vote for the column which you believe best matches your query. The columns are randomised with every query.
search  google  bing  microsoft  yahoo  searchengine  comparison  blind 
june 2009 by robertogreco
Microsoft To Shutter Encarta, Read All About It On Wikipedia
"Microsoft is preparing to shut down Encarta, the digital encyclopedia it first launched in 1993 as a direct competitor to old reference standbys like Encyclopedia Britannica. The encyclopedia, which for years was based on optical media and eventually made its way to the web too, grew quickly in the mid to late 90’s as a reference guide that was more convenient than book-based encyclopedias and was available for a tiny fraction of the price. According to its FAQ, Encarta’s web sites will be discontinued on October 31, 2009 (Except for Japan, which has until December 31, 2009). Microsoft will also stop selling the Encarta products by June."
wikipedia  microsoft  encarta  encyclopedias  reference  online 
march 2009 by robertogreco
SeaDragon Mobile: Microsoft's First Ever iPhone App
"SeaDragon Mobile is pretty much a demo of Microsoft Live Labs' photo display platform (also seen in Photosynth). Users can use the app to zoom in on photos with incredible resolution. The app achieves this by storing different resolutions, and shows only the portions needed at any given time."
iphone  applications  mobile  microsoft  seadragon  photography  images 
december 2008 by robertogreco
Small Basic Teaches Kids How to Program - ReadWriteWeb
"After a year in the making, and with very little fanfare, Microsoft last month launched Small Basic, a free programming language aimed at kids. Unlike Scratch and Alice, tools designed for kids to learn programming in a 'codeless' environment, Small Basic is essentially a small version of the BASIC language.
children  basic  programming  learning  education  coding  microsoft 
november 2008 by robertogreco
Why Microsoft and Intel tried to kill the XO $100 laptop - Times Online
"Nicholas Negroponte had a vision: to build a $100 laptop and give away millions to educate the world’s poorest children. And then the fat-cat multinationals got scared and broke it... "
olpc  microsoft  intel  capitalism  competition  negroponte  linux  laptops  education  technology  economics  business  opensource  mit 
august 2008 by robertogreco
Instant-Messagers Really Are About Six Degrees from Kevin Bacon - washingtonpost.com
"With records of 30 billion electronic conversations among 180 million people from around the world, researchers have concluded that any two people on average are distanced by just 6.6 degrees of separation, meaning that they could be linked by a string of seven or fewer acquaintances...What we're seeing suggests there may be a social connectivity constant for humanity...this idea goes beyond folklore."
society  culture  socialnetworking  internet  networking  research  sociology  complexity  im  microsoft  sixdegrees  communication  geography  socialnetworks  social  study 
august 2008 by robertogreco
Technische Universiteit Eindhoven: Ennea
"Ennea records real-life data by looking at social contact and interaction between pupils within a school environment. This is done with mobile-networked objects, which can be carried around by the pupils."
social  children  youth  teens  interaction  personalinformatics  ethanzuckerman  microsoft  finance  mobilephones  behavior  design  socialnetworks  arduino  surveillance  privacy  socialization  schooling  edg  xbee  wireless  microcontrollers 
july 2008 by robertogreco
WorldChanging: Social Lions, Fiscally-Literate Mobile Phones
"set of small, cute, wireless-aware objects that students carried with them for a few weeks. The objects measured interactions between children, timing the interactions each child had, and whether they were with individuals or groups."
social  children  youth  teens  interaction  personalinformatics  ethanzuckerman  microsoft  finance  mobilephones  behavior  design  socialnetworks  arduino  surveillance  privacy  socialization  schooling  edg  xbee  wireless  microcontrollers 
july 2008 by robertogreco
Microsoft | The meaning of Bill Gates | Economist.com
"Watching Microsoft in company of Google & Facebook is a bit like watching your dad trying to be cool....Gates had good fortune to be perfectly suited for his time—but is less well-equipped for collaborative & fragmented era of internet computing."
microsoft  billgates  collaboration  google  facebook  leadership  management  future  generations  business  administration  society  change  internet  socialnetworking 
july 2008 by robertogreco
Why Brazil Loves Linux : Gustavo Duarte
"So that’s it. I think these are the main factors in Brazil’s love affair with Linux: economics, disregard for copyright, anti-Microsoft sentiment, and massive alpha geek support. These factors feed off each other, all pushing towards Linux. Millions
brasil  business  computing  culture  linux  microsoft  economics  copyright  opensource 
june 2008 by robertogreco
http://vavatch.co.uk/guide/
"This is a complete walkthrough for the Internet game of the Spielberg movie 'A.I.'. It gives away everything and speculates like mad. It's written linearly and assumes no background knowledge. You'll be able to find out about the latest updates of The Gu
ai  arg  walkthrough  games  gaming  marketing  cloudmakers  tv  film  microsoft  mysteries 
june 2008 by robertogreco
cloudmakers.org
"On April 11, 2001, Cloudmakers was founded as a discussion group for the interative web game centered around the film A.I. We officially solved the game on July 24, 2001. Though the original game, The Beast, has ended, Cloudmakers now serves as a clearin
arg  games  gaming  play  gamedesign  2001  ai  community  entertainment  microsoft  participation  hivemind  perplexcity  pervasive  marketing  interactive 
june 2008 by robertogreco
Microsoft announces more clues in Vanishing Point puzzle game
"Created to coincide with the launch of Windows Vista at the end of the month the top prize is a trip into space for one lucky entrant. But unlike competitions on Pocket-lint entrants to the Vanishing Point are expected to circumnavigate the globe in an a
cities  games  gaming  arg  ubiquitous  play  microsoft  marketing  2007  gamedesign  puzzles  travel 
june 2008 by robertogreco
Mute magazine - Culture and politics after the net
"joy of hacking comes more from creation of something new & clever not simply ‘breaking’ into a system while still maintaining its previous paradigm. Breaking into a system to explore how it works [qualifies]...for commercial gain [does not]"
politics  internet  net  governance  power  networks  government  protocols  hacking  anarchy  anarchism  digital  sovereignty  privacy  timberners-lee  cyberspace  alexandergalloway  vintcerf  history  policy  corporations  google  theory  microsoft  w3c 
may 2008 by robertogreco
ivan krstić · code culture » Sic Transit Gloria Laptopi
"OLPC has a responsibility to spread the culture of freedom and ideas that support its educational mission; that cannot be done by only offering a proprietary operating system for the laptops."
olpc  opensource  linux  learning  hardware  economics  politics  software  sugar  philosophy  mac  osx  xo  microsoft  windows  culture  technology  business  education  development 
may 2008 by robertogreco
The day the music died [dive into mark]
"This is a letter I sent to my father to explain what it means that Microsoft is pulling support for MSN Music. Tech issues like this often bubble up into the media that he reads, but they are rarely explained well. My father assumes I have an opinion on
drm  copyright  apple  microsoft  eff  business  itunes  mp3 
may 2008 by robertogreco
Architecture astronauts take over - Joel on Software
"these smart kids, cream of our universities, are working on hopeless & useless architecture astronomy because these companies are like cancers, driven to grow at all cost, even though they can't think of a single useful thing to build for us"
microsoft  joelonsoftware  programming  business  google  jobs  mesh  windows  development  software 
may 2008 by robertogreco
A VC: The Declining Power Of The Firm
"like government's pursuit of Microsoft in 90s, it will not...bring change to marketplace...will be rise of new way, like open source movement fundamentally changed software marketplace, that will bring change that is badly needed to financial markets."
business  umairhaque  change  economics  innovation  internet  microsoft  online  strategy  technology  trends  gamechanging  regulation  finance  via:preoccupations  banking  tylercowen  information  reform  recession  history  competition  control  crisis 
april 2008 by robertogreco
Being Human: Human-Computer Interaction in the Year 2020
"Computer technologies are not neutral – they are laden with human, cultural and social values. We need to define a new agenda for human-computer interaction in the 21st century – one that anticipates and shapes the impact of technology rather than si
body  computer  computing  interface  future  microsoft  research  technology  interaction  hci 
april 2008 by robertogreco
Tuttle SVC: More Idle Speculation on Something that Won't Happen: How Microsoft could p0wn OLPC
"It seems to me that Microsoft needs a greenfield OS project. They need to mothball XP, and all these cheap laptops that can't run Vista will just drag them down further."
olpc  windows  microsoft  os 
march 2008 by robertogreco
Online social networks | Everywhere and nowhere | Economist.com
"So it is entirely conceivable that social networking, like web-mail, will never make oodles of money. That, however, in no way detracts from its enormous utility."...“E-mail in the wider sense is the most important social network"
business  internet  socialsoftware  socialnetworking  email  linkedin  thunderbird  facebook  myspace  tahoo  google  microsoft  aol  bebo  webmail  via:cityofsound 
march 2008 by robertogreco
Technology Review: TR10: Modeling Surprise
"Combining massive quantities of data, insights into human psychology, and machine learning can help manage surprising events, says Eric Horvitz."
microsoft  predictions  simulations  traffic  transportation  urban  blackswans  context-awareness  nassimtaleb 
march 2008 by robertogreco
ongoing · Blows Against the Empire
"Then I saw “Open as as a Google Document” and I tried and, you know, it’s Good Enough. And snappy. And free. And internationalized. And I’m not the only person having this experience."
googledocs  google  webapps  microsoft  office  via:preoccupations  online  productivity 
february 2008 by robertogreco
Screw Microsoft Word - Featured on BuzzFeed
"Like Howard Beale in Network, many longtime Microsoft Word users are mad as hell, and they're not going to take it anymore. So they're abandoning Word in droves, turning instead to Google Docs and other more elegant, intuitive, user-friendly apps such as
wordprocessing  microsoft  office  text  googledocs  writeroom  scrivener  trends 
january 2008 by robertogreco
Saffo: journal: Davos and Gates Foundation 2.0
"Now history is about to repeat itself, as the charitable innovations of the Google founders and Bill Gates inspire their peers to meet – and exceed—their visions."
paulsaffo  billgates  microsoft  google  competition  davos  generosity  innovation  history  foundations  change  future 
january 2008 by robertogreco
Turning Business Education on its Head
"How Anne Kirah and the 180°academy are promoting creative thinking in business leaders—to ensure that Denmark's economy stays competitive"
innovation  education  learning  creativity  anthropology  business  leadership  competition  denmark  annekirah  microsoft  design 
december 2007 by robertogreco
Charlie's Diary: Commoditizing our future
"A naive soul with no prior experience of consumer capitalism might ask why, instead of doubling in power, the manufacturers don’t concentrate on cutting prices? But that’s not how the industry worked. Until now."
computers  computing  mooreslaw  technology  eeepc  asus  laptops  olpc  economics  hardware  intel  microsoft  business  trends  gamechanging 
november 2007 by robertogreco
Ten things holding back tech - ZDNet UK
"1. Microsoft's stranglehold on the desktop 2. Operator lock-in 3. Input methods 4. Battery life 5. The mania for speed 6. Intellectual property law 7. Skills inequalities 8. Web 2.0 9. National interests 10. The current lack of global wars and/or disaste
future  innovation  technology  trends  progress  information  development  change  microsoft  speed  input  batteries  ip  skills  web2.0  disasters  war  twitter  skype  facebook  leapfrogging  qwerty 
november 2007 by robertogreco
Computer Randomly Plays Classical Music
"During normal operation or in Safe mode, your computer may play "Fur Elise" or "It's a Small, Small World" seemingly at random. This is an indication sent to the PC speaker from the computer's BIOS that the CPU fan is failing or has failed, or that the p
windows  humor  hardware  microsoft  music  sound 
november 2007 by robertogreco
Umberto Eco's piece on Mac and DOS, Catholic and Protestant
"I am firmly of the opinion that the Macintosh is Catholic and that DOS is Protestant. Indeed, the Macintosh...tells the faithful how they must proceed step by step to reach - if not the Kingdom of Heaven"
humor  mac  microsoft  software  religion  philosophy  umbertoeco  computers 
october 2007 by robertogreco
James Governor’s Monkchips » The rise and rise of the social/digital bridgebuilder
"Specialism is a good thing, but its not the only thing. Do you know any good bridge-builders? If you don’t, find some and hire them."
ambientintimacy  blogging  networking  socialnetworks  socialsoftware  people  society  work  yearoff  jobs  generalists  connections  socialnetworking  social  human  brands  branding  microsoft  robertscoble  digital  careers 
october 2007 by robertogreco
Microsoft System Center Ad - (37signals)
"Only Microsoft could possibly see a big panel of buttons and think “this must be what our customers want”."
humor  microsoft  buttons  comments  usability  ux 
october 2007 by robertogreco
Windows Live SkyDrive Beta
"Password-protected online file storage. Always available where you need it."
onlinetoolkit  storage  microsoft  backup  files  windows 
august 2007 by robertogreco
Genius and Misfit Aren’t Synonyms, or Are They? - New York Times
"Perhaps the steady rise in power by faceless teams of engineers, technicians and scientists explains the persistent romantic appeal of the lone misfit."
innovation  microsoft  google  science  technology  invention  progress  history 
june 2007 by robertogreco
A Head For Detail
"Gordon Bell feeds every piece of his life into a surrogate brain, and soon the rest of us will be able to do the same. But does perfect memory make you smarter, or just drive you nuts?"
brain  memory  life  research  profile  search  storage  technology  data  tracking  habits  microsoft  mylifebits  lifelogging 
december 2006 by robertogreco
Microsoft sued by Chilean Indians over Windows translation - Nov. 23, 2006
"Chile's Mapuche Indians allege that Microsoft translated Windows software into their native language without getting tribal leaders' permission."
language  chile  rights  windows  microsoft  law  latinamerica  translation 
november 2006 by robertogreco
Microsoft Live Labs: Photosynth
"The Photosynth Technology Preview is a taste of the newest - and, we hope, most exciting - way to view photos on a computer. Our software takes a large collection of photos of a place or an object, analyzes them for similarities, and then displays the ph
3d  art  design  geotagging  graphics  images  photography  interface  imaging  sharing  space  travel  visualization  virtual  web  windows  world  collaboration  galleries  microsoft 
november 2006 by robertogreco

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