TechFlash: Seattle's Technology News

January is nearing an end. But before the month closes out, we wanted to share the top 10 most read stories on TechFlash. It was a busy month, from Microsoft layoffs to the Minecode scandal to news that Hearst may pull the plug on the Seattle P-I. February is shaping up as an interesting month, and we'll continue to cover our beats in full force. Thanks to everyone for reading.

Online file storage from ... Dilbert?

Laid-off Microsofties offered free office space, linux servers

Microsoft: Mac Office use is 77%

Brad Smith (Microsoft photo)

Lawyers are usually the ones arguing against corporate blogs, but Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith was pushing for "Microsoft on the Issues," the law and policy blog launched by the company a few weeks ago. Smith, who introduced the blog in this post, is expected to be one of the people posting there regularly.

In an interview, Smith explained his motivation, described the first difficult situation encountered by the blog, and discussed the prospects for Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer ever trying his hand at this blogging stuff. Read on for excerpts from the conversation.

Microsoft solutions adviser Dan Woodman achieved minor celebrity status for getting a tattoo of the company's unofficial "Blue Monster" mascot -- a character created by Hugh MacLeod imploring employees to "change the world or go home." In this impassioned blog post last summer, Woodman expressed his love for Microsoft and explained that he got the tattoo as a daily reminder of that mantra.

In a post this evening, Woodman acknowledged that he was among the 1,400 employees laid off by the company last week. However, he says, he has no plans to give up the Blue Monster. Nor is he giving up on the company.

Former Microsoft employee Miki Mullor responded this afternoon to the company's allegation that he illicitly accessed confidential company documents to support a patent lawsuit filed by his startup over a Microsoft anti-piracy technology. Mullor called the allegations "shameful, dishonest attacks on my character by Microsoft – the company that stole my idea in the first place."

See this earlier post for details of Microsoft's case, and read on for the text of Mullor's statement.

Windows 7 development is proceeding as planned, if not better, judging from a blog post today by Steven Sinofsky. The Windows engineering chief writes that the "next milestone" in the development of the new operating system will be the release candidate. As the term suggests, that's a test version that the company puts out as a proposed finished product.

Sinofsky doesn't give a timeline for the Windows 7 release candidate or the final release. In fact, to avoid any confusion, he explicitly says the post "is in no way an announcement of a ship date, change in plans, or change in our previously described process."

However, the post is one more piece of evidence suggesting that the company is aiming to ship Windows 7 this year.

Microsoft's Surface tabletop computer is being used to coordinate security personnel at this weekend's Super Bowl in Tampa, Fla. See the video below for to get a sense for how it will work. Gizmodo points out that the device could be just as useful for holding Super Bowl snacks.




<a href="http://video.msn.com/?mkt=en-US&playlist=videoByUuids:uuids:286ccd43-a8c8-4fd8-be1f-f942d4da016f&showPlaylist=true&from=msnvideo" target="_new" title="Super Bowl: Microsoft Surface helps police monitor security">Video: Super Bowl: Microsoft Surface helps police monitor security</a>

Almost lost amid the recent news of Microsoft’s unprecedented layoffs was a glimmer of hope for technology job seekers: The company is still hiring.

Microsoft will “continue to hire in most of the areas it has been investing in, areas such as online services, search and cloud computing, to name a few,” a company representative said in a statement this week. Analysts and outside staffing agencies cited Live Search and the Server & Tools Division as two areas where the company is likely to continue bulking up.

Microsoft says a startup founder took a job at the Redmond company under false pretenses, then used his inside access to download confidential documents for a patent complaint his company has since filed against major computer makers.

The latest results from Nintendo and Sony are out, and as expected, the Nintendo Wii continued to dominate the worldwide video-game console market during the critical holiday shopping season. However, Nintendo surprised investors by reducing its forecasts for console sales -- the first big sign that video games may be susceptible to the global economic turmoil.

Michael Sievert

It's always fascinating when stealthy technology companies get acquired before announcing what they are doing. It happened earlier this month when eBay quietly purchased Positronic, a Seattle startup led by former Microsoft search chief Christopher Payne. And now it has happened again with yet another former Microsoft big shot. Lenovo -- the personal computer giant -- today announced the purchase of Seattle-based Switchbox Labs for an undisclosed price.

Led by former Windows marketing vice president Michael Sievert,  Switchbox was relatively unknown until two weeks ago when my TechFlash colleagues uncovered the startup's name and corporate documents.

The big gadget blogs are scratching their heads this morning over the sudden disappearance of Microsoft's Mac software site, Mactopia, but it looks like it's just a problem with the site -- not signaling anything ominous about Microsoft's Mac Business Unit, which makes Office and other Microsoft programs for Apple computers.

Update: The site is back up. In the process of looking into this, I also asked Microsoft about how last week's cutbacks are affecting the Mac BU. Read on for the company's response.

Newly appointed Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz spoke on her first earnings conference call for the company yesterday, and preempted the inevitable questions about the possibility of a Microsoft deal by asking and answering them herself. Here's what she said.

Here's another indication of how much people are liking the preview of Microsoft's next Windows version -- or how much they're not liking Windows Vista. Inspired by podcasting guru Leo Laporte, Windows 7 fan Kelly Poe of Tennessee has started an online campaign calling on Microsoft to just get on with it and release the dang thing already. As in, right now.

One of the AHCS shirts

At the Automated HealthCare Solutions offices in Florida last Thursday morning, chief operating officer Donnie Reynolds was talking with fellow executive Veer Hossain about their hiring needs. Later in the day, Reynolds was reading about Microsoft's plans to cut thousands of jobs.

Shortly after 8 a.m. this morning, they were standing on a chilly street corner outside Microsoft headquarters, offering free cookies and shirts in an effort to persuade some of the Redmond company's excess talent to move to warmer climes. The message on the shirts: "Getting a cold shoulder in Redmond? Upgrade to the warm and fuzzy in Miami."