microsoft

Microsoft stirs up a price war in the database market

Even as MySQL and PosgreSQL yank the carpet out from under Oracle and Microsoft, Microsoft is turning the other cheek by cutting Oracle off at the knees on price, as Mary Jo Foley reports:

Microsoft officials announced on September 19 that they have no plans to increase the price of SQL Server 2008 beyond what the company already charges for SQL Server 2005. Microsoft execs also announced that, starting today,… Read more

Google remains king of search

Hitwise released statistics today that showed Google has nearly 64 percent of the U.S. search market, compared to Yahoo's 23 percent, Microsoft's 8 percent and Ask's 3.5 percent. Year-over-year, Google's share inched up, Asks' and Yahoo's were fairly flat and Microsoft lost market share, nearly 4 percentage points.

Meanwhile, Nielsen/NetRatings figures for August 2007 put Google at 53.6 percent U.S. market share, Yahoo at 20 percent, Microsoft at 13 percent and AOL at 5.6 percent.

Senate plans hearing on Google-DoubleClick deal

As expected, the proposed union of Google and ad-tech firm DoubleClick is about to get some congressional scrutiny.

According to an aide, the U.S. Senate Judiciary subcommittee that deals with antitrust issues has scheduled a hearing for September 27 entitled "An Examination of the Google-DoubleClick Merger and the Online Advertising Industry: What Are the Risks for Competition and Privacy?"

A witness list hasn't yet been finalized but is likely to be released Thursday, the subcommittee aide said. But the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that lawyers from Google and its rivals Yahoo and Microsoft are likely … Read more

More on Zimbra: profitable, exploding sales, and open source

This time, I have the numbers from an unimpeachable source close to the company. Zimbra has been doing much better than we knew. Importantly, Zimbra has demonstrated the kind of success one can have in open source, success which would be expensive and difficult to achieve in proprietary software. Here's the real data:

~$6 million in 2006 (bookings) On track to hit $20 million in 2007 (bookings) Most importantly, the company has been profitable on and off, and could be profitable today.

Net net? Maybe not everyone can build a sustainable, innovative business with open source, as Microsoft has slurred. But Zimbra can, and has.

Think about what these numbers mean....… Read more

Microsoft to ship Office PerformancePoint server

Microsoft on Wednesday is scheduled to launch its PerformancePoint Server, the last server to ship as part of its Office 2007 product launch.

The application, which is expected to be available next week, is aimed at business users who model and run financial operations, such as budget planning. It also includes analytical tools built around Excel and other Office applications.

The suite combines three existing products, said Alex Payne, Director of Office Business applications at Microsoft. It will bundle the latest versions of Microsoft's existing Scorecard Manager application for financial monitoring, the analysis tools it gained through its acquisition … Read more

Ignorance (of open source), thy name is Microsoft

Oh, my. We're back to the good old days of Microsoft mythology. I had actually believed that Microsoft had grown up and wised up.

But no. Microsoft's Clint Patterson, public relations director for the Unified Communications Group, had this treasure trove of open-source "wisdom," circa 1998, to share with CNET's Stephen Shankland:

"The open-source development model has yet to demonstrate the ability to support profitable software businesses that can drive the coordinated research and testing necessary to sustain innovation. Many in the open-source software community have shifted to hybrid business models. They are making the same business decisions as any commercial software company in terms of what products and services to give away, what intellectual property to protect, how to generate revenue, and how to participate in the community."

This would all be true if it weren't false.… Read more

Will free office suites supplant Microsoft as the industry leader?

Quite a bit of talk has arisen today over two of Microsoft's competitors (Google and IBM) offering free office suites in an attempt to supplant Microsoft as the office king. And now that this is happened, some are wondering if Microsoft will finally face reality and offer its own Office product for free so it can compete.

The possibility of having Word, Excel, PowerPoint and the rest for free sure sounds awfully nice, but if you think Microsoft would give it up for free, you're dreaming.… Read more

The EU, Microsoft and digital media formats

Correction: this story has been corrected to remove the implication that iTunes sells audio files in formats other than AAC. iTunes did begin selling DRM-free songs earlier this year, but those files are still in the AAC format. Other stores are selling DRM-less MP3s, but not iTunes.

In 1998, the European Commission began investigating Microsoft on grounds that it was illegally using its desktop operating system (OS) monopoly to squeeze into new markets. At some point along the way, RealNetworks complained that Microsoft was repeating its kill-Netscape tactic by bundling the Windows Media player into Windows. In 2004, the EC agreed, … Read more

Xtreme Reality gets your hands on the Web

If you've kept an eye on the gestures scene, you'll be familiar with the concept of controlling various apps and services with hand gestures. The idea is to help you escape the use of traditional peripheral devices like a mouse or joystick in place of your body and hands. Lately we've seen examples from Microsoft, as well as a slick peripheral from 3dconnexion that's specifically been designed for navigating 3D spaces. Xtreme Reality is a software that captures body gestures via Webcam and converts them into keyboard and mouse inputs. You can create your own keyboard … Read more