Microsoft

Microsoft is considering taking a stake in Time Warner's America Online unit, a move that could have significant repercussions in the competitive market of consumer Internet content and services, according to reports published Thursday.

Microsoft and Time Warner are actively discussing such a deal, reports say, although the stage of the negotiations and the nature of a subsequent partnership are being characterized in conflicting ways by different media outlets.

The Internet Explorer development team has revealed details of upcoming key features that will land in the next beta of IE 7.

Among the features demonstrated this week at a Microsoft Professional Developer Conference presentation, then outlined on the IE team's blog, were Quick Tabs and Page Zoom.

Windows XP Professional x64 edition is clearly not a mainstream product. For example, though you can order Dell Dimension XPS models with XP X64 installed, Dell gives you this rather dire warning when you try to buy a system with the OS installed:

"Peripherals you currently own or plan to purchase in the near future (cameras, printers, MP3 players, handheld devices) will most likely NOT work on a system purchased with Windows XP Professional x64, and some software applications may not work on the x64 operating system."

Microsoft pushed security to the front of its Tech.Ed agenda on the Gold Coast this month, aiming to debunk what it claimed were common myths about IT security.

The software giant held a session titled 'Debunking Security Myths' for developers and other IT workers at its Tech.Ed conference. Jesper Johanssen, enterprise security architect at Microsoft, told delegates and news media at the conference that business users often failed to realise that security was always a trade-off.

After much hemming and hawing, Microsoft finally shipped its so-called N Editions of Windows XP--Windows XP Home Edition N and Windows XP Professional Edition N--to European Union (EU) countries in mid-June. The N Editions, as you may recall, were designed to satisfy an EU antitrust ruling against the software giant which stipulated that Microsoft must ship a version of Windows XP that did not include Windows Media Player (WMP) or any associated files.

Looking to drive demand for a wave of forthcoming products, Microsoft will fill the pockets of developers this week with early versions of several programs, including the latest "build" of Windows Vista.

Microsoft has opened the beta program of its OneCare anti-virus service to all comers after keeping the list short since testing began in June.

OneCare, a consumer-oriented service that includes anti-virus and anti-spyware defenses, two-way firewall protection, disk clean up and defragmentation tools, and file repair capabilities, was first announced in May. Like most end-user security systems, OneCare provides automatic updates to account for new threats and exploits. Microsoft has not established a price for OneCare, nor committed to a definitive release date.

Microsoft has apparently tried to hire open source evangelist Eric S. Raymond (known in the community as ESR), according to a post on his Web log late Thursday.

According to a copy of an e-mail he received from Mike Walters, a recruiter for the Central Sourcing Team at Microsoft, a member of the research team forwarded Raymond's name to Walters as a possible candidate for an engineering job at the Redmond company. "I would love an opportunity to speak with you in detail about your interest in a career at Microsoft," Walters wrote.

Microsoft plans to make its next generation games console, the Xbox 360, as difficult as possible to hack.

The 360 will have security built directly into the hardware, said Xbox engineer Chris Satchell.

Fans have modified the first Xbox to turn it into a media centre, upgrade the hard drive or allow it to play imported games.

Modifying a console is illegal in the UK if this is intended to get around anti-piracy measures on the Xbox.

Microsoft on Thursday unveiled its pricing plan for the next-generation version of its online multiplayer video game service, Xbox Live.

In addition to a new pricing structure that it hopes will encourage players to splurge for a full year's subscription, the company said it will no longer require a credit card to sign up.