I’m back with a bad news to whom using pirated copy of Windows operating system. Finally, Microsoft has decided to put up a message on the login screen for every pirated Windows user.

Quoted:
Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of local PC users running pirated Windows operating systems will soon face the shame of being reminded of their illegal action every time they switch on their machines.

Face the shame? Not sure about this but I suppose the anti-piracy message will be very annoying.

This anti-piracy message will appear after the next Windows update commencing today (April 26, 2006). At the moment, only users of pirated Windows in the following five countries will experience this “new” and “special” feature, they are United States, Britain, New Zealand, Australia and Malaysia.

Well, Windows with this “special” feature can still receive software update, but not allowed to upgrade Internet Explorer to version 7 and download Windows Defender.

For more information, read the source.

Just for your information, Microsoft just delayed the release of Windows Vista, the upcoming version of Windows desktop operating system. Windows Vista will only be available until January 2007.

Microsoft previously set the release date for this major update in fourth quarter of 2006, now we will have to wait another 10 months or so. It’s in the 5th year now since Microsoft released Windows XP in late 2001. No other choice but to wait.

So, what you can do now is to have a look of the forthcoming Windows, like which might be their new Start button. Would you want to know why Windows Vista is better? Take a look of its features and some cool stuffs. Last but not least, read the review of Windows Vista if you want to know more.

Microsoft is preparing to launch a newer version of MSN Messenger very soon. The next generation MSN Messenger tentatively is named Windows Live Messenger and it is still in beta testing stage. Like the next version of Hotmail - Kahuna, Windows Live Messenger is also accepting beta users to test on the new service but unfortunately I do not have the invitation for this one.

Anyway, I’ve got you all some screen shots of Windows Live Messenger.

While remaining most of the features we already familiar with, such as text and voice messaging, emoticons, and video conferencing, Windows Live Messenger integrated VoIP and File Sharing of any kind of documents.
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The Next MSN Messenger - Windows Live Messenger

I just got an invitation from Microsoft last Friday to test the forthcoming Hotmail service, Kahuna. I am definitely not the first to do a review for Kahuna but I hope this entry shares the experience of using it from a diffrent point of view. Well, there are quite a number of good reviews written, such as this article from PC World, this article from PCMag or even this comprehensive list of features from MSN.

Kahuna is the next version of Hotmail and it will have 2GB capacity. It utilizes the latest web technologies such as AJAX, which GMail is also using. Since Microsoft Outlook or Outlook Express is still having the largest user base for Windows-based email client applicaiton, Kahuna tries to bring the same user experience into the web application.

Click To Enlarge

Mail Box

On the Today page, which happened to be the welcome page, we will see some messages from Microsoft regarding this beta version of next Hotmail. To give us the user experience of Microsoft Outlook or Outlook Express, we will see the user interface of Kahuna is very similar to them with three columns design:-
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The Next Version Of Hotmail - Kahuna

Have you ever wonder of how those big companies come out with the idea of how to name their companies? Like me, probably you might think some of the big names are just a common word that we speak everyday like Yahoo!, or the company just simply comes up with such a name.

Well, this page gives you a better idea of knowing how the big names are created. I am not too sure about the validity of the creation of the names, but I felt it is something really interesting to share with you all. Of course, if you know the original idea of naming those names listed, feel free to tell us in the comment area.

I will just list down some of the famous ones :-

• Yahoo!
  It’s actually an acronym for “Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle”. See the name history. Before this, I thought it is just a simple word “Yahoo”.
• Sun Microsystems
  Now only I know it means the acronym for Stanford University Network.
• Microsoft
  Originally called Micro-Soft, which is the suppose to be a short form of MICROcomputer SOFTware. The ‘-’ was then removed.
• Intel
  I thought it means Intelligence, but in fact it is the acronym of INTegrated ELectronics.
• Hotmail
  Named as such was not because the email is hot, but because Hotmail includes the letters “html”, which is the most widely used programming language on the Internet. Initially, HoTMaiL was the way how it is written.
• Cisco
  Actually it’s the abbreviation of San Francisco, and the company logo is the image of Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. Before knowing the real reason, I thought the logo is some form of signal wave.
• Apple Computers
  Apple is the favourite fruit of founder Steve Jobs. LoL … This is classic !

I read from this news source that Microsoft and Yahoo! are working out a plan to allow both their Instant Messaging (IM) Services, MSN Messenger and Yahoo Messenger, to link with each other. Seeing the launch of Google Talk in August 2005, Microsoft and Yahoo have responded quickly enough to hunt down the new comer. These two IM services is currently serving more than 1/4 billion of users around the world. So, with the merge between them, their rival AIM and Google will have to think of a better strategy to counter it.

Well, the merge of MSN and Yahoo Messenger will mean communication between these two IM without using a third party client, such as Trillion.
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MSN + Yahoo Messenger Merging