Good morning. Well. It will be afternoon by the time I finish this. So good day to you. Here in Boston, it's already snowing again, as we face our fourth major snowstorm of the season. Lovely.
Microsoft today
announced a new support lifecycle policy for its online services, putting these hosted offerings on par with its traditional products, from a support perspective. More specifically, Microsoft is committed to providing customers a minimum of 12 months of prior notification before implementing potentially disruptive changes that may result in a service interruption. Furthermore, Microsoft commits to providing 12 months prior notification before termination of a Business and Developer-oriented Online Service.
You know, I was just thinking about writing an article called something like,
Microsoft on the Mac. With that in mind, Microsoft has just released a
30-day trial of Office 2011 for Mac, giving Mac users a chance to check out the latest version.
In yet another sign that
Yahoo! is circling the drain, the company is
laying off another 140 employees. I think I see an AOL-esque future for this place, unfortunately.
The other day, I linked to an Ed Bott article about Windows 7 and SSDs, and since then he's written
a follow-up article. Not surprisingly, it's very much worth reading, as it deals with
SSD setup secrets and tune-up tweaks. And a third article is coming next week, so stay tuned.
Irony alert: Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook page was
hacked.
CNET's Stephen Shankland
looks at the promise of low-end Android-based phones, and I think
this diversification is what's going to help Android utterly defeat the iPhone, which is model limited by design. Microsoft is going this route with Windows Phone, too, btw: You'll see low-end Windows Phone begin appearing this year.
Google is on a hiring binge this year if you're looking,
according to the company. Google plans to hire more new employees in 2011 than it has in any previous years. And you were afraid Google was morphing into the next Microsoft.
Verizon has been pretty cagey about the costs of its various services for iPhone customers, but details are starting to leak out. And now AppleInsider
reports that iPhone voice plans will start at $39.99 on Verizon. But there's more: An unlimited data plan will cost $29.99 per month and 2GB of data tethering will cost an additional $20. So it looks like the basic cost of an iPhone on Verizon will be $75 before taxes (factoring in a low-end SMS plan), or about the same as on AT&T.
