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but if it's being sold as XP Professsional, that's all that is relevant

Go here and click on Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional English North America CD w/SP2. Adding the item to your cart gives you the product name: "Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional". This is not the 64-bit version.

Moral of the story: If you buy Windows XP Professional from Microsoft, you are not getting a separate and distinct product that runs in 64-bit mode on your processor. For that, you would need to buy Windows XP Professional x64 Edition.

Not yet convinced? Visit here to see that "Windows XP Professional" and "Windows XP Professional x64 Edition" are different editions of Windows XP. A nice table illustrates the point.

If a product you buy says it is supported under Windows XP Professional, you cannot assume it is supported under Windows XP Professional x64 Edition. They are different products and they have different names.

The listed product requirements mention XP and Vista, but didn't (and at the time of writing still don't) mention anything about incompatibility with 64-bit versions.

It's reasonable to assume

Your critique is valid. I stated the case quite poorly. Microsoft clearly intends Windows XP Professional x64 Edition to be a consumer operating system, in which light I should have said it failed. Although I think that the barriers to its widespread adoption go beyond the issues you describe, in general I agree with your assessment. I'm not particularly interested in a detailed discussion of that nuance however, so with your kind permission I'll simply retract the statement you quoted. I don't consider it to be fiction, but a proper treatment of the topic would be lengthy and not particularly stimulating. Thank you for keeping me on my toes.

For 32-bit processors it's called Physical Address Extension PAE. Any one process is still limited to only 4 GB of memory but the OS can have different 4 GB maps that are assigned to different processes. It theory it works well, in practice it's a pain in the ass.

I highly doubt Billy is gonna give code to operate seemless with 64 Windows.

Why should Mac support windows and vise versa.

To start with, there are very few 64bit users out there. Does anyone have statistics on how many have taken the plunge?

The reason only few users have switched is that there are plenty of incompatibilities with existing software. Microsoft themselves say "The 64-bit editions of Windows Vista are not for everyone, and require a system with a 64-bit processor and 64-bit system drivers. Please confirm that your system, applications, and devices are compatible with a 64-bit edition of Windows Vista before installing."

In other words, if you run 64-bit Windows, you already have a problem. You should not just assume that all previous software works with 64-bit. You should make sure that there is an explicit specification: "Hey! We promise that we work in 64-bit." If not, it is unlikely that it does.

Besides someone who runs 64bit Vista also necessarily has the software to run 32 bit, unless I am mistaken. If you are unlucky enough to have bought an iPhone and only have one computer and that one runs 64 bit, you already have the software to downgrade it to 32 bit for activation.

Is it inconvenient? Yes. Is it surprising that there is an incompatibility? No.

Regarding your deleted post, I am sure it was not because you revealed the truth to mankind. There are dozens of posts in the discussion forum about people with 64 bit problems. Not many out of 6000 posts and many thousands sold units, but some, probably reflecting the number of users in this situation. Posts are deleted when they do not follow the terms of use. They should be constructive, polite, and they should not discuss Apple policies. Further they should not include ads and so on and so on. I do not know what rule you broke against in your post, but it was hardly that you mentioned a technical problem.

the customer shouldn't have to worry about compatibility. When they buy a product called "Windows XP," it should provide compatibility with all programs written for "Windows XP." Microsoft claims that "Windows XP Professional x64 Edition gives you access to greater amounts of memory while continuing to support 32-bit applications." and "seamlessly run 32-bit...applications." (emphasis added)

So blame Microsoft, not Apple. Even Microsoft's own Zune didn't run on XP64 when it was released.

"Microsoft: Vista Most Secure OS Ever"

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=bob+muglia+vi sta+most+secure

http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/06/15/173 223

http://www.betanews.com/article/Microsoft_Vista_Mo st_Secure_OS_Ever/1150366131

Based on the highly publicized claim by Bob Muglia at TechEd.

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/bobmuglia/ default.mspx

This isn't hyperbole?

Security is proven, never claimed. The only answers to the question of security are "no" and "maybe."

Ah... this would be the part then:

So they can sell or re-distribute your work, and give others permission to do the same...

And then there is this section...

We may use technology or other means to protect the service, protect our customers, or stop you from breaching this contract. These means may include, for example, filtering to stop spam or increase security. These means may hinder or break your use of the service.

In order to provide you the service, we may collect certain information about service performance, your machine and your service use. We may automatically upload this information from your machine. This data will not personally identify you. You may read about this information collection in more detail in the privacy policy at http://privacy.microsoft.com./

Which we have learned from previous cases (in court) and previous anti-trust actions, truly means that MS WILL collect personally identifiable information, under the clause of better serving you/better maintaining their service (which is vaguely covered in the related link they provided - and stretched in reality/practice to include such actions).

And then this section:

Which allows them the rights to permanently or temporarily re-assign their rights to others - which translates into "we can give anyone whatever we want that you upload, and the rights to see all the data we collect on you - as defined in the parts of the agreement where you gave us those rights - but you cannot do the same."

Just some of the relevant ones I gleaned...

Ah well... it's to be expected... and a far cry from Google's attitude of keeping your private data private. Though they (MS) have re-worded the "We can give away or sell or re-license your content" section to be more ambiguous, it is still there... along with the "we'll gather whatever information we want on the basis of improving the service" section.

Game downloading existed as far back as the Megadrive/Genesis.

Ok, that covers Xbox Live Arcade, which is about a third of Xbox Live.

Either way, the difference between what Nintendo is doing and what Sony and Microsoft are doing is that Nintendo encourages indies, provides a cheap dev kit, and will do QC for them. Not sure what Microsoft is doing, exactly, but Sony doesn't seem to go as far.

Microsoft:
1) Encourages indies. http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/xna/aa937785.aspx
2) Provides a *free* dev kit. (Requires only a standard Windows PC, which virtually everybody already has.) http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/xna/aa937795.aspx (Note: compiling to Xbox 360 does cost, but it's token cost; I believe it's $100 a year. You can do all the programming you need on the Windows PC.)
3) And will do QA for them. (If your game is chosen to be published.)

Nintendo just announced that they'll start to offer the same thing Microsoft has had for almost a full year now. It's seriously not news.

I know you probably hate Microsoft with the fiery passion of a thousand suns, but seriously, do at least a teeny bit of research before writing a post like this so I don't have to waste my time correcting it, k?

(I won't comment on Sony because I'm not familiar with Sony's service offerings.)

Game downloading existed as far back as the Megadrive/Genesis.

Ok, that covers Xbox Live Arcade, which is about a third of Xbox Live.

Either way, the difference between what Nintendo is doing and what Sony and Microsoft are doing is that Nintendo encourages indies, provides a cheap dev kit, and will do QC for them. Not sure what Microsoft is doing, exactly, but Sony doesn't seem to go as far.

Microsoft:
1) Encourages indies. http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/xna/aa937785.aspx
2) Provides a *free* dev kit. (Requires only a standard Windows PC, which virtually everybody already has.) http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/xna/aa937795.aspx (Note: compiling to Xbox 360 does cost, but it's token cost; I believe it's $100 a year. You can do all the programming you need on the Windows PC.)
3) And will do QA for them. (If your game is chosen to be published.)

Nintendo just announced that they'll start to offer the same thing Microsoft has had for almost a full year now. It's seriously not news.

I know you probably hate Microsoft with the fiery passion of a thousand suns, but seriously, do at least a teeny bit of research before writing a post like this so I don't have to waste my time correcting it, k?

(I won't comment on Sony because I'm not familiar with Sony's service offerings.)

for windows there is also the Microsoft solution called "Windows Desktop Search" you can download it here http://www.microsoft.com/windows/desktopsearch/def ault.mspx for Windows XP cheers

Dude, thanks for spending the time at Techfest and for spending far more time editing the videos together. I know this was a huge amount of time and I really appreciate it.

It always pisses me off when people say that Microsoft hasn't commercialized its research. We've worked closely with our product gorups to transfer a ton of stuff over. What we haven't done is get in people's faces about it.

In Vista: the 3-D interface, the Sidebar, Superfetch, speech recognition. The network map autodetection. Ink parsing. IPv6 support. The IE7 phishing detector. The new HP photo format. MSR made significant contributions to all of these. In Office 2007, we helped with the new Ribbon UI, made improvmenets to search relevance in Sharepoint, improved chart labeling in Excel, and improved the spell checker. For the XBox we contributed graphics library for photorealistic functions, TrueSkill, geolocation for XBox live, the AI for Forza. Data mining algorithms in SQL Server came from MSR. We contributed to the spam filters in Hotmail, Exchange and Outlook. Several of the tools in Visual Studio Team Server came from MSR, as did the static driver verifier in the Vista DDK. There's MSR technology everywhere.

There are dozens and dozens of other examples. The Tablet PC came out of MSR. The first-generation Windows Media audio codec came out of MSR too. Our interactive TV work started in MSR.

So fine, if you want to beat us up for not blowing our own horn, I'll take that hit. But to say that we don't commercialize our research is just wrong.

Comment by Kevin Schofield -- March 20, 2007 @ 10:29 pm

http://scobleizer.com/2007/03/20/one-thing-microso ft-does-way-better-than-google-research/#comment-3 00607

Yup, forgot that XBox Live was using F#. Thanks for the catch.

I also forgot the news of this week -- the announcement of "Response Point" which was incubated in MSR. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/mar0 7/03-19MSResponsePointPR.mspx

As to Alex's question: there are several that we can identify now. Keeping in mind that most truly "groundbreaking" technologies take 10+ years before they're recognized as such, I'm sure that there are more that we haven't identified as such yet.

But some examples:
- the foundations of image based rendering, by Hughes Hoppe
- hardware support for graphics processing (aka "Talisman") by Jim Kajiya, Turner Whitted et al
- ClearType (read the papers and the patent application before you judge; there's much more to this than is generally admitted) by John Platt
- source code analysis, modeling and verification, by Jim Larus, Sriram Rajamani, and several others
- public area wireless networks by Victor Bahl
- support vector machines for spam filtering, by John Platt and David Heckerman
- applying spam filtering algorithms to designing an HIV vaccine, by Heckerman and Jojic
- functional programming language work by Luca Cardelli and Simon Peyton-Jones
- performance optimizing a program by re-arranging its code and data segments based upon empirical observation, but Amitabh Srivastava et al.
- 3-D information visualization papers by George Robertson
- Mary Czerwinski's papers on understanding differences in spatial abilities between men and women
- Cerwins

Dude, thanks for spending the time at Techfest and for spending far more time editing the videos together. I know this was a huge amount of time and I really appreciate it.

It always pisses me off when people say that Microsoft hasn't commercialized its research. We've worked closely with our product gorups to transfer a ton of stuff over. What we haven't done is get in people's faces about it.

In Vista: the 3-D interface, the Sidebar, Superfetch, speech recognition. The network map autodetection. Ink parsing. IPv6 support. The IE7 phishing detector. The new HP photo format. MSR made significant contributions to all of these. In Office 2007, we helped with the new Ribbon UI, made improvmenets to search relevance in Sharepoint, improved chart labeling in Excel, and improved the spell checker. For the XBox we contributed graphics library for photorealistic functions, TrueSkill, geolocation for XBox live, the AI for Forza. Data mining algorithms in SQL Server came from MSR. We contributed to the spam filters in Hotmail, Exchange and Outlook. Several of the tools in Visual Studio Team Server came from MSR, as did the static driver verifier in the Vista DDK. There's MSR technology everywhere.

There are dozens and dozens of other examples. The Tablet PC came out of MSR. The first-generation Windows Media audio codec came out of MSR too. Our interactive TV work started in MSR.

So fine, if you want to beat us up for not blowing our own horn, I'll take that hit. But to say that we don't commercialize our research is just wrong.

Comment by Kevin Schofield -- March 20, 2007 @ 10:29 pm

http://scobleizer.com/2007/03/20/one-thing-microso ft-does-way-better-than-google-research/#comment-3 00607

Yup, forgot that XBox Live was using F#. Thanks for the catch.

I also forgot the news of this week -- the announcement of "Response Point" which was incubated in MSR. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/mar0 7/03-19MSResponsePointPR.mspx

As to Alex's question: there are several that we can identify now. Keeping in mind that most truly "groundbreaking" technologies take 10+ years before they're recognized as such, I'm sure that there are more that we haven't identified as such yet.

But some examples:
- the foundations of image based rendering, by Hughes Hoppe
- hardware support for graphics processing (aka "Talisman") by Jim Kajiya, Turner Whitted et al
- ClearType (read the papers and the patent application before you judge; there's much more to this than is generally admitted) by John Platt
- source code analysis, modeling and verification, by Jim Larus, Sriram Rajamani, and several others
- public area wireless networks by Victor Bahl
- support vector machines for spam filtering, by John Platt and David Heckerman
- applying spam filtering algorithms to designing an HIV vaccine, by Heckerman and Jojic
- functional programming language work by Luca Cardelli and Simon Peyton-Jones
- performance optimizing a program by re-arranging its code and data segments based upon empirical observation, but Amitabh Srivastava et al.
- 3-D information visualization papers by George Robertson
- Mary Czerwinski's papers on understanding differences in spatial abilities between men and women
- Cerwins

In addition, to better characterize the type of people Microsoft prefers to do business with it might make sense to link the phrase "Dumb-Fuck Ready to the target site. At least to me that characterizes the people who haven't at least started seriously considering alternative to a continued relationship with the company.

To me, 'People-ready business' represents a new low in catch-phrase marketing.

It's actually worse: did you know the full slogan is Dynamic IT for the People-Ready Business ? I agree with Computerworld, you can't use that phrase and not sound like an idiot - well, unless you are mocking it I guess.

First "Share the Social" and now this.

[1] "By Jeffrey R. Jones Director, Microsoft Security Business and Technology Unit"
[2] "Jeffrey R. Jones, a self-described "security guy" who works at Microsoft's security division"
[3] "an overview of Microsoft's progress in improving security by Jeffrey R. Jones, Senior Director - Microsoft Security Business Unit."

[1] - http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-1035_11- 5173565.html
[2] - http://www.boxxet.com/Windows_Vista/Windows_Vista_ News_Researcher_Says_Vista_The_Most_Secure_OS.6304 6006.details
[3] - http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/secnews/ articles/itproviewpoint031004.mspx

Of course, you don't need a separate Windows licence to test Windows/IE6. MS makes a VM available:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?Fa milyId=21EABB90-958F-4B64-B5F1-73D0A413C8EF&displa ylang=en

Okay, it's a VPC image, but even if you're not able to run VPC then you can convert it to a VMWare image...

A computer, by common definition since 1980s means something you can install programs, there is some payware or free SDK open to development .

I am speaking about these:
http://www.symbian.com/developer/index.html
http://trolltech.no/developer
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/embedded/default. aspx
http://www.java.net/

You know, Symbian, Linux, WinCE handheld devices are "handheld computers". Lets say, the mail client doesn't fit your needs? Go to sourceforge or handango and get a better client for your needs and install. You need a specific function such as GPS? You buy add on device, install its software and you got it.

A $60 J2ME (Java) supporting regular phone is more close to computer than iPhone is.

I may have lost my little remaining trust/respect to Apple centric media after iPhone. That is a big deal since I use Macs whenever possible. I won't be checking Apple hating gray beard sites either. We don't deserve this kind of media...

Right, sort of like the monkey boy, who gets hypered easily in public conferences and meetings. Oh, and let's not forget him vowed to kill one another, and threw a chair across the room.

Well, if Steve Ballmer's children and wife gone missing one day, I bet the public may not apply the same prejudice to his case.

Mod parent up, Informative! The report doesn't account for vulnerabilities in IE 7, Windows Mail, and is ignoring several other vulnerabilities, such as one in Vista that could allow information disclosure.

Here is a direct link for the Windows XP version for all people who detest WGA:
http://download.microsoft.com/download/3/5/e/35ecc f22-f333-4469-8209-fafc2d084e8f/WindowsXP-KB936357 -x86-ENU.exe

Seconded. Also FileMon or its replacement Process Monitor will tell you what's accessing your hard drive.

Nice to see Microsoft still support the BSOD screensaver although they don't let you have the password recovery utilities any more.

Seconded. Also FileMon or its replacement Process Monitor will tell you what's accessing your hard drive.

Nice to see Microsoft still support the BSOD screensaver although they don't let you have the password recovery utilities any more.

Seconded. Also FileMon or its replacement Process Monitor will tell you what's accessing your hard drive.

Nice to see Microsoft still support the BSOD screensaver although they don't let you have the password recovery utilities any more.

While it is true that there is no real way to "X-ray the pipes" here are the tools the Microsoft Technet guys use and I've found can be very good at hunting down the bugs.http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals /default.mspx

It also has an option to replace TaskManager, which is very handy...

They actually already do this for compatibility testing. They release Virtual PC VHD's that let you run their os in a virtualized state. And from my knowledge it works on OS x or at least Virtual Pc 2007 does.

VHD images http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/aa700831. aspx For New VS

http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2007/04/17/ie7-vi rtual-pc-image-and-ie6-virtual-pc-image-refresh.as px
for XP sp2.

Of course they do expire but new ones are posted when they do.

I run them under VPC 2007 on 64 bit vista and they do just fine. I just wish I could figure out the usb pass through for my usb phone and my ipod. Other then that with additions its a free version of xp to beat on :) and use to test.

WinCE will run on X86. Here's some info.

You may be right about the release dates, but I have not seen any Silverlight alphas or betas about on the web. I also haven't seen anyone except MS getting excited about it.

Did you even attempt to look? http://silverlight.net/ Download the beta (or Alpha, they still have that) http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/silverlight/defau lt.aspx

Many MS developers are very excited. We can now target, cross browser and cross platform the web with a very rich UI framework. Yes, that may have been done, but the really exciting part is that its built off of WPF, so we can target the web with the same technology that we are going to use to target the Windows desktop. No need to learn everything over again, and we can use code that is already in place as is.

If Silverlight was going to be big, it would be out and about in beta form and used by many websites by now.

Its out in beta now, and there are some big names working with it. Would you release a production site built on beta technology though? I wouldn't.

I'm absolutely sure Silverlight it nothing to worry about. Just let it pass and die out. Or just let MS flog it like at a dead horse.

I advise not to get involved with developing it. If you do, MS will only release a newer and updated version for you to "hack". Such a waste of time!

Keep living in your bubble then, we won't miss you. I build on the MS platform anyway, so I'm not worried about a third party trying to keep up. Perhaps this part of your post is why it was modded a troll. There's not a lot of thought put into it, its more mindless Linux fanboyism.

That being the case, did Microsoft ever release the Instant Search option as a separate download from any Windows OS? I can't think of any time they ever did that to my recollection. In fact, as someone else pointed out, searching is not only integral to the file systems of an OS, but it's been included in Windows from quite a ways back (if not as efficiently as it currently is implemented in Vista.)

Just keep at it - RSI tends to not be noticeable while you are slowly being damaged. Then one day it kicks in. No really, you won't see it coming.

For your own sake, please consider at least sitting in a fairly ergonomic position. Both Apple and Microsoft have extensive sites on the subject:

http://www.apple.com/about/ergonomics/

http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/hcg/hcg_view.msp x

"You're confusing Windows CE with desktop Windows. Windows CE is a whole different beast;"
No I believe that you are confusing Embedded Windows with Windows CE.
I am pretty sure that the ATMs are using Embedded Windows which is a stripped down version of XP or 2000.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/embedded/default. mspx is a link to all of them.

WinCE mainly lives on the ARM. I know Microsoft had an X86 version they called CE but I am not sure if it was really CE or Embedded Windows. Since the older ATMs used OS/2 I would bet on the new ones running Embedded Windows over CE.

"ATMs running CE don't run Word, or have weird hardware, or have Windows UIs. So would you like to try constructing another straw man or two?"
I guess you didn't understand my post.
I was pointing out that Windows strengths, large selection of software, large base of supported hardware, and a familiar UI are not an advantage for an ATM!
An ATM doesn't use Windows GUI, let people install strange new hardware, or run off the self software. So Windows isn't a big advantage.

BTW Win's CE uptime is worse than a properly maintained Windows 2003 Server or even a Win2K server. I hear the latest version of Win CE now called Windows Mobile is better but I have not played with it.

Alrighty. If it is a virtual machine, where can we find documentation about:
1) the OPCODES of this vm
2) the standard libraries and interbrowser API
3) The format of silverlight compiled scripts

Wouldn't it have been nice if the submitter or author would've included a link to silverlight in the damned post in the first place?!?

A list of stagnant "cross-platform" Microsoft products:

Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac
Internet Explorer for Mac
Windows Media Player for Mac
Internet Explorer for Unix
Remote Desktop for Mac
Virtual PC for Mac
Outlook Express for Mac


Though, for the first time, this is Open Source. So it may have a fighting chance, until perhaps Microsoft starts developing closed API's for the Windows version of Silverlight that are incompatible with other plugins such as "Moonlight".

A list of stagnant "cross-platform" Microsoft products:

Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac
Internet Explorer for Mac
Windows Media Player for Mac
Internet Explorer for Unix
Remote Desktop for Mac
Virtual PC for Mac
Outlook Express for Mac


Though, for the first time, this is Open Source. So it may have a fighting chance, until perhaps Microsoft starts developing closed API's for the Windows version of Silverlight that are incompatible with other plugins such as "Moonlight".

A list of stagnant "cross-platform" Microsoft products:

Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac
Internet Explorer for Mac
Windows Media Player for Mac
Internet Explorer for Unix
Remote Desktop for Mac
Virtual PC for Mac
Outlook Express for Mac


Though, for the first time, this is Open Source. So it may have a fighting chance, until perhaps Microsoft starts developing closed API's for the Windows version of Silverlight that are incompatible with other plugins such as "Moonlight".

A list of stagnant "cross-platform" Microsoft products:

Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac
Internet Explorer for Mac
Windows Media Player for Mac
Internet Explorer for Unix
Remote Desktop for Mac
Virtual PC for Mac
Outlook Express for Mac


Though, for the first time, this is Open Source. So it may have a fighting chance, until perhaps Microsoft starts developing closed API's for the Windows version of Silverlight that are incompatible with other plugins such as "Moonlight".

A list of stagnant "cross-platform" Microsoft products:

Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac
Internet Explorer for Mac
Windows Media Player for Mac
Internet Explorer for Unix
Remote Desktop for Mac
Virtual PC for Mac
Outlook Express for Mac


Though, for the first time, this is Open Source. So it may have a fighting chance, until perhaps Microsoft starts developing closed API's for the Windows version of Silverlight that are incompatible with other plugins such as "Moonlight".

A list of stagnant "cross-platform" Microsoft products:

Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac
Internet Explorer for Mac
Windows Media Player for Mac
Internet Explorer for Unix
Remote Desktop for Mac
Virtual PC for Mac
Outlook Express for Mac


Though, for the first time, this is Open Source. So it may have a fighting chance, until perhaps Microsoft starts developing closed API's for the Windows version of Silverlight that are incompatible with other plugins such as "Moonlight".

Microsoft has a very significant presence in the market for embedded systems. There are customized version of Visual Studio. You are not limited to Visual Basic. WindowsEmbedded

What the heck is Silverlight?

Okay, Silverlight is a Microsoft product, and is some kind of plug-in related to "media experiences and rich interactive applications for the web", according to the above page. Not finding that especially enlightening, I clicked on the FAQ, where the first question is "What is Silverlight?". Great! Unfortunately it yielded a "We're sorry, the page you requested could not be found" error. Maybe I need Javascript turned on or something? Ah. There we go. [Shrug] Huh? Same terse verbiage-filled useless description as before. Thanks for nothing. Other information on the FAQ page imply streaming of content using "Windows Streaming is another major goal of the product, complete with fancy DRM [weak Golf clapping].

So, I'm still not 100% sure, but I think it's trying to emulate the typical user experience with Flash, including the ungraceful handling of missing/disabled browser features :-)

Oh. I did find out that the Microsoft definition of "cross-platform" is Windows (versions unspecified) and Mac OS X 10.4.8+ (Intel and PPC), but they say they are considering wider support.

Favorite buzzword phrase: "free cloud-based hosting and streaming solution".

Cloud-based? I haven't heard that one before.

What the heck is Silverlight?

Okay, Silverlight is a Microsoft product, and is some kind of plug-in related to "media experiences and rich interactive applications for the web", according to the above page. Not finding that especially enlightening, I clicked on the FAQ, where the first question is "What is Silverlight?". Great! Unfortunately it yielded a "We're sorry, the page you requested could not be found" error. Maybe I need Javascript turned on or something? Ah. There we go. [Shrug] Huh? Same terse verbiage-filled useless description as before. Thanks for nothing. Other information on the FAQ page imply streaming of content using "Windows Streaming is another major goal of the product, complete with fancy DRM [weak Golf clapping].

So, I'm still not 100% sure, but I think it's trying to emulate the typical user experience with Flash, including the ungraceful handling of missing/disabled browser features :-)

Oh. I did find out that the Microsoft definition of "cross-platform" is Windows (versions unspecified) and Mac OS X 10.4.8+ (Intel and PPC), but they say they are considering wider support.

Favorite buzzword phrase: "free cloud-based hosting and streaming solution".

Cloud-based? I haven't heard that one before.

What the heck is Silverlight?

Okay, Silverlight is a Microsoft product, and is some kind of plug-in related to "media experiences and rich interactive applications for the web", according to the above page. Not finding that especially enlightening, I clicked on the FAQ, where the first question is "What is Silverlight?". Great! Unfortunately it yielded a "We're sorry, the page you requested could not be found" error. Maybe I need Javascript turned on or something? Ah. There we go. [Shrug] Huh? Same terse verbiage-filled useless description as before. Thanks for nothing. Other information on the FAQ page imply streaming of content using "Windows Streaming is another major goal of the product, complete with fancy DRM [weak Golf clapping].

So, I'm still not 100% sure, but I think it's trying to emulate the typical user experience with Flash, including the ungraceful handling of missing/disabled browser features :-)

Oh. I did find out that the Microsoft definition of "cross-platform" is Windows (versions unspecified) and Mac OS X 10.4.8+ (Intel and PPC), but they say they are considering wider support.

Favorite buzzword phrase: "free cloud-based hosting and streaming solution".

Cloud-based? I haven't heard that one before.