I would actually like to see a surface-type environment, though I’m unsold on the big-ass-camera model Microsoft is promoting. Still, this gives a much needed laugh…

The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs: Borg: People really, really want us to fuck up their coffee tables, and we’re doing our best to make that happen

See, in Microsoft math, “three years from now” is 2018. That’s for the fucked-up beta version. RTM happens in 2020, still with loads of bugs. SP1 for Surface ships in 2025 and by then Microsoft is owned by Google so the table comes pre-loaded with Google’s useless productivity apps that nobody wants and tiny little text ads all around the edges. Or something.

Multi-core architecture seems to have so out-paced multi-core hitting programming that this kind of investment is probably just the tip of the iceberg needed to catch up. And yes, the mind reels at what that kind of power, unleashed, will be used for.

Intel and Microsoft fund $20M grant to reinvent computing: where do you want to go tomorrow? - Engadget

Although both Microsoft and Intel’s R&D departments have been responsible for some nifty futuristic tech, the two companies got together last week and announced a $20M grant to two universities to “start over” and develop next-gen computing systems based around parallel processing. The grant will fund Universal Parallel Computing Research Centers at UC -Berkeley, which is kicking in another $7M, and the University of Illinois at Champaign / Urbana, which is donating $8M of its own. According to Mark Snir, head of the UIUC lab, the goal is to find a way to make “parallelism so easy to use that parallel programming becomes synonymous with programming” — an increasingly important priority as current multi-core processors aren’t necessarily being fully utilized, and 100-core processors aren’t far off.

Just what I always wanted, a subscription based OS that I will have to pay for forever, with multiple, independently blue-screening modules. 807 different versions of Vista wasn’t enough?

Evidence mounting: Windows 7 going modular, subscription

Mary Jo Foley is wagering that one of the big changes coming with Windows 7 is that it might be “available in pieces.” That is to say, Windows 7 could be a modular OS. I’ll go further. Windows 7 will be a modular OS, and we can already see the clues in Windows Vista, because it, too, is a fledgling modular OS. What we’re talking about and why it matters (= software subscriptions), follows…

Microsoft doesn’t do well in brand loyalty. In IT, even people who use Microsoft tend to hate its living guts. Anyone who’s had to run IIS, Exchange, or any other of their proprietary, poorly developed server-side junk is not usually happy. Windows and Office are just so dominant you likewise have to use them. The development apps and maybe stuff like World Wide Telescope are rare exceptions.

Also, outside Windows and Office, where Microsoft got in early and (famously) abused their monopoly, they haven’t been doing well. Xbox is barely profitable even years in and Zune has floundered.

The only thing saving them is that Sony, thusfar, has floundered worse. They lost the MP3 market to Apple, and now the console back to Nintendo.

For developers, a cell processor on the PS3 may not be as familiar as the PowerPC in the Xbox 360. I’ve heard it described as programming for 11 size 1 CPUs (for Sony) rather than 1 size 10 CPU for the Xbox.

All of them are crazy. Whoever first gets to market with a single development platform with complete code portability/leverage for mobile, PC, and living room will clean up from developers. Be that Zune/WinMob/Vista/Xbox 360 or PSP/Viao/PS3 or iPhone/Mac/Apple TV.

PS3Blog.net » Blog Archive » Is the PS3 an Afterthought among Developers?

N’Gai Croal writes that most developers seem to prefer the Xbox over the PS3, not only as a development platform, but also for their personal gaming. Even beyond the tech people, the business side of the industry seems to generally favor Microsoft as well.

Watching Steve Gibson again, this time on the soon-to-be late, lamented Lab with Leo, and he’s elaborating that wireless keyboards in general are fairly easily sniffed, but Bluetooth keyboards, while not perfect, benefit from the the inherently better security afforded by the spec itself.

So, Apple Keyboard is better than standard wireless keyboards at least, maybe not as good as secure wireless.

Thanks Steve!