The Hotfix
The best website for technology news including Windows 7 and more!
Posted by admin on July 9, 2009 at 07:03 PM | Filed under General
Sports site RootZoo has sued Facebook for click fraud, alleging that the social networking site charged for more clicks than actually occurred. The lawsuit comes several weeks after Facebook users began flooding message boards with complaints about overcharging.
RootZoo, which advertised on Facebook from November or 2007 until June of last year, alleges that its own analytics programs showed significant discrepancies between the data provided by its own analytics programs and the numbers claimed by Facebook.
The complaint provides specifics for one day -- June 2, 2008. On that date, RootZoo's own software programs allegedly showed that 300 clicks had been generated by Facebook, but the company was charged for 804 clicks.
Posted by Diablofan on July 9, 2009 at 06:05 PM | Filed under Microsoft
Microsoft Corp. has promoted Steven Sinofsky to president of the Windows Division. Sinofsky, a 20-year Microsoft veteran, most recently led the Windows and Windows Live Engineering Group, contributing to the 22nd October availability of Windows 7.
As president, Sinofsky assumes responsibility for the Windows business including both the engineering and marketing functions for Windows, Windows Live and Internet Explorer.
“Steven Sinofsky has demonstrated the ability to lead large teams that deliver great products. The work he and the team have done in getting ready to ship Windows 7 really defines how to develop and ship world-class software,” said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. “He is a perfect fit to lead the Windows group.”
Source: Microsoft.com
Posted by someone64 on July 9, 2009 at 04:35 PM | Filed under Google
We get asked all the time why Google keeps its products in beta for so long. And Gmail, five years after launch, is consistently a subject of this questioning, even of jokes.
Some people thought that once we opened sign-ups, Gmail should have come out of beta.
Others said that once we integrated chat, developed new anti-spam technology, expanded to 53 languages, shipped a mobile app, added group chat, launched an iPhone UI, added a vacation autoresponder, launched Gmail Labs, subsequently modified the vacation autoresponder with a Gmail Lab, launched 48 other Labs, launched video chat, enabled open protocols and APIs (POP, auto-forwarding, IMAP, and the Contacts Data API), let you POP mail in from other accounts, added a delete button, rearchitected our entire javascript code base, and added key functionality to get large companies, startups, universities, and many other organizations (in addition to Google itself) running on Gmail, we should have come out of beta.
Some people think we should wait until we launch < one of ongoing secret projects >.
Others say that, over the last five years, a beta culture has grown around web apps, such that the very meaning of "beta" is debatable. And rather than the packaged, stagnant software of decades past, we're moving to a world of rapid developmental cycles where products like Gmail continue to change indefinitely.
The end result (many visible and invisible changes later) is that today, beta is a thing of the past. Not just for Gmail, but for all of Google Apps — Gmail, Calendar, Docs, and Talk.
Posted by djdanster on July 9, 2009 at 04:32 PM | Filed under Apple
This piece of news takes me back to when I was a boy at school. I remember
clearly that I was easily categorized as one of the 'geeks'. A title that I didn't mind having, because as we all know, it surreptitiously makes us way cooler than all of the popular kids, my 'gang' just didn't know it back then and neither did the cool kids for that matter.
Posted by admin on July 9, 2009 at 04:12 PM | Filed under Google
You may be aware that the CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt, is currently positioned on the 
board of directors at Apple, helping oversee the workings of the company. You may also be aware that the search giant just announced an operating system based on their Chrome Browser. You may finally be aware that Apple is well known for their iPhone device, and that Google has their Android operating system respectively, two technologies which go head to head against one another. This last fact, when tied with the fact that Google's new operating system would compete with Apple's OS X, means that Google's CEO may very well be kicked off the board of directors that he currently sits on.
Schmidt already has to excuse himself from iPhone meetings with the board, as it would conflict with the Android division of Google, however, despite this, the FTC has been investigating the link between the companies to ensure that there is no anti-trust violations. Let's take a quick review; Schmidt is currently not sitting in on iPhone meetings, after the release of Google OS chances are the same will happen with Mac OS meetings... so he's left with overseeing the iPod.
Posted by djdanster on July 9, 2009 at 04:08 PM | Filed under Microsoft
Earlier this week, Microsoft and United Nations Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization announced that they were forming a partnership designed to focus on higher education. The duo also committed to launching the UNESCO-Microsoft Task Force on Higher Education and Information and Communication Technology (ICT). Building on the initial announcement, the Redmond company revealed that it was ready to pour no less than $50 million in higher education resources that are designed to fuel economic recovery from the global financial crisis.
Posted by djdanster on July 9, 2009 at 03:54 PM | Filed under Microsoft
When it comes down to Windows 7 special offerings,
Microsoft still has one or two aces up its sleeve. While it revealed the official pricing details for the upgrade and full retail boxes of Windows 7, and went live with a program designed to allow consumers in select markets to buy the Home Premium and Professionals SKUs of the OS at considerable discounts, the Redmond company has yet to unveil discount initiatives and price tags for additional offerings and flavors of the next iteration of the Windows client.
This is the case with the Windows 7 Family Pack and the Windows Anytime Upgrade options. But even with Microsoft keeping a tight lid on the Windows 7 Family Pack and WAU pricing, company partners from the retail channel have made sure to leak the prices to the public.
Posted by admin on July 9, 2009 at 03:35 PM | Filed under Microsoft
A little more than a month ago, Microsoft officially launched Bing.com. Preliminary reports 
that are now being released are showing that the search engine is again continuing to climb in terms of unique visitors and total number of searches.
Last week it was revealed that Bing took 8.23% of the U.S. markets web searches for the month of June, which was up from 7.81% in the month of May. And today reports are coming in that Bing has continued to grow in terms of unique visitors for the month of June.
Posted by admin on July 9, 2009 at 02:53 PM | Filed under Microsoft
Today Microsoft launched its latest effort to "Light up the web", Silverlight 3 which is now available for download. 
Silverlight has come a long way since its version 1.0 launched in 2007. It has even attracted big players like Netflix who use it as their primary video player. 3.0 brings a host of improvements such as "Smooth Streaming" and "out of browser experiences". Web developers will also appreciate the built in support for GPU acceleration.
Silverlight 3 introduces more than 50 new features, including 3D support, GPU acceleration, H.264 video support and out-of-the-browser capabilities to Silverlight.. The out-of-browser support will enable developers to build applications that work like Adobe's AIR plugin. Dramatic video performance and quality improvements are also included.
Posted by admin on July 9, 2009 at 01:38 PM | Filed under General
Microsoft has announced that its newest operating system software Windows 7 will be ready for sale in time for the holidays.
The company confirmed through its Windows Blog that Windows 7 will hit the store shelves on 22nd October 2009. The final code should be released to manufacture (RTM) sometime in the second half of July. It is also expected that Windows Server 2008 R2 will be available around the same timeframe.
The announcement comes just short of a month since the Release Candidate (RC) was made available to millions of users around the world.
More than 32,000 participants from approximately 10,000 companies have signed up to have access to a breadth of helpful tools and resources needed to prepare for Windows 7. Partners such as Corel, Cyberlink, Sonic, ATI and NVIDIA have already invested significant time and resources to preparing for Windows 7.
For IT professionals in enterprise environments, Windows 7 along with the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack, an add-on subscription, helps enterprise customers make people productive anywhere, enhance security and control, streamline
IT management, and reduce costs.
Windows 7 enables Remote Media Streaming, enabling secure, remote Internet access to home-based digital media libraries from another Windows 7 PC outside the home. It also brings Windows XP Mode, a tool that will ease the pain of migration for some users who rely on legacy appications.
The new OS comes with different Windows 7 editions for specific market requirements. Each SKU is a superset of the previous SKU. This means that each higher edition SKU will have every feature lower edition SKUs have.
The company also says focus will be on two primary editions of Windows 7: Windows 7 Home Premium and Windows 7 Professional.
A few targeted SKUs will be offered for customers with specialized needs: for price-sensitive customers with small notebook PCs, some OEMs will offer Windows 7 Starter. For customers in emerging markets, Microsoft will make Windows 7 Home Basic available.
The complete SKU lineup for Windows 7 is: Windows 7 Starter, Windows 7 Home Basic (in Emerging Markets only), Windows 7 Home Premium, Windows 7 Professional, Windows 7 Enterprise and Windows 7 Ultimate.
View: C|NET News / Windows 7 Team Blog
Thanks to Poker Face for the notice.
Posted by admin on July 9, 2009 at 01:38 PM | Filed under General
At a press conference today, Acer said it would ship a Windows 7 machine on October 23, though it promptly qualified that as "Windows 7 ready
Acer, one of the world's three biggest PC manufacturers, held a press conference in London this afternoon to announce its exciting new Timeline series of notebooks, and upstaged itself by appearing to pre-announce Windows 7.
One of Acer's future products is the Z5600 PC all-in-one running Windows 7, which Acer said would be "one of the key products going into Christmas". Launch date? "It will on the shelves on October 23."
"Have you just given away the launch date for Windows 7?" asked ZD-Net's David Meyer, amid much laughter.
From his seat in the audience, Acer vice president Massimo D'Angelo, in charge of Europe, said it would be on the shelves running Windows 7 "or Windows 7 ready: then we will have the final news."
D'Angelo said Windows 7 was "already available, and seems to run very well" -- albeit that's the RC (release candidate) version. If it isn't actually released by October 23, however, "there will be free upgrade options from Vista. I believe that, like last time, you will only pay the freight cost," he said.
Microsoft has not announced an official release date, and John Curran, the American who runs Microsoft UK's Windows Client Group, told me that Windows 7 will be launched before 1 June 2010, when the free RC beta expires.
Posted by admin on July 9, 2009 at 01:38 PM | Filed under General
I was pleasantly surprised when I opened up my TechNet account today and found that they now offer Home product downloads. Yes, that finally includes Windows Home Server. So thanks to all of those that kept bugging and pestering Microsoft into allowing Windows Home Server to be downloaded via TechNet. On top of the server, Windows XP Home Edition is also now available. That comes in handy for me when I fix computers that need a clean install and half my CDs don't work and my product key is used up too much. Anyway, I just thought I'd let everyone know, I'm glad that they're here and I'm excited to try the new Windows Home Server.
-Jordan F.