Searching for world-changing technology
If you’re coming to CES, the Microsoft Gadget folks (hi Sanaz and team) worked with the Comdex folks to build a little CES Gadget for Live.com. That’s one of more than 140 Gadgets available for you to play with.
Update: I just loaded the gadget and it lets you look up booth numbers for the companies you want to visit. It tells me that Microsoft has four booths. Although calling them booths is a little bit of a misnomer. These things are HUGE.
Robert Fripp, famous guitarist, was on Microsoft’s campus a few weeks ago recording the sounds for Windows Vista. Charles Torre got an invite into the studio to record and watch.
Michael Connolly, a product unit manager on MSN Spaces, adds onto the China discussion with a post titled “Running a Service in China.” Here’s a quote from his post: “In China, there is a unique issue for our entire industry: there are certain aspects of speech in China that are regulated by the government. We’ve made a choice to run a service in China, and to do that, we need to adhere to local regulations and laws. ”
Mary Jo Foley is reporting speculation that Microsoft wants to buy Yahoo.
Well, I did tell BillG to buy Flickr…
Anyone else got some speculation to get out? Dang, next you’ll tell me that Google’s making a PC (oh, wait, that one is already getting denied) or something like that and Apple’s making a Media Center. 
Oh, it’s going to be a fun week. The rumors always get wild right before CES and MacWorld.
Seriously, I don’t know about any Yahoo purchase and if I did I’d probably be taped to a tree here in Redmond with an extra roll around my mouth. 
I thought we were just getting together to discuss our Mix06 conference and shoot a Channel 9 video but Jennifer Ritzinger had invited Anthony Weeks (here’s a picture of Jennifer standing with Jeff Sandquist, my boss). Now, if you followed my trip last year to Target’s headquarters you’ll remember that Anthony “recorded” that meeting by drawing on a wall during the meeting. It was cool seeing him again.
Well, Anthony just recorded our meeting the same way. So, I can finally show you how he works. He listens. He draws. All while we’re having the meeting. Here’s Anthony standing in front of his finished work and here he is working.
Steve Cellini (right) and Ray Winninger (blue shirt). Ray’s the guy who does most of the Mix06 blogs and is heading the content teams. Steve is running the thing (he was the guy in charge of the PDC too).
Here’s the rendition of the first 15 minutes of the meeting. Detail shot of “It’s Microsoft Unplugged.” (We were talking about how Mix should be different than, say, a TechED or a PDC). Detail shot #2 of Big New Microsoft Conference. Detail shot #3 of “the 72 hour conversation.” (We were taking about the role that blogs, RSS, and other communication types will play). Detail shot #4 of “blur between traditional roles of ‘designer’ and ‘developer’” (We were talking about how Sparkle will change development/design roles). Detail shot #5 of “The Web is Inevitable and it’s here to stay.” (I asked Ray if Microsoft was trying to kill the Web. Heheh, I always have to be a troublemaker).
These were sent to my Flickr account live from my new sooopppeeeerrr dooooppppeeerrrr SmartPhone and without checking with anyone. And wait until you see the video we shot!
By the way, Anthony still doesn’t have a Web site. All the business he gets is through word of mouth. And he’s freaking busy from what Jennifer told me.
The Security Response Center has posted an updated advisory about the WMF Vulnerability. Says a patch is coming January 10.
