Feed: LiveSide - Windows Live news and interviews - AggScore: 75.4

Yesterday in a blog post, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof called for a boycott of Bing, because of the way it handles Chinese characters searches outside of China when searching for politically sensitive (to China) material.

Today in a blog post on the Search Blog, Adam Sohn responds, by first pointing out that some searches in Chinese do provide “very balanced web results”.  Mr. Sohn goes on to say:

We recognize that we can continue to improve our relevancy and comprehensiveness in these web results and we will.

In addition, today’s investigations uncovered the fact that our image search is not functioning properly for queries entered using Simplified Chinese characters outside of the PRC. We have identified the bug and are at work on the fix. We expect to have this done before the Thanksgiving holiday.

Bing’s intent for these types of queries is to provide relevant and comprehensive results for our customers.

In the NY Times blog post, Kristof points out that Bing is certainly not alone in having issues dealing with links to sensitive Chinese information:

(This is an issue with Google as well, but to a much lesser extent. Google censors results on its search engine used within China, google.cn, but offers mostly uncensored results using simplified Chinese characters on its worldwide browser, google.com. However, some searches on google.com, such as images for Falun Gong, are also censored.)

It seems to us that the problem here is not so much with Bing, as it is with the oppressive nature of the Chinese government’s relationship with the internet.  Why not call for a boycott of China until these issues are resolved?  The Chinese government maintains a long list of blocked websites, including Facebook, YouTube, Wikipedia, and until recently, even the New York Times.  The problems with Bing searches are occurring largely due to having to maintain separate functionality inside and outside of China.  Yes, Bing looks like it missed something in image searches, and they’re working to fix it.  But the much larger issue of the Chinese government’s relationship with the internet is the elephant in the room here.  Why isn’t Nicholas Kristof calling for a boycott of China?  Not as much Techmeme juice, perhaps?

For everyone who wants to get the most out of Windows Live: The Windows Live Essentials and Services Book.

This book by MVP Brad Jones and Marcus Schmidt is a full-color, step-by-step guide for using Microsoft's new Windows Live Essentials series of free applications.

Step-by-step instructions show you how to use not only these applications, but also associated Windows Live on-line services. As an example, you'll learn just how easy it is to create panoramic pictures in seconds or how to create movies from pictures in just a few minutes. Then you'll get the inside scoop on how to communicate and share using Messenger, SkyDrive, Spaces, and Groups.

With this book, you'll quickly be on your way to accessing these useful applications in an effort to making your life easier.

• Learn how to get Live Essentials Applications free and install them on your computer
• Chat with Live Messenger, keep in touch with Live Mail, and set up and create your own blog with Live Writer
• Get creative with Photo Gallery and Movie Maker, which let you manage and enhance your photos and turn them into movies
• Socialize with the help of Live Spaces
• Organize appointments and special days with Live Calendar
• Use SkyDrive to store files and documents online for easy access from anywhere
• Explore additional apps and services such as Live Contacts, Live Groups, Bing Maps, Bing Search, and more

You can purchase the book at amazon.com.

Bing Maps China has updated their site with tons of new data and some new features:

• Yellow Pages – Over 8 million yellow page listings are now searching from Bing Maps China.
• Business Photos – Hundreds of thousands of business front photos are now available as a part of our YP listings results.
• Transit – Bing Maps China has had transit information for a while now; however, the site now hosts hundreds of transit lines around China
• Road Data Refresh – Updated the entire country with new road network data inclusive of over 4 million road segments
• Traffic – Higher fidelity, wider coverage traffic flow information for more roads around the country
• Performance Enhancements – Route and transit calculation times cut by over 50%
• Signposts (Directions) – visual improvements for driving directions
• Signposts (Highway Exits) - visual improvements for highway exit signs
• Signposts (Border Crossing) - visual improvements for border crossing signs

The Bing Maps China API SDK has also been updated.

One sure fire way to get a new feature noticed is to attach it to TechCrunch, and indeed TC noticed a new Bing feature yesterday that appears on Bing search results for “TechCrunch”:

The “Latest posts” feature only appears for certain websites (TechCrunch, New York Times, etc), and appears to be different than the “Top Headlines” feature that shows not the latest headlines, but perhaps the most popular ones?

In the screenshot above you can see that a search on “New York Times” shows both lists, with the “latest posts” showing results from minutes or hours ago, and “Top headlines” showing results filtered by something other than time.

We don’t have “Latest posts” showing up on a search for “LiveSide” (hey!, what’s up with that?) and it seems to be kind of hit or miss as to who has the new feature at this point, but it seems like it could be quite useful.  We’ll keep an eye on it.

I got called a namedropper on Twitter today for my earlier Day 1 post, but really we think of our readers as being the reason we’re here, and it’s because of you that we’re able to get to do this cool stuff.

We’ll have a bit more later on the PDC in general, but at the risk of being called a namedropper again, today I had a chance to spend 20 minutes with Dr. Gary Flake of Live Labs, and got a personal demo of the project they’ve been working on for the past year, Pivot:

Here at Live Labs we’re all about experiments, and Pivot is our most ambitious to date. Pivot makes it easier to interact with massive amounts of data in ways that are powerful, informative, and fun. We tried to step back and design an interaction model that accommodates the complexity and scale of information rather than the traditional structure of the Web.

You need an invite code to get into the preview, and thanks to Gary Flake and Microsoft, we’re going to put up some codes on our Twitter account for you.  Of course we want to be a bit sneaky about it, so we won’t hashtag the codes or anything, you’ll need to know to look on our Twitter feed to find the codes. Each code is good for 10 installs, so be nice and use one and leave the others for other LiveSide readers, please.  I’ll put the first code up shortly (we have 4 codes to give away, 40 installs total), and more as I get time in the next day or so.  Remember, the first 10 installs win!

You can learn more about Pivot and watch a video with Gary Flake describing the latest Live Labs project at www.getpivot.com, and we’ll have a review up soon, too.  Have fun, and thanks for reading LiveSide (and following us on Twitter)!

Now the liveblogging is over, let’s take a look at what was announced today.

Silverlight

A whole lot was said about Microsoft Silverlight, going through some features of Silverlight 3 but most of all of Silverlight 4! Yes, today at the PDC in Los Angeles, Scott Guthrie announced the availability of Silverlight 4 beta, just four months after bringing Silverlight 3 to market.

More information about Silverlight 4  is available at http://www.silverlight.net/getstarted/silverlight-4-beta/

Office 2010

Also announced today is the Office 2010 Beta (Professional Plus) availability. You can learn more about all the 2010 productivity apps at www.microsoft.com/2010 or go directly to the site for Office 2010 and download from there after filling in a little questionnaire (it’s meant for business customers, but hey ;) ). Included apps are Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, Excel, OneNote, Access, Publisher, InfoPath, SharePoint Workspace and Communicator.

Microsoft Office Mobile 2010 beta is available now too, you can download it through the Windows Mobile Marketplace for Windows Mobile 6.5 phones.

IE 9

Besides these announcements, Steve Sinofsky gave some details on the development of the next version of Microsoft's Web browser, Internet Explorer 9. IE9 will support DirectX and other standards, including CSS3 and HTML5. For some videos head on over to Channel 9.

Some more read of interest:
Microsoft Showcases Developer Opportunities for Windows and the Web
Microsoft Office 2010 Reaches Beta, Bringing Productivity Gains to the PC, Phone and Browser
Duet Enterprise for Microsoft SharePoint and SAP Extends Collaboration and Productivity
Digital Inspiration - What’s New Inside Microsoft Office 2010
Announcing the Outlook Social Connector

Here we go!  Live blog day 2!

Thanks to Sunshine for recapping the PDC day one keynotes, our second day of keynotes, and liveblogging, is set to begin in a few hours.  At this PDC, to be sure, there’s not a lot of Windows Live news, or news about Live Mesh or any of the periphery of software and services that make up what interests us most, but that’s not to say we’re not working hard in Sunny LA (too bad we didn’t see much of that sun, maybe later in the week).

We’ve met some of our best contacts and favorite colleagues at events such as this one, and the first order of business has been to hook up with the liveblogging crew, get reacquainted, and get a feel for the business of Microsoft watching in its current and future forms.  This is a fun bunch, but along with some (very) sharp wit, we find in invigorating to talk shop.  It may not translate into immediate blog posts, but it’s important networking, and fun.

We were also honored to be invited for a second year to attend a lunch meeting with Microsoft President Bob Muglia and CTO Ray Ozzie. A heartfelt thanks to Jeff Sandquist from Channel 9 (and much more), one of the real good guys at Microsoft.  Our lunch was a casual, interesting conversation, again invigorating, a chance for the non-Wall Street Journal types to talk tech with a couple of passionate and interesting guys.  In a way we’re sorry we couldn’t have it online somehow, but the very act of “reporting” on the conversation would have altered it, and not for the better.  

Day one was about Azure, not right up our alley, as you might have been able to tell from the tone of the live blog.  To be sure, the hard work of replumbing the world’s data centers into a more cloud based approach, once you’ve unveiled a new name and logo (Azure, at last year’s PDC) isn’t quite as “sexy”, say, as reporting on a new Google phone.  It also isn’t the kind of work that’s going to make Microsoft the same kind of boatloads of cash that the glory days of Windows and Office have made, either, to be honest.  It is important and necessary, and while the message here at PDC may have been a bit muddled, Microsoft is where it needs to be to deliver cloud computing to the backbone of business.

Later, we headed on over to the expo booths, poked around the Bing and Live Labs booths, and spotted Angus Logan and Ori Amiga, from Live Services/Live Mesh/Windows Live.  Of course they weren’t talking except for saying how hard they’re working and to stay tuned, but good to make contact, to let them know we’re still here, and that we’ll be looking for them in the months to come.

Last evening, at a press and analyst’s reception, we had a chance to meet two real “rocket scientists”, from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.  They were here to promote their collaboration with Microsoft on the “Dallas” project, but what fun to talk tech with rocket scientists!  A highlight of our “career” here at LiveSide, to be sure.  We’re excited to take a look at Dallas when we have a bit more time.

After that it was off to dinner at Morton’s, apparently something of a tradition now, with some old friends and new to talk more tech and relax.  Then back to the hotel for our usual 5 hours of sleep, and we’re off again to bring you a Day Two liveblog, lots more networking, and more invigorating conversation.  Not the PDC for breaking news, this one, but one that sets up events to come.  Be sure to tune into the live blog today, as we’re expecting some news about Office Web Apps, maybe a sneak peek at Internet Explorer 9, and some Silverlight surprises.  Should be fun!

The transcript of yesterdays keynote, with Ray Ozzie & Bob Muglia, has been posted online. Let’s take a look at some interesting tidbits:

Today, we're going to focus primarily on the back-end: servers, tools and cloud computing.

So what was there? Azure will be going from CTP to production service in January 2010. Billing won’t start until February.

Of course there was more: Seesmic for Silverlight, Wordpress on Azure, Windows Server AppFabric Beta 1, ASP.NET MVC2 beta.

Ozzie also unveiled the next evolution of Microsoft Pinpoint (a unified catalogue of business apps and services targeted specifically at developers and IT) and introduced a new information service codenamed “Dallas,” also available through Pinpoint and build completely on Windows Azure. “Dallas” is available as a limited community technology preview (CTP). A project that already makes use of “Dallas” is the new citizen-science programming competition called the Pathfinder Innovation Challenge (NASA).

To add to the codenames (3 new ones in total) there’s also Project Sydney, a technology that enables customers to connect securely their on-premises and cloud servers, slated to go to beta early next year .

You can read it all in the transcript. Or wait for the video to become available on demand of course, it should be on microsoftpdc.com within 24 hours after the keynote. For additional comments and pictures see the Day One liveblog.

Tomorrow, we're going to focus more on the experience, things at the top of the stack: Windows, IE, Silverlight, Office and SharePoint.

This should make an interesting keynote, you can watch the keynote live at http://microsoftpdc.com/. Don’t forget to also follow the liveblog here!

And then in a few months, this coming spring, you're going to hear about the progress we've made with Windows Live and the Windows Live platform, and again also this spring at MIX 2010 you'll hear about developing apps for the next generation of our Windows phones.

Looks like there will be no Wave 4 this year…(very disappointed).

We're here in sunny Los Angeles ( 76 degrees and sunny :)  ) again, liveblogging the PDC keynotes today and tomorrow.  You can watch the keynote live at www.microsoftpdc.com, and follow along with our motley crew of bloggers and journalists (Long Zheng, Mary Jo Foley, Ed Bott, Paul Thurrott, Tom Warren, Rafael Rivera, and yours truly).  Hope you have as much fun as we do, and from what we hear, we're in for a few surprises!

It hasn’t even been a week since we noticed in a post that Windows Marketplace would support Windows Mobile 6.0 and 6.1 later this month! Well, later this month has come. Starting today almost all people with phones running Windows Mobile 6.0 and above with a supporting data plan can access Marketplace.

To get Marketplace for a Windows Mobile 6.0 or 6.1 based device, customers can simply point their phone’s browser to http://mp.windowsphone.com to start the download process; from the Web, customers can visit http://windowsphone.com/getmarketplace or simply click here. Then browse and shop a wide range of quality applications for work and play; roughly 90% of the apps in our catalogue already support Windows Mobile 6.0 and 6.1 devices.

Go on, have a look!

There are now over 800 applications available at Marketplace, which is more than three times the number it started out with. Surely there’s something that suits your needs.

A story in the Financial Times today is reporting that Zune services will soon be expanding into a number of new markets:

The Zune-branded service – which includes the most popular films from MGM, Paramount and Universal – will be available in 18 of its largest western markets, including the US, UK, France, Germany and Australia.

The article doesn’t offer any timetable, or any news on whether the Zune HD will be available in these new markets.  In fact, there doesn’t appear to be any official word coming from Microsoft, at least in the form of a press release or similar.  However, The Financial Times quotes Christine Heckart, general manager for TV, video and music marketing at Microsoft, on bringing Zune to 3 screens (PC, TV, and Mobile):

“The strategy and vision of Zune is to continue to build out that full entertainment experience,” Ms Heckart said. “This is a very important step for us to introduce Zune to new consumers around the world.”

We’re hearing unconfirmed reports that Zune services, and Zune HD sales, are being readied for China and India, but again, the timing, and indeed if these reports are even true, are unclear at this time.

Zune services are set to become a big part of Microsoft’s 3 screen approach to offering music, video, and movies to consumers in a number of markets around the world.

We’re honored again to be able to bring you a group effort liveblog of the keynotes at PDC, coming up next Tuesday and Wednesday.  The same gang is back again this year: Long Zheng from istartedsomething.com, Mary Jo Foley from All About Microsoft, Ed Bott from Ed Bott’s Microsoft Report, Paul Thurrott from Windows Supersite, Rafael Rivera from Within Windows, and Tom Warren from Neowin.net  (Todd Bishop from TechFlash apparently prefers the November rain in Seattle to 76 and sunny in LA, go figure).

We’ll have more details and the CoverItLive widget up on Tuesday morning (the keynotes are at 8:30 am pdt (GMT-8)).  You can follow along at home by watching the live streaming webcast available on keynote days at www.microsoftpdc.com

What to expect

First, we’ll be hearing from Ray Ozzie, Bob Muglia, Scott Guthrie, and Kurt DelBene in the keynotes:

While we don’t expect a lot of Windows Live news (we don’t expect a Wave 4 announcement, unfortunately), we should learn more about Office Web Apps and how they fit into Windows Live.  Just this morning, the new Office.com website was updated, with the first official mention of Windows Live Documents:

For personal tasks: You can access your Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote files by posting your documents online to Windows Live Documents. When you are ready to edit or view the document online, simply log on to Windows Live from Internet Explorer, Safari, or Firefox. A Windows Live ID is required for accessing the Windows Live Document account.

Ray Ozzie will of course be talking about Azure, and we love hearing about cloud computing.  Of course we’re keeping our fingers crossed for a few surprises, too.

So set your clocks and join us on Tuesday and Wednesday and join in the Liveblog Keynote madness!  We’ll be watching for your comments!

Bing UK is no longer in beta, it just shed its beta tag. So now when you search for football you won’t get NFL schedules but Football results (Americans call what we call football soccer), providing you do use the UK Bing page of course.
 
Some of the great features for Bing users in the UK are:

• The daily Bing Homepage image and hotspots are something that now will be localized in the UK, with unique imagery and hotspots.
• Visual Search using visual images and metadata to make search more visual and more compelling.
• More Instant Answers. Get quick response answers and results to searches, such as how is Liverpool doing in the Premiership or which tourist attraction should I take my in-laws to at the weekend?
• See who or what is being chatted about real-time with a global live Twitter feed with Bing Twitter search.
• Looking for the best deals?  - There is now an integrated shopping experience with Ciao UK. With Bing you can search the Internet to find the best prices, reviews and local availability. 
• With insights from our Multimap users, Bing Maps now offers new map styles, imagery and transit integration as well as draggable routes.
• Bing has been built for the UK to help consumers get to key local sites and services in fewer links by including popular links, search boxes and suggestions within best match.

Not only did Bing shed its beta tag in the UK, Bing Maps UK was also released. You may have already noticed this when we notified you about a new Bing Maps Interface. This means that if you are in the UK and go to Bing Maps via Bing.com/maps you will get the new Bing Maps Experience, not what you were used to from Multimap.com. However, if you want to, you can still access that via Multimap.com. Afraid you’ll miss out if you use that one? Don’t be! In the next few weeks you will be asked if you’d like to try the new Bing maps experience.

Here are the features of Bing Maps UK (some shared with US market):

Windows Marketplace for Mobile, launched in October together with the launch of Windows phones, got some upgrades:

Developer portal improvements and stronger anti-piracy protection

We’ve been gathering input on what we can do to improve the developer experience and have made some subtle but important enhancements to the developer portal to enable easier uploading of images, greater insight into account status and several other refinements based on feedback from developers. Today’s update also provides more advanced anti-piracy protection. While the underlying technical changes will be transparent for customers, developers will now be able to take advantage of these new protections by following the steps outlined in this anti-piracy whitepaper. As always, updates to existing applications can be submitted for free. To learn more about developing applications for Windows phones, head over to the Windows Mobile for Developers site.

Browse and buy applications from the PC

While we’ve heard great feedback on the Marketplace experience on Windows phones, sometimes people just want the benefits of a shopping on a PC. Starting today, Windows phone customers can browse, buy and download applications online at the Windows Marketplace for Mobile site. The selected applications are delivered wirelessly to the customer’s Windows phone and install the next time the Windows Marketplace client runs on the device. This creates another way for customers to easily find and purchase applications and gives developers a whole new level of exposure.

But that’s not all of the news! In the announcement on the Windows Mobile Developer blog something else caught my eye:

I look forward to providing a more detailed update on Windows Marketplace for Mobile when we extend the service to Windows Mobile 6.0 and 6.1 customers later this month.

Support for Windows Mobile 6.0 and 6.1 customers later this month! Yes, this month! Now is that good news or what?