Top stories

Journalists Cover Microsoft, Using Macs

It’s not an easy time for Microsoft — with Steve Ballmer having to field questions about being “buffoons” and an “evil empire”  at the shareholder’s meeting (.doc) — so when they get together “the world’s most influential technology pundits and online writers” (nb: we weren’t invited) for Mobius to discuss super-secret mobile tech you’d think [...]

Guide To Black Friday Apple Bargains: Cheap MacBooks, iPods and Accessories Galore

Here’s a guide for finding the best bargains on Apple-related gear during the infamous Black Friday sales on November 27. We’ve compiled a comprehensive list of gear from leaked photos of sales flyers and descriptions of sales.
The bargains include a 2.26 GHz MacBook + $150 gift card at Best Buy for $999.99 ; a 32GB [...]

Review: Voices Is Today’s Best Thing Ever, Grab It Now While It’s Cheap

New on the App Store is Voices from the clever folk at Tap Tap Tap. You can guess what it does.

Open it up, pick a silly voice. Helium is pretty silly. A microphone appears and the app even clears your throat for you (try it, you’ll see what I mean). Now speak your brains, and [...]

Review: Sony Walkman S540 Series Video MP3 Player

Press releases, you will hardly be surprised to hear, are rarely very interesting. But one arrived in my inbox a couple of weeks ago that made me double-take.
“Sony’s S Series Walkman,” it chattered, “is a serious challenger to the iPod Nano.” Gosh, really? Perhaps the Cult had better have a look at one, then, despite [...]

Report: Microsoft To Unveil App Store, MobileMe Clones In February

Microsoft may unveil two mobile services February designed to counter Apple’s iPhone App Store and MobileMe, a blog claimed Monday.

Citing unnamed “sources close to Microsoft,” Neowin claims the software giant will unveil SkyMarket and SkyBox at next month’s Mobile World Congress.

SkyMarket, like Apple’s App Market, will offer a site for Windows Mobile users to download applications. In September, Microsoft began advertising for a Product Manager for SkyMarket. The service would be tied to Redmond’s Windows Mobile 7.

SkyBox would mimic Apple’s MobileMe service, permitting users to sync photos and other data. SkyBox reportedly won’t require the Windows Mobile software.

Along with the two services, Microsoft may introduce Windows Mobile 6.5, including and updated screen and improved interface. The introduction could signal Microsoft’s ground-breaking Windows Mobile 7 will not appear in 2009 as expected.

About the author

Ed Sutherland

Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.

Email the author | Read more posts by Ed Sutherland.

6 comments

    How innovative of them!

    Their next project will be Skynet.

    Proving once again how unimaginative Microsoft is.
    They even tried to copy features in Leopard and failed.
    Give it up Microsoft. You’re a dinosaur doomed for extinction.

    I am sure it will be a quarter as good for half of the price.

    Don’t be so down on Microsoft. Mimicry is the sincerest form of flattery.

    The MobileMe service has been great… although I still can’t seem to get the calendar to sync properly with the service. The fact that it is so well integrated into both OS X and iPhone/iPod touch is going to make it very difficult for Microsoft to compete — especially with how slow Windows Mobile handsets tend to be.

Buy Inside Steve's Brain Buy from Amazon.com Buy from Barnes & Noble