Tag: microsoft

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Bing Sydney Put In Check

It’s been an interesting few weeks for Microsoft. After announcing their partnership with OpenAI and incorporating ChatGPT into it, things have gotten… weird. In only a short time it has threatened and insulted users. It has insinuated it spied on its creators via their webcams. To say it’s off the rails is an understatement. Tom Warren at The Verge gives some insight into how Microsoft is trying to reign this in. Reflecting on the first seven days of public testing, Microsoft’s Bing team says it didn’t “fully envision” people using its chat interface for “social entertainment” or as a tool…

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It Looks Like You Need a Sweater

Does anyone like Clippy? For anyone who’s initial response is “Who?” let’s rewind. Back in the mid 90’s, Microsoft introduced an assistant into Word named Clippy. It was an animated paperclip with eyes. It would monitor what you were doing and interrupt your work with suggestions. It was… annoying. Dipping into the nostalgia well, Microsoft is bringing Clippy to life in the most Everything-Old-Is-Cool-Again way: an ugly sweater. Tom Warren at The Verge has the story. This year, Microsoft has turned to Clippy, which is more Office-inspired than Windows itself. Born in Office 97, Clippy was resurrected in 2019 for Microsoft…

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That’s Miss Jackson, if You’re Crashy

Leave it to a mega star like Janet Jackson to create a cyber security situation back in the mid-2000s. The pop singer of yesteryear released a song called Rhythm Nation which happened to emit some frequencies that would legit crash a nearby computer. Rob Thubron at Techspot has more of this odd tale. Jackson’s track would crash certain models of laptops when it was played within proximity of the device. It was discovered that the effect could be replicated on other laptops from multiple manufacturers, all of which shared a common feature; the same 5,400 RPM hard disk drive was…

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Windows 95 Launch Video Reminds Us How 90s the 90’s Were

Tech events unveiling new software, gadgets, and services are pretty common nowadays. However, back in the earlier times of computers, it was still a nerd’s paradise. Computers were a niche product, existing mostly in professional settings or schools. The Internet was still in its infancy. So, to say that Microsoft’s Windows 95 was a big deal, it’s all true. The Blue OS Museum YouTube account has unearthed and posted the full 90-minute video showing Microsoft’s event. It has everything you could ever want from a company flexing its semi-might at a pivotal point in computing history. From the clothes, to…

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Excel’s Debut Commercial Is Everything We Love About the 90’s

Microsoft Excel is everywhere these days. It lives on the web via Office 365, in a standalone application since 1992, and has been replicated tons of times. Excel will always be a thing and a commonplace product. But back in 1992, Microsoft tried to wow everyone with what it could do. One elevator, two businessmen, one report they’re trying to complete. It’s a great trip down memory lane.

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Green Update

While Microsoft may have pioneered regular software updates back in the Windows 98 days, they are not alone in this realm anymore. We live in (and have lived in it for a long while) a world where software constantly updates. It is to the point where developers will even ship software to get it out the door and patch / update it later on. Now, Microsoft is doing something interesting: updating when the computer is using green energy. Andrew Cunningham at Ars Technica has more. Using “regional carbon intensity data” from electricityMap and Watttime, Windows will keep tabs on what…

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Next Of Kin

The unveiling of a new product is a milestone for any company. Years of R&D, hundreds of hours in meetings, immense time and money spent, all to coalesce into a single moment: the launch. Every company has high hopes for their new products, but some fly higher than others. Even mediocre products can float along for years before a company kills them off. In 2010 Microsoft held one of their unveilings. A mysterious new product aimed at an under-targeted demographic was to unleash a new era of communications. They had all their ducks in a row: the experience of an…

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Embracing The Ring

Sometimes a company has a monumental screwup so big that they simply want to move on. Never look back and never talk about it again. For Microsoft, that is certainly the 2007 “Red ring of death” debacle during the days of the Xbox 360. That video game console had a green ring surrounding the power button. However, if it turned red and remained that way, the console was dead. This “red ring of death” was immensely infuriating to gamers. The system would brick due to a design flaw and it would come out of nowhere. The system was basically overheating…