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For most people, Bill Gates and Microsoft are one and the same. Gates has led Microsoft to global dominance in the 33 years since its founding, combining a strong opportunism -- getting the code for DOS to sell to IBM for the first PC and aping Apple's visual interface for the first Windows are the two best examples of Gates' moving where the wind was soon to blow -- with a steady vision of desktop computers being as powerful as the mainframes that captured techies' imaginations in the 1970s. This is the intro and overview into a series of articles describing the future of Microsoft through five possible scenarios. The series includes under the lead article, "The Future of Microsoft"; * The "Borvell" scenario * The "slow decline" scenario * The "streaming" scenario * The "Oort services" scenario * The "Gates was right" scenario ]

Flash versus Open: Perhaps one thing we can all agree on is that the future of the web, mobile or otherwise, will be more or less open. That would be HTML, MP3, H.264, HE-AAC, and so on. These are not propriatery Adobe products, they are open standards…unlike Flash. In confusing codecs with UI, Wilson keeps asking, "why is it tha[t] most streaming audio and video on the web comes through flash players and not html5 based players?" The answer is rather pedestrian: HTML5 is just ramping up, but Flash IDE has been around for many years. Selling Flash IDE and back-end server tools has been a commercial focus for Adobe, while Apple, for example, hasn't paid much attention to QuickTime technologies and promotion in ages. It's thus reflected in adoption patterns. Hopefully, this summary will clear Wilson's blind spot: Apple is betting on open technologies (as it makes money on hardware) while Adobe (which only sells software) is betting on wrapping up content in a proprietary shackle called Flash.

Nvidia chief executive Jen-Hsun Huang is on a mission to get graphics chips into everything from handheld computers to smart phones. He expects, for instance, that low-cost Netbooks will become the norm and that gadgets will need to have battery life lasting for days. Holding up an Ion platform, which couples an Intel low-cost Atom processor with an Nvidia integrated graphics chip set, he said his company is looking to determine "what is the soul of the new PC." With Ion, Huang said he is prepared for the future of the computer industry. But first, he has to deal with Intel. Good interview. See interview with Charlie Rose! The Dance of the Sugarplum Documents is about the evolution of the Web document model from a text-typographical/calculation model to one that is visually rich with graphical media streams meshing into traditional text/calc. The thing is, this visual document model is being defined on the edge. The challenge to the traditional desktop document model is coming from the edge, primarily from the WebKit - Chrome - iPhone Community. Jen-Hsun argues on Charlie Rose that desktop computers featured processing power and applications designed to automate typewritter (wordprocessing) and calculator (spreadsheet) functions. The x86 CPU design reflects this orientation. He argues that we are now entering the age of visual computing. A GPU is capable of dramatic increases in processing power because the architecture is geared to the volumes of graphical information being processed. Let the CPU do the traditional stuff, and let the GPU race into the future with the visual processing. That a GPU architecture can scale in parallel is an enormous advantage. But Jen-Hsun does not see the need to try to replicate CPU tasks in a GPU. The best way forward in his opinion is to combine the two!!!

"The Sun Labs Lively Kernel is a new web programming environment developed at Sun Microsystems Laboratories. The Lively Kernel supports desktop-style applications with rich graphics and direct manipulation capabilities, but without the installation or upgrade hassles that conventional desktop applications have. The system is written entirely in the JavaScript programming language, a language supported by all the web browsers, with the intent that the system can run in commercial web browsers without installation or any plug-in components. The system leverages the dynamic characteristics of the JavaScript language to make it possible to create, modify and deploy applications on the fly, using tools built into the system itself. In addition to its application execution capabilities, the Lively Kernel can also function as an integrated development environment (IDE), making the whole system self-sufficient and able to improve and extend itself dynamically....." Too little too late? Interestingly, Lively Kernel is 100% JavaScript. Check out this "motivation" rational: "...The main goal of the Lively Kernel is to bring the same kind of simplicity, generality and flexibility to web programming that we have known in desktop programming for thirty years, but without the installation and upgrade hassles than conventional desktop applications have. The Lively Kernel places a special emphasis on treating web applications as real applications, as opposed to the document-oriented nature of most web applications today. In general, we want to put programming into web development, as opposed to the current weaving of HTML, XML and CSS documents that is also sometimes referred to as programming. ...." I agree with the Web document <> Web Application statement. I think the shift though is one where the RiA frames web documents in a new envirnement, blending in massive amounts of data, streaming media and graphics. The WebKit docuemnt model was designed for this p

"Fizz is an intriguing early manifestation of capabilities never seen before on the web. It provides the ability for us to control, aggregate, share and play with our own data streams, and bring together the bits and pieces of our digital selves scattered about the web."

[Here at Ars we're big fans of Creative Commons, both the idea behind it and the work that gets produced. As publishers, we benefit from Creative Commons in a number of ways-we look things up in Creative Commons-licensed Wikipedia (used with caution, of course), the Creative Commons-related policy issues that we cover give us a steady stream of great news content, and we make use of Creative Commons-licensed images in our news stories. ...]

[04.10.2011 19:00h - 20:30h Place: Medialab-Prado. Plaza de las Letras, C/ Alameda, 15 · Madrid Una nueva sesión de #redada con la participación de David García Aristegui (programa Comunes en Radio Círculo), Ignasi Labastida (Creative Commons España) y el abogado Javier de la Cueva sobre la posibilidad de crear una entidad de gestión de derechos de cultura libre. [streaming en directo] Hashtag: #redada Se recomienda llegar a las 18:45h para evitar problemas de aforo. ]

KODAXIL To Replace XML?

File this one under the Universal Interoperability label. Very interesting. Especially since XML document formats have proven to fall short on the two primary expectations of users: interoperability and Web ready. Like HTML+ :) Maybe KODAXIL will work?

The recent Web 2.0 Conference was filled with new web services , portals and wiki efforts trying their best to mash data into document objects. iCloud, MindTouch, AppLogic, 3Tera, Caspio and Gazoodle all deserve attention. although each took a rather different approach towards solving the problem. MindTouch in particular was excellent.

"A Montreal-based software and research development company has developed a markup solution and language-neutral asset-descriptor that when fully developed, could result in a universal computer language for representing information in databases, web and document contents and business objects."

"While still at a seminal stage of development, the company Gnoesis, aims to address the problem of data fragmentation caused by semantic differences between developers and users from different linguistic backgrounds."

Gnoesis, the company that has developed the language called KODAXIL (Knowledge, Object, Data, Action, and eXtensible Interoperable Language), a data and information representation language, says the new language will replace the XML function of consolidating semantically identical data streams from different languages, by creating a common language to do this.

The extensible semantic markup associated with this language will be understood worldwide and is three times shorter than XML.

"from the streaming-away dept In all of the discussions about cord-cutting, it seems like many times we get lost in the weeds of specific details on certain angles or certain perceptions. Occasionally lost in all of this is the simple fact that the public ditching their cable TV subscriptions is happening and the pace at which it's happening is rising." [# ! … wants to #choose # ! by themselves… # ! …and not another TV # ! Stop #contents #restrictions and #You'll see… # ! #Give The Pe@ple what they want, what they deserve… # ! … and a #new -#fairer- #business #model will #rise.]

"from the who-are-you-blaming-now? dept A small group of very vocal musicians has decided that the new target of their anger, after attacking cyberlockers, search engines and torrent sites, should be legal, authorized streaming services. "

"By guest blogger Taylor Lambert and Kevin Erickson In the age of on-demand streaming, it's common to hear people talk about music as "limitless"- something that flows forth endlessly like water. "

" Andy on April 3, 2015 C: 0 Breaking After a judge handed down a summary judgment in its case against EMI this week, embattled music streaming service Grooveshark has published a new anti-piracy policy."

"When the songs you write are downloaded or streamed worldwide, you may be earning royalties you don't even know about. TuneCore Music Publishing Administration finds & collects these royalties for you."

"Amazon is working on a 'Spotify killer'. Sound familiar? Apple Music was hailed as such by basically everyone. Google's All Access was called the same, back in 2013. Even Tidal got the label. And now it's Amazon's turn. As first "

" By Andy on February 14, 2016 C: 17 News Last month we were alerted to a beautiful site that merged the smart looks and playlists of Spotify with the music of YouTube to make a very decent free streaming service. Little did we know that almost anyone can put together a similar platform in minutes, all for an initial outlay of just $38."

[This could be one of the biggest albums ever, in the history of the recording industry. But it won't be available on Spotify, Apple Music, or other streaming music platforms. ...]

" y Ernesto on November 20, 2015 C: 5 News The popularity of Popcorn Time has triggered the release of several streaming websites that mimic the features of the popular application in a web browser. This is a cause of great concern for the major movie studios, resulting in what appears to be a never-ending game of whack-a-mole. "

" Ernesto on December 13, 2015 C: 132 Breaking BitTorrent currently transfers petabytes of data across the Internet every month, but with the shift to online streaming it's losing prominence. Stanford University graduate Feross Aboukhadijeh is bridging this gap with WebTorrent and has already piqued the interest of Netflix, other tech companies, and many enthusiastic developers."

" Rick Falkvinge on November 29, 2015 C: 164 Opinion With a lot of people streaming music and video from services such as Spotify, Pandora and Netflix, torrenting is less of a visible conflict than ten years ago. But similar fights continue in the shape of net neutrality and privacy, with the same values: it was never about the money."

" Sí, el gigante de Redmond hace caja cada vez que facilita información al FBI, algo que han confirmado desde la propia Microsoft, diciendo que las leyes estadounidenses permiten a las empresas el reembolso de los costes asociados al cumplimiento de órdenes legales que, en este caso, tienen por objeto la obtención de datos de clientes. Esto quiere decir que sí, efectivamente, Microsoft cobra, pero no en sentido estricto, ya de lo expuesto se deduce que sólo suple los costes de cumplir esas órdenes y ceder información al FBI, algo que a pesar de todo ha generado una cierta y comprensible controversia. Microsoft cobra por ceder información al FBI En teoría el coste por cada petición va desde los 50 hasta los 200 dólares, pero se realizan de forma muy frecuente y normalmente en grandes cantidades, lo que da lugar a facturas tan abultadas como la de la imagen que acompaña la noticia, que asciende a nada menos que 352.200 dólares. Categorías: Actualidad, Microsoft, Noticias Etiquetas: cobra, Datos, FBI, información, Microsoft, Seguridad, Tecnología « Anterior: Moto 360 tendrá pantalla OLED, carga inalámbrica y cristal de zafiro Siguiente: Microsoft ofrece descuentos de 100 dólares por abandonar Windows XP » Análisis Nokia Lumia 1320, análisis Nokia Lumia 1320, análisis Tras analizar el Nokia Lumia 1520, el phablet tope de gama de Nokia, ahora llega... Panasonic Lumix TZ60, análisis Panasonic Lumix TZ60, análisis No son tiempos fáciles para las compactas; el fenómeno smartphone,... FRITZ!Box 7490, análisis FRITZ!Box 7490, análisis Tras una primera toma de contacto con FRITZ!Box 7490, el... Monitor Philips 231C5, análisis Monitor Philips 231C5, análisis Philips 231C5 es un nuevo monitor táctil que destaca por... Más Análisis... MuyTV Smartwatch Motorola Moto 360 Nuevo WhatsApp Windows Phone Thumbnail Nuevo WhatsApp Windows Phone Tras la actualización del WhatsApp para Android, los responsables de... PC contra Xbox One en Ti