Although with her husband, Bill, Melinda Gates ranks as one of world's top philanthropists. But when it comes to letting Apple products into the Gates household, the aforesaid Mrs. Gates (quite understandably) still flies the Microsoft flag. From today's New York Times Magazine:

Do you own an iPod, which is made by Apple?

No, I have a Zune.

What if one of your children says, "Mom, I have to have an iPod"? I have gotten that argument -- "You may have a Zune."

Is it true that Bill works on an Apple laptop?

False. Nothing crosses the threshold of our doorstep.

Isn't there room in this world for both Apple and Microsoft?

Microsoft certainly makes products for the Macintosh. Go talk to Bill.

You can read the full Q&A here.

In its most concrete comments yet about the next version of Windows, Microsoft said in a blog post on its Dutch Web site that Windows 8 is about two years from hitting the market.

Microsoft is working on the next version of Windows, the blog says in Dutch, but it will be about two years before Windows 8 is on the market.

The comments, noted earlier Sunday by Winrumors.com, came at the end of a post celebrating Windows 7's first birthday. Microsoft also

on its U.S. Web site this week but made no mention of the timing of Windows 8.

A Microsoft representative, reached on Sunday morning, declined to comment or elaborate on the blog posting.

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Perhaps Microsoft isn't so stubborn about Windows 7 tablets after all. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer may have just left himself an out to pave the way for a Windows Phone 7 tablet. The official line is that Microsoft will not offer a Windows Phone 7 tablet.

Ballmer, speaking at the Gartner Symposium in Orlando, was set up for a rough keynote from the beginning. A video of tech exec questions all asked whether Microsoft could compete with Apple on the iPad and iPhone. Gartner analyst John Pescatore noted that "no one is lining up in the snow to get that hot new Windows phone and there's no hit movie about SharePoint."

Gartner set up the interview as a consumer/enterprise dueling banjos sort of thing. The big topic was Windows Phone 7 whether it could appeal to both the business and consumer markets. Naturally tablets came up. When asked about whether there would be a Windows Phone 7 tablet instead of a Windows 7 slate, Ballmer held up a WP7 phone and said:

"This is Windows too. Could be this Windows or another Windows. There are technical details I'm not getting into today. We get multiple experiences."

Microsoft has officially said that there will be no Windows Phone 7 tablet. Indeed, Ballmer could have been referring to Windows embedded and Windows 7 on tablets. However, Ballmer seemed to indicate that Windows Phone 7 would be a possibility - or at least that experience. The Gartner analysts had noted they wanted the Windows Phone 7 experience on a tablet.

Reading the tea leaves, it sure sounds like Microsoft is at least open to a Windows Phone 7 powered tablet. That's a move that would make a lot of sense. Windows Phone 7 appears to be much more suited to tablet use. And if Microsoft can leverage its PowerPoint franchise, a WP7 tablet could be a winner. Instead, Microsoft seems to be force-feeding Windows 7 on the tablet form factor.

Ballmer was cagey throughout the interview about tablets, which were a big focus at the Gartner conference. On Windows tablet availability, Ballmer said:

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SAN FRANCISCO--Aiming to bolster its hosted software for businesses, Microsoft announced today that it is adding Web-based versions of Office to its collection of hosted software for business. The company will also offer traditional Office as a subscription-based service.

, the company also rebranded the product.

What once went by the mouthful Business Productivity Online Suite will now be known as Office 365, Microsoft announced at an

at the St. Regis Hotel here. The St. Regis is owned by Starwood hotel chain, one of Microsoft's early customers for its hosted online services.

Kurt del Bene said that the shift to the cloud is as big a change for computing as the move to a graphical user interface a generation ago. Del Bene noted that Microsoft developed Office 2010, which was released earlier this year, with the goal of having products that could be used both online and as traditional software.

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In a surprise move, Microsoft announced today that Chief Software Architect Ray Ozzie is leaving the company.

The move, which raises questions about the company's future technology direction, was announced in an e-mail to employees from CEO Steve Ballmer. Ozzie is leaving after an unspecified transition period, expected to be several months.

"With our progress in services and the cloud now full speed ahead in all aspects of our business, Ray and I are announcing today Ray's intention to step down from his role as chief software architect," Ballmer said in the memo, which was posted to Microsoft's Web site. "He will remain with the company as he transitions the teams and ongoing strategic projects within his organization--bringing the great innovations and great innovators he's assembled into the groups driving our business. Following the natural transition time with his teams but before he retires from Microsoft, Ray will be focusing his efforts in the broader area of entertainment where Microsoft has many ongoing investments."

Ozzie joined Microsoft when the company bought Ozzie's Groove Networks back in April 2005. Initially, he was one of three chief technical officers and was named to his current role in 2006, at the same time the company announced Bill Gates plan to retire.

Microsoft said it has no plans to fill the chief software architect role.

Ozzie was already a computing industry legend by the time he joined Microsoft, having worked on several early PC programs before creating Lotus Notes. Ozzie ventured out on his own after IBM acquired Lotus, creating Groove, a collaborative document creation engine.

"Ray contributed significantly to the early success of Windows," Ballmer noted in his memo to Microsoft employees. "Since being at Microsoft, both through inspiration and impact he's been instrumental in our transition toward a software world now centered on services."

Microsoft's acquisition of Groove was widely seen as the cost of bringing in Ozzie.

During his time at Microsoft, Ozzie is best known for his Internet Services Disruption memo five years ago, which outlined the need for all of the company's businesses to move to the cloud. Since then, Microsoft has launched plans for Windows Live, Windows Azure, and Office Web Apps, among other cloud efforts.

However, Ozzie's tenure has also been marked by clashes with various product teams over both resources and technical direction.

Before he leaves Microsoft, Ozzie will focus on the company's entertainment strategy, Ballmer noted. Microsoft has been trying to flesh out its notion of a "personal cloud," which is in many ways the consumer parallel to the business cloud strategy that the company has laid out.

One of Ozzie's pet projects at Microsoft was Live Mesh, a technology incubation that aimed to offer people the ability to have their content automatically synchronized with the Web and their other devices. Parts of Live Mesh are now part of Windows Live, although more work is needed to fulfill the broader vision, including securing broader rights from Hollywood to allow users to take purchased content, such as movies and TV shows, to whichever device they are on.

Microsoft declined to make Ozzie available for an interview, nor did it have any comment on his plans once he leaves the company. Ballmer left the door open to continued work with Ozzie.

"He's always been a 'maker' and a partner, and we look forward to our continuing collaboration as his future unfolds," he said. This story originally appeared on CNET

Rummaging through his home office recently, Ray Ozzie, Microsoft's chief software architect, came across a trove of old documents that tech aficionados will get a kick out of: the press materials announcing the launch of Windows 1.0. Ozzie subsequently uploaded the files for the public's perusal. Here's a snippet:

BELLEVUE, WA -- NOVEMBER 20, 1985 -- Microsoft Corporation announced today the retail shipment of the Microsoft Windows operating environment to dealers and distributors. Microsoft Windows extends the features of the DOS operating system, yet is compatible with most existing applications that run under DOS. Windows lets users integrate the tasks they perform with their computer by providing the ability to work with several programs at the same time and easily switch between them without having to quit and restart individual applications. In addition, it provides a rich foundation for a new generation of applications.

"Windows provides unprecedented power to users today and a foundation for hardware and software advancements of the next few years," said Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft. "It is unique software designed for the serious PC user, who places high value on the productivity that a personal computer can bring."

ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley, who first noticed the post, points out that this marks a return from a four-year hiatus from blogging. (The headline for his post is "I'm back."

NEW YORK--While Microsoft

yesterday as its answer to the iPhone, many are still wondering what the company's response will be to the iPad.

CEO Steve Ballmer has noted on several occasions that there will be some Windows 7 slates this year, but that's not the answer to the question--Microsoft has had tablets for years. The real issue is how Microsoft plans to respond to the iPad's instant-on abilities, it's long battery life, and the fact that it's easily navigated with just a finger and no need for a keyboard.

"You will see a set of things from our partners, essentially around the holidays," Ballmer said following the launch event here for the new mobile OS. He added that Microsoft's position will be strengthened with the arrival of Intel's Oak Trail processors next year.Continue »

Maybe it was just my vantage point, watching the press conference streamed live over the Internet. But as he moved through his opening remarks, Steve Ballmer seemed slightly out of sync with his material. Here was Microsoft's CEO, pitching his company's new mobile operating system, and it seemed as if he had just been handed the material five minutes before heading out on the podium. In the weeks and months ahead, nobody's going to remember - or care very much - whether Ballmer's performance came off as stilted.

But as Ballmer tried to whip up enthusiasm for the early crop of smartphones he had on had that were powered by Windows Phone 7, I couldn't help but be reminded of myriad Steve Jobs-a-thons, where Apple's CEO glided effortlessly through his presentation, the audience hanging on his every syllable. OK, it's an invidious comparison, perhaps. But Apple, perhaps better than any contemporary computer or consumer electronics company, has a keen sense of how to slake its customers' desires. Microsoft doesn't need to demonstrate that it's equally cool. But it does need to navigate through a market where consumers are notoriously fickle and Microsoft's legacy applications in business software mean little.

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"I've been looking forward to this day, for some time I would say," Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said as he opened a press conference in New York to officially announce Windows Phone 7.

It was an inside joke that everyone in the audience got. This is Microsoft's second try at cracking this market. The first was a device aimed at businesses that the company discontinued a year and a half ago. Watching the success enjoyed by Google's Android and the iPhone in the mobile market, Microsoft had concluded it needed a more consumer-friendly product. (Windows Phone 7 was first shown at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona early this year.)

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As grumbles grow on Wall Street about Microsoft's stock performance, chief executive Steve Ballmer today promised that Windows-based tablet computers will be ready to compete against Apple's iPad in time for the all-important fourth quarter.

"You'll see new slates with Windows on them. You'll see them this Christmas, you'll see them continue to change in the fall," Ballmer said in a Q&A session after a speech at the London School of Economics.

"Certainly we have done work around the tablet as both a productivity device and a consumption device," Ballmer said, without getting more specific about Microsoft's plans.

That prediction comes as a report from the firm Bernstein Research finds that Apple has sold 3 million iPads in the 80 days since its debut. Colin McGranahan, the retail analyst who wrote the report, described the iPad as "a runaway success of unprecedented proportion."

The absence of viable competition to the iPad was one reason why Goldman Sachs downgraded Microsoft. Also, Janney Capital cut its rating on Microsoft, showing increasing impatience with the company's dismal stock performance since the spring. If he's paying attention to the criticism, Ballmer's not letting on. Responding to questions in London about how he thought Microsoft was doing, he kept a proper stiff upper lip and painted an optimistic picture:

"Pretty darn good. Could be better, always could be better. But we're a company that, I don't know, will make about $26 billion profit pretax (this year). I can only think of one company in the world that makes more than that so I'm not going to be apologetic for our financial results."

The immediate problem is that Microsoft has been talking a big game for months with not much to show. In January, Microsoft's CEO showed off a Windows-based tablet computer said to be under development. But HP hasn't yet offered more details about the device, especially since buying Palm. Its Windows Phone 7 software is on tap for its official release on Oct. 11, about a long delay that's raised questions about Microsoft's handset strategy. In a recent interview Ballmer seemed to acknowledge missteps but still argued that his company was ready to present a convincing story to consumers.

"In a sense, you could say we missed a cycle. We had some execution issues from an R&D perspective. In the time frame since the last significant release certainly the industry has moved, the technology has moved, the hardware has moved. Microsoft plans to unveil a lineup of smartphones using the revamped version of its mobile operating system in early October. This launch is crucial for Microsoft, which has been battered by Apple's iPhone and Google's Android mobile software. We said, we've got to move forward, not shoot for yesterday. We've got to shoot ahead in a way that's delightful to users, accessible to developers and prioritize everything else we do around those elements."

Analysis: Why Windows tablets for holidays won't rival iPad

The challenge now is to make good on that promise without again slipping up. If he can't, the chorus calling for a change at the top will grow ever louder.

Microsoft today is releasing the final version of its new set of Windows Live apps, including updates to its photo- and video-editing programs, as well as synching and blogging tools.

The Windows Live Essentials 2011 apps have been in testing since June and are available for download from Microsoft's site. The collection includes Windows Live Photo Gallery, Movie Maker, Messenger, and Mail, along with Windows Live Mesh, Family Safety, and Writer.

Microsoft also plans to announce that Dell will be the first global PC maker to start including the programs preloaded on its PCs.

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SAN FRANCISCO--Just days after launching Internet Explorer 8 in March 2009, Microsoft's Dean Hachamovitch wrote a memo about what the company really needed to do with the next version of its browser.

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Microsoft's top lawyer said on Monday that the company is taking action in the wake of a report that its antipiracy efforts have been used by the Russian government as a means to monitor computers of dissident groups in that country.

In a blog post, general counsel Brad Smith said that the company is hiring an outside law firm to investigate a report in The New York Times that the Russian government has used Microsoft's antipiracy efforts as a pretext to search computers of potential dissidents and, separately, that some lawyers hired by Microsoft have worked with corrupt police to shake down businesses over the piracy issue.

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