M3 Sweatt

Today on the Seattle Times personal technology page, there’s a good review of Windows Defender, the free program that helps protect your computer against an assortment of what is thrown at us today: pop-ups, malware, spyware and other assorted bits. (The title of this post is courtesy of the Times.) From the Seattle Times:

“By policing how new programs try to modify Windows, Defender has swatted away much of the spyware I’ve thrown at it while staying out of the way otherwise. (The unwanted programs it couldn’t evict defied the efforts of competing spyware removers, too.) And it provides something horribly overdue in Windows: a simple way to inspect all the software active on a computer, including those programs normally hidden from view.”

More info on Windows Defender, and a link to the download, is available here available here.

As Stephen Wildstrom of BusinessWeek said in his column last month, “steps to make security software simpler and to integrate it more effectively are welcome, but the industry has to improve its products so that the nontechnical consumer won’t be required to make highly technical decisions.”

Totally agree with that statement, and one of the reasons I’m pleased to see that the interface of Defender (as well as Windows OneCare) is easy-to-understand and provides a good experience for the customer. The teams on these products have close connections to the customers using and testing the products, and are able to implement updates and changes in direction much more nimbly than packaged software. (Here’s a link to the Windows OneCare team blog.)

A friend (she’s at a web success in the Valley) commented to me recently on the number of online products and momentum she was seeing in the press: “it’s all about the internet, and it looks like this Windows Live, software-as-a-service thing has some major frickin’ traction (at Microsoft).” (She’s quite colourful in her descriptions.)

IMHO, that’s why it’s ‘Windows Live’ not ‘Static.’ ; )

Last, I recommend the video of Bill Gates and Mike Nash discussing the vision for security from the RSA Conference 2006 in February. You can even chat online with the erudite Mr. Nash next week in his monthly chat on Security on March 16 at 10:30 AM Pacific. (Click here to add the chat to your calendar.)

More info…

• To find out more about spyware – what it is, ways your computer can become infected, and what you can do to prevent it – watch this video on protecting your computer.


• If you’re wondering how Windows Defender compares with other Microsoft antispyware and antivirus technologies, check out this product comparison chart.


• Windows Live Safety Center – A Web service designed to help ensure the health of your computer with free scanning tools that help you get rid of unwanted software.


• Malicious Software Removal Tool – A security tool that checks your computer for specific viruses and other malicious software and helps remove any infection found. This tool alone has run more than 2 billion executions.


• The link to the Microsoft Security Response Center Blog

Tags: microsoft, antivirus, antispyware, Windows Defender, OneCare.

As noted on CNet, the new beta version of Windows OneCare Live Windows OneCare now includes anti-spyware technology.

As OneCare hits the homestretch, Microsoft is putting the final touches on the product. The “beta refresh” released Thursday adds anti-spyware functionality to the software, the one main feature that wasn’t yet part of the beta product. The anti-spyware features come from Windows Defender, Microsoft’s anti-spyware application that’s also in beta.

More on the new version can be found in the new entry “Windows Live OneCare – Changes, Changes, Changes” on the Windows Live OneCare Team Blog.

Tags: microsoft, antivirus, OneCare.

A few of the good folks from IBM Business Consulting Services released a report earlier this year on “The end of TV as we know it.” It provides their view on what the landscape in 2012 looks like across the industry for television programming, distribution and consumption. The authors interviewed a number of extensive interviews with analysts, pundits and execs from across a worldwide and industry-wide spectrum.

“Our analysis indicates that market evolution hinges on two key market drivers: openness of access channels and levels of consumer involvement with media. For the next 5-7 years, there will be change on both fronts – but not uniformly. The industry instead will be stamped by consumer bimodality, a coexistence of two types of users with disparate channel requirements. While one consumer segment remains passive in the living room, the other will force radical change in business models in a search for anytime, anywhere content through multiple channels.”

Interesting.

No surprise that the report heralds sweeping changes we will see in television and video entertainment consumption due to the growing and near pervasive success of digital video recorder (DVR) technologies (commercialized now in Tivo, ReplayTV, Windows Media Center systems), television programming distributed via the web (as we see today in iTunes, Google, Akimbo and others) and more (like our own Microsoft IPTV solutions).

When I look back to the estimates we made at my previous company in 2000, I remember that we guesstimated at the hockey stick of DVR adoption, with “DVR in every major household” by, well, just about now. I remember projections that pegged North American DVR households at more that 30-40 million units, and possibly as high as 60-70 million by the end of the decade. Now those estimates may be right, when you take into consideration the number of devices that now enable video entertainment (OK, multimedia) in the home, on the go and across a wide spectrum of devices and services. 

IBM called out is that TV viewing will be predominantly passive, with people watching programming when it’s on, and that the younger generation (I guess Generation X — where I fall — and younger) will be more in tune with content that is available anywhere and anytime they want it, whether it’s via a TV, PC, phone or other portable media player.

For me, the concept is incredibly satisfying. But I’ve found that the experience is increasingly frustrating. That is an area where a complete, simple and interconnected experience will benefit consumers the most. At a time when the average consumer spends less than 20 minutes to learn how to use a new consumer gadget, people rarely have the time or patience to configure and connect all of the devices in the chain.

I do enjoy the relatively simple experience I have today with a Media Center PC at the centre of our system, Media Center Extender and portable Media players – but I still spend time managing, sync’ing and archiving. The vast majority of our entertainment viewing comes through our ReplayTV DVRs — the TV equivalent of “point-and-shoot” digital cameras — which allows us to time shift our programming from the networks. Our family straddles that line between the two cultures that IBM called out, with a couple of GenX and a few of the latest generation of consumers driving us to be more demanding about our video entertainment choices. 

Mind you, TV doesn’t rule our lives, but we’re certainly in the mainstream when it comes to the average amount of television we watch at home. (I recall that TV viewers in the US watches an average of 18 hours a week, although this has declined in the last few years with the rise in web surfing.) Nothing beats a beautiful weekend outdoors… but when the weather doesn’t cooperate, it’s great to have a queue of the stuff you want to watch waiting at home for you. 

Tags: microsoft, dvr, akimbo, iptv, digital music, iTunes.

Announced this week, improvements to the Windows Live service with improvements in Search, a new Windows Live toolbar (which auto-detects RSS feeds and updates your personal Live.com home page)

Debuting in test form Wednesday, Windows Live Search is Microsoft’s latest move in a major strategy shift that has the world’s largest software company focusing more heavily on Internet-based software and services.

For me, one nice feature is the ability to save searches and have them automatically updated on my own Live.com home page. See more at http://ideas.live.com/.

Tags: Microsoft, Windows, Windows Live, search.