Corporate

Microsoft Announce Prices for Office 2010

Pretty similar to Office 2007. If you want the mind numbing details of all the different versions etc. Mashable has them here

Microsoft has revealed the four editions of Office 2010 that it will be selling at retail, along with their prices. It’s also trying something new by offering what it calls Product Key Cards. While you can still buy them at retail, they don’t actually contain the software; rather, they contain keys to unlock installations of Office 2010 that are pre-loaded on some new computers.

The cheapest single computer version is the $149 and the most expensive $499. Cheaper “key” versions are available, where the software is on a new computer but has to be purchased to be unlocked.

I will prod on with my free Open Office Suite.

Parent Company of Foreclosure.com files for Bankruptcy

Insert joke here. The filing is a chapter 11 so it is a restructuring thing as opposed to going out of business thing and the company will, apparently continue trading throughout the process.

The parent company, (FFS DATA Inc.), of Foreclosure.com and a stable of more than 150 other Web sites says its doors will remain open after two lawsuits forced it to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

From here

Toys R Us Bargain – 1/100th of 1% discount

Spotted at a Toys ‘R’ Us branch. You’d think someone would have spotted this:

from The Consumerist

Amazon’s Substandard Treatment of Workers

Article based on a London Times reporter’s experiences while working undercover at an Amazon UK facillity. Lets just say that Amazon are unlikely to win any workplace of the year type awards.

The part that compelled me to write the linked article was the idea of being disciplined for time off sick even if the employee had a doctor’s note confirming sickness. That is very wrong.

MSNBC- Conflict of interest?

MSNBC writer just happens to advocate for Comcast – doesn’t declare a conflict of interest

Here is a post on the Big Money section of the MSNBC web site. which claims to be about companies that make the best use of Twitter. It rambles on for a bit about how they chose 12 companies to focus on setting up an expectation of graphs and numbers and other such wonkish delights.

The numbers never really appear but eventually we get a section on Twitters recommended user function, where Twitter are, in effect, giving their seal of approval to certain accounts and the apparently arbitrary nature of the whole process. OK, the writer may have a point, addition to the list can literally make a seven figure difference in the amount of followers that a company or individual will garner. Still pretty wonkish stuff

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Goldman-Sachs Cowboys Buy Guns

Apparently they are tooling up for a popular uprising. They actually understand that people may be pissed at them. I suppose that is a step in the right direction.

Boing Boing

This is not exactly the best sourced story out there but it does have a ring of truth about it. The last two paragraphs of the original article make the point well.

How Desperate are Microsoft?

This is absurd if true. Apparently Microsoft’s new search app Bing is looking into paying news providers not to list on Google. According to this Techcrunch piece by Erick Schonfeld Microsoft have or are considering offering Richard Murdoch, owner of News Corp International and other publishers cold hard cash and other incentives not to list on Google.

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