Just a few weeks after the independent developers of Longhorn Reloaded hit milestone 1, Microsoft has effectively shut the project down with a cease and desist notice.

Longhorn reloaded is an operating system based on an early release of Windows Longhorn, including features that were abandoned by the time Vista came out. It's really not at all surprising that Microsoft has asked the project to shut down, seeing as nobody bothered to get permission from Microsoft to use its intellectual property before spending the time and energy necessary to turn Longhorn into a usable OS.

One interesting side note: if you read the message posted on the JoeJoe forums, you'll notice that the author doesn't say development is stopping. Rather, the note reads "we are no longer able to provide you with a download link to longhorn reloaded." It might not be worth reading too much into that statement.

After all, there are already at least a handful of people who downloaded the image of Longhorn Reloaded M1 Technical Refresh. So perhaps, the message just acknowledges that the image exists and will no longer be publicly available. But it could also mean that development and distribution will now simply move from a public forum to the shady back alleys of the internet.

[via CNet]