When I wrote up Microsoft's free tool to copy downloaded Windows 7 images to USB flash drives or burn then to DVD, I thought the app seemed like a great idea. After all, it provided student downloaders an easy way to get their cheapo upgrades copied onto install media.

Rafael Rivera was doing his usual Columbo routine on the MS tool's source when he found something in the code which struck him. A section relating to UDF handling appears to have been "borrowed" from ImageMaster - an open source project hosted on Microsoft's own CodePlex service. An by "appears" I mean Rivera's checks with the Reflector .Net code inspector set off the alarms.

As Rivera points out, it's not just the use of the code that is the issue here. It's also the fact that Microsoft has added their own licensing terms.

I'm sure there's some kind of saying about not doing something where you eat, and it certainly sounds like that's what Microsoft has done in this case. Innocent until proven guilty, of course - so we'll wait to see what Microsoft has to say in response in the coming days. For now, they've removed all links to the download tool.

If you're not too concerned with the hullabaloo over the code, you might still be able to find the download on some other sites. A little birdy told me MajorGeeks still has a copy...

In exchange for just one search on Bing, Microsoft's new search engine, Microsoft will grant you free WiFi access on hotspots nationwide (but mostly in airports and hotels).

Apparently the offer began in September but perhaps they've been steadily unrolling it across the country as they only just announced it officially yesterday.

It's an interesting approach to marketing, and no doubt not the cheapest one either. But they're reporting good 'engagement rates' well above the usual .1 or .2% and will continue the scheme for the foreseeable future -- so enjoy your free wireless access! (As a juicy, related titbit, and in no way coincidental, Yahoo will be providing free wireless access at Times Square in New York City, for an entire year.)

Whether it's worth Microsoft's money or not may never be known. But one thing's for certain: Microsoft are famous for their brazen and fearless love of loss-leading -- they have the cash to do it, so why not?

And I tell you what... I would switch to Bing if Microsoft paid for my Internet connection. Wouldn't you? Now there's an interesting thought.

[via MediaPost]

To some of you, this might be a shock. To the rest of you that prey on poor, unsuspecting girls with webcams... not so surprised.

Apparently 14.5% of all online time is spent on MSN Live Messenger -- 14.5% of 27 billion total hours.

To put it into perspective, the next biggest service is Facebook at at 5.2% with YouTube coming in third at 4.4% (and Google's biggest slice of the online pie.)

One has to wonder if people with Messenger logged in in the background counts towards the total -- I imagine it does. So the totals are probably somewhat skewed -- but in either case, you can find all of the data on the original comScore report. Perhaps most impressive is Facebook's 200% climb in usage since the same time last year!

[via SeattlePi]

The EC might be content with Microsoft's browser ballot screen, but that's not stopping Google from getting OEMs to turn away from Internet Explorer on their own.

Google already has deals with several OEMs to include their software, of course. They've been shipping Google Desktop on OEM pcs for quite some time now, and their plans to drop Google Chrome on new users have come to fruition as well.

As you can see, I unboxed a new Sony Vaio laptop running Windows 7 yesterday. Nestled amongst the other desktop icons was the tri-color Chrome orb.
Not only was Chrome pre-pinned to the Windows 7 taskbar, but a quick look at the internet options on the laptop revealed sad news for Internet Explorer: it had been bumped from default web browsing duties.

If we weren't already in the middle of an all-out browser war, the introduction of Google Chrome as the preinstalled default on Windows PCs could well set things off.

MSN.com, Microsoft's search, news and services portal page, hasn't weathered the years well. Tweaking the same basic design for a decade left it far behind the times in terms of design and usability. With today's clean, whitespace-friendly, reimagining of MSN.com, Microsoft ditches the spectre of MSN search and delivers a site that's a little more worthy of showcasing the company's new search hotness, Bing.

A prettier, less cluttered layout and a prominent Bing search bar aren't the only upgrades to the homepage. In a touch that says Microsoft actually knows what year it is after all, you can add your Facebook newsfeed and your Twitter stream to an area on the right side of the page. The news is still there, but it's more customizable, and the layout presents fewer stories at a time than the cluttered old MSN.com did. There's also a local focus, with local weather and a Bing-powered local news widget at the bottom left.

I have to say that, compared to the MSN of old, this new design looks attractive and functional. Speaking of comparisons, though, have a look at our gallery of MSN.com designs since 2001. Looking at how slowly the site changed over the years only underlines how much it just changed overnight.

After months of planning, Microsoft officially opened its first bricks and mortar retail store today in Scottsdale, Arizona. The store launch comes on a day when Microsoft launched its next-generation Windows 7 operating system, and began selling PCs through its online store.

Microsoft will obviously be using its retail stores to sell software, but also Microsoft hardware including the Xbox 360 and Zune HD. The stores will also sell computers and smartphones running Windows and Windows Phone. That includes a number of PCs from major computer manufacturers.

Overall, the whole thing looks an awful lot like another company's retail stores... I just can't quite put my finger on.... oh right. Apple.

Anyway, Microsoft also has a "Microsoft Answers Suite" which isn't exactly a bar filled with geniuses -- but it is a place where customers can bring computers to have an attempt to diagnose and fix problems.

The video above was shot at the grand opening today. You can find a ton of pictures of the store at Gizmodo.

There are plenty of ways to get your hands on Windows 7 starting today. You can buy a new PC that comes preloaded with the operating system, or pick up a retail or OEM copy. But there's another way that you might be able to snag a free or cheap copy: if you've purchased a computer running Windows Vista in the last few months, there's a pretty good chance it qualifies for the PC maker's Windows 7 Upgrade program.

Here's how it works. If you buy a qualifying PC between June 26th, 2009 and January 31st, 2010, you can register for an upgrade to Windows 7 and your PC maker will ship an upgrade DVD to your door. Most netbooks, nettops, and other low cost PCs running Windows XP don't qualify for these upgrade programs and other restrictions may apply. Some companies may send you an upgrade disc for free of while others may charge a small fee and/or charge for shipping.

Here's a roundup of Windows 7 upgrade programs from most of the major PC manufacturers. If you purchased a computer from any of these companies on or after June 26th and haven't already registered for an upgrade you might want to click the links below to register now.

• Acer Windows 7 Upgrade Offer
• Asus Windows 7 Upgrade Program
• Averatec Free Windows 7 Upgrade
  
• Dell Windows 7 Upgrade Option Web Site
  
• eMachines Windows 7 Upgrade Option
  
• Fujitsu Windows 7 Upgrade Offer
• Gateway Windows 7 Upgrade Offer
  
• Gigabyte Windows 7 Upgrade Program
  
• HP Windows 7 Upgrade Option Program
  
• Lenovo Windows 7 Upgrade Program
  
• Medion Windows 7 Upgrade Program
  
• MSI Windows 7 Upgrade Program
• Packard Bell Windows 7 Upgrade Offer
  
• Samsung Windows 7 Upgrade Program
• Sony Windows 7 Upgrade Program
• Toshiba Windows 7 Upgrade Program

For the most part you should be able to upgrade to the Windows 7 equivalent of the operating system you're using. In other words, if you purchased a PC with Windows Vista Home Premium you'll probably be able to upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium for free.Know of a PC maker with an upgrade program that we missed? Let us know about it in the comments!

I'll admit that it seems strange to use Microsoft's Live Mesh on a Mac, but with Apple's MobileMe getting spotty reviews, some Mac users prefer to look for alternative ways to sync. Until now, Snow Leopard users who rely on Live Mesh were out of luck, but a new version of the Live Mesh client supports OS X 10.6. If you're still on Leopard, you don't need to update to the new release, but Snow Leopard users will have to reinstall Live Mesh to get it working again.

Remembering that Live Mesh is available on the Mac - and seeing the new iPhone app from another syncing service, Dropbox - got me thinking about whether you can use Live Mesh on an iPhone. It turns out that the answer is yes, although there's unfortunately no app for that, yet. If you're sharing files through Live Mesh, you can get to them on an iPhone via the web interface. Although Apple fans tend to balk at using anything from Microsoft, this might be one case where it's viable.

This isn't the first time Microsoft has taken liberties with Firefox users. There's that whole .Net thing that happened back in May of this year.

So what gives, Redmond? Why - especially after the fallout from the last incident - would you go and push a Windows Presentation Foundation plugin on my Firefox install? I didn't ask for it, and I don't really want it. Plenty of people consider software that installs in this kind of underhanded way to be malware.

Not to mention a security risk. You know, the same way you (Microsoft) consider Google's Chrome Frame to be a security risk for your own browser. I'll need someone to explain to me how MS figures the situation is different when the shoe is on the other foot.

I'll clear something up for you right now - and this goes for all software companies, not just Microsoft. I expect control over what gets installed on my system and what doesn't. Go ahead and offer me updates, add-ons, and plugins. But please, give me the choice to install.

Heck, I can choose to put off Windows updates forever if I want and some of those are pretty critical patches. So why should I not be given the choice to opt out of something as trifling as a WPF plugin for my non-IE browser?

Get your filthy hands off my browser, you damn, dirty ape!

As operating systems have become more complex, boot times seem to have consistently gone up. One of Microsoft's big claims for Windows Vista was that boot time would be better than XP, but the real-world results ended up disappointing. So again, Microsoft is claiming that Windows 7 will boot faster than Vista.

Unfortunately, Iolo, a company that sells tune-up software for Windows machines, has found that in many cases Windows 7 boots noticeably slower than Vista, results that are corroborated by CNET labs.

Personally, I'm not sure that boot-up time is such a big deal any more. Computers have suspend and hibernate states that make the need to reboot very infrequent. I find that I reboot my laptop about once every two weeks, so if it takes a few seconds longer, that really doesn't bother me too much.

How about you? Are you disappointed that Windows 7's boot times are slower than Vista?

[via Engadget]

If you're a T-Mobile Sidekick user, today is probably not a good day for you. T-Mobile has posted on their forum that they (well, actually they're blaming Microsoft and Danger) have "almost certainly" lost their users' data:

Regrettably, based on Microsoft/Danger's latest recovery assessment of their systems, we must now inform you that personal information stored on your device - such as contacts, calendar entries, to-do lists or photos - that is no longer on your Sidekick almost certainly has been lost as a result of a server failure at Microsoft/Danger. That said, our teams continue to work around-the-clock in hopes of discovering some way to recover this information. However, the likelihood of a successful outcome is extremely low.

What are the implications of this for people who are relying more and more on cloud computing? On one hand, putting your data in the cloud allows you to hand off responsibility for security and backups to an entity that is probably in a better position to deal with it than you are. On the other hand, what if they fail?

The best solution is a solid combination of both. For every important piece of data that you leave on an online service, you should have an easy way to synchronize it to your local machine. If you don't, you're playing with fire.

[via Engadget]

Here at Download Squad, we like saving money. We love finding freebies, and we're certainly not ashamed to walk up to the cash register with a fistful of coupons. Since the announcement of the Windows 7 pricing scheme, we've been looking for ways to cut the costs to make the move.

We've compiled a list of seven ways you can get that Windows 7 goodness without shelling out quite as many bucks. Read on for savings!

We all know Microsoft is working on the successor to OneCare -- Security Essentials is currently in beta testing and should be ready for public consumption any time now. It's a decent protection package, and should help protect users from things like nefarious fake antivirus apps and other "scareware."

But Microsoft has decided to go one better. After all, simply removing infections or blocking them isn't all that detrimental to the bottom feeders who are pushing the malicious apps. They've now launched a second wave of attacks using one of the deadliest weapons in the Redmond arsenal: lawyers.

Reuters reports that Microsoft has filed suit against several "malvertisers," low-lifes responsible for things like the recent pop-up scare on the New York Times website. The case targets several cheesily-named businesses including "Soft Solutions," "Direct Ad," "qiweroqw.com," "ITmeter Inc" and "ote2008.info."

Microsoft hopes to uncover the actual identities of those responsible. Regardless of your feelings for Microsoft, I think we can all agree that it would be nice for this lawsuit to hit the bad guys where it hurts - in their ill-gotten bank account balances.