With little fanfare Microsoft released
Windows Media Player 11 in beta form last week coupled with Urge, the music service from Microsoft and MTV designed to compete with Apple's iTunes Music Store. WMP11 is a sort of preview of what we can expect to see next year in Windows Vista, and the question that seems to be on everyone's minds is whether Microsoft can finally best Apple's rock-solid player and service. According to the Washington Post's Rob Pegoraro, at least,
the answer is no. His article can be summed up by its title, "New Media Player: Nice Features, but It's No iTunes." Pegoraro says that WMP11 has a cleaner interface that represents "a smart, creative way to organize a digital music library" and catches up with iTunes in a number of respects, like its ever-present live search box and easy CD burning functionality. Its album artwork downloader, however, is bewilderingly inept. Pegoraro's review of Urge, which has both a la cart ($0.99/song, $9.99/per album) and subscription (rent your music for $9.99 a month) options, is less favorable, saying, "Not only has MTV failed to match iTunes, it has repeated some of the worst mistakes of earlier iTunes challengers." He criticizes the service's lack of extras like lyrics and bonus videos, irritating search behaviors, and the lack of iPod support that has become a cliché among iTunes' competitors. Head over to the
Washington Post for the full review or
Microsoft's web site if to bite the bullet and try Windows Media Player 11 out yourself.
With Halloween fast approaching, it's a great time to get in some practice defending your territory against zombies. In Graveyard Shift, you take aim at zombies and other creepy-crawlies, blasting them into splatters of cartoony green guts. It's a casual first-person shooter, and it's very easy to get the hang of - use the mouse to aim, click to fire. Graveyard Shift has at least 15 levels, and it might even have some secret stages I haven't unlocked yet.
They key to getting good at Graveyard Shift is learning to use ...
