Here it is at last, folks—a brand new operating system for the iGeneration! Straight from the market’s leading software manufacturer, specifically designed for tablets and smartphones, it’s free from all that tiresome text and crammed with brightly-colored blobs! Move them around, tap them, press them, fondle them! It’s a whole new way of interacting with your phone, your PC, your fridge, your spouse! Yes, it’s here, it’s now, it’s the revolutionary innovation of 2011—it’s Unity! Wait ... what? You thought I was talking about Windows 8? Sorry, folks, but for those of us who embrace the Linux way of life, all...

  One of the true innovators of the reading of text on screen, Bill Hill, died yesterday. Hill will be remembered primarily as one of the inventors of Microsoft‘s ClearType screen typography system, but his impact on our screen experience spanned a quarter century. Robert Scoble, who interviewed Hill many times, says that Hill worked behind-the-scenes, but was “one of the greats.” Hill started out as a newspaper writer for 20 years in Scotland. In 1986 he joined Aldus on their seminal PageMaker layout program. He was approached by Microsoft in 1994 to run its typography group. He left Microsoft in 2009 and worked on screen-reading...

B&N/Microsoft Finalize Partnership, Creating Nook Media (GigaOM) Publishers Adapt to Digital Market (Good E-Reader) Audiobook Self-Publishing: A Brief Primer (Publisher's Weekly) How to Pick an eReader (Digital Trends) Kindle Daily Deal: Boardwalk Empire by Nelson Johnson (&) Hush Little Baby by Sylvia Long...

Microsoft’s CEO, Steve Ballmer, recently spoke with the Seattle Times about the status of the company, all of the upcoming releases, and what the company plans to do over the next 10 years. While Ballmer only touched the surface of the Surface, his response was revealing in its vagueness. Ballmer told the Seattle Times that Microsoft had not yet announced a price for its upcoming line of Surface tablets, but he did offer a range that he believes is “the sweet spot.” He doesn’t think the iPad is particularly expensive. “When people offer cheaper, they do less,” said Ballmer. “They look less good,...

ZDNet's Microsoft reporter, Mary Jo Foley, has something of a rumor-piece posted that's definitely worth a read ... at least for those of you interested in staying abreast of the latest self-publishing services and active-reading apps. Here's the takeaway, beginning with a little background info: After settling a patent dispute back in April, Microsoft and Barnes & Noble formed "a new venture to focus on e-reading and the education market." On April 30, according to a Microsoft press release, the two companies announced both "a strategic partnership" and a new e-book subsidiary, Newco, which "will bring together the digital and College businesses of...

Vanity Fair has an article on Microsoft’s corporate culture, and some ways in which that culture crippled innovation at the company. One of those ways is responsible for Microsoft—and Bill Gates in particular—rejecting a prototype for a touchscreen e-reader—in 1998. According to [writer Kurt] Eichenwald, Microsoft had a prototype e-reader ready to go in 1998, but when the technology group presented it to Bill Gates he promptly gave it a thumbs-down, saying it wasn’t right for Microsoft. “He didn’t like the user interface, because it didn’t look like Windows,” a programmer involved in the project...

  Via Ebook Friendly...

After the build-up of yesterday’s invitation and attendant rumor, today’s Microsoft event promised to be exciting (even if it turned out Barnes & Noble would not actually be involved). And true to form, Microsoft announced…a tablet. A Windows 8 tablet, in fact. Or, indeed, two of them. The Microsoft Surface will come in a regular version powered by an ARM processor, or a “Pro” version rocking a Core i5 x86 processor with either 64 or 128 gigabytes of storage. Both versions will run Windows 8—the same Windows 8 as your desktop PC, putting it one up on Apple if...

In April, Microsoft and B&N entered into a “strategic partnership” with no official name (but referred to as “Newco”). Now it looks like one of the fruits of that partnership may be announced tomorrow afternoon at a Microsoft event in Los Angeles. TechCrunch’s Peter Ha reports hearing from unknown sources that this event will announce a joint Microsoft/Barnes & Noble tablet which could be the first non-Xbox device that can stream from Microsoft’s Xbox Live on-line streaming service. Ha noted that, unlike previous invitations, the one for this event carried absolutely no specific product-line branding, simply calling it “a major Microsoft...

Competition is always a good thing, right? In today's marketplace B&N is the company best positioned  to compete with Amazon for #1 in ebook sales. The problem is B&N still operates like a brick-and-mortar retailer while Amazon is a technology company to the very core. Some have suggested that Microsoft's investment in B&N will help them make the transition to becoming a technology company. If spinning off the Nook business is what it takes for B&N to start thinking more like Apple, Google and Amazon then let's hope they do it soon. As the owner of a Nook with GlowLight it's painfully obvious that...

Microsoft's $300 million investment in B&N's digital businessis about more than ebooks. Much more. Or at least I hope so. Success in this venture will not be measured by sales of ebooks. Microsoft should instead use this as an opportunity to create an end-to-end consumer experience that rivals Apple's and has the advertising income potential to make Google jealous. But how will that happen by investing in the distant #2 player in the ereader space?Microsoft has spent billions over the years as it repositions itself from the makers of Windows and Office into a much broader brand. They've done a...

From the press release: Barnes & Noble Inc. (NYSE: BKS) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) today announced the formation of a strategic partnership in a new Barnes & Noble subsidiary, which will build upon the history of strong innovation in digital reading technologies from both companies. The partnership will accelerate the transition to e-reading, which is revolutionizing the way people consume, create, share and enjoy digital content.  The new subsidiary, referred to in this release as Newco, will bring together the digital and College businesses of Barnes & Noble. Microsoft will make a $300 million investment in Newco at a post-money valuation of...