Cody Taylor

The company has formed a cybersecurity posse with technology companies, academic organizations, and Internet infrastructure firms to dismantle the Conficker/Downandup worm’s infrastructure.

MojoKid writes “Right now the only real ‘competition’ to Apple’s App Store is the Android Market. Presently, anyone using an Android-based phone can download applications from the Android Market, which first started offering free applications in October ’08. A drawback to Android application developers, however, is the fact that the potential Android Market user base is fairly small right now, as there is presently only one Android phone available, the T-Mobile G1. However, in the coming months we’re also going to see more app stores come online for additional smartphone platforms. Nokia will officially launch an app store for its Symbian OS-based smartphones at Mobile World Congress on Monday. Microsoft is also getting in the game for smartphones that run the Windows Mobile OS, with Steve Ballmer delivering the keynote speech at Mobile World Congress as well.”

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There never will be another smartphone to utilize the Palm OS. The company announced today it will begin a transition to webOS while also supporting Microsoft Windows products. The current Centro smartphone will be the last phone to utilize the Palm OS.

Krojack writes with this excerpt from Computerworld: “Los Angeles resident Emma Alvarado charged Microsoft with multiple violations of Washington state’s unfair business practices and consumer protection laws over its policy of barring computer makers from continuing to offer XP on new PCs after Vista’s early-2007 launch. Alvarado is seeking compensatory damages and wants the case declared a class-action suit. … Irked at having to pay a fee for downgrading a new Lenovo notebook to XP, Alvarado said that Microsoft had used its position as the dominant operating system maker to ‘require consumers to purchase computers pre-installed with the Vista operating system and to pay additional sums to “downgrade” to the Windows XP operating system.'”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Here are some whimsical predictions for Microsoft’s retail store it announced it would open soon.