I love my Windows Phone etc but I try and avoid the arguments about which is better etc, no one will ever win those. It is all about personal preference and there is no right answer.

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

I assume this will be for icon and full text support to replace the calendar text.

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

I definitely think it will have a new Kinect, Bluray will be great a well as a larger friends list.

The illumiroom will be awesome but they have already mentioned that this is still WIP and won't be out with the new Xbox.

Another great marketing campaign kicks off for Windows Phone, very funny: http://blogs.windows.com/windows_phone/b/windowsphone/archive/2013/04/29/three-smartphones-and-a-wedding.aspx

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

IllumiShare is some pretty smart stuff, but I'm with you Laura. I want my hands on with IllumiRoom !

Worldwide Telescope is amazing, probably as close to the stars as I'm ever going to get sadly. Maybe need to start saving for a seat on Virgin Galactic.

The Xbox Rewards programme is a great incentive to reward those that spend time (and money) on the Xbox. I've been in it since it launched and so fan had almost 4000 MSP's in reward points

We call it noughts and crosses here in the UK. The funny differences I find are usually between the same word definitions here in the UK and over there in the US. Like pants, or fanny. They mean different things here :/

posted by IRB

The paying the dev's thing is pretty neat but of course it is US only, so the rest of use dev's around the world are not encourage quite as much :/

In the UK we do have a similar thing, but much tamer http://www.appbuilder-rewards.co.uk/

You do seem a little lax on how bad you think getting your Xbox Account hacked could be, don't make too light an issue out of it.

Hmm tax tips, sounds like you need to set yourself up as a company and make your "base" in Luxembourg and then pay yourself via dividends/profits as they are ridiculously low in tax.

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

Ummm ....... yeah there you go.

Cross platform is always good, but you need to be able to only buy ONE copy of the game and not 3 times. Galactic Reign is also another game that now does multi-screen.

Other than matching the same functionality, it could be an extension of the main game. Something like Fable Coin Golf/Pub Games did for the Main Xbox Fable 2/3 games.

Ouch Laura, didn't you know it was a character I was playing, just letting you win

One-Note is by far the best Office product, an amazing product especially if you have a pen-supported tablet.

Well I mainly relied on Office ( Word mostly) for report writing and various developer tools like Visual Studio and Win-PROLOG for AI programming. Still used pen and paper for note taking in those dark ages when I was at Uni

posted by IRB

posted by IRB

14 hours ago, Laura10 wrote

Where is everybody!?!?!?

Weird isn't it! I think they are all waiting for episode 170

Edit: Just noticed today that the 9 guy has a party hat on, did he hear I was throwing a party? or what is the occasion?

posted by IRB

11 hours ago, Dirtbagg wrote

HERE @IRB 

Yay, welcome to the (albeit small) party 

posted by IRB

Blimey, just you and me Laura in the comments this week? :/

posted by IRB

Improved Kinect resolution is great, but I'd image an updated version of Kinect will arrive with the next Xbox allowing even higher resolution.

Viral Tweet stats could be interesting but it might just be used for evil, marketing you more junk. However nothing I ever tweet is worth reading so nothing I say will be in there

The Valve Steam Box is not something for me, but it does look quite interesting and extra competition is always welcomed as it spurs everyone else on!

The best stuff I've seen come out of MS is Photosynth (yeah I know it isn't new this year but it has been updated for WP this year)

Edit: Not forgetting the comeback of Ping and the Question of the Week, that needs to go into MS's greatest things of this year

posted by IRB

18 hours ago, SheldonS wrote

*snip*

I agree with you on the phone app.  I still use it as my primary on my Droid 2 Global, but that app could use some improvements.  Same with the Windows 8 mail app.

Now here is a stupid newbie question for you, but one I've wondered before but never tried to look up.  Does the Live Mail (including the mail app on Windows 8) store the emails locally?  I wouldn't want to take up space with lots of emails and have to worry about saving them when I get a new machine.

It stores a local copy of the folders you open/sync down via the client to keep an offline cache so you can still read those emails when you are not connected to the net. The email will still always be in the cloud (unless you delete them via the client of course) so you don't have to worry about backing them up or moving them etc.

posted by IRB

That crime fighting tech looks pretty clever it makes me think of 24, awesome show

It'll be a good day when we get tot he point that we don't have to encourage people to develop apps etc to help empower women and they are on an equal footing until then, keep up the excellent work.

The new Outlook is great, I've been using it for a long time (when ever the preview launched) and it is much cleaner and slicker than the old Hotmail. I've used Hotmail for over a decade now but I've mostly used client software live Outlook, Live Mail or the Windows 8 mail app which I prefer. The one thing that still needs to be brought out of the 90's is the Calendar you have on the Outlook.com site :/

posted by IRB

posted by IRB