Returning at long last from his home away from home of Vegas, the Kitty struggled to adapt from the desert to the deluge. “Boston must have taken Microsoft up on its Dreary Skies Initiative,” mused the meteorological Mouser as he recalled a Ballmerian witticism about the San Diego weather during Microsofts recent Tech Ed conference there. “Here is the first extension of our DSI initiative,” joked the Microsoft CEO, alluding to the companys Dynamic Systems Initiative. “Microsoft can now span out dreary skies from Seattle to absolutely anyplace. Its all under centralized management control.” Bleak weather; bleaker humor.
But the horizon must be looking bright for some Microsoft customers ever since Redmond announced it will guarantee a minimum of 10 years support for all its business and developer products. Pretty generous for a company that was just ordered by the Dutch courts to pay a “whopping” $944 euros to the Lindows folks after failing in its most recent attempt to prove copyright infringement by the Linux vendor. “Thats about $1,500 in American currency,” the Tabby tabulated. “Microsoft spends more on a junk food buffet at one of its conferences.”
Of course, the EU antitrust fine of $497 million euros that Redmond is appealing translates into a lot more Twinkies. “Maybe they can wiggle out of paying the $250,000 Sasser virus bounty if they need the cash,” cackled the Kitty.
Spent from his brief bout with mathematics, His Hirsuteness was about to curl up for a Katt nap when he got a call from a Redwood City tipster who said to expect more anti-virus software companies to buy up anti-spam companies. “The line of spam companies waiting to speak with Network Associates goes around the block and down the street,” claimed the tipster.
NAI can probably afford a spam company or two since it opted out of a deal to buy vulnerability player Foundstone. Currently, the word on the street is that Foundstone had been banking all its chips on being acquired by NAI and is now hoping another benefactor, possibly Internet Security Systems, will be willing to scoop it up.
Now wide awake, El Gato was about to surf the boob tube for a bit when he recalled a video Microsoft recently used to promote the release of its new Visual Studio Team System. Unveiled at Tech Ed, the video featured a group of guys that resembled the “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” makeover team. Called the A5, or Architect 5, team, the group is shown sweeping through IT sites pointing out the foibles of folks applications and architectures. In one scene, the group swoops in and sweeps a set of shrink-wrapped Java software and some Java books off a shelf. “Mustve been McNealys cubicle,” purred the Puss.