The Xbox elite that was out before its street date release (Apr. 29th) is now on eBay. It was put up for $600 but the current bit stand at $5000 USD. With 14 hrs to go, I can only see the bids going higher…

Click here to see the eBay listing.

A ‘Target’ Store sold an Elite too early. They are officially going to be released around 29th April ‘07 in the U.S.

(Picture Source)

(Photo Source)

“Microsoft spent millions of dollars advertising its next generation OS ‘Windows Vista‘ in China, in fact the IT juggernaut threw up the biggest Vista Ad on the 421 meter high Jin Mao tower in Shanghai China. However after 2 weeks (Jan 19 to Feb 2) from launch Microsoft managed to sell a mere 244 copies of Windows Vista. Software piracy is rampant in the middle kingdom and a pirated version of Vista sells for a mere $1 on the streets. The following numbers are quoted by Windows Vista chief distributor in Bejing.”

[Via NewLaunches.com ]

Isn’t it time we got a grip and sorted some of this out? Last year, the IWF (Internet Watch Foundation) had more than 31,000 reports of websites which had alleged child abuse images. Around 10% of this actually had indecent images of children, which were under the age of 12.

31,776 reports processed
10,656 pages contained child abuse content
3,077 websites contained all of the images
1,667 were commercial websites
10.5% of all pages were on photo sharing websites
91% of victims appear to be under 12 years old

Peter Robbins, chief executive of the IWF, said that the US was the worst offender, principally because of access to technology and its geography.

Microsoft are trying to play a part in increasing web safety with such safety features being implimented in Windows Live Messenger, Hotmail and Spaces, with a standalone product, Family Safety, being released later in August according to internal sources. Is this enough? Should the software giant be doing more to promote web safety seeing as it’s their products being used to do these things? Comment ahoy.

Parts sourced: BBC News

Click on the Picture to enlarge

Source: Red vs. Blue

“The Algorithm is banned from China.”

“The Algorithm is from Jersey.”

“The Algorithm Constantly finds Jesus.”

“The Algorithm killed Jeeves.”

You might have seen these lines on billboards in the US and wondered wtf do they mean? Even I don’t know wtf they are supposed to mean but it is a bizzare advert campaign by Ask.com in which they kill their own mascot Jeeves?

I searched for “The Algorithm Constantly finds Jesus.” on Ask.com and I did not get any meaningful results but when I Googled for it, I did get a few good results. So I can safetly declare that The Algorithm can’t find The Algorithm or The Algorithm needs to find a new Ad-Agency!

Drop me a line via a comment or email me: d [at] liveandbeyond dot com if you know the purpose or logic behind these ads.

Oh, wait! I am talking and blogging about Ask.com and did a search too, so is that the purpose? Mission accomplished!?

At the moment, Windows Selfhost is an internal product being tested by a number of Microsoft employees, at the “dogfood” stage (where internal developers and staff trial the products themselves as a method of quality control).

We’re honestly not quite sure what this is yet - a self storage solution, part of Windows Server System, possibly a Windows Live service (could well be from the FolderShare program which was acquired last year), or could be part of Windows Home Server, as guessed as the logos are the same. Whatever it is, it’ll have something to do with Vista no doubt.

Anyone have any more information, ping us at admin@liveandbeyond.com.

Congratulations to Evan Rodge and Alijah Green. As unexpected, there are some beta invites issues, as in I can’t send them as the website is down. I’ve put a note in my phone to try again later, and left a message with one of the beta program managers, Ron, who hopefully will get back to me soon.

V Sharma shows a security flaw in Orkut, if exploited it exposes the email address of any person.

“Orkut has been in the midst of privacy and security concerns since its launch. There have been many ways through which you can get to know the email address of any person on Orkut even when it is not displayed in the public profile. Although, Google keeps on fixing bugs as and when they are highlighted; however, there seems to be a long way before they can make Orkut a secure social network.”

Orkut: Your Email Address Can Be Hacked