VistaCrew

Wordpress 2.5 is coming your way! Soon! Though we didn’t mention much about Wordpress in our blog, but hey… I found that it’s interesting! The new features are cool! and I love it’s new UI! The layout is much better than the previous and it’s very user friendly! Thanks for many JavaScript and AJAX features… Here’s a sneak peak video released. You can check out more from Wordpress official blog here… or you may wanna download RC2 (Release Candidate 2) for playing (testing to be precise… :p). Overall, a major leap for Wordpress and for the blogosphere…

*UPDATE* Wordpress 2.5 is officially launched! Check out here!

Ever figured out how Apple could build an ultra-thin notebook, the MacBook Air? Take a look at Tech Republic’s “experiment” on dismantling the MacBook Air! Though I’m not a fan of Macs… but I can say that is, great engineering from Apple! which achieving an evolutional and innovative way of creating ultra-thin products! But still, the degree of heat generation should be a question mark as the battery is “embedded” inside the case… Another inquiry would be the flexibility of installing additional hardwares as the only option would be expanding via external devices… Even Apple’s co-founder Steve Wozniak questioned the capabilities of MacBook Air… Anyway, it’s still interesting…

It has been almost 2 weeks since I received my new Dell Inspiron 1525 laptop… Due to CNY, I only managed to compose photos of my new lappy recently, Haha!

Here’s the box I got from the courier…

Check out more photos of my new lappy after the jump…

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I believe many readers had read about the news where software giant, Microsoft plans to buy one of the search engine pioneers, Yahoo! Actually both companies had came close once before but due to various circumstances, they didn’t managed to get “together”… But now, Microsoft is offering USD44.6 billion offer for Yahoo! Inc and they think it is the right time to acquire the search engine giant in order to slice into the domination of Google’s online advertising market. It is to say that, this would be the biggest deal to be done in the IT industry history, if Microsoft successes.

Yahoo!

Looking into both companies, we would see that both giants offer similar services to customers. Don’t forget that Microsoft launched Windows Live services not long ago and if the deal strikes, it could result mergers of lots of services between the two companies. One of the focus would be Yahoo! Mail and Microsoft’s Hotmail or Live mail services. They might retain but might also integrate into one unified interface to be used. Yahoo Search and Live Search, hmm… Yahoo do dominates larger search market compared to Live Search…but who knows how Microsoft will do? Maybe utilize Yahoo!’s expetise to boost their search engine? Also, both companies offer Instant Messaging services with MSN and Yahoo Messenger respectively. Yahoo Messenger IM merges into Windows Live Messenger platform? Wow… then we could see who’s really the Instant Messaging giant… Not forget about their advertising arm… which would be the company’s profit generating engine… and of course Microsoft would try to implement theirs since Yahoo had done quite badly in this sector, losing to their arch-rivals, Google.

Microsoft Windows Live

Another benefit for Microsoft will be Yahoo!’s wide array of existences in countries around the globe as this would help to enlarge the company’s exposure and most importantly, advertising and marketing dominance! From many people’s view, this acquisition deal would cause quite a threat to Google of course. Maybe Google will start to worry and pumping in lots of efforts to roll out more wacky yet innovative services in order to regain their momentum. So, let’s see…

Sources extracted from TechCrunch and LowYat.net.

*Update*

Looks like Google and Microsoft had started war of words on Microsoft’s intention to buy Yahoo!

Google claimed that this move will cause unfairness in terms of competition within the Internet sector… just like what Microsoft dominated most of the PC market’s OS and web browser. Don’t forget that both Microsoft and Yahoo owns a very large proportion of free mail users! (Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail) and IM users (MSN and Yahoo! Messenger). No wonder Google is concerned with this.

However, Microsoft responded that Google “dominated” the search engine as well as online advertising markets. They claimed that they will assure oppenness, innovation, and the protection of privacy on the Internet while on the meanwhile compete fairly with Google. Looks like both parties has their own opinions… but how could this turmoil ends? What will Google come out as a strategy to overcome this? That will be very interesting…

Sources extracted from TechCrunch.

*More Updates*

Yahoo! considering collaboration or alliance with it’s arch rival, Google! Looks like it’s getting more and more interesting… Some says it’s to scare Microsoft away… Some say it’s a strategy to increase Microsoft’s bid… So, what’s next?

The Final Decision?

Oh well, Yahoo!’s board rejected the bid offer from Microsoft… This may be expected by the public since it could be a turmoil growing bigger and bigger… Maybe this is a good decision for Yahoo!, Google, and Microsoft. Microsoft could increase their bid and would benefit Yahoo!’s shareholders… For Google, it could take a breath a while by the nervous acquisition case which could threaten them. For Microsoft, this may avoid antitrust regulators which could cause them quite a lot of trouble. But anyway, it is still depends on how Yahoo! thinks to rescue themselves out of the storm…

I think this blog is going to turn into a Dell fanatic blog site. LOL! Anyway, I’m going to be officially a Dell owner soon! Yes, I had made my order for the Inspiron 1525, with the stunning Chill pattern design. Quite anticipated with this new gadget of mine, but in fact I would love to own a more luxurious lappy, the XPS! Haha…

Recently, Dell just released a brand new colour option for the XPS series. It’s the Midnight Blue! First appeared on the CES 2008. The new colour was stunning and awesome on the XPS M1330 or M1530 laptops. In par with the glamorous Crimson Red option.

Oh yeah, Dell also announced the (PRODUCT) RED series of products in conjunction with Dell’s devotion to fight against AIDS in Africa. What is (PRODUCT) RED? Well, check it out here! Despite Dell, Microsoft, Converse and even Apple joined the (PRODUCT)RED alliance as well whereas Apple made a seductive red iPod which was eye catching. Back to Dell, Dell introduced special editions of the XPS with (PRODUCT) RED branded. Besides the cool Crimson Red colour lid, there’s also a special edition OS – Windows Vista Ultimate (PRODUCT) RED with a customized red theme. Cool! Not sure when it will land on Malaysia but I believe it will be a hit! (*Update* The XPS (PRODUCT) RED arrived in Malaysia!) Too bad no $$$ for me to buy it… So, just enjoy the pics and imagine…

Do you know that Bill Gates is retiring from Microsoft? Well, the fact that is Bill Gates is planning to retire from his managerial post at Microsoft to devote in his health and education foundation, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Here’s a video specially produced to showcase his speech at CES 2008 about his retirement and his “Last Day” at Microsoft… Nevertheless, he’ll still be chairman and advisor for Microsoft instead… Anyway, you will see the “true face” of Bill Gates, very funny and amusing… enjoy…

From Saturday evening onwards, many visitors and bloggers had experienced some setbacks while visiting blogs… All blogs affected will be redirected to another domain parking page. Of course, VistaCrew was affected as well. It was caused by Adverlets’ failure to renew their domain and this had caused a major widespread affect to Malaysia and Singapore blogosphere since many blogs installed Adverlets’ ads. Coincidently, it was Saturday and Sunday, no office of course! So how are Josh Lim & Associates will handle this problem? There’s a temporary blog set up by Josh Lim and he explains about the problem and timeline for resolving it. Looks like the team is working very hard in recovering… But it is to believe that many bloggers would be quite disappointed with Adverlets for making such mistake for sure. Looks like Adverlets is going to have a big headache while handling complaints all over the region. Anyway, just hope everything could be recovered back as usual as well Adverlets could learn their lesson this time.

Blogs were redirected to this domain parking page

*Updates* (7 Jan 2008) – Adverlets.com is up online now. I think the credits goes to the Adverlets team as they tried really hard to resolve the problem. And of course, they learnt their lesson and made an apologise to all blogers. Here’s the official post from Josh Lim.

Finally! Dell had revealed the much anticipated Inspiron 1525 notebook! The all new Inspiron 1525 will replace the popular 15.4″ 1520 model and will be targeted for the mainstream consumer crowds.

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