installing Windows 8.1 (one user's experience)

Bill Gates’s first day at work in the newly created role of technology adviser got off to a rocky start yesterday as the Microsoft founder struggled for hours to install the Windows 8.1 upgrade.

The installation hit a snag early on, sources said, when Mr. Gates repeatedly received an error message informing him that his PC ran into a problem that it could not handle and needed to restart.

After failing to install the upgrade by lunchtime, Mr. Gates summoned the new Microsoft C.E.O. Satya Nadella, who attempted to help him with the installation, but with no success.

While the two men worked behind closed doors, one source described the situation as “tense.”

“Bill is usually a pretty calm guy, so it was weird to hear some of that language coming out of his mouth,” the source said.

A Microsoft spokesman said only that Mr. Gates’s first day in his new job had been “a learning experience” and that, for the immediate future, he would go back to running Windows 7.

[P.S. it's a joke.]

is this website safe?

there are several websites which check whether other websites are safe to visit

There was one I was using the other day, but I don't remember what it was, so here's a few more:

https://safeweb.norton.com/

http://www.avgthreatlabs.com/website-safety-reports/

scanurl.net

PCWorld recommends URLVoid since it checks using multiple websites such as the above.

(Note: I assume the above websites are safe, but one can't be too sure as anybody with experience with fake antivirus / anti-spyware software can attest to.)

Comcast agrees to buy Time Warner Cable

Comcast said Thursday it had agreed to buy Time Warner Cable for $45 billion in a deal that would combine the two biggest cable companies in the United States.

If the deal is approved, the combined group will be the country's dominant provider of television channels and Internet connections, reaching roughly one in three American homes.

 Time Warner Cable (TWC, Fortune 500) owners will be offered 2.875 Comcast (CMCSA, Fortune 500) shares for each share they own, valuing Time Warner Cable at about $158.82 per share.

The two companies expect the merger to take effect by the end of the year, but regulators are likely to take a close look at the potential impact on consumers.

To address those concerns, Comcast said it was prepared to divest about 3 million subscribers. But it would still have about 30 million customers. Comcast Cable CEO Neil Smit will lead the merged company.

The proposed deal ends months of jockeying for control of Time Warner Cable, the second biggest U.S. supplier of cable television, with about 11 million subscribers in cities such as New York and Los Angeles.

Smaller rival Charter (CHTR, Fortune 500) wanted to buy Time Warner Cable, indicating last month it was ready to pay about $130 per share.

 Now, by swallowing Time Warner Cable on its own, Comcast will gain even more leverage over the country's marketplace for television, broadband Internet and phone services. Comcast has about 23 million television subscribers in markets like Philadelphia, where it is headquartered.

With millions more subscribers, Comcast will add muscle in its negotiations with cable channel owners like The Walt Disney Company (DIS, Fortune 500) and Time Warner (TWC, Fortune 500), the parent company of this website. (Time Warner Cable was spun off from Time Warner in 2009 and no longer has any connection to the owner of CNN, HBO and Warner Bros.)

Although cable providers in general have poor reputations, Comcast has received some high marks for its next-generation software and set-top boxes.

Time Warner Cable, on the other hand, had what the American Customer Satisfaction Index called an "industry low" score last spring. It has shed television subscribers in recent months for a number of reasons, including a protracted blackout of CBS and Showtime in several million homes. Comcast could theoretically improve Time Warner Cable's performance by bringing in its own software.

new chief at Microsoft

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Microsoft has named the head of its cloud computing business as the company's next CEO, tapping a longtime insider to lead efforts to catch rivals in mobile devices and offer more software and services over the Internet.

Satya Nadella replaces Steve Ballmer immediately to become only the third chief executive in Microsoft's 38-year history. Company founder and first CEO Bill Gates is leaving his role as chairman to serve as an adviser. He will spend a third of his time working on future products and technology.

Nadella, 46, most recently headed the company's small but growing cloud computing unit, in which customers buy software and services housed on distant servers connected to the Internet. It's a departure from Microsoft's roots making software installed directly on personal computers.

In addition to growing that business, one of Nadella's first tasks as CEO will be the completion of Microsoft Inc.'s $7.3 billion purchase of Nokia's phone business and patent rights — part of a plan to boost Windows Phone software in a market dominated by iPhones and Android devices.

The direction points the company toward an orbit occupied by rivals Google Inc., Apple Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. and away from the core PC business that has been Microsoft's mainstay.

"Going forward, it's a mobile-first, cloud-first world," Nadella said in a video accompanying the announcement Tuesday.

Gates, meanwhile, will remain on the company's board. The new Microsoft chairman will be board member John Thompson, who led the search for a new CEO after Ballmer said in August that he planned to step down.

Thompson said Nadella was the board's "first and unanimous choice." Other candidates considered included Ford CEO Alan Mulally and other insiders such as Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner and former Skype head Tony Bates.

Nadella has "the right background to lead the company in this era," Gates said in a video message. "There's a challenge in mobile computing. There's an opportunity in the cloud. The various business groups he's worked in, he's driven innovation, gotten architectures put together that really meet the needs of our customers. The opportunity for Microsoft is greater than ever before."

Nadella has been an executive in some of the company's fastest-growing and most-profitable businesses, including its Office and server and tools business. In four years as division president, he helped grow that business into one with $20 billion in annual revenue — about a quarter of Microsoft's total revenue in the most recent fiscal year.

For the past seven months, he was the executive vice president who led Microsoft's cloud computing offerings. Nadella's new cloud enterprise group has also been growing strongly, more than doubling customers in the latest quarter — although it remains a small part of Microsoft's current business.

SD over HD?

It seems to me like 95% of the people I know still watch SD TV even though HD is available to them.

Granted these are probably older people that grew up on SD.  And they know that SD channel number and not the HD channel numbers.

Furthermore they usually watch the picture stretched out of proportion on a wide-screen TV.  That kind of annoys me, but I guess they're used to it.  And some people seem to even prefer watching SD over HD (even though the screen is out of proportion and the picture is blurry).

I wonder if my experience is the same as others.  So I'll google it.

And here's a couple of links.

why do people watch SD programming on HDTV sets

step away from the SD

yep.

I guess it's kind of like Frank Barone preferring his scratchy LPs to digital CDs.