http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2016/06/microsoft-will-use-steam-to-sell-windows-games-not-just-its-own-store/

Microsoft is planning to sell more of its newer games on Steam since some of them are exclusive to the Microsoft store. This will,likely, allow Microsoft to gain more players of its video games. The newer games Microsoft plans to add to Steam include Forza 6 Apex, Killer Instinct, Quantum Break, and Gears of War Ultimate Edition. This plan is a smart one. There are a lot of Steam users and there could, possibly, be some Steam users who do not own PCs.  

Microsoft Encourages Schools to Use Minecraft as Another Way for Teachers to Teach Their Students

Microsoft is encouraging schools to use Minecraft for educational purposes. For example, a history teacher could, potentially, recreate an ancient civilization from a textbook. Microsoft is encouraging teachers to educate their students with Minecraft because they thought it would help their students stay more engaged and, mostly, more interested in learning. I think using Minecraft in school would be more beneficial for teaching little kids. It is, probably, harder to engage little kids than it is to engage somebody who is in, let us say, high school or college student. Teaching a high school or college student would be bizarre and would, most likely, make them seem childish. However, there are, probably, plenty of high school and college students who play Minecraft. Microsoft is letting teacher's try the Minecraft education edition for free until September. After that, Microsoft is thinking of having students pay between $1 and $5 for a one-year subscription of the game. I think that is a pretty generous offer. Teacher's, if they wanted to, could include the cost of the Minecraft subscription with the other school supply fees their students have to pay, anyway.  The Minecraft education edition includes additional features that the regular version of Minecraft does not including chalkboards teachers can add to the game that display important information on them, an interface that would allow teachers to know where their students are on the map of the game, an in-game camera for screen shots, the ability for teachers to give their students resources for building, the ability for teachers to chat with their students, and the ability for teachers to chat with their students if they get lost.  I think this idea Microsoft has is a great one. Little kids get bored, so you have to make them interested in learning. Also, little kids want to have fun. Reading out of a text book for, let's say a history class, is not fun. Even for a high school or a college student, reading out of a textbook is boring. However, teachers can interest high school and college students by having them make arguments on what they read instead of having them play Minecraft. I would, though, like to see either High school or college students play Minecraft. I have never played Minecraft before, but it sounds interesting, even, to me. Minecraft might not be, just, for little kids; it might just be a fun game to play in general. Maybe Microsoft could think about convincing high school teachers and college professors to teach their students through Minecraft. I think, aside from being used to teach history, Minecraft could also be used to teach mathematics. As a little kid I would have enjoyed playing Minecraft as a funner way to learn.  I wonder if Minecraft could be incorporated in the IT class curriculum. Teachers, go teach some Minecraft.!

Windows Discontinuing Windows Live Mail 2012

Microsoft will be discontinuing Windows Live Mail on June 30th instead of updating it. Windows Live Mail users have two more weeks to decide how they will be able to deal with the discontinuation.  The service has not been updating since 2012 and is incompatible with some of the new Application programming interfaces. In other words, the software is becoming slightly outdated. Microsoft will be combining Live Mail as well as Office 365, Hotmail, and MSN Mail with Outlook. Microsoft will provide its Windows Live Mail users a free one year subscription to Outlook 365 which they can find out about through email or online. Windows Live Mail users may, also, upgrade or downgrade to either the Windows Mail app (not the same thing as the Windows Live Mail app) or Outlook. Then you can import your emails from Windows Live Mail. Those options are free. I use Windows Mail a lot and I do not think I have ever used Windows Live Mail. Although it is said to have limited capabilities compared to Windows Live Mail I do not have any problems with it. I have not really used Outlook mail, either. Users of Windows 7, XP, and Vista will have to upgrade to Windows 10 if they want to use Windows mail. However, there are plenty of other options, so I do not think that would be a problem, For some people, the easiest option for them to access their email is from online.  Besides, you will need internet access, anyway, to look at you emails. If Windows Live Mail users choose to switch to Outlook 365 they will have to pay about $90 per year, but the subscription comes with 1 terabit of online storage and other Microsoft Office programs. They can also, for about $200, either Microsoft Home and Business 2016 or Microsoft Office Outlook 2016 which do not expire. If some people still want to use Windows Live Mail they can go to Configure Server Settings in the app and change them to be as follows: "Under Incoming Service information" change the server type to "IMAP", server address to "imap-mail.outlook.com" and the "port number" next to that to 993. Then, under "Outgoing server information" change the server address to "smtp-mail.oulook.com" and the "port number" to 587. People who would like to use this method for dealing with the discontinuation of Windows Live Mail will have to create a new account for their current email address and click the box that tells them to "Manually configure [their] server settings". Anybody that wants to upload their emails to a different account will have to either remember the password to their email or use a password keeper. I am not very concerned about this discontinuation since I have never, as I stated before, used Windows Mail Live. I just want to let Windows Live Mail Users know about this discontinuation. 

Apple is Thinking of Buying Either Time Warner or Netflix

Last year, Apple had hinted they may have been interested in buying Time Warner at a meeting between Apple's Eddie Cue and Time Warner's Olaf Olafsson.  Although it had been rumored Apple was thinking of buying of Time Warner, the conversation did not involve neither Apple's CEO Tim Cook nor Time Warner's CEO Jeff Bewkes. The discussion got to, at the furthest, a bid for Time Warner. However, Apple has made deals with Time Warner before such as the HBO Now service featured on Apple T.V. last year. Aside from Time Warner, Apple has recently hinted it would be more interested in buying Netflix. They might be thinking of developing a WiFi accessible video streaming service, which is what Netflix, already, is. Apple ,supposedly, has been considering getting more involved in the media business to develop more business areas they can grow in.  Apple has enough money to purchase both Time Warner and Netflix, but that would, probably, be an unwise decision for Apple to make since they have not gotten involved in the media business any further than Apple T.V. Besides, if Apple wants an online streaming service, Time Warner would, probably, not be as influential to the as Netflix would be. However, if Apple thinks they can make money by buying both Time Warner and Netflix, maybe the should buy both companies.  If Apple decides to either or both Netflix and Time Warner, will they get rid of Apple T.V.? Probably not, but. We do not, yet, know what changes Apple will choose to make to Time Warner if they buy it, but you can assume Netflix will stay pretty much the same other than some Apple features considering it is already a streaming service. Who, even, knows how Time Warner would change if Apple buys them considering they are a cable company and are not a streaming service like Apple wants.  If Apple chooses to buy either Time Warner, Netflix, or both they better not tweak either company too much, because they would, certainly, not want more dissatisfied customers. I think Netflix would be a smarter investment for Apple than Time Warner would. With Netflix, Apple could have the streaming service they have been wanting to have. I know Apple has been thinking about investing in either Netflix or Time Warner, but what if Apple made some type of deal with Amazon? Amazon has developed mobile devices and other gadgets such as the Kindle Fire, the Amazon Fire phone, and the Amazon Fire TV . Both Apple and Amazon have been trying to develop streaming services; the Apple TV and the Amazon Fire TV and they both produce mobile devices. Also, Apple has iTunes while Amazon has its own version. Apple could help Amazon's mobile devices become more popular, Amazon could help Apple create, let's say, its own version of Prime, and the two companies could help each other develop good quality streaming services.

Microsoft Sells Nokia For a Generous Price

Microsoft will sell Nokia to a newly founded Finnish company called HMD Global and Foxconn for about $350 million. Even though Microsoft has sold off Nokia, they plan to still produce the Lumia phone, but through Acer and Alcatel instead of Nokia. Microsoft is still able to produce the Lumia because it was not an exclusive model to Nokia. I, honestly, do not care one way or another about this sale Microsoft made. I never, really, payed much attention to the Nokia, anyway. I always thought of the Nokia as a low quality phone that I would never want to buy. Microsoft might as well stop trying to compete in the smartphone business. Nokia is only worth about $30 billion now. Nokia was, at one point, the largest smartphone producer around which was in 2014. Then, the company was worth about $250 billion. Considering Nokia is worth $30 million, Foxconn and HMD are almost stealing the Nokia brand. Surprisingly,  HMD will be the main company to produce the Nokia  instead of Foxconn. HMD is a newly established company that only has 4,500 workers. The business was founded by a former Nokia and Microsoft executive named Arto Numella. Not only will HMD produce most of the Nokia phones to be released in the future, but it will also have full control over how all Nokia phones will be produced and distributed, they will, even, have complete authority over Foxconn. Meanwhile, Nokia will not be producing the phones themselves since HMD is not directly associated with the company. Nokia will be receiving royalties from HMD. Arto Numella will invest $500 million in his newly created company over a three year period to make it possible for the Nokia phone to be sold globally. In addition, he gained the rights from Microsoft to continue to use its software for the Nokia and to be able to continue to brand certain Microsoft phones as Nokia until 2024. The main question is why did Microsoft choose to sell Nokia. Well, Microsoft acknowledged they were struggling in the smartphone business. Last year, Microsoft laid off 7,800 employees and wrote off their investment of Nokia completely, which discontinued the phone for a year. Microsoft seems to have given up, at least for now, to compete in the smartphone business and I think they made the right decision. Even though Microsoft will no longer be producing phones, they will continue to stay strong by continuing to be the software giants we have always known them to be.

Apple's Stocks Fall, Again, Since 2015, and Another Company's Stocks Surpass Their's

Apple which is worth $494.8 billion dropped to the second richest company after Alphabet which is the holding company for Google and its subsidiaries.   Alphabet is worth $499.9 billion. This is the second time this year Alphabet has surpassed Apple in its stocks. Apple lost $275 billion dollars in its market value since their peak last year. Apple's lose of revenue is mostly due to a shrink in the demand for their products. They have not been vary innovative for a while and the company is running out of new ideas for their products. Not only has Apple faced a lot of difficulty gaining revenue lately, but they also have to compete with cheaper Asian phones that run on the Android operating system. Not only have are consumers becoming more and more disinterested with Apple's products, but many investors have showed they are also becoming less interested with their products, too, because many of them are lowering their target prices and are not willing to invest as much money in the company as they initially would have. Aside from just created better, more innovative products, I think Apple needs to find away to make their products cheaper for overseas countries such as India. I, in fact, talked about the difference between the price of the iPhone in America versus the price of the iPhone in India. The 6S costs $960 in India compared to being about $649 in America. Anyway, if, even American consumers are not willing to buy a $650 smartphone, then Apple needs to, seriously, make their products cheaper. Remember, an iPhone, after all, only costs about $5 to make.  I do not exactly know why Alphabet is surpassing Apple in stocks. The most logical explanation I have is nobody can get enough of Google. Google is just, well,... Google and is getting even bigger. I like to think that Alphabet owns most of the internet from Google, Youtube, Google Scholar, the Android operating system, Gmail, and ,probably, more companies than I can count easily or maybe I'm just overreacting a bit. I hope Apple steps up its game to make its way back to the top of the stocks list. Apple should make sure its next products such as iPhone 7 are interesting and innovative and not just copies of some of their previous products. As my last word I will comment about how I think Alphabet is a dumb name for Google and the companies it owns.

You'll have to pay $119 Starting July 29th to Upgrade to Windows 10

LAST CHANCE to Receive Windows 10 for FREE. 

FREE upgrade ends July 29th.

Microsoft announced it will be discontinuing its free Windows 10 upgrade for Windows 7 and 8 users starting on July 29th, a year after it was released. Starting then, the software will cost $119 if you want to upgrade your old PC. Currently, 300 million of Microsoft's devices run on Windows 10.  The only problem with Windows discontinuing the free Windows 10 upgrade for Windows 7 and 8 devices is Microsoft wants 1 billion devices to use Windows 10 in two years. Is it, even, possible for Microsoft to have 1 billion Windows 10 users in two years? I think it could be possible for Microsoft to have 1 billion Windows 10 users in two years.  Statistically, Microsoft gained about million Windows 10 users every month for ten months since it was released on July 29th of, almost, last year. Consumers have about two more months to upgrade for free to the Windows 10 software. Then, statistically, Microsoft will gain about 60 million more Windows 10 users in the next two months. Considering these statistics, Microsoft would have about 360 million Windows 10 users by July 29th. This, does indeed, make Microsoft's goal possible because, statistically, Microsoft will have about 1.08 billion Windows 10 users in two years. However, just because it is theoretically possible for Microsoft to have about 1 billion Windows 10 users in 2 years, it does not mean it is certain Microsoft will reach this goal. I believe Microsoft will not be able to get as many Windows 10 users ,as they did this year, next year and the year after alone because the software will start to cost people money if they want to upgrade their PC's. I think Microsoft got as many Windows 10 users as they did this year because they offered a free update for the software. Once Microsoft starts charging $119 for the software, it will probably not be as popular. Meanwhile, Windows 7 is still extremely used and outnumbers the amount of Windows 10 users by a 3 to 1 ratio. That means there are about 900 million Windows 7 users. There are many people who still love Windows 7 and are not willing to upgrade to Windows 10 while others are, just, not eligible for the free Windows 10 update. Considering there are this many more Windows 7 users than 10 users, it does not seem very likely Microsoft will reach their goal of 1 billion Windows 10 users in 2 years. Even though Microsoft is discontinuing its free update for Windows 7 and 8 users, it will release what is called the "Anniversary Update" this summer which, probably, marks the anniversary of Windows 10's release, July 29th. This update will make a stylus more compatible with Windows 10 and will allow various Linux softwares to more easily run in Windows 10. Even though you will not be able to download Windows 10 for free after July 28th, people who already have Windows 10 can update their devices to have a better experience with the software.