TAG | Gates CES 2008 keynote: Pieces of the Microsoft puzzle |
|
| by Alex Zaharov-Reutt | |
| Monday, 07 January 2008 | |
|
Page 1 of 3 A humourous video of Gates’ last ‘full day’ working at Microsoft sees him working out with Matthew McConaughey, seeking work as a rock star with Bono and Jay Z, seeking the Vice Presidential ticket with the Hillary Clinton camp, seeking work with Barack Obama and Al Gore, seeking movie roles with Steven Spielberg, all of whom turn him down. A range of Microsoft executives including Steve Ballmer, Ray Ozzie and others intersperse the video with humourous comments about Gates as he goes about his final day looking for something to do now that he’ll retire from ‘full time’ work at Microsoft. Of course, Bill Gates is not retiring at all, and all of the words have been chosen carefully. It might be Bill Gates’ last keynote as a full-time employee of Microsoft, and June 2008 might see the end of Bill Gates working full-time at Microsoft, but Gates could easily be back at CES in future years, while Gates will continue work at Microsoft as a member of the board, and also working on projects in education and health. During the keynote, Gates launched no surprise new hardware or software, nor was there the launch of the much rumoured Xbox 360 Ultimate which was supposed to be equipped with an HD DVD drive as standard. If an Xbox 360 Ultimate really does exist and was to be launched, Warner’s Blu-ray bombshell may have seen any launch temporarily postponed and/or reconsidered in light of the fallout. What Gates did unveil was a glowing report on what Microsoft is offering the marketplace, what has been and what is to come. Gates spoke of the success of the ‘digital decade’ we are in now, which Gates said he started talking about in 2001, looking at PC popularity, the growing popularity of broadband, the rise and rise of mobile phones and portable digital media devices. He said that: “Since I first started talking about the Digital Decade in 2001, the speed with which digital technology has become central to the way we work, learn and play has been amazing. But in many ways, we are at the very beginning of the transformation that software will enable. During the next Digital Decade, technology will make our lives richer, more connected, more productive and more fulfilling in profound and exciting ways.” Up next was Bill Gates’ vision for the ‘next digital decade’ which would see dramatic advances in natural user interfaces such as touch and talk, the ubiquity of high definition video, the popularity of web services and connected devices, and massive amounts of online storage available instantly and seamlessly from anywhere. It was announced that US Olympics broadcaster NBC and Microsoft’s MSN have formed an alliance to bring over 3,000 hours of live and on-demand content to US broadband Internet users only, in what is being hailed as the first ‘long-tail Olympics’. For more on Vista, IPTV, the Olympics, the Xbox and new video downloads, please continue to page 2. |
| < Next story in category | Previous story in the category > |
|---|
