Back when Microsoft birthed MSN, it was seen as a paid subscription service designed to compete with the likes of CompuServe and AOL. As the online world evolved, the nature of online services have gradually changed from a fee-based subscription model to a free, advertiser-supported model: although CompuServe is no more, AOL has broken down its walled garden and is now offering services for free; similarly, Microsoft’s own Windows Live services freely offer the sorts of things people used to pay for every month.
Except…some people still pay for them every month, and Microsoft will still happily take that money. Windows Secrets‘ Scott Dunn points out that Microsoft still offers a $10/month service dubbed MSN Premium, but of the 21 features the service touts, only one of them—a download manager—doesn’t have a direct or near-direct equivalent available for free either via Windows Live or as part of Windows XP and/or Vista.
“It’s not all that surprising to find a software company offering a free equivalent to a competitor’s commercial product,” Dunn writes. “But Windows Live and MSN Premium are produced by the same company.”
Dunn points out that part of Microsoft’s motivation behind creating MSN Premium back in 2004 was to offer a package of services for broadband providers. And, indeed, MSN Premium is still offered by Verizon and Canada’s Bell Sympatico, although Microsoft partner Qwest has since shifted to offering Windows Live services). And Microsoft might be keeping MSN Premium going in part due to contractual obligations to those broadband providers. However, Microsoft has also made a point of saying Windows Live and MSN will continue to be developed as complimentary services, and that the distinctions between them will become more apparent as Windows Live evolves.
Right now, it basically looks like the “evolution” is that one set of services entails a monthly bill, and one doesn’t. On the other hand, Microsoft’s free services often come bearing advertising, and, in the case of tools offered separately from Windows, come with all the technical support users pay for. At least paying customers are entitled to “Free technical support”—which, for users who don’t have tech-savvy friends and family to rely on, might be worth every penny.
In 1950, Alan Turing asked whether machines can think. Rather than argue over definitions, he turned the question into a party game, where an interrogator trades typed messages with hidden players and tries to work out who is who. Since then, chatbots have gotten so good that they have already fooled humans in modern versions of the test.
So, four researchers from Paris Cité University asked the obvious follow-up question in a new study published in Computers in Human Behavior Reports: can AI at least catch its own kind?
Mozilla is giving Firefox’s Smart Window two new tricks. If you haven’t tried it yet, Smart Window is an optional AI mode in Firefox with a built-in chat that helps you get things done while you browse. With this update, it can fill out online forms using details from your tabs and keep an eye on websites for you.
Tired of typing the same details into every form?
The absolutely absurd idea of putting a touchscreen display on a mouse isn't exactly new. Turtle Beach already did it with its Command Series MC7, which features a 2.25-inch control screen. But apparently, even that wasn't ridiculous enough for Arctic Fox Technologies. Its new Super Mouse looks like someone took the chunky old Atari ST mouse, slapped a touchscreen and scroll wheel on it, and called it an upgrade.
The result is a rather unusual-looking mouse that is now on Kickstarter, starting at $199. And as ridiculous as it looks, some of its features are genuinely intriguing.