kinetic

Open the pod bay doors, Kinect 2. The next version of Kinect — Microsoft’s hands-free, gesture-controlled gaming peripheral for Xbox 360 — is rumored to have such high processing power that it can read lips and even detect the emotions of its user.

If that sounds scary, well, yeah, it’s a little scary. If it’s true, it also means the next generation of consoles are going to be super fun. Eurogamer spoke with an anonymous source who spilled the beans on the new Kinect and potential plans for the next generation of Xboxes.

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Microsoft Streamlines Windows Install, With An Eye To Web Distribution And Ease Of Use

Installing Windows has always been something of a joke. Not always warranted, of course, but we all know how funny and catastrophic anecdotes outlive the less thrilling reality of something as commonplace as an OS install. Yet we all have heard a few horror stories about Windows installs, or at the very least joked about how long it often takes.

Microsoft actually went to some lengths in Windows 7 to correct this soft spot of theirs, and it’s true that the installation process is simpler and better. Seeing how well this was received, and also noting a number of market trends worth integrating, they are now taking the improvements a step further with Windows 8. A one-click install or upgrade is still a ways out, but the new features are kin with Windows 8′s approach of marrying stability with mobility.

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Back in July, Microsoft “accidentally” published a teaser for a social network being worked on by Microsoft Research. Socl.com appeared to be focused on search and sharing, but what little they showed was quickly pulled down and we didn’t hear anything more — until today, when The Verge posted some new details after apparently being given early access by the Socl team.

To duplicate their description in detail would be tedious and unnecessary(likewise reposting their screenshots), but the short version appears to be that it has a familiar layout (and color scheme) with a central feed, tags and feeds on the left, and invites and video chat on the right. Interestingly, it’s not designed as a “full” social network, and communication between users is not emphasized; instead, collaborative consumption is the focus.

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It might be some time before one of these is bounding through the local park but a new ‘robo-dog’ could make life easier for blind people.

The robot was created by Japanese developer NSK, along with the University of Electro-Communications, and uses a Microsoft Kinect image and distance sensor to create a 3-D visualisation of obstacles ahead.

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The latest rumors swirling around Yahoo is that Google might bankroll a private equity buyout—although why it might do so or how such a deal could ever get past U.S. antitrust regulators remains a mystery. But ever since Carol Bartz was fired, everyone from Alibaba to AOL (our parent company) seems to be floating trail balloons for some kind of deal to buy or merge Yahoo.

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Do you mind if Microsoft drops a little future on you like a ton of bricks? This HoloDesk uses a half-silvered mirror and a Kinect sensor to “see” your hands in 3D space then project visible objects on and around them, allowing you to juggle virtual spheres, play with phones, and generally get all Minority Report up in this piece.

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Microsoft Research is unveiling technology that turns any surface into a touch screen at a user interface symposium this week in Santa Barbara, Calif.

Dubbed OmniTouch, it is a wearable system that allows multitouch input on “arbitrary, everyday surfaces,” according to a description on a Microsoft Research Web page.

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Website speed is important. One study found that 57% of online shoppers will wait less than three seconds before abandoning a site. When Google and Microsoft engineers experimented with load times on their respective search engines, they both found web delays had negative effects on traffic.

Popular methods for improving website speed are adding servers and using content delivery networks (CDNs), networks of servers that deliver a web page to a user based on the location of the user.

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You already know about Verizon bringing live TV to the Xbox 360, but it turns out that was just the tip of Microsoft’s great big television-related iceberg.

In an effort to transform the television experience, Microsoft has struck deals with nearly 40 entertainment providers to start injecting more media into their gaming platform.

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