The Palengke King is now Padyak King

By: Prime Paul Cepeda

After seething thru a gauntlet of legal questions and after questioning their delicadeza with themselves presumably, presidentiables as early as now are already indirectly campaigning for the position.
So, if I ask you, what is the most legally acceptable and effective way to campaign even before that actual campaign period starts? lo and behold! Be an endorser for a consumer brand! Or better yet, pay tens of millions of pesos for “pseudo-campaign commercials.”

Although electoral law prohibits them from campaigning this early, they never let those legal intricacies to stop them in the subtle ways of their campaign. One of them is Senator Mar Roxas. The commercial shows the senator riding in a padyak or pedicab while talking to two kids. Moved by their dreams, he told the kids to stop it and he’ll be the one to do the biking. He ends the commercial saying he won’t let the people down.

When I first saw his TV commercial, I thought it was a great hypocrisy. I had high regard for him when he was still the Secretary of the Department of Trade and Industry and I thought he would do well as a senator but so far no much was done during his 5-year tenure as an opposition Senator. That excludes all the politicking he participated. And all that stuff that He himself scorned when he was still campaigning for all went down the drain for he still

Another thing is the theme he used is already old school. So many candidates have already used this and I thought he could have come up with a better one. But no. It was still a cliché. At least another presidentiable Manny Villar highlighted his assistance to OFWs. That can merit some points for the senate president. But for Mar somehow, it only borders on the cheap meds bill that he fervently sponsored. And boy oh boy, medicines alone will not save this country from going to the dogs.

With the campaign season coming in quickly, Mar Roxas must come up with more powerful commercials and advertisements if he wishes to win. But one thing for certain now is that he won’t get my vote.

Last week, news about his marriage proposal to long-time ABS-CBN news anchor Korina Sanchez created a buzz. Last Saturday while I was enjoying my weekend (well, I thought I was), I passed by Channel 2’s Wowowee and to my utter disbelief, Mar and Korina were there professing their love for each other! I could not bear the mockery that was happening so I hastily grabbed my remote to be . Later that night, while watching TV Patrol, I learned that Mar Roxas even shed tears during the Wowowee stint. Again, I was amazed, perplexed, puzzled, and worse of all, flashbacks of my Political Science 61 class raced through my cranium that Public Opinion and Media Lobbying is part and parcel of every politicians indispensable arsenal of hat tricks when an electoral season kicks in again.

Okay, here’s the deal. We all know that Mar Roxas wants to be the next president of the Philippines. In an interview with the Philippine Daily Inquirer, he even went as far as saying that he is the “best qualified” person to run.

To be honest, I have no problem with him running. It is his constitutional right and if he thinks he can win the presidential race, by all means he should indeed run. But the recent things he’s been doing are enough to tell me that he is really desperate. His political ad hails him as the answer to all our pressing problems. He doesn’t carry an issue and worse than that, he thinks poor people can relate to him if they see him riding the padyak going to Malacanang or setting up the presidential office right smack in the middle of Divisoria market.

The Mar-Korina Wowowee stint made it more obvious that he is indeed desperate. If there is anything worth commending about this strategy is that Mar Roxas knows the people he needs to reach: the media-consuming Class C, D, and E. And if this strategy would actually work by giving the people the false idea that’s his early media presence is not really unfavorable with regards to observing campaign schedules, then I guess we can see him breezing his way through the halls of Malacañang Palace.

Google Chrome is here!

Google has been supporting the development of Mozilla browser for years now but it seems the effort is not enough to gain major market share. So, it has decided to create its own browser — Google Chrome.

In an announcement in the official Google blog:

On the surface, we designed a browser window that is streamlined and simple. To most people, it isn’t the browser that matters. It’s only a tool to run the important stuff — the pages, sites and applications that make up the web. Like the classic Google homepage, Google Chrome is clean and fast. It gets out of your way and gets you where you want to go.

Under the hood, we were able to build the foundation of a browser that runs today’s complex web applications much better. By keeping each tab in an isolated “sandbox”, we were able to prevent one tab from crashing another and provide improved protection from rogue sites. We improved speed and responsiveness across the board. We also built a more powerful JavaScript engine, V8, to power the next generation of web applications that aren’t even possible in today’s browsers.

Google will still continue efforts to help Mozilla but with the Google Chrome Browser already taking first priority, I’m not sure if the partnership will last. Of course, Google will reallocate marketing budget to its own product.

If this is an attempt to cut against Microsoft’s dominance with Internet Explorer, it might work. However, there’s a bigger possibility that Chrome will just attract Firefox users rather than IE n00bs.

The Sad Truth

Riding a motorcycle gives the rider the freedom no one can ever explain because it feels so damn good to explain.

Ecstacy. adrenalin are all pumped up every time we twist the throttle of our iron horses.

"Fear" diminishes from our souls, only pure excitement envelops us from within.

The pride and the feeling of respect from other riders as well.

The bike and the rider transforms into one creature, a creature of speed and the harmony of man and machine.

The smile on our face is always present.

We are knights amongst men who coward themselves in cages with four wheels who think they're men but not! compared to the riders that we are.

To ride with our friends and group just simply shows how we "Love" the life we live in on two wheels.

The addiction of bikes is in our veins.

We sleep thinking about it, we wake up thinking about it.

We glance at them iron horses in our garages as if they were beautiful maidens.

No rider can ever deny that we are all consumed with our love for riding.

No one and nothing can ever take us away from our iron horses.

But... The Sad Truth...

More and more of our brothers are not aware of the privilege we all are granted with.

Some riders disregard the laws and the freedom given to us, causing the inevitable downfall of our brotherhood.

They look at us now as if we're reckless renegade rebels of the roads.

Hated by almost every motorist plying the road and stereotyped as lawless motorists who were granted wheels for improper use.

Uneducated fools tattering the real men in iron horses.

Like the battle fields of the old centuries we Knights fall one by one because of the dangers the road presents.

Death from accidents due to cages and riders as well.

Poor couples in bikes crippled by lawless fools surrounding our metropolis.

The unending statistics of reports from riders fatally killed or hurt everyday... just like the battle fields of the past.

We indeed are warriors, "Knights" who in the times of war and turmoil will still prevail.

"Love" for riding is what matters to us true Knights, the camaraderie and respect we give to all motorists will always be of utmost importance.

"I am a RIDER" I will show all these ignorant motorist what class of humanity a true Rider is, and maybe just maybe, we can all be great examples for all, that being disciplined will help make every ride pleasurable.

I call amongst all the true Knights...

lets help stop the "Sad Truth".

RIDE OR DIE!

The Irony of Kung Fu Panda

By: Prime Paul Cepeda

After breaking records at the box office in China, the animated movie "Kung Fu Panda" has caused controversy, debate, and introspection in the Chinese film community about the role of Western movies and the competence of Chinese animators.

Along with breaking box-office records in China, the movie has drawn protests calling for a ban of its release, making Kung Fu Panda a veritable source of controversy in the Chinese mainland.

Artist Zhao Bandi, whose works are mainly panda themed, was at the forefront of the movement against the release of the movie. He and other two men protested outside the offices of the State Administration of Radio Film and Television in Beijing last month and called for more supporters through their blog condemning the apparent disrespect to Chinese culture & society by the movie itself.

The blog listed their reasons for the petition: firstly, the movie is making money by taking advantage of Kung Fu and the panda, both of which are Chinese national treasures and the Chinese see it as a distortion of their culture. Secondly, the movie is made by DreamWorks, a studio founded by Steven Spielberg, who withdrew from his role as an adviser to the Beijing Olympics early this year over concerns about China’s role in the humanitarian crisis in Darfur, Sudan.

The protest was widely reported by media in China, and sparked a debate about how the Chinese should react when their cultural elements are shown on the big screen and appreciated around the world, notwithstanding the apparent disrespect that was shown in the movie, an allegation of which i do not see a single grain of truth in.

This is the first time I feel a Hollywood movie is approachable from a Chinese perspective and I strongly feel that the film is a tribute to Chinese history & culture, not the other way around as they seem.

I can’t even barely understand when Chinese culture was valued more by other countries, much more developed and westernized at that. why they want to say no to the movie in the first place? They should be proud of themselves, broaden their minds and stop those communist nationalists going haywire.

If there is one thing all would agree about this animated comedy, it is that it’s deeply rooted in the traditional Chinese culture. The movie is infused with traditional Chinese elements, from eating noodles and steamed bread to acupuncture and calligraphy; from music performed by Erhu using the bamboo flute, to scenes inspired by landscapes in Yuan Nan and Wu Dang provinces.

It’s deinitely miles away from previous Hollywood Chinese movies like Mulan or Kung Fu King, which only touches the veritable surface of contemporary Chinese culture, and only use Chinese elements as a symbol for cinematic effect at that purpose. This time, however, the producers have done a lot of homework, and grasped the nitty-gritty of China, which is the true value and symbolism behind Chinese culture, for example, statements like "your mind is like this water, my friend, when it is agitated, it becomes difficult to see, but if you allow it to settle, the answer becomes clear", one of the numerous lines in the movie which actually points to the essence of Taoism.

These actuations leads me to think that the reason why the Chinese are miles behind some developed western countries, is that they always put traditional Chinese culture on the lips instead of focusing on exploiting its value in relevance with the times.

But the protest and petition did bring about some impact; the movie’s release postponement in Sichuan Province is a case in point. An 8.0-magnitude earthquake hit Sichuan Province, home of the endangered giant pandas this May and left thousands of people dead, millions of people homeless and a 9 year-old female panda killed. To appease the survivors of the quake region, the movie release has been postponed, according to the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television.

These controversies only points out to the fact that Chinese people are still lost in their desire to an integral part of the global environment in which bridging the gap between Oriental peculiarities with standardized Western idiosyncracies.

Why do they want to host the 2008 Summer Olympics anyway? Pathetic

A taste of Korea plying Dumaguete streets

By: Prime Paul Cepeda

After the untimely demise of Ken Taxi Co.'s taxicab operations in the late 1990's, (attributed to the company being bankrupt and in dire need of folding up and not because of the lack of a viable market) we are now slowly seeing the return of taxicabs in the city after a few years of hibernation.

It was recently spearheaded by ANT (Arari Negros Taxi), also a trusted tour bus operator in the city, initially with 5 cabs, with more units coming in the next few month's, wishing to fulfill a market which is upbeat about having a more personalized mode of public transportation aside from the proverbial pedicabs plying the lanes of Dumsville. This thing is unavoidable though, for Robinson's Place Dumaguete is set to open in the middle of 2009 at the Dumaguete Business Park in Calindagan, of which the presence of motorized trikes might be considered as Passe, and by that time demand would definitely preempt the supply, good thing is that it's now hastily provided before the big thing drops in.

The interesting thing is, ANT is not just using the proverbial Toyota Corolla's and quintessential Nissan Sentra's that dominates the local taxi industry, with its entry-level frugality and spartan nature as a blue-collar workhorse much adept at this duties. But, lo and behold! ANT is using luxurious Hyundai Sonata's as their taxi units! these cars cost almost a million pesos in the local market, with its ample legroom, large trunk, and leather interiors, coupled with power windows and a long wheelbase, this is gourmet taxi at its finest. It definitely brings pictures of Seoul and Korea in my mind, as they use the same kind of taxicabs back there.

Oh, and before i forget, these Sonata taxicabs really look like Mercedes-Benz E-Class cars inside and out, talk about East Asian ingenuity (pardon the pun). Just don't mistake them for funeral hearses from Eterna Funeral Homes, ok?

So on that trip to Mogadishu, LOL!

Dumaguete streets never fails to amuse :-)

Bisdak Pride! Dice & K9 does it again!

Dice & K9 (a.k.a. Mobbstarr)

check out their music video on the right sidebar =>>>

By: Prime Paul Cepeda

I can still remember from my early High School days, a lowly R&B group from the Queen City of the South, predictably named as "Dice & K9" storming Dumaguete's clubbing scene a few years ago, in sacred nocturnal haunts like El Camino Blanco, Gimik, and Why Not!. But unfortunately their compatriot crowd didn't really nursed an affection for their strange but somewhat decrepit urban music. I could safely conclude that at that time, nobody could expect much from another homegrown Cebuano band invading Negros shores just to escape the saturated Cebu night scene and strike a little balance between being avant-garde and passe at the same time.

But, boy were we in for a nice surprise. Dice & K9 made their way and successfully navigated the musical chairs of their industry in a quite lackluster but nevertheless commendable way to ease themselves out of the rut that they were in at that time. Hits like "Itsumo" rocked the charts not just in the Philippines but also in other Asian countries at that, and the rest is history.

This song will definitely make the turntable and the synthesizer an indispensable tool in both electronica and urban genre's, coupled with the seamless merging of uptempo and downtempo beats reminiscent of auditory kingdoms. Now how's that for melodic convergence!

The song is addicting! And it's bound to take you places with your iPod. A perfectly seamless blend of electronic trance & urban beats and a good song to finally reap the psychological benefits of LSS with, LOL. This is bound to be another hit. A testament to our musical prowess and ingenuity in the global music industry. Go Pinoy! Bisdak Pride!

Why Friendster has gone to the dogs

By: Prime Paul Cepeda

Did it ever cross your mind that the Internet was bound to destroy all barriers known to man? That it’s existence was indispensable in tearing down the walls that divide and putting up the ties that bind? Nada? Nill? Well, that means that you're not really passe as of the moment. There's still a big difference between those lucky souls with dedicated broadband connections, or should I say rocket-propelled ISP’s with speeds averaging 1 mbps in the privacy of their own homes and bedrooms compared with those not so lucky fellas who have to frequent Manong Juan de la Cruz’s Friendly Neighborhood Internet Cafe with its Pentium Celeron PC’s running Linux open-source software that usually comes cheap at P10-15 per hour just to keep up with their Friendster accounts and what have you.

Recently, I have observed that some of my friends, especially the well endowed, in financial matters that is, and the tech-savvy are slowly migrating their personal profiles to upscale social-networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace, even Orkut may get the cut, to the detriment of their own Friendster accounts that are now on hibernation I suppose. Facebook, they say, is much classier and posh than Friendster. Plus, you can do more tweaks to your profile on those dedicated servers rather than get condemned with Friendster’s lackluster personalization and networking options where you could not really poke someone online literally, much less make a big difference. Plus, to rub salt on Friendster's wounds, its members excess use of tacky styles just to put their respective account names in a significantly higher placement in their friend’s list, coupled with the use of stupid usernames with numerous asterisks, apostrophes, and zero's before their stupid names, for example: “******abcdefdudegirlwhatever!” just to give you a picture! And sad to say, it seems that everybody and everyone, I repeat, EVERYONE AND EVERYBODY seems to have a Friendster account nowadays, much worse multiple accounts, including clumsy household helpers and blue-collar laborers, LOL!

Just look at this typical Friendster account and you'll certainly know what I'm talking about:

• duds

  adel&chupay Send Message Send a Smile Add as Friend Forward to Friend Add Bookmark

"maraming salamat po sa lahat ng bumati hindi ko poh kayo malilimutan"

• Female, 85, Domestic Partner
• Interested In: Friends
• Member Since: Jul 2007
• Location: Calamba City, Laguna, PH
• Hometown: brgy 20 san nicolas ilocos norte
• College: University Of Santo Tomas
• Company: adela'house
• Last Login: 24 hours
• duds's URL:
• http://profiles.friendster.com/dudschupay

"cute syempre"

• duds's Photo Gallery

  

  • chupipay
  • 5 photos
  • Public

  

  • My Public Photos
  • 99 photos
  • Public

  View All Albums (2)

• More About duds

  • Schools (Other):

    training center

  • College/University:
    

    University Of Santo Tomas, Attended 1901 - 1905, Class of 1905, Other

  • Occupation:
    

    guard

  • Affiliations:
    

    samahan ng mga dog sa pilipinas

  • Hobbies and Interests:
    

    aw aw eating alpo

  • Favorite Movies:
    

    animal planet

  • Zodiac Sign:
    

    Gemini

  • About Me:
    

    cute syempre

By the way, the background song was "Ikaw Lamang", a duet sung by Janno Gibbs and Jaya. Talk about being Kapuso! LOL!

That's Friendster, bow!

But things drastically changed when I opened my account one fateful day and then lo and behold! A shampoo advertisement, I think that was Pantene if I can still remember, greeted me on the sidebars of my profile page, these clumsy pictures of 4 showbiz women strutting their stuff, literally I was sharing my personal space with the rest of Showbizlandia's forgotten mavens and blood-thirsty advertising agencies. I felt violated, that was my private space! My personal niche in cyberspace taken over by flimsy actresses and showbiz personalities. An even cheesier snippet came with a SMART advertisement, that pathetic cellphone company, using the proverbial, “dito na me! wer na u?” catchphrase. Oooopppssss! I do agree that social-networking sites really need advertisements to sustain their supposed “humanitarian & social” concern, but that was way too tacky man! I say Manny Pangilinan, get a life! Go paste this advertisements at the homepage! But not on the personal profiles of your unsuspecting members who would later realize, the hard way that is, that the're slowly enriching Bill Gates without them even knowing. How pathetic!

That's Friendster. Nothing more, nothing less.

And that was just so cheesy!!! Would you agree?

But we still do love Friendster (no wonder why they moved their corporate HQ's to Singapore and established a satellite office in Manila, the dough is rolling here baby! yeah!) How ironic :-)

Dumaguete is now on Google Earth!

By: Prime Paul Cepeda

My city used to be a forlorn dot and speck of heady terrain on Google Earth since time immemorial, and try as I may, i really could not find a comprehensive satellite shot on this side of the Boot-shaped island that is Negros. But lo and behold! Google Earth has recently updated their satellite imagery coverage of the Philippines last May, and its outlying peripheral parts, so I could say that this is no longer the monopoly of Imperial Manila. Satellite imagery of Sibulan, Valencia, Bacong, and even Tanjay City is included. Sad to say Bais City was excluded from the list, sad for an emerging tourist destination, but nevertheless a good development from our friends at Google. Thanks Mountain View, CA peeps! :-)

I had fun locating my familiar haunts in the city, including the places where i usually get a small dose of luck on fairly unpleasant days, LOL! However, a street-level view is not yet available, I bet that will take a lot of resources to do, much less to replicate the grandeur of Rue de Champs-Elysses in Paris or Trafalgar Square in London. Anyway, that would be too much of a shame though, because yours truly would not want to get caught in his pajamas or much worse, his boxers.

WHY FI?: Dumaguete's plan to be the Philippines' 1st Wireless City

By: Prime Paul Cepeda

Grand Haven, Michigan or St. Cloud, Florida. Sounds familiar? well if you’ve been burying yourself in an endless maze of processed plastic and silicon for the better part of your lives, it does ring a bell. There you have it ladies and gents, the first wi-fi cities in the United States and in the world. Back then, it was not so much of a big deal, for wireless fidelity was still in its brazen infancy that even the most tech-savvy people wouldn’t mind a welcome addition to there ever-increasing work-detail, but the ramblings of technology pretty much surprises us nowadays like Britney Spear’s psychotic behavior right?

And then, there I was sitting one lazy morning in the City’s session hall, perhaps to do justice to my Political Science degree and to underline the futility of public accountability in government. I seem to be struggling to get into knee-deep political jargon when lo and behold! a group of city councilors and officials started to talk about creating a city-wide Wi-fi cloud covering the whole expanse of the City of Gentle People. This jolted my nerves back to its usual nonchalance as I intently honed in to their bullish but nevertheless noble plan of having Dumaguete City as “the 1^st wireless city in the Philippines.”

Let’s not be sissies here so let’s admit that the amount and pace of development especially in the urban areas now is technology-based. Technology has become synonymous with soaring development, this is manifested by the mushrooming of call centers and IT-based industries in high density urban areas like our own city and the retail/support facilitites that go hand in hand. With this, things really do look good, in the economic forecasts I suppose, and in 10 years time, I’m telling you now, things would be very different. Lets just hope that our police force and the City govt. can keep up with the pace, anyway.

And if no one knows about this fact, Dumaguete, already has a robust fiber-optic cable network capacity already in place, thanks to the efforts of Deutsche Telecom/Singapore Telecom (who owned Islacom at that time, then bought by Globe Telecom) who laid our world-class fiber-optic backbone at the cost of US$10 million, which not only connects the city to Cebu and Manila but to other islands as well including Mindanao. The fiber-optic network in Dumaguete is the best for a city outside Metro Manila, having a capacity of up to 800 Gbps, which translates to 4.5 million high quality data, voice, and internet lines, which can accommodate up to 5 million call center agents or a city with a population close to half a million like Dumaguete City.

This will only add to the feverish pace of development that Dumaguete is going through at the moment, with new industries, new buildings, and new businesses being established day after day.

SIGN OF THE FUTURE

I swear, the day will come, as sure as the sun shines in the morning (except in Scandinavia where it never does, but then you and I never get to see that corner, either), when these glorious 7,101 islands will be blanketed by wi-fi. Wherever I go, it’ll be at least 3 bars on my 802.11a/b/g/n meter; I can catch a signal in the bathroom or while cozying up around in the beach; or doing my weekend warrior duties in the mountains and in far-flung areas; and best of all, it’ll be absolutely free! with no silly usernames and passwords to remember, and no brain-deadening bill to at the end of the month.

Uhhh… hello, am I awake? Am I alive? Is this the Philippines? Well, I can dream, can’t I?

I know, there’s the depressing truth: while places like Macedonia (really, why Macedonia?) are racing to become the first thoroughly wireless in the world, we are still struggling to electrify more than a few of our islands. And even presuming that we do distill enough juice from the sun to power up those boonies, Filipinos who live there are to poor to even buy a light bulb.

But let’s think positive, and dream on, to a time when even our lowliest farmers and tricycle drivers will own Wi-fi capable laptops or at least cellphones, maybe as a result of a US$10-billion National Unity through wireless Connectivity Project that the next administration will manage to get past everyone, on along holiday weekend when no one’s looking. That’s it, that’s what we really need, a great big wireless national group hug to banish the rebellion, sedition, and destabilization blues. If not love, then technology will keep us together.

As dreamy visions go, there’s something about a free Wi-fi enabled nation that excites the imagination. It means that, theoretically, all Filipinos will only have to turn on their Nokia’s, SE’s, or iPhones (sorry Treo fans) to dialog with one another, exchange likes and dislikes, pass on stupid jokes, harass ex-girlfriends and ex-boyfriends, pester Papa for a bigger allowance to bag that spanking new iPod Touch and listen to it in Boracay with all the brandishing and bragging rights to boot, conduct steamy SOIP (Sex Over Internet Protocol) affairs (bwahaha! JOKE!!!), tell some poor sods in a Third-world country that they’ve won a Mercedes if they hand over the price of a Toyota, fool someone into believing that you do look like Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie over some clandestine social-networking site, and while were at it, just living out your virtual personality without the wires. Aahhhh. Good.

Hmmm, on second though, WHY FI?

Why Microsoft is desperate for Yahoo

By: Prime Paul Cepeda

"There are a ton of great jobs in the world, but running Microsoft? No thanks. I'd rather run Iraq." - Bill Gates

Those were the words of Microsoft founder & CEO Bill Gates, one of the wealthiest global personalities, on questions hounding the future of the software and electronics conglomerate. And his words would reflect that things are getting awry in the Redmond, California based company for the years to come.

Microsoft is apparently under assault in every direction, and is likely losing the battle on any number of fronts. That's why it's so desperate to come to terms, and in any terms, i mean, with Yahoo. The software giant in fact have been knocking on Yahoo's doors in the recent weeks to suggest a joint venture that would give Bill Gates' brainchild a position in Yahoo's search engine business. We're supposed to believe that Yahoo is now feeling the heat. But it's Microsoft that has everything to lose here. The barbarians are at the gates, and Gates (as in Bill Gates) has gone off to serve humanity. Without a search strategy that works, and with Yahoo potentially linking up with Google, a partnership that is expected to be announced in a few days, things would end up in an awry mess. Microsoft is an empire in rapid decline, trust me guys.

Let's start with its core competencies, operating systems. Vista is a disaster! and Windows 7, its successor, is a far two years back. So apparently by then, the market for desktop/laptop operating systems will be smaller, perhaps dramatically so. The sweet spot is steadily moving away from "computers" to mobile devices. Especially phones and PDA's, mainly because Microsoft's mobile operating system has never captured anyone's imagination to be honest, let alone the manufacturers operating in the market, unless affiliated Motorola has any other ideas for that. Proof of this would be the dominance of Iphone over Windows Mobile in the PDA software market. And with iPhone 2.0 and a variety of Google-powered cell phones set to roll out, things are definitely not going to get any easier for Microsoft i suppose.

I could go on and on talking about Microsoft flaws, ticking off the things that Microsoft needs to fix. But Kevin Johnson, president of the company's platforms and services division, does a far better job than I could. He oversees the 14,000 people who work in the Windows and online divisions of the company. He took over the job three years ago, which means that Vista is his baby. In a memorandum to employees Sunday that touched on the latest Yahoo overture, he admitted that Microsoft's search biz has stalled: "The fact is that we are not where we want to be in this business yet and we've been in this position longer than we'd all like." You can say that again Kevin.

For me, there's only one way out for Microsoft's predicament at the moment, figure out a way to combat Google. There has been rumours of a "major new initiative" the company will be announcing at Silicon Valley later this week. The initiative, he promised, will "innovate and disrupt in search." Whatever that means, Good luck with that, but at this point even a Yahoo acquisition might be too late.