How low can Microsoft go?
Very low, it seems, in announcing really bad fourth-quarter earnings, missing Wall Street revenue estimates by an astonishing $1 billion.
Talk about a game of extreme limbo.
No surprise–Microsoft shares have been taking a beating in after-hours trading.
BoomTown liveblogged the earnings call.
As CEO and chairman of Mozilla, respectively, John Lilly and Mitchell Baker have overseen the huge growth of Firefox, the popular open-source browser.
The pair talk about this and more in an interview with Walt Mossberg at the seventh D: All Things Digital conference.
Walt Mossberg and BoomTown are in San Diego for DEMOfall, one of two big tech start-up demo conferences taking place this week (the other is TechCrunch50 in San Francisco).
At both conferences, a passel of start-ups come to show off their wares to an audience of press, venture capitalists and one other.
Walt and I also appeared here this afternoon onstage in what was called “Head-to-Head,” a feature which we hope to debut on this site soon.
At the Google launch of its new “not-a-Windows-killer” Chrome browser, held at its Mountain View, Calif., HQ yesterday morning, Google Co-Founder Sergey Brin arrived late and looked casually dressed and very windblown.
But he was quite talkative about Google’s Chrome, the software to navigate the Internet that the search giant released yesterday.
Brin talked about a lot of aspects of Chrome’s development and implications, as well as its business prospects.
Here is a video I did while I was attending and liveblogging the Google launch of and press conference for its new “not-a-Windows-killer” Chrome browser, held at its Mountain View, Calif., HQ yesterday morning.
Google released its own software to navigate the Internet yesterday, setting itself up for yet another bruising competition with Microsoft.
See Googlers, snacks and more…
Finally, Google Co-Founder Larry Page takes the microphone and thanks the Chrome browser team and compliments them for their efforts.
This is, as anyone on the receiving end of Page’s sometimes pointed manner knows (and BoomTown has been), a big deal.
Page also starts to talk about how browser choice and innovation could make the planet a better place.
Of course! World peace through better browsing!
Now, we have two guys (sorry, I will fill in their names later, but they talked fast) who are demoing Google’s new Chrome browser and its features and user interface.
“Friendly” tabs, knowing your history better graphically, auto-typing, simplicity, easier downloading with a new window that one guy is calling a real app like “Pinocchio, because I wanted to build a real boy.”
Well, Pinocchio was wood for most of that story, but I like the effort!
Okay, BoomTown is grudgingly going to liveblog this event at the Googleplex, as it might be mercifully short, given that Google is supposed to release its new Chrome browser at high noon, Pacific time.
Then again, this is Google, so you know they love to talk, because they are super-duper smart, I am told.
I will be posting video later, but thus far: A roomful of press in Building 43 at Google’s HQ in Mountain View. Tasty snacks as expected, but unusually caloric (many tiny pastries, heavy cream, very small amounts of fruit).
First up: Sundar Pichal, Chrome honcho!
BoomTown is back from a seasick cruise vacation in the wilds of Alaska–official sightings: lots of icebergs, 16 glaciers, a passel of jellyfish and starfish, four lumberjacks, three orcas, two seals, one otter, no moose or bears and, yep, one Republican Vice Presidential candidate’s lovely house in Juneau–just in time for school.
Or, more precisely, a little schooling for some of the tech companies that I cover in a mildly obsessive-compulsive manner.
All of them, I predict, are in for a news-filled fall.
Thus, here is a rundown of what to expect and also what some of those companies need to focus on over the next several months.
Later this morning, the media circus has been summoned to the Googleplex in Mountain View for a look-see at Google’s new Chrome browser and a chitchat with Google about the meaning of it all.
(Also, a 100 percent chance of both free comics and tasty organic snacks too!)
And Chrome, the shiny code name of the project, which stuck as the brand name, will also be going out to the world at large right after that.
BoomTown will be doing a video report, of course. But, until then, I have decided to forgo writing the expected long, long, long, long what-the-new-Google-browser-represents-for-geekkind thumbsucker for a much shorter version.
As was reported earlier today by BoomTown, Google confirmed on its blog that it will launch its new Chrome browser tomorrow.
Google said it would be launching Chrome in 100 countries, but but will only be available in beta in Windows (Google said Mac and Linux versions were coming soon).
The move by the search giant, although the blog does not say so, is clearly a direct shot over the bow of Microsoft, which dominates the browser market with 74 percent share.
Here is the full blog post by Sundar Pichai, VP Product Management at Google, and Linus Upson, Engineering Director.
Here is Google’s entire comic book–BoomTown’s not going to say the search giant is juvenile, but a comic book?–that it is using to explain the technical details of its new browser called Chrome.
Sources told me definitively Google will launch the browser–which is its most blatant attack on Microsoft yet–as early as tomorrow for download by consumers.
In its most frontal and aggressive attack on Microsoft yet, sources with knowledge of the project said Google is preparing to unveil a new browser–ready for download to users as early as tomorrow–to try to loosen Microsoft’s iron grip on the most important piece of software to navigate the Internet.
In addition, Google Blogoscoped has published a comic book that Google is apparently using to explain the technical aspects of its open-source browser, which is called Chrome.
Kara Swisher started covering digital issues for The Wall Street Journal's San Francisco bureau in 1997 and also wrote the BoomTown column about the sector. With Walt Mossberg, she co-produces and co-hosts D: All Things Digital, a major high-tech and media conference.
Here is a statement of my ethics and coverage policies. It is more than most of you want to know, but, in the age of suspicion of the media, I am laying it all out.
D is unlike any other executive conference. Since its debut in 2003, D has brought to life the energy and excitement of the digital revolution in an unscripted, upfront and unparalleled way. Read more »
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