All Things Digital

As most know by now, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer introduced the software giant’s relaunch of its search offering, dubbed Bing, onstage at the seventh D: All Things Digital conference.

You can see that here, as well as Ballmer demoing the product, which is Microsoft’s biggest and priciest attempt yet to catch archrival Google and Yahoo in the search business.

It is a market where the typically dominant Microsoft is a mouse in comparison. But, no surprise, that did not stop Ballmer from doing some roaring about Bing.

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Well, despite the news being as bad at Microsoft as it was at Yahoo earlier this week, the conference call after the software giant released its third-quarter earnings was 100 percent less naughty and 200 percent more glum.

In other words, while there were no F-bombs dropped, there were lots of E-bombs–as in econalypse.

Here’s BoomTown’s liveblogging of the call–featuring the software giant’s semi-apocalyptic CFO, Chris Liddell.

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Microsoft’s earnings and revenue took a hit in its third quarter, as expected, with profits down 32 percent from a year ago on a six percent sales decline.

Before one-time charges, the software giant earned $2.98 billion, or 33 cents a share after one-time charges, on revenue of $13.65 billion.

The weak results were relatively in line with analysts’ estimates of 39 cents a share on $14.1 billion in revenue.

The culprit for the bad news was the decline in consumer and business spending on computers since half Microsoft’s operating income comes from sales of its Windows operating system.

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An unusual Israeli-Palestinian joint venture start-up, which makes a cloud-based Web operating system letting users access their desktops from any computer with an Internet connection, is alleging a trademark violation by Microsoft in its new $300 million advertising campaign.

G.ho.st, which stands for “Global Hosted Operating System,” claims it has a pending trademark registration for the tagline “no walls.”

Microsoft disputes G.ho.st’s contention.

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We’re posting all the interviews from the sixth D: All Things Digital conference that took place in late May.

But–as many readers have requested–they will all be available in their entirety in this column.

In the less contentious spirit of DEMOfall and TechCrunch50, two demo conferences taking place simultaneously this week, we’re happy to bring you all the demos we had onstage at the D6 conference.

Last, but not least: the G.ho.st Web operating system, which lets users access their desktop from any computer with an Internet connection. It’s also the name of a one-of-a-kind joint technology venture between Israelis and Palestinians.

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We’re posting all the interviews from the sixth D: All Things Digital conference that took place in late May.

But–as many readers have requested–they will all be available in their entirety in this column.

In the less contentious spirit of DEMOfall and TechCrunch50, two demo conferences taking place simultaneously this week, we’re happy to bring you all the demos we had onstage at the D6 conference.

First up is TransMedia’s Glide, an operating system that cuts across all operating systems.

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The blogosphere immediately jumped all over the inevitable meme that after the Yahoo deal fell apart, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer’s job was at risk.

What with the problems with the new Vista operating system and the general feeling that Microsoft’s Internet strategy is in shambles, the argument that Ballmer would be shown the door by an impatient board and replaced by former CEO and Founder Bill Gates was clear.

Actually, not so such much at all, but that has not stopped all the noise.

Maybe Ballmer should go and maybe not, but I would like some proof that’s not in evidence as yet.

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