Looks like Robert Scoble has some inside (and unknown) sources that Microsoft is ready to release a second wave of “mind blowing” Kinect games this April. This should be interesting and hopefully they will actually be mind blowing, I bet they will be mainly fitness and dancing games, however. Who knows, maybe there will be a Guitar Hero type game without the guitar. That would be fun, right?

Have you heard of Docs for Facebook (or Docs.com)? It seems as though yesterday they rolled out some backend updates which will improve performance and stability of the platform. Not only were backend improvements introduced, but also more languages are supported (about 30 overall) along with spell checking support in the Word Web App on docs.com. For a list of supported languages, checkout http://docs.com/A2E0.

Microsoft is now investigating Bluetooth issues on Windows Phone 7 according to WinRumors. Apparently this issue has been known by Microsoft since last November but nothing was yet done (or even confirmed by them) to try to solve the issue. “I, too, have a similar problem with a Samsung Focus and Acura MDX. Wildly varying volume levels, plus static and garbled sound. Old Samsung Blackjack II, [i]Phone 3GS, and iPhone 4 all work perfectly in the car,” according to one of the commenters on the Microsoft forums. What a way to treat your customers, Microsoft.

There are some more Internet Explorer 9 RC rumors out and about now, including ActiveX filtering according to WinRumors. This “filter will allow users to control what ActiveX elements are displayed on sites they visit,” says WinRumors. Am I missing something here? Are you not already asked to run an ActiveX control in existing versions of Internet Explorer, or am I thinking of something completely different? Also, IE9 RC is rumored to also have the option to put the tabs back under the address bar.

Surprise, surprise! Those Facebook apps that claim they can tell you who is visiting your profile or viewing photos, etc. are all lies! If you are using these fake things, be sure to stop and tell your friends as well. These apps just take your information for other purposes and, as stated, don’t do what they say they do, so who knows what else they are doing. The reason these don’t and won’t ever work: Facebook doesn’t provide any sort of API for apps to implement such things, same goes for those Dislike apps… Yeah, they don’t work because only Facebook themselves can implement such features.

There have been many people complaining about mysterious Windows Phone data usage, using data in upwards of 35-40MB a day when they have done nothing to use that much. This of course has upset many people because some only have 200MB data plans, and um, 35 x 30 = 1,050MB, I think that is a little more than 200MB, don’t you think? Well it appears Microsoft may have found the culprit, they just didn’t tell anyone, according to Paul Thurrott.

We have determined that a third-party solution commonly accessed from Windows Phones is configured in a manner that potentially cause larger than expected data downloads. We are in contact with the third party to assist them in making the necessary fixes, and are also pursuing potential workarounds to address the configuration issue in case those are needed. At this point in our investigation, we believe this is responsible for most of the reported incidents.

We are investigating additional potential root causes for the remainder of the reports. A small (low single-digit) percentage of Windows Phone customers have reported being affected.

We are continuing to investigate this issue and will update with additional information and guidance as it becomes available.

I am still confused though: third-party solution? Is this an app or what?

Apple posted blockbuster earnings for Q1 (FY2011) with $26.74 billion in revenue. Nice! Here are some sales numbers: 4.13 million Macs (mostly thanks to the new MacBook Air — gain of 23% year-over-year), 16.24 million iPhones (86% increase year-over-year), 7.33 million iPads (beating estimates by 1 million) and finally 19.74 million iPods (7% decline year-over-year, though half were iPod Touches, which cost more). Unsurprising, really.

Lastly, Microsoft will begin rolling out an Xbox LIVE Dashboard update today which re-enables the ability to boot from the disc in the drive, so you can go right to playing the game instead of going to the Dashboard first. This option (once installed) will be available under System Settings. Not only will that feature be added, but “the update is also designed to cause issues for users which altered the console’s firmware in order to circumvent the company’s anti-piracy measures for games,” says Softpedia. Also the gamercards on Xbox.com will get a little bit of an update: “We’ve updated the Gamercard look and feel a bit and removed gamerzone from the card. Other than that, the same amount of information is on the card,” according to Larry Hyrb (Xbox Live Director of Programming).

The Bing Gives campaign has been going for two months, and over that time — thanks to thousands of people — they have donated $353,583 to public schools and such, not bad.

I bet you have heard about that whole Google removing H.264 from Chrome in v10, right? Well, many people are confused as to why Google is doing it, and Ed Bott has beat the AVC/H.264 license to death and found that money cannot be the issue, royalty rates will not go up until after 2015, and even then, the license prevents the rate from going up any more than the maximum of 10%. So how much does it cost to put H.264 in a browser? That depends:

So, how much does those rights cost? Under the terms in place for 2011-2015, the royalty rates are the same regardless of whether a product is part of an OS. There’s no royalty for the first 100,000 units of a licensed product; sublicensees pay 20 cents per unit up to 5 million and 10 cents per unit above 5 million. The current agreement includes an annual limit: “The maximum annual royalty (‘cap’) for an Enterprise [is] $6.5 million per year in 2011-2015.”

– Ed Bott of ZDNet

Yes, you read that right, those licensing H.264 will only have to pay up to $6.5 million. Wow Google, how could you ever afford that? It would bankrupt them!

Steve Jobs took a medical leave starting this last weekend, so far it is unknown as to why he has left for now, but one thing is sure: Wall Street is a bit upset, with Apple shares down 2% (still bouncing around).

No surprises here: the Xbox 360 is topping both hardware and software sales. In December of 2010, Xbox 360 sales grew 42% year-over-year, something no other console accomplished. Microsoft sold 1.9 million Xbox 360′s in December alone (though Nintendo sold 2.3 million Wii’s), this made December of 2010 the biggest month for Xbox in history. As for software: $2.1 billion for the PlayStation 3, $2.6 billion for the Wii and $3 billion for the Xbox 360.

If that isn’t enough, Microsoft is warning of possible Kinect shortages because “In order to keep up with holiday demand in December for Xbox 360 and Kinect, Microsoft pulled units from its January and February production.”

Do you use OneNote? Do you have an iPhone? Well, you’re in luck, as Microsoft just released OneNote Mobile for the iPhone and get this: it is free for a limited time. Microsoft finishes off by saying: “It should be about the ideas and information, not the device, right?” Could it be coming to Android next? I guess we will see.

Do you have an iPhone? Do you use the OneNote application in the Microsoft Office suite? Well then, you might want to head down to the iPhone App Store and download OneNote Mobile, and it is completely free for a limited time.

With the OneNote application you can takes notes (of course), along with inserting photos from your library or take a picture with your camera. These notes get automatically backed up to Windows Live Skydrive which then allows you to access them anywhere (such as your computer with OneNote on the desktop, your browser with Office Web Apps and Windows Phone 7).

Microsoft claims OneNote “gets some of the highest customer satisfaction ratings of any app.” Along with inserting photos, OneNote can also capture handwriting, audio and video clips.

Microsoft finishes off by saying “It should be about the ideas and information, not the device, right?”

OneNote Mobile for Android coming up? I guess we will see.

I may be a few days late, but I don’t think that will make too much of a difference, but it is time for me to make my first predictions for the year of 2011, regarding Microsoft, that is.

I have never made any predictions like this before, so please bare with me. The predictions I am going to make will be pretty broad, but hopefully next year they will be better.

Oh, and there will be predictions for a few other products as well.

Windows 8

We still know very little about Windows 8, but what we do know is that Windows 8 will run on ARM and other SoC (System on a Chip) architectures, which is no surprise.

My prediction is that we will continue to know very little about Windows 8 until sometime this summer, maybe a private or public beta of some sort, but nothing for tablets. The beta (if any) that will be out will be merely for the desktop and a tablet version will be seen at a later date in 2011.

Some sites are saying Windows 8 could RTM as soon as this year, personally, I am saying no to that, as there will be quite a bit of work to be done in order to have Windows 8 work on both desktop and tablet devices.

I have one last prediction for Windows 8, and that is it will become more compartmentalized. Since Windows 8 will be comprised of multiple components the system will be able to run on lower-end hardware such as netbooks and tablets. A couple components would be the GUI and legacy support, this way tablets can have a custom interface with legacy removed (why would they need it? Seeing as tablets will need custom applications).

Windows Phone 7

This one is fairly straight-forward: Microsoft will continue to not get it.

What I mean is that Microsoft won’t update Windows Phone 7 as quickly as they should.

As for devices, we will start to see some phones that are designed for Windows Phone instead of slapping Windows Phone 7 on devices originally designed for Android. Sales will be okay, but as long as Microsoft continues to think that a little bit of advertising will go a long way, they will be disappointed.

As for that rumored major update codenamed “Mango,” I believe we will see that update around fall of this year.

Bing

On the other hand, Bing will continue to receive update after update, making it much more compelling to people to make the switch. What will Bing get feature wise? Not too sure to be specific, but I predict we will see that HTML5 update (with animated and more interactive home page backgrounds, Instant Search like display and so forth) around spring time, and summer at the latest.

Market share wise, Bing will continue to grow, taking small bits out of Google’s market. I am going to say that by years end, Bing alone will take 18% of the market, not including Yahoo!

Steve Ballmer

I don’t care much for Ballmer, I personally would like to see him go. He is a good business man, but as for vision, there is nothing there.

As I said, I would like to see him go, but he will remain at Microsoft for another year.

PC sales

Many people continue to say tablets will eat PC sales (I mean any sort of computer, whether it be running Windows or Mac OS X), but I am not so sure.

The reason I am not so sure is we still haven’t seen any compelling tablet other than the iPad. Sales of the iPad will continue at a strong rate, but they will do little to PC sales, until we see more competition that is.

iPhone

The iPhone for Verizon was announced, and no one was that excited… It was welcomed, but there were no huge parties or anything

Sure, the iPhone is now on what some call a better network, but I predict the iPhone will continue to have issues with dropped calls and what not.

Here is a broad prediction: the iPhone 5 will be launched sometime this year, without LTE capabilities of any sort. Oh, and the iPhone 5 won’t be immediately available on Verizon, it will come to AT&T first and on Verizon at a later time.

Google Chrome OS

Chrome OS will come out sometime this year, with decent sales, but won’t take off. In other words: Windows will remain king.

My reasoning: people will find it boring, useless and underpowered. Whether or not people know a lot can now be done in a web browser, they won’t see it that way, they want the ability to run full on applications, something Chrome OS can’t provide.

So there you have it! My predictions for the year of 2011. Be sure to come back next year to see how I did. Probably poorly, but we have a while year to find out, don’t we?

Windows Phone 7 Connector for Mac is self explanatory, as it allows you to sync your music, photos, videos and podcasts “from your existing iTunes and iPhoto libraries to your Windows Phone 7.”

Yesterday Microsoft released Windows Phone 7 Connector for Mac beta 2, which included a slew of bug fixes and also some features as well.

Electronista found out what was changed in this version, and is as follows:

• Fixes playback for the AAC files synced from iTunes (wouldn’t play previously)
• Now able to take MP3′s off the device, useful when you buy music on the phone
• Now syncs: bookmarks, rating and release dates (previously left out)
• Better handles iPhoto ’11 libraries
• Video preparation process improved
• Support for updating the phones firmware
• Faster syncing

Sadly it is no Zune software, and probably never will be, so Windows Phone 7 Connector for Mac will always be behind when compared to the Zune software for Windows.