Software prices could fall as companies develop subscription sales and distribute increasingly complex programs that run in Web browsers, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said Thursday. "With less piracy, with more proper use, it certainly creates an opportunity for us and for other software companies to take a look at also reducing the cost, not just improving the benefits and the value of the software," Ballmer said.

But many experts say that those who want to completely eradicate the scourge of unwanted email have only one realistic option: forget about it. Although better technological controls have provided some measure of relief, spam still is responsible for about 70 percent of mail to consumers, according to the security firm Commtouch. For businesses, who tend to have better protections in place, the statistic is better, but not by much: 46 percent of the entire email traffic into a company is spam, spam, spam.

Andrew Tridgell, creator of the Samba server software used by free and open-source software developers alike, made an important contribution to the European Commission’s defense of its 2004 Microsoft antitrust ruling at the Court of First Instance. Speaking slowly and loudly with his soft Australian accent, Tridgell’s testimony was compelling not only because it seemed to so effectively refute Microsoft’s arguments, but also because of the way he characterized the world of software development and Microsoft’s role in it.

What is winmail.dat and why is it annoying your email recipients? If you want to fix the problem, read this article.

Read this OutlookPower article.

In reputation-based filtering, senders are graded on their practices and assigned a reputation score based on several variables, such as complaint rates, volume of mail sent and response to unsubscribe requests. It’s one of the latest techniques used to combat the problem of spam, which makes up more than 80 percent of all messages sent today, according to e-mail security service Postini. Also in response to spam, e-mail service providers are aggressively filtering messages to keep the medium useful for their customers. That, allied to the reputation push, is putting a burden on companies to meet the requirements of those providers.

Apple Computer will look to a rising new generation of managers to ensure that the recent departure of two of the company’s three most prominent managers won’t spell the end to Apple’s vibrant growth.

Internet identity theft is one of the fastest-growing crimes in the U.S. today. For five straight years, the Federal Trade Commission ranked it as one of the most-reported types of fraud. Despite the increasing awareness of identity theft among consumers and financial institutions, the identity-theft racket shows no signs of slowing. Reported losses from identity theft, currently responsible for over 40 percent of all fraud complaints, approached nearly $300 million last year.

At the Microsoft Management Summit 2006, Microsoft highlighted its momentum with industry-leading independent software vendors including BMC Software, CA, Citrix Systems, CommVault, Full Armor, and Quest Software. These ISVs have integrated their management solutions to extend the value of the Microsoft platform for the benefit of customers. The technologies featured at MMS 2006, including extensions to System Center technologies such as Microsoft Systems Management Server 2003 and Microsoft Operations Manager 2005, are designed to help simplify management of today’s complex and dynamic IT environments. Microsoft and its ISV partners are seeing broad adoption of the Microsoft management technologies among customers, signaling strong industry momentum for the Microsoft platform in the infrastructure and management space.

Microsoft and Hyperion announced plans to integrate their business intelligence solutions to enable customers to make the most of their existing IT investments through improved interoperability between the companies’ technologies. Collaboration plans include four initiatives that integrate Microsoft SQL Server 2005 technologies–including SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services, SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services and SQL Server 2005 Integration Services–with Hyperion System 9 BI+, a key part of Hyperion’s business performance management solution. The announcement was made at Solutions 2006, Hyperion’s global BPM conference in Las Vegas.

Anti-virus powerhouse Symantec has released patches for three "moderately critical" security vulnerabilities that could put users at risk of security bypass and information exposure attacks. In an alert posted online, the vendor urged users to upgrade to Symantec Scan Engine 5.1 to protect against the threat of improper authentication for Web-based user logins. Symantec claims there are no known publicly available exploits. However, security researchers warn that proof-of-concept exploit code showing how a remote attacker can change the administrator password has already been published, raising the likelihood of targeted attacks.