Windows Experience Blog : Community

State of the Blog – A Little Update on Where We Are Today

Brandon LeBlanc — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 01:03:59 GMT

We are in an exciting time for Windows. We’re about to launch our best version of Windows yet – Windows 7. In between all the Windows 7 awesomeness, I wanted to take a moment to talk about The Windows Blog and where we are today with the site.

We’ve come a long way since 2006 when we launched as the Windows Vista Team Blog. This last fall we re-launched the site as The Windows Blog. When we re-launched, the focus of the site was to be the ultimate resource for Windows through the use of blogging – and to grow.

In the site’s design, we put an emphasis of multiple blogs existing under The Windows Blog “umbrella” that would cater to different audiences. Our original blog, Windows Vista Team Blog, became one of several blogs under that “umbrella” and we also launched the Windows 7 Team Blog which is where you will find all the latest Windows 7 news and announcements. Also in the fall, we launched the Windows Security Blog featuring blog posts focusing on Windows security from Paul Cooke. Paul blogged live from RSA earlier this year.

And in the last few months, we’ve grown quite a bit to cover a broader array of audiences with several other new blogs joining our site:

Windows for your Business Blog: Launched in February by Gavriella Schuster, this blog focuses on our commercial customers for Windows. Most recently, Rich Reynolds who is a GM on the Windows Commercial Marketing Team posted a blog about how our business customers provided early feedback for Windows 7.

Windows 7 for Developers Blog: At the end of March, we launched the Windows 7 for Developers. This blog is run by Yochay Kiriaty from the Developer and Platform Evangelism (DPE) Team here at Microsoft. Yochay blogs about all the really cool things developers can do with their applications to take advantage of Windows 7 features like the new Windows Taskbar. If you’re a developer – this blog is a must read.

Springboard Series Blog: This blog launched in early June and is run by Senior Community Manager Stephen Rose. The Springboard Series is a TechNet portal and is the ultimate Windows resource for IT Professionals. The Springboard Series Blog focuses on calling out those resources for IT Pros. Just recently, a Virtual Roundtable (VRT) discussion was help with Mark Russinovich on Application Compatibility – check it out here!

Soon, my friends over on Windows Mobile will be blogging on The Windows Blog too! Their blog can be found here.

And of course I continue to focus on my Windows experiences on the Windows Experience Blog as well.

What’s great about growing the blogs under The Windows Blog “umbrella” is that we have blog posts talking about a variety of Windows topics relevant to a broad set of audiences.

However what if some of the content being blogged about isn’t relevant to me?

All blog posts from all blogs automatically appear in our main RSS feed. Some people want to see and read everything. This is likely how they are doing so or going to our frontpage. But if you only care about content from a specific blog, you can subscribe to the individual RSS feed for that blog. Here are the RSS feeds for each of the blogs here on The Windows Blog:

Tags we use for blog posts also have their own RSS feeds. If all you care about is our announcements, you can subscribe to the RSS feed for the Announcements tag.

If RSS isn’t your thing, you can also follow The Windows Blog on Twitter and get all our latest blog posts too.

So what’s coming up for The Windows Blog? Well – lots more awesome Windows 7 blog posts of course. We’re also going to be introducing a new menu system in the coming weeks and introducing more new blogs – including some localized blogs in a variety of different languages.

I’m very proud of the community of Windows blogs we’ve built up here on The Windows Blog. Thank you to the millions of visitors who read our posts each month and continue to be excited for Windows!

Have Your Windows & Windows Live Blog Posts Showcased - Join The Clubhouse

Brandon LeBlanc — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 23:08:15 GMT

Are you using your blog to talk about using Windows and Windows Live? Do you want to get your post showcased on Microsoft websites? You should join The Clubhouse. The Clubhouse is a place that brings together people using their blogs to help others how to use the best parts of Windows and Windows Live.

How does The Clubhouse work?

You first need to apply to join The Clubhouse. There is a small review process in order to insure that there is a good fit for people applying and the rest of The Clubhouse.

Once you’re approved, you continue to write fantastic Windows and Windows Live content on your blog and use special tags that help identify what you’re writing about as it relates to either Windows or Windows Live. Your posts are brought into the Clubhouse via your RSS feed (having an RSS is a requirement to take part in The Clubhouse). Once you tag your post for The Clubhouse using the special tags, it gets pulled through your RSS feed into The Clubhouse.

In order to use the special tags needed to identify your contributions for The Clubhouse, you will need to add a new Tag Provider in Windows Live Writer. Right now, The Clubhouse has special tags for Windows Live and Windows Vista, with a set of special tags launching for Windows 7 later this month.

Once your post is published with the special tags – it appears within The Clubhouse where members of The Clubhouse rate one another’s contributions, so the top rated content can be showcased on Microsoft websites, newsletters, and even tweeted from @MSWindows and @windowslive. So it’s up to your peers to choose which content is good enough to get showcased.

So where is your content showcased?

After you get enough good votes inside The Clubhouse – depending on the type of post (Windows Vista or Windows Live) your stuff will show up on 1 of 2 Microsoft websites:

Explore Windows Live:

Discover Windows Vista:

Outside of the really cool opportunity to get your content from your blog showcased on Microsoft websites, The Clubhouse offers several other “perks”.

As you continue to write your own content – you will earn Club Points and Badges. When you earn a certain amount of Club Points, you get Badges. Each Badge you earn will appear next to any of your content showcased on Microsoft websites. You also can earn special-recognition Badges as well. These Badges are a great way for people reading your content to see how much you rock.

Because I am a Microsoft employee, for any of my content you will see this Badge:

If you blog quite a bit about using Windows and Windows Live – I suggest giving The Clubhouse a look and applying! It can be a great way to gain more exposure of your content!

Clubhouse Tags: Clubhouse, Story, Windows Live, Windows Vista

Introducing Sports Channel for Windows Media Center

Brandon LeBlanc — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 20:09:13 GMT

Yesterday we announced a brand new offering for Windows Media Center users: Sports Channel. Sports Channel will be offered to Windows Vista Home Premium and Windows Vista Ultimate users as a new tile under “Sports” in Windows Media Center.

Sports Channel offers a variety of sports content from great sources CBSSports.com, Fox Sports, MSNBC.com and more. Content flowing through Sports Channel ranges from breaking sports news to interviews of your favorite players to the ability to track your fantasy sports teams.

Sports Channel is a great example of our continued investment in providing new and easier ways for people to find and access compelling content through Windows Media Center.

Instead of going through my own experience with Sports Channel, I’d like to call out Ian Dixon’s overview of Sports Channel here and Stuart’s screenshots of the Sports Channel experience here from The Digital Lifestyle.com (one of the best Windows Media Center sites on the web today).

For the best experience with Sports Channel in Windows Media Center, a broadband connection is highly recommended. Today, Sports Channel is currently available in the U.S. only.

I also recommend checking out MSNBC News in Windows Media Center (which I blogged about last October) – which is no longer in beta.

Post PDC Keynote: What are people saying about Windows 7?

Brandon LeBlanc — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 09:07:00 GMT

I thought it might be nice to do a little round-up of what folks are saying about Windows 7 after today’s keynote here at the PDC in Los Angeles. I’d like to share some of the best ones we’ve found so far. We’re not trying to “toot” our own horn here – many of these folks are extremely critical of what we do with Windows so what they say is very important to us.

This is what Ed Bott from ZDNet had to say:

This loaner machine certainly doesn’t feel like it’s running pre-beta code. It’s wicked fast and eerily quiet thanks to a solid state drive. In a very long day’s worth of use it has yet to crash or display any of the flaky behavior you might expect from a beta.

Ed, it was a pleasure seeing you again at PDC!

Peter Bright at ArsTechnica says:

Windows 7 may not change much under the hood, but the extent of these interface changes makes it clear that this is very much a major release.

That was from Peter’s post that has enjoyed the top spot on Techmeme today for most of the day.

Lance Ulanoff from PC Magazine says:

It (MSFT) ignored the advice of dozens of pundits and is now playing out a script that, in the end, could make the company look like a band of geniuses.

Paul Thurrott says:

Well, let me ruin the surprise up front. Windows 7 is Windows Vista done right. If you're already a fan of Windows Vista, you'll love Windows 7 because it's a better rendition of that earlier OS. If you're a Vista hater, take heart: The makers of Windows 7 have reevaluated virtually everything about Vista and made changes small and large across the board. The result is a better Windows, no matter how you slice it.

Today was Paul’s birthday - at least according to his Windows Live profile. Happy birthday Paul! Paul has been doing “exhaustive” reviews of Windows for a while now.

Jason Brooks from eWeek says:

In the day and a half I’ve spent using Windows 7 on a Microsoft-provided Dell XPS M1330 machine preinstalled with Build 6801 of the OS, I’ve found its polish and performance a world away from the first Longhorn build I tried out at PDC 2003. At this point, Windows 7 feels more like a second beta or an early release candidate than a developer conference sneak peek.

Andre Da Costa from ActiveWin says:

It’s safe to say I am overwhelmed, overjoyed and most of all excited about Windows 7. This is the release of Windows everybody has been waiting for, it’s what Vista was meant to be and beyond that. Windows 7 puts the user first… This is an upgrade I am looking forward to and you should too.

Robert McLaws from Windows-Now says:

The Sunday before PDC, I was given the opportunity to join about 200 other journalists for a workshop on Windows 7. Lead by the dynamic (as well as unusually candid and often very self-effacing) duo of Mike Nash and Steven Sinofsky (surprisingly enough, he didn’t try to have me killed… sweet!), we were given a six hour tour of the much anticipated follow-up to Windows Vista. I didn’t know what to expect, and I walked away with the feeling I got after seeing Longhorn for the first time. yes, I believe it was just that good.

Both Windows-Now and ActiveWin are Windows Featured Community members.

Wilson Rothman from Gizmodo says:

…even the early build of Windows 7 feels like a fast, stable environment. There's a lot going on behind the scenes to make the OS more usable, one monumental improvement being how video memory is allocated for unseen windows. (Hint: It's not.) The result is a highly responsive machine that gets decent battery life.

Now that folks have the Pre-Beta build of Windows 7 and with WinHEC coming up – we expect to see ever more discussion from folks on putting Windows 7 to the test.

Are you a Geek? Want a Chance to Win a LifeCam VX-5500?

Brandon LeBlanc — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 03:57:00 GMT

A few weeks ago, Chris Pirillo (of Lockergnome fame) launched a brand new community website – called Geeks! - designed to give geeks of all ages a place to socialize on the web. On Geeks! – folks can sign-up to become members on the site and create photo albums, add videos, and even create a blog – all for free! The best part essentially is interacting and socializing with fellow geeks with the same geeky interests as you. Being a geek myself – I’ve signed up on Geeks! and if you’re a geek – you should too!

To help attract more geeks to Geeks! – the awesome Microsoft LifeCam folks at Microsoft Hardware have donated 10 Microsoft LifeCam VX-5500 webcams to Chris for a giveaway. These are the brand spankin’ new webcams just announced earlier this month.

This is how you can be entered to win one of these new Microsoft LifeCam VX-5500 webcams:

1. Sign-up to become a member of Geeks!

2. Join the Microsoft Hardware group on Geeks!

Once Geeks! hits 7,500 members – Chris will randomly draw 10 names for the 10 Microsoft LifeCam VX-5500 webcams from the list of members in the Microsoft Hardware group. You are required to be a member of the Microsoft Hardware group to be entered for the giveaway. As of the writing of this post – Geeks! currently has 5,040 members. So sign-up and tell your friends!

I own both a Microsoft LifeCam VX-5000 and VX-7000 and both offer excellent quality video as well as impressive video conferencing capabilities via Windows Live Messenger. You can also use the brand new LifeCam 2.0 software to add video effects to your webcam video and images. Microsoft’s LifeCams (including the VX-5500 being given away) are also compatible with AOL Instant Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, Microsoft Office Communicator, and Skype.

Click here to view Chris’s announcement of the giveaway.

After you sign-up on Geeks! – feel free to add me as one of your geek friends!

This post was written using the new Beta of Windows Live Writer now available on download.live.com. I used Chris’s YouTube video to test Windows Live Writer’s ability to insert videos from YouTube. In the past I’ve only inserted videos from Soapbox on MSN Video. For a more complete list of what’s new with the Windows Live Writer Beta – click here.

Best Windows Vista Website Contest Winner Announced

Brandon LeBlanc — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 06:40:00 GMT

Almost two weeks ago, I blogged about a contest being put on by The WinVistaClub for finding the best Windows Vista website on the web. And yesterday the winners were officially announced!

Winner: Tweaking with Vishal

The website Tweaking with Vishal took the crown by a landslide, capturing 32% of the 11, 520 votes. The website is definitely a Vista tour de force with hundreds, dare I say thousands of tips and tricks for customers.

Congrats to Vishal and all of the finalists. We appreciate your hard work and dedication to spreading the word!

Vote for Your Favorite Windows Vista Website!

Brandon LeBlanc — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 07:23:00 GMT

Rock the vote!

No, I'm not talking about race for President of the United States. I'm talking about the slightly less controversial contest currently in swing over at The WinVistaClub for choosing the BEST Windows Vista Website (besides this one!). The contest is designed to highlight community websites that offer extensive and interesting Windows Vista content.

Folks were able to submit what website they thought was the best Windows Vista Website. Then a panel of judges consisting of Steve Sinchak MVP of TweakVista.com , John Barnett MVP of VistaSupport.mvps.org, Steven Bink of Bink.nu, Kerry Brown MVP of VistaHelp.ca, Aryeh Goretsky MVP of Eset.com, James Stables of WindowsVistaMagazine.com, Emil Protalinski of Arstechnica.com, Barney Tormey of Neowin.net, and Anand Khanse of The WinVistaClub voted on the Top 10 Finalists for the Best Windows Vista Website. Now *you* get to choose THE Best Windows Vista out of the Top 10 Finalists. Here they are (in no particular order):

The criteria to win according to the Anand Khanse (aka happyandyk) is simple: Does the website have substantial original quality content of interest & use to a Windows Vista user?

Click here to Vote Now!

Voting is now live until 5:30 AM PST on September 11th. The Top 5 sites will go onto the next round and the winner and 2 runner ups will be announced around September 15th.

I've read through each of these sites and can tell you that they definitely meet the bar, but I'm interested to know...which one is your favorite? Or do you have a Windows Vista website that isn't listed that you think should be? Leave a comment and let me know! And don't forget to vote!

Talking about Blogging Windows

Brandon LeBlanc — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 03:53:00 GMT

Last week was an exciting week for Windows and blogging. Senior Vice Presidents Steven Sinofsky and Jon DeVaan launched a brand new blog called Engineering Windows 7 (or E7 for short). In case you don't know who these guys are, Jon DeVaan manages the engineering team responsible for creating the central (or "core") components and architecture of Windows and Steven Sinofsky manages the group responsible for the user experiences in both Windows and Windows Live. The Engineering Windows 7 blog is designed to create an open discussion about how we're making the next version of Windows - currently codenamed Windows 7 - and to create a background of understanding for the engineering decisions made in order to ship Windows 7.

Engineering the next version of the most used operating system to-date is a very complex software project. Why? Because Windows has a very large user base and that user base is very diverse. Planning the next version of Windows (and ultimately developing it) is a huge under-taking as it requires Microsoft to learn and understand the needs for all types of customers that use Windows today. On the Engineering Windows 7 Blog, you can expect a two way discussion on how those customer needs are balanced out to deliver Windows 7 into the hands of customers.

The one thing you won't find on the Engineering Windows 7 Blog is major product announcements. The focus is to simply discuss the engineering of Windows 7. Not only can we expect posts from both Steven and Jon on the Engineering Windows 7 Blog, we can also expect to hear from other members of the engineering team who are essentially building the next version of Windows as we speak. Sweet!

I look forward to reading about the engineering done to make Windows what it is.

So what does that mean for us here on the Windows Vista Team Blog and for the Windows Experience Blog? Windows Vista is still very much relevant today. There is still very much to say in regards to Windows Vista and lots more experiences to blog about surrounding Windows Vista and Windows Live. Our blogs here won't be going away. We continue to add value to Windows Vista with releases such as Windows Search 4.0 and coming soon the Beta 2 release of Internet Explorer 8. You can also expect us to take part in the ongoing discussion taking place from the Engineering Windows 7 blog on building the next version of Windows as well.

WindowsLive.com Launches with Community Content

Brandon LeBlanc — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 22:15:00 GMT

Today, the brand new WindowsLive.com website has launched sporting an all-new look and feel and lots of great content such as neat tips and tricks and show-and-tell stories on how people are using Windows Live in their lives. The goal for WindowsLive.com is simple: give people a place to discover the benefits of Windows Live. What better than to use content from excited Windows Live users to highlight those benefits?

The content on WindowsLive.com is driven from the community of passionate Windows Live users through the Windows Live Clubhouse. The Windows Live Clubhouse is a special Windows Live Space that brings other Windows Live users together in talking about Windows Live on their own Windows Live Space. Using Windows Live Writer and using special tags designed for the Windows Live Clubhouse, users can have content written on their Windows Live Space aggregated to WindowsLive.com and shared with the world!

Windows Live Clubhouse: Click here to request access and take part in providing awesome Windows Live Content for WindowsLive.com!

The community decides what content goes up on WindowsLive.com based on how pieces of content (posts) are rated. In someone writes about something regarding Windows Live that is inaccurate - the community can respond simply by not rating the post highly and it will never show up on WindowsLive.com. You drive the content!

For each person who is writing content on their Windows Live Space for WindowsLive.com - a special page is created on WindowsLive.com to highlight that person and their content. The page brings in information about the user from the user's Windows Live Space.

Using my own personal Windows Live Space, I've taken part in the Windows Live Clubhouse and have content I've written on my Windows Live Space about Windows Live aggregated to WindowsLive.com as you can see in the above screenshot. You can view my WindowsLive.com profile here. As I write more about Windows Live on my Windows Live Space - this page will update to bring in any new content I write.

At WindowsLive.com - people can explore all the Windows Live services and applications. The pages for each Windows Live product is designed to highlight what the product is about and also splices in a showcase piece from someone in the community who has talked about the product.

With WindowsLive.com and community driven content - Windows Live customers now have an opportunity to have a voice in helping talk about Windows Live.

Senior Product Marketing Manager Marty Collins (Hi Marty!) has blogged about today's launch on her Windows Live Space. LiveSide, who is also a member of the Windows Live Clubhouse, has also posted about today's WindowsLive.com launch as well.