Building The Perfect Beast

via Daring Fireball Linked List: Welcome to the Microsoft Store.

It’s creepy, as in like stalker-ish creepy, just how blatantly they’ve copied Apple.

I’m curious though, is their Genius Bar equivalent a phone bank to India?

Microsoft recently sent CultofMac a DMCA Takedown For Linking To Windows 7 Beta in an article about installing the Windows 7 beta on a MacBook. The only possible CultofMac infringement was a link in the article to the Microsoft Windows 7 beta.

But what’s really bizarre/scary is the following:

But the notice doesn’t specify what the infrinegment is, nor what has to be taken down. Rackspace has contacted the company acting for Microsoft, DtecNet, for clarification. We’ve left the post alone until we clearly understand the demands.

Microsoft’s Demand for Immediate Take-Down provided no specifics re: why the post in question needed to be taken down, only that it needed to be taken down and taken down immediately.

Dan Miller’s article is excellent overall, but it’s this quote that cuts right to the heart of the matter.

I spend 8+ hours a day dealing with the operating system. OS X is, to me, pretty much the entire reason to use a Mac.

Exactly…

I think I could make posting this stuff a full time job…

Microsoft placing “I’m a PC” recording booths outside Apple stores – Engadget.

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There was yet another Microsoft “I’m A PC” ad during the World Series tonight. 10-12 lo-res video images of people saying, “I’m a PC” with the person’s URL listed in the lower right-hand corner of the ad.

My daughter, who was watching the end of the game with me, looked at me after the ad was over and said, “I was expecting that to be funny.”

I… was expecting it to make sense.

It appears that Apple’s so unimportant that Microsoft deems it necessary to tell us how much it doesn’t matter… almost every day.

Apple had a big launch of a new product, and they launched at scale in a lot of new countries with a lot of new [wireless] operators. This quarter, RIM is having its big launch, and at some point we’ll have our big launch. We’ll have to see where things normalize.

So says Microsoft’s Robbie Block.

Microsoft implosion imminent, methinks…

Microsoft waves dismissive, bloated hand at iPhone sales figures – Engadget.

Call me crazy but, after reading this CNET interview with Microsoft’s Brad Brooks, I think that they’re scared to death in Redmond.

First it was the crazy-ass ads now it’s this interview, which seems to me to be a complete train wreck.

How bad IS the bleeding in Redmond? I think it’s worse than anyone has yet to let on. Try these quotes on for size…

Ina Fried asks:

Just the fact that we’re having this long of a conversation about Apple, it seems to reflect a shift in Microsoft’s thinking that Apple is more of a threat on the PC side. I mean, how do you guys view Apple in terms of a competitive threat on the desktop?

And Brad Brooks replies:

The conversations that we’re having really started back around our partner conference in early July. And I came out and said, right there onstage in front of tens of thousands of partners, “we’re drawing a line in the sand…”

Uhm… for the record, you’re not drawing a line in the sand unless you feel like someone’s breathing down your neck.