What a Week in the Tech World

By Richard Hay, on June 9th, 2009

Well it has been almost a week since we left for Europe and our vacation. Of course the timing is such that there has been a ton of tech news in the past week with me not being connected to the Internet the way I am usually am. Now I have had connectivity everywhere we have been with wireless access everywhere but it is hard to keep up with some news without having regular dedicated access. No complaints though for the most part because it is vacation

So going back to last week at E3 and Microsoft’s big announcement about Project Natal. If you have not heard of this it is an interface device that plugs into your Xbox360 and reads your motions, emotions, facial expressions and allows you to interact with your Xbox360 interface and games. It has also been reported that Steven Spielberg is involved in the development which adds a lot of credibility to the device and project. The folks from Engadget were given an opportunity to interact with it at the announcement and filed this story about it and their reaction to it. It will be interesting to see where it goes from here. I can only imagine that it will take some additional computing power to help with the interface to the Xbox360 though – to do that many calculations and then pass them along to the Xbox360 console and the game the console will need some help. Why do I think this? Well check out this story about the Xbox360 being maxed out according to an EA VP.

In another area of great interest for so many websites is the upcoming release of WordPress 2.8. The next version of WordPress has already seen Beta 1 and 2 releases and now the first Release Candidate of WordPress 2.8 is available to download and try out. Word on the streets is that the final version of it will be released on the 10th of June to everyone.

Some additional resources to get ready for this new release are:

I have not decided 100% yet but I will likely try the automatic upgrade to WordPress 2.8 with my family website to see how that goes. I am a little leery of doing it away from home and especially as we are on vacation. The site is where we post for family and friends during our travels and I would not want to lose that ability out here on the road.

Just a reminder about this Tuesday and the release of 10 updates to everyone running Windows, Microsoft Office, and Internet Explorer. You can see more details at my earlier blog post about those updates here at June 2009 Security Updates Advance Notification.

Stay safe out there on the Internet and make sure your antivirus software is up to date!

Richard Hay (3349 Posts)

Richard is the Owner of WindowsObserver.com and has been involved in tech for over 25 years. His first website – AnotherWin95.com – came online in 1995. Back then he used GeoCities Web Hosting for it and what you see here today is the result of the work he has continued on the site since 1995. In January 2010 his community contributions were recognized by Microsoft when he was awarded the Most Valuable Professional (MVP) Award for Windows Desktop Experience. In January 2011 he was renewed as a Microsoft MVP but in a new category called Windows Expert - Consumer and in January 2012 he received the award for the third time.

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