Microsoft has been releasing monthly updates to OEM’s on their upcoming Windows 7 operating system.

Techarp has posted their latest update where Microsoft notes that they are currently finishing product research based on feedback from OEM and end users. This will help them determine potential Windows 7 offerings / SKUs. Microsoft aims to provide detailed Windows 7 SKU information sometime this month. The next OEM update is scheduled to be released around November 13, 2008.

Interestingly, Microsoft has revealed the "Windows 7 Language Waves". Localised versions of Windows 7 will be released over 101 days after RTM. These are not general release dates but dates that indicate when the various languages will be finalised.

Wave 0 - RTM - English, Spanish, Japanese, German, French
Wave 1 - RTM + 14 days - Italian, Dutch, Russian, Simplified Chinese
Wave 2 - RTM + 28 days - Brazilian Portuguese, Polish, Turkish, Korean
Wave 3 - RTM + 45 days - Traditional Chinese (Hong Kong), Czech, Portuguese, Hungarian
Wave 4 - RTM + 59 days - Danish, Norwegian (Bokmål), Finnish
Wave 5 - RTM + 73 days - Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, Ukrainian
Wave 6 - RTM + 87 days - Thai, Romanian, Lithuanian, Slovak, Bulgarian
Wave 7 - RTM + 101 days - Estonian, Croatian, Serbian Latin, Latvian, Slovenian

In the OEM update Microsoft also detailed Windows Anytime Upgrade (WAU). Like Vista, Windows 7 users will be able to upgrade to a "more premium" version to unlock additional features. More details will be forthcoming in Novembers update presumably when Microsoft release SKU information.

Microsoft is also planning a Windows 7 Tech Guarantee Program, where end users you purchase Vista systems will have the option (for a limited time) of upgrading to Windows 7.

Eligible Editions : Windows Vista Home Premium, Windows Vista Business, Windows Vista Ultimate
Eligible Languages : Wave 0 to Wave 4
Available Upgrade Paths : Like-to-like product paths only (e.g. from Windows Vista Home Premium to Windows 7 Home Premium)

One of the many ways that the election of Barack Obama as president has echoed that of John F. Kennedy is his use of a new medium that will forever change politics. For Mr. Kennedy, it was television. For Mr. Obama, it is the Internet.

“Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not be president. Were it not for the Internet, Barack Obama would not have been the nominee,” said Arianna Huffington, editor-in-chief of The Huffington Post.

She spoke Friday about how politics and Web 2.0 intersect on a panel with Joe Trippi, a political consultant, and Gavin Newsom, the mayor of San Francisco, at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco. (Karl Rove and Newt Gingrich had been invited to balance out the left-leaning panel, but declined, according to John Battelle, a chair of the conference.)

Howard Dean’s 2004 campaign -– which was run by Mr. Trippi –- was groundbreaking in its use of the Internet to raise small amounts of money from hundreds of thousands of people. But by using interactive Web 2.0 tools, Mr. Obama’s campaign changed the way politicians organize supporters, advertise to voters, defend against attacks and communicate with constituents.

Mr. Obama used the Internet to organize his supporters in a way that would have in the past required an army of volunteers and paid organizers on the ground, Mr. Trippi said.

Read more @ New York Times

Chinese hackers have penetrated the White House computer network on multiple occasions, and obtained e-mails between government officials, a senior US official told the Financial Times.

On each occasion, the cyber attackers accessed the White House computer system for brief periods, allowing them enough time to steal information before US computer experts patched the system.

US government cyber intelligence experts suspect the attacks were sponsored by the Chinese government because of their targeted nature. But they concede that it is extremely difficult to trace the exact source of an attack beyond a server in a particular country.

”We are getting very targeted Chinese attacks so it stretches credulity that these are not directed by government-related organisations,” said the official.

The official said the Chinese cyber attacks had the hallmarks of the “grain of sands” approach taken by Chinese intelligence, which involves obtaining and pouring through lots of - often low-level - information to find a few nuggets.

Some US defence companies have privately warned about attacks on their systems, which they believe are attempts to learn about future weapons systems.

Read more @ Financial Times