This has been said before but many of you still haven’t hear of it so I beileve it deserves a mention again as help for the world’s nine million child refugees is just a click away thanks to the online fundraising effort called Click for the Cause.
For every windows live search made using Click for the Cause until March 31, 2007, Microsoft will donate to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), an agency charged with protecting refugees worldwide. Click for the Cause advances a UNHCR global awareness and fundraising effort called ninemillion.org, which Microsoft helped launch in June. The campaign has raised US$1.4 million to date.
But it’s still not enough, they still need your support to get the word out. Help by adding Click for the Cause to your favourites and using it for your searches. Then ask everyone you know to do the same. Also visit the Space, where you can add a comment and become a friend.
The Great Escape Festival returns on the 17th-19th May bringing the best of live music from across the World back to Brighton.
ARTIST ANNOUNCEMENT! – More Artists announced for 2007:
Barfly are excited to announce that the following artists have been added to the bill for this year’s Great Escape Festival:This follows last week’s announcement where we confirmed that The Besnard Lakes, Blood Red Shoes, CSS, Dan Mangan, Foals, Hadouken, Help She Can’t Swim, I Like Trains, Kubichek, Mechanical Bride, Mumm-ra, Mr. Hudson & The Library, Nouvelle Vague, Orange Lights, Passenger, Patrick Watson, The Prayers, The Strange Death Of Liberal England, Ripchord, Rubik, We’re Marching On, Willy Mason, Wintersleep and Yes Boss will all be taking to the stage at this year’s event.
SPEAKER ANNOUNCEMENT! – The first Speakers to be announced for 2007:
Barfly are also extremely pleased to announce the first key note speakers to be confirmed for this year’s Music Ally Digital Day. This is a one-day conference focussing on the latest and forthcoming developments in the digital music and media worlds. The event takes place on Friday 18 May from 9am to 5pm and will feature a series of insightful interviews with leading figures from the music industry including: and many more big names to come…
Barfly will be making regular announcements over the coming weeks as more and more bands and speakers are confirmed for this hotly tipped event.
GET YOUR TICKETS NOW!
Tickets are now on sale and are expected to sell fast, so get your Early Bird tickets from http://www.escapegreat.com/tickets and join everyone who’s going for round 2 of this fabulous festival by the sea. 1 wristband will get you access to over 15 venues showcasing more than 150 of the world’s best new artists over 3 days. There are a limited number of these £35, 3 day wristbands available don’t miss out!
Virgin Radio have just this moment exclusively revealed the headliners of the 12th Virgin Mobile V Festival on the 18th and 19th of August 2007 as The Killers, Foo Fighters and Snow Patrol.
Other bands confirmed to play are Virgin Radio regulars Mika, The Kooks, The Fratellis, The Fray, The Goo Goo Dolls, Manic Street Preachers, James Morrison, KT Tunstall, Damien Rice, and Paolo Nutini.
Other big names set to appear are festival favourites Primal Scream, Basement Jaxx, Babyshambles, Kasabian, Editors, P!nk, Happy Mondays, James and The Proclaimers.
Tickets will be available from 9am on Thursday the 1st March 2007 from this website.
Earlier this week, Microsoft published a list of 800 applications that should run properly on its new Windows Vista operating system. On its Web site, Microsoft says the number of applications certified for use with Windows Vista is constantly growing and that its list “will be update weekly.”
View: Applications that Microsoft has approved for Vista
Remember my post about how Comedy lovers would be able to visit MSN Video to enjoy a dose of humour from one of Ireland’s most famous exports Ed Byrne.
Well now there’s also a Windows Live Spaces Comedy which may be of some interest to some of you. Enjoy! 
Wow what a great weekend I had last week (Monday 18th – Sunday 19th February 2007), probably one of my best in London yet!
Because not only was in London for the second MSP (Microsoft Student Partners) Event to take place this academic year 2006/2007 but I was also there to have the chance to celebrate the first day of the Chinese New Year (The Year of the Pig) in style by watching the Chinese parade and attending the Celebrations in central London’s Leicester Square and Trafalgar Square.
The Chinese festivities started at 11:00 a.m. with a grand parade of dragons, lions and dancers along the Strand, Charing Cross Road and Shaftesbury Avenue with an official opening ceremony followed in Trafalgar Square, with music, dance and martial arts throughout the afternoon, while Leicester Square hosted two fireworks displays.
And though I didn’t get to see the fireworks as I was in Trafalgar Square I did get a pretty good position, pretty near to the front of the stage, which was pretty good considering there were in the near of 300,000 people attending the Chinese New Year celebrations in London. (check out the photos here)
However at around 2:30pm I decided to make a move towards to Hilton London Metropole Hotel, which was the Hotel Microsoft had booked for us Microsoft Student Partners (MSP’s) that Sunday Night.
I made it to the hotel at around 3pm and checked in, so I could wait for Ryan Maxwell my MSP Buddy who would be sharing the room with me that night.
Eventually Ryan turned up as his train was unfortunately delayed and we went in search of some other MSP’s who wouldn’t mind coming out to get something to eat before Stuart Leddy and Matt Duffin from Microsoft came to take us from the Hotel to the Namco Station at 6pm.
Anyhow we found another 4 MSP’s and we headed down the street in search of a place to eat, and guess what we ended up in McDonalds, not before checking further down the road for anywhere else though.
Once we had got some food/drinks we decided to make a move back to the hotel, back there we ended up checking out the Hotel facilities like the Gym and Pool, that of which we decided we would visit tomorrow morning at 6am for a good morning swim. Great idea then but when you try and get up for that time after drinking quite a lot the night before it’s not such a good idea.
So yeah we checked out the facilities and in no time at all did it reach 6pm which meant it was time to head down to the reception lobby of the hotel to meet up with all the other MSP’s who would been coming to the social evening/night out at the Namco Station.
We (MSP’s, Matt Duffin, Stuart Leddy and Matt McSpirit) waited a while just in case anyone else turned up and then we all started making our way to the tube station to catch the tube to Waterloo Station from which we could walk our way to Namco Station which just happens to ne next to the County Hall and the London eye.
On the way there we took a group photo next to the London Eye, maybe at the next Microsoft Student Partner Event we can get a group photo of all the MSP’s plus Stuart, Matt and Dianne Terry plus everyone else who’s been a part of this year’s MSP programme as there always seems to be at least someone missing in the group photos.
This of course gave us the opportunity to take a pretty cool group photo right in front of the London Eye, shame not everyone was in it though, so maybe at the next Microsoft Student Partner Event we can get a group photo of all the MSP’s plus Stuart, Matt, Dianne Terry and everyone else who’s been a part of this year’s MSP programme as there always seems to be at least someone missing in the group photos.
On the way there we took a group photo next to the London Eye, maybe at the next Microsoft Student Partner Event we can get a group photo of all the MSP’s plus Stuart, Matt and Dianne Terry plus everyone else who’s been a part of this year’s MSP programme as there always seems to be at least someone missing in the group photos.
This of course gave us the opportunity to take a pretty cool group photo right in front of the London Eye, shame not everyone was in it though, so maybe at the next Microsoft Student Partner Event we can get a group photo of all the MSP’s plus Stuart, Matt, Dianne Terry and everyone else who’s been a part of this year’s MSP programme as there always seems to be at least someone missing in the group photos.
Anyway a few minutes later we arrived at Namco Station and started making our way down to the bottom section in which Microsoft had booked out an entire seating area for us to enjoy, one of the first things I noticed while we all made our way down to the bottom area was that there were some signs which said (Microsoft UK) which was pretty cool, and guess what it wouldn’t be the last time we would see these signs would serve a purpose!
Once we arrived at the bottom one of the first things that people did was of course get a drink, kindly provided on Microsoft’s Tab which I must say stretched pretty far that night considering most of us were there for nearly 4 hours and there were about 20 of us.
After we had all had some drinks and used up some of our Arcade Tokens given to us at the start, we all made our way to the Dodgems (Bumper Cars) to have some great fun, especially as the Dodgems seemed to be faster than normal, or it could just be that the alcohol made them seem more like killers than they really were, whatever the case if you got hit, it wasn’t a good thing. *ouch*
After a go on the dodgems we all went back down stairs where some nice tasty food was being brought out on trays and after eating as much as possible we made our way to the Bowling Lanes which were conveniently situated just to the side of where we were sitting.
The bowling lanes were just as much fun as the Dodgems especially when our lane stopped working, we got it fixed once but as soon as someone fixed it, it happened again, the problem was that the pins were not being reorganised automatically after each throw, damn strings. It was all pretty funny when one of the bowling balls came shooting of the shoot and rolled straight towards us!
After the bowling had finished it was time to yet again hit the dodgems by which time we were pretty tippsy, and then after that we basically just had more fun, which of course included using up our arcade tokens and the Tab at the bar.
It was now 22:45 so a small group of about 10 of us hit the road in which we had as much as fun as we did back at the Namco Station, especially with them Microsoft Signs we had erhh… borrowed! :p
After taking some great pics along the way, we eventually ended up back the hotel, where some of the other MSP’s were wondering where we had got to. By this time it was pretty late but that didn’t stop us from going to the Hotel bar where we found two American girls, or better said one girl and her stepmother. The step daughter was trying to get her stepmother drunk which was pretty funny.
It was now 1am in the morning and there were only 5 of us left (Me, Ryan, Grant and the 2 Americans) so we decided it was time to head back to our rooms, though it was obvious that the stepmother couldn’t hardly stand up so we ended up helping her with her step daughter back to their room, in which we were invited in, and well I’ll let the photos explain the rest… It’s fun letting you all guess!
I beileve myself and my MSP Buddy Ryan ended up going to sleep at around 3am, and set our alarm for 6am to head to the pool with some other MSP’s, haha well we woke up at that time but didn’t get out of bed until much later, just in time for breakfast.
After we had all had breakfast and joined up in reception we set out for the Microsoft/MSN London Offices which isn’t too far from Piccadilly Circus. Once there we were split into 3 groups and told what workshop we would attend first.
The first workshop session that myself and my group attended was by Darren Strange who is the UK Product Manager for the 2007 Microsoft Office system, in this session he talked about how we can give good answers to both easy and difficult questions different people like the press and students might ask us. He also showed us some of the new features in Office 2007 and why they were chosen. All this information would be of great use for our Microsoft Office 2007 Campus Launches.
The second session that we had was by Matt McSpirit who gave us a talk on Windows Vista. This included what new features to show the Student Audience at our Windows Vista Campus Launches. He defiantly showed us some interesting parts of Windows Vista that I hadn’t noticed before.
The third and last session of the morning workshops was by Mark Johnston, who gave us a talk about how to build a timed schedule that we could put in place to show our audience the basics of what WPF is and what they can do with it. He also talked about some other interesting stuff too but as I’m under NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement) I’m keeping my mouth shut. Well at least until I’m told otherwise.
After this last morning session is was lunch time, Dominos Pizza all round!
Our first afternoon session was by Eileen Brown, who nearly put us to sleep as she welcomed us all in a very slow drowsy voice. Off course I knew something was wrong and that this wasn’t what she would do normally as I’ve seen her presenting before and it’s much better than that. And then she confessed that she was just demonstrating what not to do, after that she speed up and it was much livelier. She talked about how to perfect your presenting skills. This was great as she got out of the audience Steve Workman an MSP and Stuart Leddy + Matt Duffin our Microsoft guys to come out and present to the audience, she would then stop them talking if they did anything wrong. I learnt quite a lot in this session.
After this session it was time for our second afternoon session that being a Campus Launch Overview talk by Dianne Terry, here she talked about our Windows Vista/Office 2007 Campus Launch Kits and how to run a Campus Launch Event. Which was pretty cool.
After a short break we then had a presentation by Paul Kiddie who talked about his Imagine Cup 2006 Experience and what we could do for the Imagine Cup 2007. Unfortunately I’m not entering the Imagine Cup this year as I just don’t have the time, but I’m sure those of you that will, would have picked up some useful information here.
The next two sessions by Stuart Leddy, Matt Duffin and Dianne Terry, were basically questions and answers sessions in which they asked us about our experiences as a part of the Microsoft Student Partners Programme and how they could improve it. Always great to let them know our feedback.
And then it was Swag/Freebie time, got myself some cool stuff:
- Windows Vista Ultimate
- Microsoft Office Standard 2007
- MSN Lanyards
- T-Shirts
- Mints
- Putty
- Pens
And here it ended what a great weekend it was. Like I said at the beginning of this post, it was probably one of my best in London yet!
A big shout out goes’ to all the MSP’s (Microsoft Student Partners) that attended, if you would like a link to your website/blog or photo album let me know, and I’ll add it below! 
Ian MacGillivray (blog post) | Amin Islam (photos) |
And hey on another note if you can find a photo or video of me at the Chinese New Year in London this year let me know, it can’t be that hard as I was at the front. Maybe I’ll have to think of something to give the winner! 
Update: Uploaded some videos to Soapbox on MSN Video:
Video: Microsoft Student Partners Bowling London
Video: Microsoft Student Partners at Namco Station London
It’s a funny old business UK Workers spend 24 working days a year in stitches
New research today reveals that UK workers spend an average of 45 minutes each day having a good giggle. That’s the equivalent of half a day (3.75 hours) per week and 24 working days each year – 4 days more than the average UK worker’s annual holiday allowance.
The study of 1,000 UK workers was carried out by MSN Video – the online entertainment channel to coincide with the launch of Ed Byrne’s Bytes a series of daily comedy clips aimed at workers looking for some light relief throughout the day.
Girls just wanna have fun
According to the survey, men take their job more seriously than women, with female workers laughing for 51 minutes per day compared to their male colleagues who laugh for just 39 minutes each day. Older workers find less to amuse them at work 55-64 year olds laugh least (38 minutes), compared to 18-24 year olds who giggle for almost an hour each day. The Midlands workforce seems to have the most fun (54 minutes per day), with the least fun to be had in workplaces across the South East (38 minutes per day).
Laughing all the way to the bank
For those seeking enjoyment at work, a career in customer services and hospitality or travel offers the most enjoyment, with workers laughing for over an hour each day (70 minutes and 61 minutes respectively). In fact, two in five people working in customer services admit to being in constant fits of giggles at work, with most amusement derived from poking fun at customers (63%).
The least laughs to be had are in sales and marketing (including PR and advertising), where people laugh, on average, for just 27 minutes per day. Strict bosses and heavy workloads are cited as the main culprits behind the humorously-challenged working environment. Those in finance and accountancy or management consultancy are next (29 and 30 minutes respectively), perpetuating the stereotype that accountants really are a serious lot.
What you laughing at?
Unsurprisingly, most laughter in the office (73%) is the result of banter amongst colleagues, whether they’re swapping gossip or sharing tales of weekend antics. However, almost half of UK workers (45%) enjoy a good chuckle at their customers’ expense, while 42% have a good snigger behind their bosses’ back.
Dissatisfaction guaranteed
It’s not all happy times, however, in some UK workplaces. While many of us are enjoying our daily dose of humour, one in seven UK workers (14%) barely even summon up a smile at work, laughing for less than 5 minutes each day. A further one in ten UK workers (11%) feel guilty when they have a giggle at work.
Over half (53%) of Brits claim to be too busy at work to stop for a laughter break and a third (33%) feel their job is too serious for frivolity. A further one in four (25%) claim that their boss won’t tolerate laughter in the office, while one in five (18%) blame boring colleagues for lack of laughter and a further one in five (18%) are too unhappy in their jobs to find anything to laugh at while at work.
Laughter is the best way to promotion
Revealingly, the research also indicates that bosses who frown on fun at work may be missing a trick. The study shows that the majority of UK workers feel happier (90%), more relaxed (87%), more productive (75%) and better able to concentrate (67%) after a good laugh at work. Only 1 in 5 (20%) get distracted by banter in the workplace.
Irish Comedian Ed Byrne, who is currently working with MSN Video on the comedy project, says: I consider myself lucky as I get to laugh on the job, and I certainly couldn’t stick it out in a serious office. Anyone in need of a good giggle at their desk can log on to MSN Video daily, from 19 February 2 March, and enjoy three minutes of my best stand-up comedy, safe in the knowledge that, if the boss comes along, there’s now a legitimate excuse for taking time out from work.
Ed Byrne’s Bytes – a series of three minute stand up clips – will be exclusively available to view on MSN Video at video.uk.msn.com from Monday 19th February to Friday 2nd March. Catch a new clip every working day for two weeks.
Laughter League Table
And as I’m sure you’re wondering how many minutes of laughter the other job sectors have so here’s a Laughter League Table with all the other results:
- Customer Services / Telecomms = 70 minutes
- Travel / Leisure / Hospitality = 61 minutes
- Construction / Property / Surveying = 49 minutes
- Admin support = 49 minutes
- Social work = 48 minutes
- GP./ Nurse / Pharmacist = 47 minutes
- Public Sector / Government / Charity = 47 minutes
- Teaching = 47 minutes
- Retail = 40 minutes
- Consultancy / legal / insurance = 30 minutes
- Finance / Accountancy = 29 minutes
- PR / advertising / sales and marketing = 27 minutes
Not long to go now until the Windows Live Make The World a Better Space Competition ends on Friday the 23rd of February 2007, so if you haven’t added the Better Space Prize Gadget to you’re Windows Live Spaces yet, then you better hurry!
So we’ve created the Better Space Gadget that’ll present you with a daily stream of messages offering words of wisdom, morsels of advice and – best of all – chances to win hundreds of prizes.
Adding the Better Space Prize Gadget to your Windows Live Space will not only make your Space a whole lot more fun, it’ll also make you feel good. And every now and again, the gadget could bring you the most welcome news you’ve had all day – that you’re a winner.
If you could do with a little positivity in your life, get the Better Space Prize Gadget. You’ll be all the better for it.
So, what’s up for grabs? For the very lucky among you, we’re giving away £1,000 worth of Topshop vouchers to blow on a fashion-fab shopping spree. Don’t feel bad if your luck’s not in. Fortune might yet smile on you in the form of a Creative Zen Vision:M media player – 30GB of video, music and photos that fits in your pocket.
But there’s more… MoPods to make your mobile cooler and warm your heart. Mood Beams to chill out with. Amazon gift certificates for anything you want. And the hottest DVDs delivered straight to your door.
Add the Better Space Prize Gadget
Damn do I love search term statistics of how people got to my blog or what!
Just noticed that if you search for “Microsoft Wow” either with quotes or without that I rank quite high in the search engines:
Position number 5 in Google:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=microsoft+wow
Position number 7 in Live Search:
http://search.live.com/results.aspx?q=microsoft+wow
Position number 10 in Yahoo Search:
http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=microsoft+wow
Update: Seems like my rank with that search term is slowly fadding away! 
Yesterday at 3GSM World Congress 2007, Microsoft Corp. and BT announced the launch of the Connected Services Sandbox competition series to help promote the development of innovative customer solutions that merge traditional telecommunications offerings such as voice or text messaging with Web 2.0 applications such as mapping or search. The competitions will be managed by TopCoder Inc., a leader in online programming competitions, skills assessment and competitive software development.In the competition series, developers will be given the task of developing managed network mashups that address the specific service requirements of multiple usage scenarios. The winners of each competition will receive prizes ranging from $2,500 to $25,000.
The Connected Services Sandbox competition series will be open to freelance developers and member organizations of the Sandbox. By registering directly through the Sandbox, developers can review the competition rules, choose from the competitions available, and begin designing applications appropriate for individual competitions within the series. The competitions are divided into multiple usage scenarios as defined by Microsoft and BT. Usage scenarios can include a combination of communications services, such as e-mail, instant messaging and document collaboration, with Web services, such as Windows Live, Microsoft MapPoint®, Amazon, eBay, Google and Yahoo!
With the Sandbox environment, we have the ability to see new services created and developed from concept to market, said Bill Murphy, managing director at BT Business. We anticipate that the Sandbox competitions will provide us with compelling business opportunities that we can ultimately deliver to our customers. For example, we will be looking at services targeted at the small-to-midsize business market, where a unified communications solution can benefit a company with one to 10 employees.
Each competition has two stages: In the first stage, the Design Competitions, developers create a storyboard for an innovative mashup idea and present that idea, either graphically or through written specifications, to a panel of judges. The winning mashup design resulting from the first stage moves on to the second stage, the Assembly Competitions, in which developers build a prototype of the winning design that can deliver a demonstrable service.
The initial designs and resulting prototypes will be judged by BT, a panel of Microsoft customers, engineers and peers from the community. Winners are rewarded through monetary prizes and nonmonetary promotional programs. In addition to monitoring the competitions, TopCoder will be responsible for prize administration and distribution. The first round of winners will be announced at NXTcomm in Chicago, June 18 through 21, 2007, with winning services demonstrated at the Microsoft booth.
Developers can find more information about the Sandbox competitions at http://www.networkmashups.com.
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