My TechEd Australia 2009 photos are now online

I know it’s a while after TechEd finished, but they’re now available on my Flickr!

Microsoft pulls the plug on Popfly

Just got this email announcing discontinuation of Popfly:

I’m writing to thank you for registering and using Microsoft Popfly. I’ve been fortunate enough to see all the innovative mashups, Web pages, and games created by the Popfly community since we launched Popfly two years ago. It has truly been a pleasure to watch the spirit of creativity flow through a growing Popfly community over the life of the product.

It’s with a heavy heart that I share some news with you today: on August 24, 2009, the Popfly service will be discontinued and all sites, references, and resources will be taken down.

After August 24th, your access to your Popfly account, including any games and mashups that you’ve created, will be discontinued. However, Microsoft is still very much dedicated to helping you express your creativity and pursuing a path to software development. If you’re interested in refining your skills in Web applications, please visit Microsoft Web Platform Installer. For those interested in programming on the Xbox, then please visit Microsoft XNA or Microsoft Kodu. And for those who are interested in Windows programming, please visit Microsoft Express.

Thanks again for your support and please don’t hesitate to contact us at popfly@microsoft.com if you have any questions.

Regards,
John Montgomery
for the Popfly Team

Goodbye to Popfly!

Microsoft is still hiring interns for this coming Christmas

In such times of the global financial crisis, Microsoft shuffles its internals and is reorganising itself (at the same time saying goodbye to some of its employees). But, business as usual, Microsoft Redmond is still hiring new talent from Australia.

It’s true. Their international recruiting team sent me a flyer about the 3 month SDE/SDET internship at the end of the year. But remember, application closes 22 Jul 09 – that’s less than 3 weeks away!

It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity to work for a company of such scale. And note, this is not an internship with Microsoft Australia, it’s with Microsoft in the US! It means you get to go over there, all relocation expenses paid for, etc. It’s worth trying for.

There’ll be a series of interviews involved of course, but even flights to interview site will be paid for. Remember to send your resume to ausrec@microsoft.com.

Sydney Uni Students Gets New Outlook Live Email Service

Just received an email from the ICT guys at Sydney Uni – all students are getting a new email service! According to ICT Switch, the email service is going to be the new hosted services from Microsoft, called Outlook Live. It means that there’s finally a decent user interface to the university email, plus seamless Outlook integration!

This is great new, because unlike Hotmail (or Windows Live Mail), hosted Outlook services are Ad-Free! Or so I hope. Which means, we’ll be getting the best email services without the unnecessary advertising. Also, we’ll be able to keep the email address even after leaving uni, which is absolutely awesome. It’s a good thing that it means the uni doesn’t have to manage (and pay for) the mail services even for students whom have left.

The only issue is, I’d have to change my uni email address, and changing emails addresses is never fun. Thank goodness that I can keep this email address forever.

I tried to log onto my new email account today at https://www.outlook.com/, but it appears that it hasn’t been activated yet. Can’t wait until it kicks off on 6 May 09!

A copy of the email can be found after the break.

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DreamSpark for High School Students Too!

Finally! More students can get the share of the good stuff offered by Microsoft. I’m writing an email to my high school computing teach as I write this post. More free software!

Source: Bill  Gate’s announces DreamSpark availability for High Schools