Microsoft buys office networking site Yammer

So, what exactly is a Yammer? Well, it's a simple social network designed not to connect you with family or college roommates, but with with your coworkers. The platform has had some success, but its most high profile moment may be today's announcement that Microsoft had purchased the company. Rumors had been circulating for about a week, but now Redmond has made it official and issued a press release announcing its plan to purchase the startup for $1.2 billion in cash. Yammer will continue to live on as a stand alone service, which should make its 5 million users and countless Fortune 500 customers happy. But Microsoft will certainly be looking to fold its features into its own suite of enterprise offerings, like SharePoint and Office 365.

What OEMs desperately need to learn from Microsoft's Surface

This week, Microsoft crossed a line it has maintained for three decades. With its new Surface PCs for Windows 8, it will compete directly with the OEMs who license Windows. Why now? Because those OEMs desperately need a challenge.

Microsoft is not throwing its OEM partners under the bus. It is pushing them out of the way of an onrushing freight train.

See what I did there? I substituted one violent transportation-based metaphor for another. That was deliberate. So was Microsoft’s unprecedented decision to cross a line it has maintained for three decades.

World's first 'tax' on Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7

The Australian online retailer Kogan.com has introduced the world's first "tax" on Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7 (IE7) browser.
Customers who use IE7 will have to pay an extra surcharge on online purchases made through the firm's site.
Chief executive Ruslan Kogan told the BBC he wanted to recoup the time and costs involved in "rendering the website into a antique browser".
The charge is set to 6.8% - 0.1% for every month since the IE7 launch.