Disqus - Latest Comments for Mike Torres

Re: Google and MSFT need to try harder

Mike Torres — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 12:41:32 -0000

Storage isn't "virtually free" when you multiply it by hundreds of thousands of users - or millions of them. Email has a very different pattern of usage.

Having said that, expect Microsoft to continue to push new things in this space over time.

Re: GMail and Google Talk, I thee wed

Mike Torres — Mon, 06 Feb 2006 18:52:41 -0000

The chat history is a pretty cool feature.

But everything else was done in Hotmail years ago. Unified contact list, online presence indicators in the inbox & contact list, and "Instant Reply" on email messages. And the great thing is that it doesn't even require a client; it uses MSN Web Messenger if MSN Messenger isn't installed. Pretty cool.

Re: GTD update

Mike Torres — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 21:48:21 -0000

I can set you up with my macros - I dig them - just let me know. Much lighter weight than plug ins.

Re: 2006/08/02/windows-live-spaces-goes-live-succeeds-msn-spaces/

Mike Torres — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 16:38:54 -0000

Very good write-up. Fair and balanced. Much appreciated.

One thing though: Firefox is treated as a Tier 1 browser for us, so everything that works in IE should work in Firefox with the exception of ActiveX for uploading multiple photos at once. If that isn't the case for people, please contact me directly.

Thanks...

Re: 2007/04/04/yahoos-biggest-fck-up-not-buying-facebook/

Mike Torres — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 23:56:15 -0000

Couldn't resist but Windows Live Spaces is seeing many more than 6 million photos uploaded per day. We were at that number last August.
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/newsroom/msn...

Re: 2007/04/04/yahoos-biggest-fck-up-not-buying-facebook/

Mike Torres — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 18:25:45 -0000

Thanks Pete. Rob and I are going to do what we can to get some stats about the service out there. Things like total number of markets we're in (people will be surprised) and stats around photos and blogs worldwide. The photo numbers will surely surprise many, many people who say things like no one cares about WL Spaces ;)

Re: 2007/05/07/live-hotmail-gmail/

Mike Torres — Tue, 08 May 2007 00:20:50 -0000

Good write-up. I can't argue with much although I think Hotmail's folders do beat out labels for most non Web 2.0 people. And I would give the IM integration a tie since no one actually uses Gtalk :)

There are two areas that we really focused on outshining the competition - I'm biased but I would have loved to see them appear in your review. They are:

* Native Outlook 2003 & 2007 synchronization. This isn't POP or IMAP access, this is full-on sync of the data in Hotmail with an amazingly rich PIM. The only thing that comes close to this for me is in the enterprise space - Exchange Server. This feature will be released for Outlook this month along with Windows Live Mail - a lightweight client version of Hotmail that serves as an upgrade to Outlook Express and Windows Mail on Vista. Both are worth checking out.

* Online safety. The work the team has done on anti-phishing, virus scanning, and spam protection is serious. 280 million people will benefit from this immediately, which is great.

Of course, there are other things that I dig about Hotmail - the Outlook-style reading pane, the real-time spell checker, the built-in Windows Mobile 6 client with always-on push email, and the basic theme picker (I like customization) but these are just nice-to-haves while the two bullets above are must-haves for me.

BTW, the search works really well.

Re: The many feed icons of Microsoft

Mike Torres — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 23:33:41 -0000

FYI: MSN Spaces uses the orange RSS icon. Look at the bottom of any space.

Re: Maryam’s blog gets upgraded

Mike Torres — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 14:45:13 -0000

If that wasn't mentioned at BlogHer, that was a real mistake.

Re: Maryam’s blog gets upgraded

Mike Torres — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 14:53:05 -0000

Oh, and I agree that anonymous comments would be great. But you know, only the hardcore bloggers ask for it. Messenger users don't seem to care that much because all of their friends are signed in already.

The tricky thing is limiting the spam surface area with 120 million users/month. But it's something we're working on.

Re: Is Microsoft really the largest blog vendor?

Mike Torres — Sun, 20 Aug 2006 21:42:18 -0000

Robert:

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but your test isn't going to tell you anything.

Approximately half (I don't remember exact %) of all Windows Live Spaces are private and don't send pings to any service (including search engines and our own updates page). These Spaces are hidden from the world in almost every way.

And they are, in a lot of cases, the most active for obvious reasons.

Spaces started as a communications tool for your Messenger contacts (friends and family) and that's how a *lot* of people use it today.

PS. I'd also like to know who "shoved it in your face".

Re: Is Microsoft really the largest blog vendor?

Mike Torres — Sun, 20 Aug 2006 22:05:37 -0000

Scoble: if your definition of a blog doesn't include people who don't want to be found, then *no one* at Microsoft could claim that Windows Live Spaces is the largest blogging service.

But that's a pretty silly definition for someone who claims to get trends :)

Re: Scoble says half of all Live Spaces aren’t blogs*

Mike Torres — Sun, 20 Aug 2006 22:19:43 -0000

Just because you wrote it in a Think Week paper, doesn't mean it's a fact. Sorry.

It's the same as it not being fact just because Microsoft Marketing/PR defines it a certain way.

You are just talking about different things, and that's OK. Whatever. There are more important things to worry about!

Re: Is Microsoft really the largest blog vendor?

Mike Torres — Sun, 20 Aug 2006 22:25:46 -0000

Amazon has plogs - I thought of that too ;) I will surely let Marketing and PR know that you take issue with this. I could call it whatever I want and that wouldn't change anything. I'm just 1/70,000.

We've always said Spaces is more than blogging alone, so I've personally never been a fan of calling it a blogging service. But Marketing isn't my job.

Re: Scoble says half of all Live Spaces aren’t blogs*

Mike Torres — Sun, 20 Aug 2006 22:31:11 -0000

BTW, this title is sensationalistic and something I wouldn't expect from you. I said they are "private" - I didn't say they "aren't blogs".

Re: The blog counting game

Mike Torres — Sun, 20 Aug 2006 23:02:08 -0000

Dare's right. It's about the total number of unique visitors/month (according to ComScore, NOT Microsoft) that you hear about, not the total number of Spaces created since inception - a stat which isn't all that interesting in and of itself.

Re: Scoble says half of all Live Spaces aren’t blogs*

Mike Torres — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 00:22:28 -0000

Totoro - I'm sorry, I didn't give that presentation.

Re: Trip to Google tomorrow

Mike Torres — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 02:55:13 -0000

The HTML generated by Spaces is likely not the reason. I could give you a hundred queries where Spaces show up at or near the top (like Maryam Scoble).

Plus, I doubt the fact that Yahoo and MSN/Windows Live return the Writer blog in the #1 spot mean they have better HTML parsers than Google.

Re: Research is great, but Twitter is shipping…

Mike Torres — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 19:50:09 -0000

Oftentimes I think you correlate winning an Internet popularity contest with building a business.

In some cases, popularity can help (as in the case of one-time-unknowns Twitter or Flickr, etc.) but do you really think that if Ray and Microsoft announced something of obvious and great value that got people talking that people would still be concerned that Ray's been quiet lately?

I don't know. But I doubt it. Once we do release something though, as a company we're constantly involving our customers in its evolution. There are literally hundreds of examples of this.

Re: Microsoft trial balloons Web strategy?

Mike Torres — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 11:18:59 -0000

Let's not jump to conclusions until you actually see the things Adam's referring to.

Re: Microsoft trial balloons Web strategy?

Mike Torres — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 13:37:51 -0000

I'm down for the ScobleShow. Of course, attendance is limited at MIX and I'm not a dev, so I won't be there ;) But we should definitely sync up.

Re: Ning 2.0 launches: build your own social network

Mike Torres — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 18:43:01 -0000

Would be great if you could play these videos at 1.5x speed within this control. I used to do that with Channel 9.

Re: Microsoft is ahead on developer workflow

Mike Torres — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 01:43:57 -0000

Except for the fact that Macs run Windows now. I'm doing it now.

Re: Microsoft tells MVPs “we’re in it to win” — Really?

Mike Torres — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 12:53:51 -0000

"maybe they ARE looking for me when they type Robert. PC World named me one of the most important people on the Internet. So did Forbes."

Every once in a while, the ego shines on through the rants :)

Re: Microsoft tells MVPs “we’re in it to win” — Really?

Mike Torres — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 16:50:39 -0000

"Mike: and you’re not egotistical? Riiiiigggghhhhhttttt."

Well, I don't know. But I don't praise myself in my own comments every week :)

"When you gonna build a better blog service? My wife is on it and it really really sucks."

That's constructive. You guys have my email address, phone number, office number, and URL. The last time I received any feedback was probably almost 2 years ago.

Re: Microsoft tells MVPs “we’re in it to win” — Really?

Mike Torres — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 18:05:18 -0000

Thanks Maryam. I will check it out.

Re: Microsoft tells MVPs “we’re in it to win” — Really?

Mike Torres — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 19:00:01 -0000

Diego: Ultimately, just like any site, the more content you have on your page(s) the slower the page will load. We do take performance very seriously and are making gains every release - we've improved quite a bit recently.

Maryam: We're working on commenting!

One thing to point out though: comparing WordPress to Spaces is like comparing Twitter to IM or Facebook to Flickr. They are just different tools with different goals for a different audience. Not everyone strives to be the #1 Robert or to get their service mentioned in Mashable on Tuesdays.

Re: Microsoft tells MVPs “we’re in it to win” — Really?

Mike Torres — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 19:56:24 -0000

I know TDavid, I want it too (I have my domain ready to go) but there are some pretty complex scaling and authentication issues to get over first before it's possible. Part of the "problem" with a big service. If we only had 10,000 or 100,000 or even 1 mil users, we could do it tomorrow.

Re: Microsoft tells MVPs “we’re in it to win” — Really?

Mike Torres — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 21:48:39 -0000

You can install thousands of gadgets including custom HTML (so technically unlimited) already. There are tons of cool ones in Live Gallery. And if you see one you like on someone's space, you can add it to your own.

And we HAVE made it faster. If something is still running slower than you'd like, you might want to remove some stuff (like gadgets). You can't load your page up with a bunch of Ajax goodness and expect it to load as fast as Google search results of course.

Anonymous comments is something we all want.

Customization has also gotten a LOT more flexible (more layouts, more themes, more color and transparency options, more custom HTML options) and we have even more coming that will allow people to make the page look completely unique without having to deal with HTML.

I can take you through it so you are up to speed on everything.

Re: ABC TV’s new player rocks

Mike Torres — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 10:37:07 -0000

Worked perfectly on the Mac with Firefox!

Re: Apple TV: Sharp or Not?

Mike Torres — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 18:28:59 -0000

Master William - thanks for calling me an ass :)

"Either run a HD podcast or a trailer from the Quicktime site."

Normal people don't watch podcasts - they want TV shows, movies, music videos - and they don't get excited about spending $300 to watch movie trailers in high-def. Come on.

Apple will up the quality of the shows on iTunes - it's a matter of time. The point is that current state of the world is weak at best.

Quick: you missed your favorite show last week and didn't record it. What do you do? Until it's obvious, there's a problem. It's not specific to Apple - it's the industry's problem.

ABC is taking some major steps though.

Re: Apple TV: Sharp or Not?

Mike Torres — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 00:27:08 -0000

There's no "retreat" here. I wouldn't recommend an Apple TV to a single human being on the planet :)

Re: Full text vs. Partial text feeds, Argument #495

Mike Torres — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 18:02:35 -0000

Totally agree. I almost unsubscribed from John Battelle when I read his poll :)

But I think the 10% reading feeds stat is way, way optimistic. I would bet it's closer to .1% or depending on how measured (i.e. what counts as a feed?) 1-2% as a stretch.

Re: Google Reader adds better email features

Mike Torres — Wed, 02 May 2007 23:13:18 -0000

It's nicely done but... unfortunately, it isn't much use if you don't use Gmail. It doesn't honor the custom reply-to address from Gmail, so any responses go back to an account I don't use (766 spam messages this week).

Re: Why Microsoft doesn’t deserve Facebook

Mike Torres — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 18:37:54 -0000

Best of breed == things Scoble likes the best :)

I don't know why Microsoft has any bearing on this conversation other than making for a fun headline on TechMeme.

Re: Thanks so much for all the kind words…

Mike Torres — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 02:56:47 -0000

Congrats! We're right behind ya by a few weeks!

Re: What you all are missing about Google

Mike Torres — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 20:11:20 -0000

Robert - if you want to switch away from Hotmail (which I'd hate to see but...) you can do it just by using the forwarding feature. We implemented it for people interested in using other mail services, so there's nothing stopping anyone from using the service they like best. I believe it's a premium feature ($19.95/year) to forward to an external address.

BTW, this was funny: "So, every month that Microsoft and Yahoo will be stuck in some courtroom arguing out why this is a good deal means money in the bank for Google as they close mobile phone deal after mobile phone deal"

...because I can almost guarantee that the same people "arguing in courtrooms" wouldn't be the same people writing code or making mobile deals :) Ah well.

Re: “Wait until you see what Ray Ozzie is doing”

Mike Torres — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 23:28:40 -0000

I use Hotmail everyday in Firefox - both Mac and PC. Works perfectly.

Re: “Wait until you see what Ray Ozzie is doing”

Mike Torres — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 18:00:24 -0000

It's prob because you're using a version of FF that changed (i.e. broke) things from 2.0. Use the released version. It DOES work perfectly. Can't expect all sites to work with a moving target.

If you'd like to do a video of Hotmail on Firefox, I can hook you up with some folks to demo it working ;)

Re: Story Pitch: Microsoft’s “flattened” Windows 7 team and what it means for business

Mike Torres — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 14:48:33 -0000

One thing you can look to with respect to a proof point for the changes in the organization: the new IE8 beta 2 which also reports through Steven. I've been running it for 2 days and it absolutely screams. Agree that it needs more for the "passionates" but all things considered (given the recent history post-IE6) the progress is very impressive.

Re: How Microsoft Office 10 will be locked out of my toolbag

Mike Torres — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 22:39:44 -0000

You can't predict who will win the hand until you see everyone's cards. And no one sees all the cards at this point.