Priceless

While on a slow connection, I happened to notice this feedback from Gmail:

I must say, I like the idea of finding out why people cling on to older versions of products. As a developer, it is usually difficult to get in the end-user’s state of mind.

Unfortunately, Google messed up this one. 

My MacBookPro is in the shop for the moment so I have reverted to my old IBM Thinkpad (a great machine!). Of course, the Windows Update came up about 3 times and eventually, I was offered the Internet Explorer 8 browser.

I was amused by the following text describing the update:

Internet Explorer 8 is the latest version of the familiar Web browser that you are most comfortable using. Internet Explorer 8 helps you get everything that you want from the Web faster, easier, and more privately and securely than ever.

So, first of all, I am not most familiar nor most comfortable with Internet Explorer. Secondly, we know for a fact that it’s not the fastest browser and probably not the safest either.

UPDATE: I played the Extended Play tonight… the difference is that there is no “1”... it’s every man for himself. The nice surprise though was that it was also in English! I don’t know how that happened but I’m glad it did.

Tonight, Microsoft launched the first beta-test of 1 vs 100 for France. I must say, it’s quite fun! The game is actually still going on as I type this… Clearly, some things still need to be translated for the French public. Overall however, the questions are good, varied in difficulty, and the prizes look interesting. So far, I’ve seen a lot of XBox Arcade games and XBox points being given out. (However, as this is a beta, no prizes will be given for tonight’s show).

Requests
I would really like it if I could play the US version of the game, from Europe… I would just prefer US-oriented questions. Also, I think foreigners living in France who want to play this are going to have some trouble with some of the questions that are very “France-oriented” - such as “What is the relationship between François Mittérand and Frédéric Mittérand?” Unless you regularly follow the French news, this is not CNN breaking news.

Possible Bugs
It seems that the candidate, the “1”, is always frowning and shaking his hand in a “oh no, I screwed up” or “I need help!” kinda way even when he/she obviously answered quickly and without using a joker… it would be nice if the animation was logical… or perhaps the player should be able to control the animation. I haven’t been the “1” yet so I don’t really know what that person sees or can do.

Here are a few videos I filmed using my camera… sorry about the low quality but it gives an idea of what’s to come…