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On September 1, Microsoft announced this morning, it will be making upgrade editions of Windows 7 available to European customers, as originally planned, apparently with Internet Explorer 8 included. These editions will be publicly available on the originally planned global availability date of October 22, although pre-orders will begin September 1.

This leaves a one-week window in which European customers may continue to pre-order full versions of Windows 7 Home Premium at the upgrade price, which is currently €119.99 for most European customers, £79.99 in the UK. While we do know that €119.99 will be the upgrade price for Home Premium from September 1, and that the full version price will be somewhat higher, we do not know as of yet the specific breakdown for the upgrade prices for the Professional and Ultimate SKUs. These prices did not yet appear on Microsoft’s online retail sites in foreign countries, as of 12:15 pm EDT Monday afternoon.

European customers may also expect pre-order availability of a three-license Family Pack version of the Home Premium SKU, though prices there have also not been released. Versions without Windows Media Player, marked with a prominent “N” and a big red box, will also be available for all SKUs in both full and upgrade editions, but for no discount off the regular price.

Currently, pre-orders for the full edition of the Windows 7 Professional SKU are selling for €285 / £189.99, and the Ultimate SKU for €299 / £199.99. Microsoft’s Web site does show the non-UK prices to be limited time discounts, however, which suggests that on September 1 their prices may climb to €309 and €319 (the UK site does not show full pricing as presently discounted).

The summer recess has precluded the European Commission from issuing an opinion on Microsoft’s decision three weeks ago to reverse course on offering “Windows 7 E” without Internet Explorer 8 pre-installed. It therefore appears that, for now, the distribution of Windows 7 worldwide will go forward precisely as originally planned.

However, Microsoft is not saying at this time whether Windows 7 SKUs being prepared for October shipment are being pre-equipped with the ability to offer the “ballot screen” — the ability for customers to select the Web browser of their choice, download it, and install it. Technically, it’s possible for Microsoft to deploy a kind of hotfix that’s downloaded during the latter stages of the installation process, containing the instructions necessary to bring up the ballot screen — this way, the company would not need to issue recalls on box shipments that have already been made, or to have OEMs undo Windows 7 installations that are already present on new PCs.

But for Microsoft’s proposal to work completely as it has planned, the manufacturers of the alternate browsers listed — Mozilla, Apple, Google, and Opera Software — would have to be on board. Specifically, they would need to be able to provide users with destinations for the ballot screen to download and install browsers, in accordance with the Windows 7 installation instructions. Objections already lodged by Opera’s and Mozilla’s chiefs suggest that at least some would not be on board with this idea; and that even if the EC gives the go-ahead to the browser screen, the Windows 7 installer might not be able to make the necessary handshakes to enable alternative browsers.

I guess I stirred up quite the beehive of activity with my last column, Windows 7 is coming: Don’t upgrade. Before I continue, I wanted to share a few final thoughts on what’s clearly been the most controversial piece of writing I’ve published in a while.

First, I’m a big boy, and I’ve got a thick skin. If you didn’t agree with what I had to say (and many of you didn’t) I promise you I didn’t skulk back to my office with a sniffle in my nose and a tear in my eye after reading the comments. Pro or con, agree or disagree, if I get readers to think critically about a given issue, I’ve accomplished my goal. I don’t particularly enjoy fanboys agreeing with my every word, so don’t expect my writing to reflect some kind of middle-of-the-road festival of milquetoast mutual admiration.

Second, if you’re interested in having a frank, open and sometimes tumultuous debate over the merits of a position I’ve taken, advice I’ve given, or a point I’ve made, then game on. By all means, leave a comment that outlines your position and why you think I’ve veered clearly into lunar orbit. Be as detailed and as passionate as you wish, because that’s the fuel of great debates and, ultimately, great learning.

Third, the basis of any debate involves knowing your audience. Innately. And this last week has taught me more about the collective you than I ever thought possible. Here’s what I’ve learned after thoughtfully reviewing every last comment you posted to the site:

1. You’re light years removed from ordinary. You’re early adopters, willing and able to buy the newest, latest, coolest whatever. You know your stuff and stand ready to debate the finer points of technology architecture with anyone who dares technically cross you.
2. You have little fear and relish the opportunity to roll up your sleeves, install something new, and work the problem until every last bug or glitch is fixed. And if you get burned along the way (I’m sure some of you have picked up Vista, the BlackBerry Storm, HD DVD players, or any number of non-Kindle book readers along the way) you suck it up, learn your lessons, and move on. The tech landscape isn’t for wimps, and you’re not about to relinquish your seat at the front.
3. You’re willing to spend. Buying ahead of the curve means you almost always pay more than trailing edge folks like my mother-in-law. That doesn’t matter to you, as you could care less about whether a particular tech purchase represents an optimal investment. You also reserve the right to buy whatever you want, whenever you want, and for whatever reason, anyone else’s opinion be damned.

Now, let’s get back to the topic at hand — once again, Windows 7. I suspect a few of my key points may have gotten lost in the brouhaha over last week’s column, so allow me to reiterate:

1. Windows 7 is quite possibly Microsoft’s best OS. Ever. No, I didn’t change my mind; that’s what I’ve been saying and what you may or may not have already read.
2. Most users who are firmly entrenched in the Windows world will be running it. Eventually.
3. Precisely how they come to upgrade to Windows 7 will differ from case to case.
4. I do not believe that upgrading existing hardware to Windows 7 is universally viable. That’s because there are costs — both direct and indirect — associated with upgrading that may make it worthwhile to simply attach an upgrade to a scheduled hardware acquisition. 

   On that last point, I don’t think any upgrade strategy is universally viable. It’s as true for auto and grocery shopping as it is for computers and operating systems. There’s a reason some of us drive Chevys and others drive Hyundais, why some single guys drive eight-passenger Cadillac Escalades while parents of three kids happily cram everyone into a Honda Fit for a cross-country drive to Grandma’s. We all have different tastes, different thresholds for acting on those tastes, and if we’re being brutally frank here, different economic capacities for acting on those tastes.

   So while someone may self righteously claim anyone who chooses to keep running Windows XP on an older machine is an antediluvian technophobe, that XP-running Luddite may have no choice but to hold on to what he’s got because he owns only one machine, can’t afford another one, can’t afford the risk of killing his productivity, and doesn’t really care about the supposed advantages of Windows 7. You can rage all you want about the stupidity of clinging to the old and the amazing ease with which everyone should be able to give their tired old XP box some love with Windows 7. But what’s easy and feasible for some isn’t necessarily so for all.

   And at the end of the day, you can’t force everyone to see the world from exactly where you sit. I guess now we know why some folks still run Windows 98 or (horrors!) DOS. You can’t make them upgrade any more than you can make the pleasantly rotund person in front of you in the grocery line ditch the pile of snack cakes in favour of something a little healthier. Different strokes, after all. Welcome to the real world.

   In my own case, the Vista laptop that serves as my main work machine is a prime candidate for a Windows 7 upgrade when the code goes gold. But not a moment before, because I won’t experiment on production hardware. I’ve got an old, unassigned PC just for that purpose, thank you.

   The old XP machine that my daughter now uses, however, will keep XP until it fails for good. Even though I could whip it to Windows 7 before she’s finished breakfast, she likes the interface and doesn’t see any reason to upset the apple cart. When we eventually buy her a new computer, she’ll have to go along for the Windows 7 ride. But I’ll have saved myself the retail cost of the OS, a couple hours worth of work (you do cost out your time, right?) and the ire of a close family member who just wants to get her homework done.

   She, like most of us, will get into Windows 7, eventually. But it’ll be on her terms. Not anyone else’s.

    

   Carmi Levy is a Canadian-based independent technology analyst and journalist still trying to live down his past life leading help desks and managing projects for large financial services organizations. He comments extensively in a wide range of media, and works closely with clients to help them leverage technology and social media tools and processes to drive their business.

As NPD recently showed, more than 72% of all phones being sold are feature phones, and though there are a few examples of app stores for these phones, the mobile app trend has largely missed the majority of phone owners. Today Microsoft announced its move to change that with OneApp, a mobile app environment which gives feature phones access to smartphone-style applications.

With applications for Facebook, Twitter, Windows Live Messenger, news, weather, sports, stocks, games, and RSS feeds, OneApp is available on several dozen feature phones: Nokia (3555, 5320, 6300, 6500, 6600, E50, E51, E63, E65, E66, E71, N70, N72, N73, N78, N80, N81, N82, N85, N95, N96) Samsung (U900, Soul) and Sony Ericsson (C510, C902, C905, G705,K610i, K800i, K805i, T650i, W200i, W580i, W595, W660i, W980.)

The OneApp environment is only 150KB in size and utilizes server-side processing and storage to improve overall performance not unlike the rendering technique used to speed up Opera Mobile. The apps themselves are less than 30KB in size.

Microsoft is focusing on developing markets with OneApp, and today announced that a partnership with South Africa’s Blue Label Telecoms will allow customers to download OneApp for free. Other markets have not yet been announced, but Microsoft says it plans to deliver OneApp to more countries in 2010.

Microsoft has also said that there will be a OneApp developer kit released by the end of 2009.

Now that it’s a known fact that Apple rejects something in the neighborhood of 88,000 iPhone apps a year, companies are getting wise and publicizing their applications before Apple has a chance to finish reviewing them.

RealNetworks has submitted an app for its subscription music service Rhapsody to Apple for approval. The application will let subscribers access Rhapsody’s 8 million song database for streaming over EDGE/3G/Wi-Fi. Though it hasn’t passed Apple’s review yet, Real is already publicizing the app

Last month, Spotify did nearly the same thing, announcing its subscription music app before it was approved or rejected by Apple.

The main difference between Spotify and Rhapsody is that the former has an offline playback mode that can cache up to 3,333 songs, Rhapsody will not support playback unless the user has a wireless connection.

Both companies could be standing on thin ice with Apple since their services compete directly with iTunes, so calling the media’s attention to the situation is a defensive tactic which has already proven useful. The Federal Communications Commisson’s investigation into Apple’s iTunes App Store approval policy was based solely upon all the attention brought to the rejection of the Google Voice app

It was last February when Terry Childs, a former employee of the City of San Francisco’s IT department, sat down with InfoWorld’s Paul Venezia in a jailhouse interview about his bizarre case. He was a high-level administrator of his division’s computers, but after learning in July 2008 he would be reassigned to a different department, he sent those systems into a state of lockdown that only he could undo.

There’s no doubt it was Childs who held city services in a virtual cryogenic state. Upon his surrender to authorities, he gave the Mayor the keys needed to unlock city systems. Childs faced four counts of tampering with city property and shutting down access. But last Friday, a judge tossed out the three tampering charges, reported the San Francisco Chronicle, leaving only the single count pertaining to the lockdown.

Showing absolutely no contrition during his interview with Venezia, Childs indicated that his goal was full exoneration, especially because the fate of his Cisco certification depended on it. “I’d lose my CCIE, and I worked too hard for that,” he told InfoWorld.

Mac OS X Snow Leopard, the incremental update to which has been a topic of discussion for more than a year will finally be available on August 28, The Apple Store now says.

As an incremental upgrade for Leopard users, Snow Leopard will only cost $29.99 for a single user license and $49.99 for the family pack (five licenses.) Also, any Mac purchased after June 8th is eligible for a $9.95 upgrade. Pre-ordering is open today for delivery on Friday.

Among the refinements promised with Snow Leopard is OpenCL, the multi-processor technology which lets the graphics processor act as an additional CPU to speed up applications; support for Microsoft Exchange Server; updated QuickTime, 64-bit support, and multi-core optimization with Grand Central Dispatch

Today, Finnish mobile phone leader Nokia introduced its first notebook PC, the Nokia Booklet 3G.

Mobility is still the name of the game for the 25-year cellular phone pioneer, as the 10″ Booklet 3G is designed for portability, with an aluminum chassis only .79″ (2 cm) thick that weighs only 2.75 lbs (1.25kg). Naturally, it will also feature built-in 3G, HSPA, A-GPS, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity.

Since Nokia is not launching the device until September 2, information about the Booklet 3G is currently limited. The Windows-based device is powered by an Intel Atom processor of indeterminate speed and will include a built-in Webcam, SD card reader and one feature not typically found on netbooks, an HDMI out for HD video output

It’s been about 18 years since Nokia produced a PC. In 1991, Nokia Data was sold to International Computers Limited (ICL), a mainframe computer company owned by Fujitsu, which was itself later renamed to Fujitsu Services Limited.

In the first comprehensive statement representing Mozilla’s viewpoint on the issue of Microsoft’s compliance with the European Commission’s recent Statement of Objections, Mozilla Foundation CEO Mitchell Baker wrote earlier this week that a “ballot screen” giving Windows 7 installers the option of setting up Firefox or another browser instead, is not enough to level the playing field. Internet Explorer, Baker fears, will continue to received favored placement elsewhere in the system, including on the desktop and the taskbar.

“Choosing another browser as a ‘default’ does not mean that the other browser takes the place of IE,” Baker writes. “For example, the IE logo (’shortcut’) still remains unchanged on the desktop. The shortcut / logo of the browser the user has selected does not replace this, it is added elsewhere. As a result, the familiar location remains IE, not the user’s choice.”

Baker’s comments come in response to Microsoft’s suggestions to the European Commission about how it can best comply with the lawmaking body’s demands — suggestions which await the EC’s formal response upon return from summer vacation. Those suggestions, as far as we know, have not included actual software demonstrations, but rather screenshots of mockups of how such a ballot screen may be presented.

Indeed, one of those screenshots as presented publicly by Microsoft itself does show an Internet Explorer logo adorning the title bar of the window where the browser screen appears. Although this screenshot does not necessarily depict how the end result of Microsoft’s work might appear, if the company left a few too many of these little logos in its other screenshots presented to the EC — for instance, in the taskbar or on the desktop — it might have left holes for its own arguments, holes that Mitchell Baker and others are already discovering.

“Even if everything in the currently proposed settlement is implemented in the most positive way,” she writes, “IE will still have a unique and uniquely privileged position on Windows installations.”

It’s not a nationwide ban like the one now in place in the Netherlands, but it may be a step in that direction. Starting September 1, Irish ISP Eircom will block its customers from accessing torrent indexing site The Pirate Bay.

Eircom started working with the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) last February to crack down on P2P music sharing, the result of an out-of-court agreement between the ISP and the “big four” major labels, in order to avoid litigation.

“The settlement reached between the parties provides that the record companies will supply Eircom with the IP addresses of all persons who they detect illegally uploading or downloading copyright works on a peer to peer (P2P) basis,” IRMA’s site announced earlier this year.

So far, it is the only ISP in Ireland to have responded to the music industry’s threats. The Irish Times reports that cable operator UPC and telco BT Ireland have both denied IRMA’s request to block The Pirate Bay.