The following is a post from Panos Panay, General Manager of Microsoft Surface.

It’s hard to believe it’s been just over a month since Surface with Windows RT hit the market. The response from Surface customers has been fantastic and exciting to see. In addition to sharing the terrific results that Microsoft is seeing with Windows 8 at a technology conference earlier this week, we also announced that Surface with Windows 8 Pro would be available in January 2013.

Today, I want to share a bit more detail about the growing Surface family of products and Surface with Windows 8 Pro, specifically around pricing. In January, Surface with Windows 8 Pro will be available in two versions and pricing will start at $899:

· 64GB standalone version at $899

· 128GB standalone version at $999

Both versions will both include a Surface pen with Palm Block technology and include the ability to use a Touch Cover or Type Cover (sold separately).

The following is a post by Mike Nichols, Corporate Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, Bing.

That Holiday Feeling

Even after Black Friday and Cyber Monday, you might walk the halls around your office at lunchtime and still find a lot of your colleagues shopping online for the holidays. 

And they’ll be in good company.  This year, according to shop.org, online sales will jump 12 percent over last year to US$96 billion dollars this holiday season.  Because nearly half of all that online shopping will start from search engines, we wanted all consumers to understand exactly what happens when they use search to find those deals. 

Specifically, we want to alert you to what Google has done with their shopping site right in time for Christmas.  Instead of showing you the most relevant shopping search results for the latest coffee maker you’re looking to buy mom, Google Shopping now decides what to show you – and how prominently to display what product offers they show -- based partially on how much the merchant selling the product has paid them. 

The following is a post by Jared Spataro, senior director, Office Division, on the growing role social media is playing in business and how Yammer, SharePoint and Office 365 are coming together to offer a powerful, secure and integrated approach to social collaboration for businesses large and small.

This week we're hosting the SharePoint Conference in Las Vegas, and one of the key themes is social.  While we had more than ten thousand people attend the keynote, I wanted to take the opportunity to share my thoughts on social for those who didn't have a chance to join us in person.

Business Value

Social has clearly rewired the way we communicate in our personal lives, and there are folks out there claiming that it will do the same for business.  I've come to believe that it will have a profound impact on the way people get things done at work. 

To understand why, consider the basic premise of the technology: open conversations and personal connections.  In a world where the pace of innovation has increased dramatically over the last few decades, the name of the game is agility.

In this edition of Weekend Reading, Microsoft releases its interactive Holiday Look Book, where to get your hands on a Windows Phone 8 device now, plus Jessica Alba and Gwen Stefani share their Windows Phone 8 Start screen.

The Microsoft 2012 Holiday Look Book. Kick off your holiday shopping with the 2012 Holiday Look Book, a shareable, shoppable, touch-enabled gift guide, featuring a collection of top products from Microsoft and its partners. Inspiration for each of the scenes within the Look Book came from conversations with product designers themselves, giving you a never before seen view of the hottest tech products of the season. See exclusive images of Halo 4, the Nokia Lumia 920, the Wedge Touch Mouse and more in the 2012 Holiday Lookbook.

The following is a blog post by Ted Kummert, Corporate Vice President of Microsoft’s Business Platform Division. Mr. Kummert is keynoting at this week’s PASS Summit 2012, where he’s announcing new capabilities for Microsoft’s data platform that help businesses accelerate their time to insights with any type of data.

This is an exciting time in the world of data. Big data is growing. The cost to store and process data is rapidly dropping. The scale and economics of cloud computing is enabling broader access to incredible levels of computing power for large and small organizations. Combined, these trends underscore the importance and need to find the value in data.

This week, more than 4,000 IT professionals, database administrators and business intelligence specialists are gathered at the PASS Summit in Seattle where I will share Microsoft’s vision for the modern data platform, showcasing new investments with in-memory computing, big data and business intelligence to accelerate insights with any data in this new world of data.

In this edition of Weekend Reading, we’ve got the latest details on Surface with Windows 8 Pro, Microsoft’s continued support for the Partners in Learning program, plus news on Outlook.com, Xbox 360 and more fun with Windows Phone 8.

Next up for the Surface family: Surface with Windows 8 Pro pricing. It’s hard to believe it’s been just over a month since Surface with Windows RT hit the market. The response from Surface customers has been fantastic and exciting to see. In addition to sharing the terrific results that Microsoft is seeing with Windows 8 at a technology conference earlier this week, we also announced that Surface with Windows 8 Pro would be available in January 2013. On Thursday, Panos Panay, general manager of Microsoft Surface, shared a bit more detail on the Official Microsoft Blog about the growing Surface family of products and Surface with Windows 8 Pro pricing. Go here to read Panay’s full post.

Eleven million educators and counting: Microsoft renews support for Partners in Learning program. On Thursday at the Partners in Learning Global Forum in Prague, in front of over 500 of the world’s most innovative educators, Corporate Vice President of Worldwide Public Sector Laura Ipsen announced an additional US$250 million in funding to extend Partners in Learning (PiL) over the next five years.

The following is a post by Frank Shaw, Corporate Vice President, Corporate Communications.

Earlier this morning, we held our Shareholder Meeting here in Seattle.  As Shareholder Meeting goes, it was fairly uneventful.  But during his speech at the meeting, CEO Steve Ballmer shared some numbers and business updates that bear repeating and amplifying.  So as we near the end of calendar year ’12, here are 12 fast facts from Steve’s speech worth repeating.

In October, Xbox 360 maintained its lead in the U.S. console market – marking the 22nd consecutive month as the top-selling console.

October 2012 U.S. NPD highlights include:

· Xbox 360 sold 270,000 units in October, more units than any other console, and held 56 percent share of current-generation console sales in the U.S. This marks the 20th consecutive month that Xbox 360 has held more than a 40 percent share of current-generation console sales in the U.S.

· Total retail spend on the Xbox 360 platform in October (hardware, software and accessories) reached $315 million. Consumers spent more on Xbox 360 products in October than they spent on the other two current-generation consoles combined.

In this edition of Weekend Reading, we’ve got stories on apps – find ‘em, get ‘em, build ‘em – including new favorites for Windows Phone 8 and Windows 8, plus a peek behind the scenes of a Microsoft Store opening.

AT&T sales begin today, Verizon Wireless taking preorders now. Great news for AT&T and Verizon Wireless subscribers: AT&T announced that the Nokia Lumia 920 and Lumia 820 devices would be available starting today, and Verizon announced yesterday that it is taking preorders for the Windows Phone 8X by HTC and the Nokia Lumia 822 starting today at 1 a.m. EST. That was a few hours ago, so go here to snag your shiny new Windows Phone.  For details and links, head over to the Windows Phone Blog.

May the birds be with you: Angry Birds Star Wars is now in the Store. First Cut the Rope, then Angry Birds Space released for Windows Phone 8. Now Rovio’s highly-anticipated mash up between pigs and Princess Leia, has launched worldwide—including for Windows Phone 8.  Angry Birds Star Wars, which costs 99 cents in the Store and requires Windows Phone 8, reimagines Angry Birds characters as the Star Wars cast, with a storyline straight from the beloved space opera—from the deserts of Tatooine to the depths of the Pig Star. Your task: Dodge Imperial Pigtroopers, laser turrets, sand people, and the dark side the Force on the way to the ultimate showdown against Darth Vader, Dark Lord of the Pigs. Check out the fun trailer below that Rovio created for a taste, and see what else is in store at the Windows Phone Blog.

The following is a post from Frank X. Shaw, Microsoft’s Corporate Vice President of Corporate Communications, highlighting some of Microsoft’s recent cloud customer wins with Office 365.

We’ve been kind of busy lately. With all of our recent news around Windows 8, Windows Phone 8, Microsoft Surface, Xbox LIVE and Halo 4, several big-time customer wins for Office 365 may have flown under your radar. 

Today’s news that the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs will deploy Office 365 for Government with Hewlett-Packard to 15,000 of its employees (expanding later to up to 600,000 employees agencywide) is just the latest evidence that our cloud-based productivity offering has gained significant traction. If you don’t believe me, you can read more about some of the gains we’ve made against the competition here. :)

The deployment of Office 365 by the Department of Veterans Affairs is merely the latest chapter in Microsoft’s burgeoning cloud services story. In early August, luxury audio and video systems maker Bang & Olufsen adopted Microsoft Office 365 to unify its e-mail, calendaring, collaboration and communication. Later that month, the County of Santa Clara, Calif. did the same for 15,000 employees.

In this edition of Weekend Reading, we’ve got stories on Halo 4 – from coming to life in Liechtenstein to a sneak peek at Halo 4 Infinity Multiplayer, plus the Windows Phone 8 story continues.

Hello Liechtenstein! ‘Halo 4’ lands on earth in ground-breaking style. Major Nelson shared news of the Europe Halo team Halo 4 launch kick off. They took 70 unsuspecting guests, from super-fans to media, to Liechtenstein this week for an Xbox 360 hosted “Halo 4” event. For one night only, Liechtenstein’s iconic Gutenberg Castle became an imposing military fort while a working mine become a war-torn battleground. Cinematic set builds, hundreds of bespoke props and pyrotechnics combined to bring a series of highly theatrical, ‘Halo 4’-inspired experiences to life for guests in vivid detail and in person. Watch the video below and head over to the Microsoft News Center to learn more about the transformation of Liechtenstein, including more video and a slideshow. 

Last night in New York City, Microsoft and Lucky Magazine hosted a holiday soiree that showcased the hottest tech gifts from Microsoft this holiday. Guests experienced Surface tablets, Windows 8 PCs, Windows Phones, hot titles for Xbox 360 and more holiday goodies. You can find information about all of these products at www.microsoftstore.com.

Here is what some of the attendees had to say, via Twitter:

Kim Weling marveled at the Touch Cover for Surface

Top of my wish list: microsoft Surface @luckymagazine - the keyboard is the case! #msftholiday instagr.am/p/So0p54uAEx/

— Kim Weling (@fashionblypetit) November 30, 2012

In this edition of The Midweek Download, we’ve got stories on how Office, SharePoint and Yammer will transform the way we work, Internet Explorer 10 bringing HTML5 to Windows Phone 8, and how this year’s Imagine Cup winner has won again.

Putting social to work. This week in Las Vegas, Microsoft hosts the SharePoint Conference and Jared Spataro, senior director of the Office Division, helped kick off the event with a guest post on The Official Microsoft Blog. Jared writes about the growing role social media is playing in business and how Yammer, SharePoint and Office 365 are coming together to offer a powerful, secure and integrated approach to social collaboration for businesses large and small. You can find more SharePoint news over on the Microsoft News Center.

The new SharePoint bets big on social, mobile, cloud. SharePoint news continues on the Office News blog, which announced that collaboration and social technologies are fundamentally changing the way people and teams work, and as we celebrate this pivotal release of SharePoint, we are humbled to announce that the product has reached more than US$2 billion in annual revenue.

In this edition of The Midweek Download, we’ve got stories on customers who are setting their businesses apart from the rest using Windows 8 and Windows 8 apps, some great Windows Phone developer tips, and Windows Azure SQL Database being named an Enterprise Cloud Database Leader by Forrester Research.

European customers embrace Windows 8. During the past year we’ve been talking about what Windows 8 means for businesses. Now that Windows 8 is officially available across the globe, so many of our customers are seeing first-hand how Windows 8 can benefit their organizations. Last Wednesday, Windows Commercial Senior Director of Business Planning Erwin Visser reported from Europe where he heard from several businesses using Windows 8. In this Nov. 13 Windows for your Business post, Erwin highlights a few favorite Windows 8 business adoption stories from Europe. And don’t miss Erwin’s post from Dubai from Monday, featuring Emirates airline.

Windows Azure SQL Database named an Enterprise Cloud Database Leader by Forrester Research. In the latest in a series of Windows Azure good news, Forrester Research Inc. has positioned Microsoft as a Leader in The Forrester Wave: Enterprise Cloud Databases, Q4 2012. In the report posted here, Microsoft received the highest scores of any vendor in Current Offering and Market Presence.

The following is a blog post from Laura Ipsen, Corporate Vice President, Worldwide Public Sector.

Laura Ipsen

Earlier today at the Partners in Learning Global Forum in Prague, in front of over 500 of the world’s most innovative educators, I was thrilled to announce an additional US$250 million in funding to extend Partners in Learning (PiL) over the next five years.

We’re renewing our pledge to Partners in Learning as a program that makes a valuable impact in the learning outcomes of hundreds of thousands of students around the world, honors a strong and growing community of educators, and underscores Microsoft’s long-term commitment to Education.  Along with Microsoft YouthSpark, PiL empowers youth to imagine and realize their full potential by connecting them with greater opportunities for education and helping them create a real impact for a better tomorrow. It’s a crucial investment in the millions of teachers who are shaping our collective future each and every day.

Here in the States, we just wrapped up the elections. It’s an exciting time where you’re reminded of what a great thing it is to be part of a process and have a voice in your government. The time leading up to the elections is always very busy, with a flurry of activity from the candidates as they try to seal the deal.

It’s been a busy fall here at Microsoft too. We’ve just finished up several big events and announcements launching a series of major products and services over the past several weeks.

It started with a busy September with the launch of Windows Server 2012 and the release of Visual Studio 2012. Then, over the next several weeks, an impressive lineup of beautiful new Windows Phone 8 devices were announced by our partners at Samsung, Nokia and HTC.

In early October, we kicked things into high gear with the unveiling of Xbox Music and an updated Xbox LIVE service. Over the last two weeks, we announced Skype for Windows 8, and launched Windows 8, Surface and Windows Phone 8. On Tuesday, we launched the fourth installment of the blockbuster Halo franchise. And looking ahead a bit, we’re not too far away from the launch of the new Office, which we unveiled over the summer.

It’s that time of year again, and Microsoft’s got you covered in the gifts department!

Get a head start on shopping this holiday season with some of the coolest tech around. For a limited time beginning 12 a.m. on Thursday, Nov. 22, Microsoft retail stores and the online store are offering great deals on hot products. Whether you’re looking for a new Touch cover for your Surface, a new Xbox 360 console, games or productivity software, you’ll find a great deal for a loved one – or yourself. Check out all the deals and get further details. Or find a Microsoft store near you.

Two stories out of Microsoft today:

First: Are olives drenched in hot sauce the breakfast of champions? They are if you’re gaming champ Alex Hebert-Ruiz, a onetime top-10 ranked Halo player and one of the world’s most gifted gamers. Alex now works at Microsoft, where she advocates for Xbox LIVE Arcade games when she's not playing Halo 4. Read this Microsoft News Center profile of Alex to learn more about how her infectious enthusiasm for games and game culture carried her to her latest adventure at Microsoft. That's Alex to the left.

Also, Microsoft has announced the first major update to Visual Studio 2012. The upgrade delivers improved Windows and SharePoint application development, agile team support and continuous quality enablement, all designed to help developers jumpstart productivity and drive down risk.

It’s a busy, busy day here at Microsoft!

First, today we mark the tenth anniversary of the launch of Xbox LIVE, defined at the time as "the first comprehensive, online game arena fully dedicated to fast-action broadband gaming experiences." Since then Xbox LIVE has evolved to become Microsoft’s premier entertainment service for the TV, phone, PC and tablet. Initially available to U.S. and Canadian Xbox players, the service is now available in 41 countries and territories around the world. The 10-year journey has been long, but Xbox continually updated Xbox LIVE to add new gaming and entertainment experiences and services to the console for its members. Below, at the Xbox 360: Zero Hour launch event in November 2005, thousands of gamers from around the world witnessed the dawning of the next generation of gaming. Xbox LIVE membership would grow from about 2 million to today's 40 million members.

Today Microsoft opened the first Microsoft Store outside the continental United States, in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Located in the Plaza Las Americas Mall in San Juan, the store is 4,000 square feet and will focus on selling Microsoft products and provide support services for consumers and small businesses.

Just under a year ago, we unveiled a set of SkyDrive APIs that made it easy for developers on modern mobile platforms to provide their users with the ability to access their SkyDrive content in their favorite apps. And since then, we’ve been working at how we could continue to make this easy for more and more developers – so we added client-side SDKs targeting Windows 8, Windows Phone, JavaScript Web library, iOS and Android as well as made several enhancement to our REST APIs by removing file extension restrictions and also letting you upload full resolution pictures. Today, we are excited to announce the availability of new SDKs for .NET and Windows Phone 8 that are available at http://dev.live.com/. Get the whole story over on Inside SkyDrive.

Also, we’re back again today with another of our favorite ways to experience Bing on Windows 8: The Sports App. The Sports app is your sports companion.

Two stories for you today out of Microsoft:

First, Emirates, one of the fastest-growing airlines in the world, announced today at the Windows 8 launch event in Dubai the development of a line-of-business application for Windows 8 called Knowledge Driven Inflight Service (KIS). An in-flight communication and customer relationship management device first introduced by Emirates for its pursers in 2004, the KIS application will now run on the soon-to-be-launched HP ElitePad 900 business tablets and will enable Emirates to continue to deliver extraordinary customer service and experiences. You can also read more about the news over on the Windows for Your Business Blog.

Also, Microsoft is excited to announce its research and development of the first zero carbon data center - called the Data Plant - that will be completely independent of the grid and will recycle common waste bi-products to sustainably power cloud services.

Big news on the Windows Phone front today.

The Windows Phone Blog is reporting that HTC’s Windows Phone 8X and the Nokia Lumia 810 are now available to T-Mobile USA customers. Head on over to the blog to find out more. That's HTC's Windows Phone 8X to the right.

Also, the American Public Human Services Association (APHSA), in coordination with Microsoft, today released the results of a new survey of health and human services departments and agencies nationwide.

Two stories out of Microsoft today:

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer last week took Microsoft's wave of new products on the road, visiting Europe and Israel. In speeches to students in Moscow, tech start-ups in Israel, customers in London, developers in Berlin, and partners in Paris, Ballmer highlighted how Microsoft delivers highly personalized experiences on Windows 8 devices and Windows Phone 8. Below, Ballmer joined Nokia President and CEO Stephen Elop on stage to launch Lumia 820 and Lumia 920 in Moscow.

Windows 8 is "the best version of Windows ever built," Ballmer said.

Two weeks ago, we announced that we were working hard on Skype for Windows Phone 8. Just like our bold new experience for Windows 8, the new Skype for Windows Phone will be fast, modern, and beautiful, while still delivering the best of what you've come to expect from Skype.