Longhorn gets a name, Dell’s got game

I’ve been in a subdued mood since the death of James “Scotty” Doohan. His passing means the original Star Trek crew will never reunite for that one last mission: Star Trek: Journey to the Edge of Incontinence. I was so looking forward to it.

Hasta la vista, baby: It seems Microsoft has replaced its marketing department with the Fab Five from Queer Eye. Their next-generation OS, previously known as Longhorn, has been renamed Windows Vista. The new ad slogan? “Clear, Confident, Connected: Bringing clarity to your world.” There are so, so many things wrong with that last phrase that a single column wouldn’t suffice to cover them all. So let’s leave it at this: Microsoft can call it whatever it wants, but it will still smell like the south end of a northbound steer.

Austin city limits: Here in Cringeville we strive to be fair and balanced on all topics — except possibly Microsoft. So I’m happy to report Andrew N.’s hellish Dell experience has a happy ending; he got Dell to replace the PC its techies inadvertently killed, a month after his initial call about a faulty CD drive. And reader Bill L. wants everyone to know he’s gotten excellent service from the Texas techsters. So Dell doesn’t always smell; sometimes it’s swell.

For God’s sake, think of the children: As I reported last week, you can no longer say “Dell Hell” on Dell’s message boards, or anything approximating it (“H-E-double toothpicks” is also banned). Apparently profanity has always been verboten, but forum monitors have gotten better at enforcing the policy. As Cringester Donna M. points out, however, Dell’s anti-pottymouth crusade doesn’t extend to domain names. The owner of dellhell.com is none other than the Round Rock Rollers themselves.

Executive search: Microsoft sued Google for stealing one of its top research brains, and Google fired back saying, essentially, bite me. Kai-Fu Lee is the third major geek in the past year to leave rainy Redmond for a brighter future in marvy Mountain View. This can only mean one thing: a series of critical security flaws will soon crop up in Gmail.

Got hot tips or clever Windows Vista taglines? Send them to cringe@infoworld.com and you may just snag a curiously yellow bag.