Contentinople - Erin Barker - News Bits: Microsoft Recovers Sidekick Data After System Failure

Written by Erin Barker

Thursday, October 15. 2009 at 11:00 AM EDT 1 comment

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Microsoft Corp. (Nasdaq: MSFT) says it has recovered "most if not all" T-Mobile Sidekick customer data lost this week when the company suffered a system failure.

In a press release today, Microsoft said it will start restoring the data as soon as possible, beginning with personal contacts.

We have determined that the outage was caused by a system failure that created data loss in the core database and the back-up. We rebuilt the system component by component, recovering data along the way. This careful process has taken a significant amount of time, but was necessary to preserve the integrity of the data.

Previously, T-Mobile (UK) had said on Oct. 10 that Sidekick users' data "almost certainly has been lost," and several lawsuits had been filed against T-Mobile and Microsoft.

In other news:

Pepsi is holding an emergency meeting to discuss whether it should pull its "AMP Up Before You Score" iPhone app, the Silicon Alley Insider reports. The app -- designed to promote Pepsi's energy drink, AMP -- gives advice on how to "score" with different types of women, and has faced a wave of criticism over its "sexist" nature.

Of course, WSJ did manage to find one person who likes the app: a "professional wingman" named Thomas Edwards.

"This actually could be useful for someone you went on multiple dates with," he said, in a video message posted on his blog. A guy could pull up links to local vegan restaurants if he were dating a "treehugger" type, he noted.

Twitter Inc. is getting into the wine business. [Ed. note: Yes, the wine business.] Aided by San Francisco wine producer Crushpad, the company will sell "Fledgling Wines" for $20 a bottle ($5 of which will go to nonprofit Room to Read).

And if that's not enough bad news for you, Microsoft has signed a deal with Fox to sponsor a half-hour Family Guy variety show, tentatively titled Family Guy Presents: Seth & Alex's Almost Live Comedy Show, to air on Nov. 8. There will be no commercial breaks, just Windows 7 marketing blended with Family Guy content.

"You'll see us deeply integrated into the content... you'll hear a lot about how Windows 7 can help you simplify your PC -- it's simple, fast and easy to use," Gayle Troberman, Microsoft's general manager of consumer engagement and advertising, told Ad Age. A sneak peek (courtesy of Ars Technica) is below:

Tags: Advertising, iPhone, Microsoft, Mobile, Twitter

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Family Guy Windows 7
cliffordjay
Rank: Vizier
Friday October 16, 2009 2:26:58 PM

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That wasn't as bad as I thought it might be. But I'd like to see the Family Guy take on the Sidekick System Failure.

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