Microsoft “Most Valuable Professional” Program

I’ve often followed the advice of Groucho Marx when he said, “I’d never be a member of club who would have me as a member”. One exception to this rule is a group of highly specialized technical experts known as Microsoft® Most Valuable Professionals. Last year I was honored to receive MVP recognition for my work in the field of computer security.

I’m proud to announce that today I received notification of my newest Microsoft® MVP Award. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting and knowing other MVP’s from around the world. I can tell you it’s a great feeling to be considered one of their peers.

Microsoft describes MVP’s on their website

"We seek to recognize the best and brightest from technology communities around the world with the Microsoft® Most Valuable Professional (MVP) Award.

These exceptional community leaders come from a wide range of backgrounds. They are teachers, artists, doctors, engineers, as well as technologists, who actively share their high-quality, real-world technical expertise with the community and with Microsoft.

With the MVP Award, we thank these inspiring individuals for representing the voice of thousands in the community through the powerful and independent feedback they give us, and for helping our customers maximize the potential of their software."

I’m sure I’m not alone today in getting my notification so I’d also like to congratulate all the other hard working, caring MVP’s who received their award. Good Job!

Live from the Microsoft MVP Summit

My morning photo from the Grand Hyatt in downtown Seattle

This week I’ve having the distinct privilege to meet with a number of my fellow compatriots in the world of consumer security. We’re here in Seattle to meet with Microsoft and be briefed on their plans for keeping customers safe in the future. It’s called the Microsoft MVP Summit and open to a select few who Microsoft has designated as Most Valuable Professionals.

There are almost 1500 MVP’s here in town for the event but last night I had chance to meet and get to know those of us here with a particular interest in consumer security. These are folks who aren’t in it for the money or fame.  They’re the ones who have spent countless hours pouring over Hijack logs and listening to frustrated users with the goal of just wanting to help. They’re unique people who investigate and follow all the malware attacks and warn users about rogue AntiSpyware downloads. These are the good guys who don’t think of each other as competition and I’m honored to call them friends.

Most of what I hear from Microsoft I won’t be able to repeat although the knowledge I absorb will certainly add to my overall tech intuition. I can tell you Microsoft is good at getting folks excited and the ultimate winners this week will be the Windows customer.

Five things every Windows beta tester should know
I was very happy to read today that ZDNet columnist and author Ed Bott has commented on my last blog post.  Ed agreed that the concept of beta testing isn’t what it used to be. I have noticed since I complained about the lack of feedback in my WinPatrol 2009 beta, bug reports and comments have increased. Sorry if I over stated the problem but I do welcome your opinions even when I’m not beta testing.

You can read what Ed says about me and about beta testers at http://blogs.zdnet.com/Bott/?p=682

Nothing like waking up to a rainbow when you’re in the Emerald City

Meet Me in Los Angeles at PDC

I haven’t posted this week since I’ve been getting ready for a trip out to this years Microsoft Professional Developers Conference.

I’m looking forward to seeing some old friends and meeting some new ones. I’m bringing along a couple dozen 1 GB WinPatrol Flash wristbands so if you spot me please say hello and introduce yourself.

The first 20 people who ask will receive a free 1 GB WinPatrol Flash wristband.

While I expect to be wearing our popular WinPatrol PLUS sports shirts I can also be identified with my always present BillP smile.

Bill Pytlovany working hard at BillP Studios home office.
(Photo courtesy of Temerc)

I’ll be reporting live from L.A. so expect some Windows 7 and other news in this blog next week. Microsoft is trying hard to get the kind of coverage you typically see with Apple events. The keynote speeches will be streamed live and number of “All-Star” bloggers have joined together to cover the event. Click for more info.

Unboxing Most Valuable Professional Kit

As I mentioned recently I've had the honor of receiving a Microsoft MVP(Most Valuable Professional) award for 2009. Today DHL delivered some fun stuff to make me really feel special.

The MVP kit includes a lapel pin, certificate, badge and a nice crystal statue.  The only thing missing was a MVP t-shirt.

Thank you Microsoft

 

Congrats Microsoft Most Valuable Professionals

Today, Microsoft provided the award of MVP (Most Valuable Professional) to number of bright and outstanding individuals who devote their time to help others. I’ve always had a lot of respect for Microsoft MVP’s and today I’ve been given the honor to join them.

Microsoft notified me this morning that I’ve been selected as a Microsoft MVP.

The Microsoft MVP Award Program recognizes and thanks outstanding members of technical communities for their community participation and willingness to help others. The MVP Award is given to exceptional technical community leaders who foster the free and objective exchange of knowledge by actively sharing their real-world expertise with technology users. The MVP Award celebrates the most active community members from around the world who provide invaluable online and offline expertise that enriches the community experience and makes a difference in technical communities that feature Microsoft products.

While I had been approached by Microsoft to see if I was interested, the award was still a little bit of a surprise.  It’s no secret that I haven’t spent much time promoting Windows Vista and I have been slightly critical of the auto update process.  I’m impressed and humbled that the folks at Microsoft honored me with this title.  I promise to continue speaking out when I can offer some constructive criticism but I’m still thrilled to be included in a group of exceptional professions.

I would especially like to thank those MVP’s who nominated me and helped Microsoft think I was worthy. It’s been a decade since I worked out at the Redmond campus so I look forward to next years MVP Global Summit and meeting my fellow MVP’s.

 

BillP Studios Always Listens

We’ve had over 100 thousand downloads of the new version of WinPatrol so far and the reaction has been extremely positive. So far, most of our Email is either looking for a lost PLUS code or requesting we bring back the original Scotty tray bar icon.

I guess a lot of people are really used to our old four color Scotty icon. I’ve uploaded a new version with a couple slight changes. If you’ve already upgraded to version 12, don’t feel like you need to run over to our download page to get this new version.

Our new build v12.0.2007.1 has two very minor changes.

1) If you’re using RogueRemover it apparently edits your HOSTS file and uses the IP address of 0.0.0.0 to block sites. The HijackPatrol log will now filter these entries out just like it does the local address 127.0.0.1 and others that might be added by the popular MVP Hosts project.
In English, unless your using RogueRemover, this change won’t affect you.

2) I have added an hidden option to allow the use of the original Scotty icon in the system tray. After downloading the new version, you’ll still need to run a registry script which is available at http://www.winpatrol.com/support/scottyicon.reg

Again, unless you really care about the icon I wouldn’t go through the bother of downloading our setup again.

If you want to know more about what a HOST file is, check out http://accs-net.com/hosts/what_is_hosts.html. Personally, I’m not a big fan of filling the host file with a large number of once known malware sites. On some machines I do think it will slow down internet connections.