Australia

The sales for Kinect for the Xbox 360 have been amazing with 18 million sold this last year. The end result has been countless hours of incredible fun with family and friends dancing and playing sports in the confines of their living rooms. Kinect has also opened the door for developers and businesses to create new and innovative experiences through natural user interface (NUI) on the PC. The explosion of imaginative ideas that can be done with Kinect is something we call the Kinect Effect.

Today we’re releasing the next version of the Zune software. As one of the Zune program managers, I wanted to provide a brief look at what’s new in the 4.8 release, which you can download here. To update your current version, click Settings > Software > General, and then click Check For Updates.

Back in January, we released the first version of Microsoft OneNote app for iPhone. Today, the OneNote team has announced that there’s a new version available (1.2) which introduces search, shared notebooks, and more customization options.

Hi everyone. Today we began delivering the March update to Telstra customers in Australia. (This update also includes 7392, the fraudulent certificate update I mentioned last week.) That’s the only new change to the Where’s my phone update? table.

Hi everyone. Today we started delivering the February and March updates to the HTC Surround on AT&T and to customers of Deutsche Telekom in Europe.

Just a very quick progress report this week.

We’re now scheduling the February and March updates for the HTC Surround on AT&T and for customers of Deutsche Telekom in Europe. We’re also scheduling the March update for Optus customers in Australia. Where’s my phone update? has the latest status.

We understand there’s still more to do. We’re not resting until we get this done globally.

We’re not going to be happy until everyone gets their update, and have more progress to report today. We’ve started delivering the March “copy and paste” update to customers of O2 and SFR in Europe. Also, Telstra customers in Australia are now receiving the February update. See Where’s my phone update? for the latest status.

Last July, we announced the availability of the second beta of Windows Intune, Microsoft’s cloud solution for PC management. In the fall, we told you that Windows Intune would be available in 2011.

On Oct. 22 Windows 7 Family Pack became available outside the United States. As we noted when Family Pack was launched earlier this month in the USA, more than 94% of folks who try Windows 7 love using it.

This afternoon the very first Windows Phone 7 handsets went on sale in New Zealand with more countries in Europe and Asia Pacific like Australia, Belgium, France, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Singapore, Spain and the UK joining the mix tomorrow, and dropping here in the U.S. starting on November 8th. This is a very exciting time for us here at Windows Phone HQ and around  the world as we finally put the phones into your hands, and we are really looking forward to hearing what you think.

Congrats to Jourdan Templeton on his purchase of the first Windows Phone 7!