Windows 8, Windows RT and Windows Phone 8 have been getting a lot of attention in recent days. Most of the news is good for Windows 8 users, but maybe not so much for Microsoft, according to CIO.com blogger James A. Martin. Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 have made a lot of headlines during the past few days, but this gem in particular stands out: Pandora is offering its excellent streaming music service to Windows Phone 8 users with no ads for free. The Pandora Windows Phone 8 app was released on March 21, and it is the only mobile app that gives users ad-free access to Pandora radio stations through 2013 at no charge, according to Pandora. Pandora subscribers without Windows Phones pay $36 yearly or $4 per month to listen to music without ads. That’s not much money, and in my opinion, it’s well worth it. But free is even better than paying $36, right? Pandora mobile apps are also available for iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Barnes & Noble Nook and Kindle Fire. In other news, Windows 8 app store growth has slowed considerably, prompting Microsoft to offer a $100 per app enticement to app developers, according to Computerworld. SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe The Windows Store, which distributes apps for Windows 8 and Windows RT, experienced a 52 percent jump in apps in December 2012 over the previous month, soon after the release of Windows 8 and its RT variant, according to MetroStore Scanner. But January saw only 10 percent more apps added compared to December, and growth slowed to 9 percent in February. So far in March, the Windows Store has increased 12 percent compared to February. The Windows Store currently has about 50,000 apps total. Microsoft also announced this week that it will roll out an update for its built-in Mail, Calendar and People apps for Windows 8 and Windows RT on Tuesday. Among the new features: Mail will let you see only unread messages, organize messages in folders and flag important messages. Calendar will make your appointments easier to read, provide a new “Work week” view and support scheduling-assistant features for business accounts that use Microsoft Exchange. You’ll also be able to forward meeting invites, send email to all meeting attendees and take advantage of more recurrence options. People will make navigation easier, let you post directly to a friend’s Facebook wall and more easily filter your “What’s new” feed by social network. All of this is mostly good news for Windows 8 users—but maybe not so much for Microsoft. Related content opinion Four questions for a casino InfoSec director By Beth Kormanik Sep 21, 2023 3 mins Media and Entertainment Industry Events Security brandpost Four Leadership Motions make leading transformative work easier The Four Leadership Motions can be extremely beneficial —they don’t just drive results among software developers, they help people make extraordinary progress wherever they lead. By Jason Fraser, Director, Product Management & Design, VMware Tanzu Labs, Public Sector Sep 21, 2023 5 mins IT Leadership feature The year’s top 10 enterprise AI trends — so far In 2022, the big AI story was the technology emerging from research labs and proofs-of-concept, to it being deployed throughout enterprises to get business value. This year started out about the same, with slightly better ML algorithms and improved d By Maria Korolov Sep 21, 2023 16 mins Machine Learning Artificial Intelligence opinion 6 deadly sins of enterprise architecture EA is a complex endeavor made all the more challenging by the mistakes we enterprise architects can’t help but keep making — all in an honest effort to keep the enterprise humming. By Peter Wayner Sep 21, 2023 9 mins Enterprise Architecture IT Strategy Software Development Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe