Microsoft IPTV is now Microsoft Mediaroom

Microsoft announced today the availability of Microsoft Mediaroom, the IPTV platform.Microsoft IPTV is renamed as Mediaroom and added functionality.

Microsoft Mediaroom features several new capabilities including in-home personal music and photo sharing, dynamic multiple picture in picture capabilities and digital terrestrial television support.

Microsoft Mediaroom also provides Application Development Toolkit for developers and service providers to create compelling, revenue generating TV based applications to run on the platform.

“The Microsoft Mediaroom multimedia platform supports simultaneous recording of multiple high-definition and standard-definition TV channels.”

With this release it is clear that Microsoft wants to sit in each and every service. This looks to be an Apple TV killer with the digital media sharing capabilities.

Windows Live Folders and Windows Live Gallery

Microsoft announced today the availability of windows live folders beta and windows live gallery beta.

Windows Live Folders:

Windows live folders is a file storage service for users, currently 500Mb of space is available for storing files. Documents, Photos and Music can be uploaded to folders. Upload is through a form, you can login to the service at folders.live.com with your live ID and start uploading. Microsoft says that this beta is for testing and to get feedback on the service to better integrate in the future. According to them the service is available is US, but i could login to the with out any problem.

Windows Live Gallery:

Windows Live Photo Gallery is a stand-alone service that upgrades Windows Vista’s Windows Photo Gallery. Windows Live Gallery is freely downloadable and offers both Vista and XP SP2 users to share, edit and organize photos and videos. Windows Live Photo Gallery beta is available today in nine markets around the world so far (including the United States (English and Spanish), China, France, Germany, Great Britain, India, Japan, and Spain), with more to come.