--The Wall Street Journal has some not-so-nice things to say about Seattle's BillMonk in its profile today of blogger Michael Arrington:

Some of the companies Mr. Arrington writes about are tiny and have questionable business models, like BillMonk, a company owned by Code Monks LLC that lets people use its online service to settle small debts between friends -- free of charge. The site may soon impose a small fee for fund transfers, though, and BillMonk co-founder Guarav Oberoi says he's confident the site will be successful. Mr. Arrington concedes he gets pitched about some "heroically dumb stuff," but he says many companies "deserve their moment in the limelight."

-- The Electronics Entertainment Expo has been significantly scaled down for next year to a smaller and more intimate video game trade show. But a second show just announced today promises to revive blustery theatrics of E3 next October. Organizers of the GamePro Expo show are predicting it will draw 30,000 attendees to Los Angeles -- that's about half of E3's attendance.

-- A new phrase, "Web science," enters the techie lexicon today with an announcement from MIT and a U.K. university that they plan to begin researching the field. The research will be led by Tim Berners-Lee, widely credited with creating the Web's basic infrastructure.
Web science will try to study the big picture of the Web, including social networks and the way people behave on the Web.

-- Mobile madness: Google upgrades its Gmail service for wireless phones, and YouTube says it wants to launch a service for mobile devices within a year.

Clearly Chinese censorship is a thorn in the company's side, even to the point of raising the issue with visiting Chinese President Hu Jintao in Seattle, but suggesting that means a pull out from China makes no sense.

Comments by a Microsoft lawyer in a BBC article today created a flurry of speculation over the company's plans.

The article quoted Fred Tipson, senior policy counsel, as saying the repressive environment might force the company to reconsider its business in China.

"Things are getting bad ... and perhaps we have to look again at our presence there," he was quoted as saying. "We have to decide if the persecuting of bloggers reaches a point that it's unacceptable to do business there."

It seems more a matter of posturing. Reading between the lines, the warning seems designed to show critics that the company has some backbone and signal to U.S. policy makers that imposing some regulation on doing business in China might not be a bad thing.

The company is finally starting to make headway there on another huge thorn in its side: lack of intellectual property protection. This week Microsoft signed a deal to license IP (fifth item) developed by its researchers in Beijing to two Chinese companies.

Perhaps patience and pressure will pay off on the censorship issue, too.

Tipson said later: "The Internet is transforming the political culture of China. There is no question about it."

Update: Microsoft issued a statement today saying Tipson's remarks were misconstrued: "Microsoft will continue to offer services and communication tools in China. Contrary to an inaccurate press account of Microsoft comments at the Internet Governance Forum, we are not considering the suspension of our Internet services in China.

"On the contrary, we believe it is better for customers if Microsoft is present in global markets with these tools and services that can not only promote greater communication, but can also help foster economic opportunity and societal advancement."

Update: The Wall Street Journal, citing people familiar with the situation, is reporting that the big announcement coming this afternoon is that Microsoft will partner with Novell to support the Suse Linux operating system, a direct competitor to Windows.

The Journal's story (subscription required) goes on to say, "The two companies have also agreed to develop technologies to make it easier for users to run both Suse Linux and Microsoft's Windows on their computers."

Original post:

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is scheduled to make an announcement of some kind this afternoon at 2 p.m. He'll be in San Francisco. We'll be on the line and will post an update posthaste.

Microsoft will Webcast it here, as well.

So, what's he gonna say? Well, we already know that Vista and Office 2007 are going out to businesses on Nov. 30. Maybe he'll repeat that for those of you who didn't hear it yesterday. Maybe he'll answer that other lingering question: When in January will Microsoft make these two big products available to the rest of us?