Microsoft is the first technology company in the country to achieve the landmark, accomplished through community partnerships and employee-driven reuse, recycling and composting programs. Among the efforts: Turning fry oil into biodiesel, using tableware completely made from plants and growing greens in hydroponic farms on campus.

Learn more at the Microsoft Green Blog.

Vanessa Ho
Microsoft News Center Staff

Players will explore snowy, extreme Alpine settings in eight new vehicles – including the 2016 Ford GYMKHANA 9 Focus RS RX – in new race events that have been specifically designed for spectacular mountain racing.

The Blizzard Mountain expansion for “Forza Horizon 3” is available separately, or as part of the “Forza Horizon 3 Expansion Pass,” which gives players discounted access to two expansions for $34.99. Ultimate Edition owners receive a $10 discount on the “Forza Horizon 3 Expansion Pass” if purchased before the end of 2016.

To learn more, visit Xbox Wire.

Suzanne Choney
Microsoft News Center Staff

“During the holiday season, many people around the world are busily planning some of their biggest and most meaningful meals of the year,” says Briggs. “But in many countries, hunger is a challenge all year-round, and over the next few decades, feeding our growing global population may become the biggest problem we’ve ever faced.”

All over the world, says Briggs, software developers, data scientists, agronomists and farmers are joining forces to address that question, using technology – and especially the cloud – to enhance food production, sometimes with very dramatic results.

To read his full essay on quantum computing and world hunger, visit the Transform blog.

Monica Fischer
Microsoft News Center Staff

Seattle-based Pioneer News Group, which owns 23 daily and weekly newspapers in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana and Utah, has begun selling Windows 10 tablets along with subscriptions. They’re preloaded with the uReporter app that lets subscribers not only read the news but report it too.

It’s an ambitious approach that has the goal of creating a new ecosystem to challenge global social-media sites through a hyper-local online community of residents and businesses, with the newspaper at its center.

“People still look to the newspaper for information, and it’s still valued,” says Pioneer Chief Operating Officer Eric Johnston. “If we can keep readers engaged, that’s part of the battle of keeping the newspaper a vibrant piece of the community, whether it’s in print or not.”

To read how Pioneer is living up to its name, read the full the story on the Transform blog.

Monica Fischer
Microsoft News Center Staff

After the turkey is gone, it’s time for fun with an exclusive Hearthstone tournament, a collaboration between Skype and One Nation of Gamers. Starting Monday, you’re invited to join the Skype Hearthstone Academy, featuring games, prizes and group chats with Kolento, StrifeCro, Zalae, Fr0zen and other big Hearthstone names.

Read more about “Skypesgiving” and the Skype Hearthstone Academy in the Skype Blog.

Vanessa Ho
Microsoft News Center Staff

With Xbox Live integration, you can sign in with your Xbox Live gamertag or Microsoft account, earn Xbox Live achievements and Gamerscore, compete with friends and continue the game on any Windows 10, iPhone, iPad or Android device.

Learn more at Xbox Wire.

Vanessa Ho
Microsoft News Center Staff

Integration issues are often “not discovered until the last minute, and this can drag the release,” Paliwal writes. “To the rescue, comes the micro-service architecture that provides a mechanism to break down the monolithic silos into distributed, loosely coupled, autonomous services that can be developed, tested and deployed independently.”

One of Microsoft’s DevOps partners, Bluemeric, recently announced its new version of goPaddle v3, an application lifecycle management (ALM) platform for micro-services that gives an integration-first approach where a micro-service architecture is created as the first step.

To learn more, visit the Microsoft Azure Blog.

Suzanne Choney
Microsoft News Center Staff

“This was a feature originally available only to VMs in Azure DevTest Labs,” Guo says. The feature helps customers quickly get “ready to test” in a “worry-free self-service environment.”

To learn more, visit the Microsoft Azure Blog.

Suzanne Choney
Microsoft News Center Staff

“In this new version of our A-Series VM’s we have raised the amount of RAM per vCPU from 1.75 GiB or 7 GiB of RAM per vCPU to 2 GiB or 8 GiB per vCPU,” Beck says. “We have also improved our local disk random IOPS to be 2-10x faster than that of our existing A version 1 sizes.”

The A_v2-Series is available in most regions and will shortly be available in all regions, Beck says.

To learn more, visit the Microsoft Azure Blog.

Suzanne Choney
Microsoft News Center Staff

Bing is collaborating with business owners and trusted partners to get accurate holiday hours in real time. When you search for local businesses, you’ll receive up-to-date changes for holiday hours.

Head over to the Bing Blogs to find out more.

Athima Chansanchai
Microsoft News Center Staff