The popularity of the Eee PC netbook has reached even those industries which you wouldn't think would be impacted by such a nifty piece of hardware. Latest industry player to join the netbook craze is toy specialist store - Toys R' Us. But wait, we're not saying that the store would be releasing its own branded netbook, but rather starting Nov. 16, the toy specialist would soon be carrying the Eee PC under its Consumer Electronics assortment of products.

News had it that Toys R' Us will be selling four models of the Eee PC 900, with the store hoping to capture the younger market. Toys R believe that the Eee PC is a kid-friendly product, hence the decision to sell the said netbooks to its consumers who are predominantly toy-loving younger consumers.

To kick-off the introduction of the Eee PC to their product offerings, Toys R' Us will be conducting a comprehensive campaign that would include print and active in-store displays.

Via Twice.com

A post from the Asus Eee PC blog.

Toys R' Us to Sell Four Models of the Eee PC

I've been having plenty of bad Microsoft days lately. If you've been following the adventures of "Brad the boy who loves new toys" you know that I recently bought a new MacBook Pro to try - once again - to switch from a Vista box to a Mac. Since I'm writing this on my Vista desktop (with my beautiful 30" Apple Monitor) you can likely infer that the switch hasn't been going very well. Yup - I'm having bad Apple days also - mostly "using Exchange and Sharepoint on a Mac sucks rocks" days, which might actually still be classified as a bad Microsoft day with Apple as the collateral damage.

At BlogWorld Expo a few weeks ago, I was wandering the exhibition hall while killing time before my panel. I noticed a small Microsoft booth with Windows Live Writer on the monitor. I made a catty comment to the guy in the booth (something like "so - is it out of beta yet?") He recognized by name, grabbed me, and said "yup - I've got to show it to you."

I tried to run away, but I'd lost. "But I use BlogJet and am very happy. I tried to use Live Writer before and it was good, but sucked at a few things." The guy didn't give up. It turns out he's Charles Teague, who is the dev manager for Live Writer.

Charles made me stand there for a few minutes and tell him what I had trouble with in the past. I threw out a few things I vaguely remembered and he showed me the solutions. He then had me so he kept on demoing. As I saw more and more good stuff, I finally broke down and said I'd give it another try. It's free, so what the hell.

A month later I'm a complete convert and ready to uninstall BlogJet. Live Writer is fantastic, does what you want it to do, and even works seamlessly across Sharepoint (which we use extensively.) Plus, Charles reminded me of the passionate Microsoft product guys of yesteryear that I used to know and love. Keep it up Charles!

Any day now. The first detailed reviews are out Ben Kuchera has a great one up on Ars Technica subtitled I don't want to be a guitar hero, I want to be in a band. I hope mine shows up before Thursday so I can spend Thanksgiving playing in my new Keystone band. A new Mac, Rock Band, and a Kindle all kinds of fun toys to play with.

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