In what is perhaps a first for this software giant, the company is asking people to hold parties in their homes to showcase Windows 7, its latest operating system due to be launched on October 22.

Interested folk can register on this site called houseparty.com, an online party coordinating service. And if you are selected, the big incentive for you is a free Windows 7 Signature Edition. India is among 12 countries that have been chosen for such parties, an indication perhaps of the importance the market holds. The others include the US, Germany, the UK, France, Spain, Italy, Canada, Australia, Mexico, Hong Kong and Japan

Windows 7 is critical for Microsoft, given the poor response to Vista. The product has received generally good reviews from those who have tested the product.

Microsoft appears to have got the idea of a party from Firefox, one of the main rivals to its Internet Explorer browser. The Mozilla community, that develops the open source Firefox browser, used parties extensively for the launch of its version 3 in June this year. Guinness World Records credited Mozilla for officially setting a record for downloads in a 24-hour period (on June 17), 8,002,530 copies of Firefox.