Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was recently interviewed by The Seattle Times, and as always he had some interesting, if not controversial, things to say about what the software giant has been up to. He spoke about the KIN and its relation to Windows Phone, Google competing with Bing, and also mentioned Facebook.

When asked about KIN, Ballmer was quoted as saying "The No. 1 message from Kin is a message of focus ... and it just defocused activity from Windows Phone." Microsoft killed the KIN just a few weeks after the handsets started to ship. Meanwhile, Windows Phone 7 devices will start arriving next month in Europe and the month after that in North America.

Ballmer was happy with Google's CEO Eric Schmidt comment that Bing is the company's biggest competitor but he also had more to add: "Our maps are better, our images our better, our picture is different ... They're starting to look at the stuff we're doing and copying it back. What is it? Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery." Google tried to add background images, like Bing has, back in June 2010 but users didn't like the change.

When asked about how often he checks Facebook, Ballmer said "every day," and when the interviewer double checked, he followed up by saying "Oh, absolutely. I'm on Facebook every day." Microsoft has a good partnership with Facebook and is still strengthening it. Check out the whole interview for more on Ballmer's latest thoughts.