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6/3/2007 Free ideasFollowing up on my last Bill and Steve video post, I'm having fun making my way through a bunch of past TED Conference talks. If you haven't heard of TED, it's all about big ideas on technology, entertainment and design. I just watched a great talk about failures in modern civic design by James Howard Kunstler. Also highly recommend Hans Rosling with "the best stats you've seen" and Blaise Aguera y Arcas' talk about Photosynth software:
6/1/2007 TechI watched the Bill Gates and Steve Jobs show the other night. It reminded me why I love technology. It is a rare experience to hear business philosophies driven by such strong personality, ego, style and technical talent articulated by guys like these two -- in front of each other. I haven't ever been a big Apple fan but Steve was great and showed his genius. It is a great discussion.
9/11/2006 5 YearsI wrote about this day privately and now I can't find the file. So as with the rest of the ramblings on this blog, maybe this public record will help me sort out a thought or two and log them for some time.
It's important to me to remember what September 11 means. It's not about attaching anything to those acts that doesn't belong. Ze Frank makes that point well. Attacking us was no doubt a political statement, but my feeling is 90% of today's politics associated with September 11 does not belong.
I don't think it's necessary for everybody, but I watched this unedited, unmoderated, unscored, amazing 30-minute clip that spans the events of that morning. It's the first time I've focused on that day in a while. And it's healthy to put my mind back there. To remember what it means. To hear an innocent voice on the tape ask "What building is that?" at a time before the image of the World Trade Center was scarred into everyone's brain.
Basically (for me anyway) it's not about a Nic Cage drama vehicle or a presidential address. It's about people and how bad we can be and how good we can be.
The CEO of my company and another executive wrote about that day and, put simply, made the events more "speakable." While it's good for me to remind myself what that day was and is about, it's more important to look at it through a clear lens of words and thoughts and conversation. 8/14/2006 Satellite Maps for NYC!Haven't seen this mentioned from the source but... Long at last we New Yorkers enjoy high quality satellite photos of the best city on earth! But only if you live below 120th Street -- here's before and after:
6/8/2006 Melted RooftopsHere's a shot at Jonathan's latest blog entry...
In the middle of January there was snow on every neighboring rooftop but, from air conditioning exhaust required to cool their energy-hungry server room, their share of snow had melted?
1/16/2006 Windows Live MailI was invited by Microsoft to join its beta for the new Live Mail service, went through all the necessary sign-in steps, and BAM! Hit with this error message -- to my knowledge I don't fall into any of these categories:
UPDATE: Several folks from Microsoft contacted me to let me know this message also applies to customers who subscribe to MSN via partners. Makes sense, thanks for the follow-up! 11/3/2005 Windows Live MarketingI don't mean to downplay the importance of Microsoft's "Live" announcement, but I see it as organizational and product-marketing moves. Not so much as technological change, at least in the near-term.
Microsoft foreshadowed Tuesday's announcement when it brought MSN into its new Windows platform group in September. Now MSN will contribute its online goods to the Windows platform, and to a lesser extent to the Office platform.
So if today's MSN product is a Web-centric service or software (Messenger, VirtualEarth, Search, Hotmail, etc.) tomorrow's upgrade will bear a new "Windows Live or Office Live" moniker (depending on if it's for consumers or businesses). MSN Messenger becomes Windows Live Messenger; Hotmail becomes Windows Live Mail. On the other hand, if it's more or less a content property (MSNBC, MSN Money, etc.) it keeps its MSN branding.
That's product marketing and re-organization more than technological change.
As always Russ sums up the strategy so insightfully. Again, I'm not downplaying the importance of the "Live" move. But I can't stand these media reports that predict an online version of Windows hosted at live.com. It's not.
Windows Live is not going to replace Windows anymore than Xbox Live replaces Xbox.
The technological changes arrive later, and I'd argue they will target user-interface innovations primarily. There's a lot of potential change when you embed Microsoft's vast online linkage into its client software. I'm sure there's also a ton of potential DOJ attention.
The UI technological change the more interesting stuff, and I'll post later when I can collect my thoughts. Microsoft can learn a lot from the fresh take on interfaces from its Media Center experience, its Xbox console, and what similar consumer electronics companies are doing as well. 10/3/2005 Add Sun to the GoogleOS MixI'll keep this quick since I'm slammed with work. In August I speculated about Google and how well positioned it is to develop a massive distributed network that delivers all services to consumers using a thin-client model:
Given Jonathan Schwartz's latest post (another must-read for some of the most compelling business cases) I'm forced to revise my Google mix a bit:
1) Google can get away with using Java as an existing platform, instead of building a Linux distribution from the ground up. Similar to how they leverage IE and Windows as an existing platform for their increasingly functional sidebar/toolbar.
2) Move up the business stack and partner with Sun, not Intel. Sun will worry about the silicon (and other hardware, plus distribution) when it builds its thin-clients. Google need not get that deep.
3) OK, so no WiMax yet. But Om broke the news on Google's Wi-Fi testing in San Francisco, and that's close enough.
[...]
4) Profit. ;) Google sells more ads. Sun delivers StarOffice as part of a complete Java-based computing environment to anyone for a Google-subsidized, cut-rate annual cost. Shirk security concerns and obselecence. 9/7/2005 Influence of ODMsRussell Beattie is a sharp, sharp guy. I slightly disagree with his conclusion that Linux will be the mobile platform to beat in the next few years, but you can't beat Russ' well-formulated arguments. Error Message Madness IIIContinuing the saga of good error messages, I got this when writing this blog...
9/4/2005 OPML Import in Start.comThis is starting to look like a start.com blog, but given past complaints I did want to point out: OPML import does now work from NewsGator to the start.com page. Thanks guys -- impressively responsive.
Ideally each feed wouldn't create its own folder but I'd bet that's a function of how NewsGator structures its OPML as much as the import function Microsoft built.
So in the below screenshot, I'd want my "Software & Projects" folder to simply list the feeds themselves for Mozilla, Gaim, Start.com, KDE, etc. instead of an extra level of separate folders containing each feed.
9/1/2005 Out With the Old, In With the NewWith this update from the good folks at start.com, the experimental portal vaults into the coveted homepage spot for my laptop. It now sports an incredibly clean UI (they need to clean the weather and stock startlets so 'add city/add stock' is only visible when I want to do so), it remembers what stories I've already read, and it lets me add/subtract how many stories I see for each source (though it doesn't seem to remember many of those changes very well).
I will point out that my weak attempt at Web 2.0 troubleshooting went nowhere -- I had hoped that trackbacks and the like would eventually help my feedback find its way to the start.com team, but I don't believe it did. The OPML import from NewsGator still has those issues. So it goes, many thanks to the team regardless.
Here's a few things I'd love to see in an upcoming release:
Anyway, lots of nit-picking. Net-net, here's the proof: 8/26/2005 Breaking News PhotosI know some people in Fort Lauderdale and have been trying to follow Hurricane Katrina. I read all the news stories, but for me nothing relates the hurricane's impact like a photo.
So here's a twist on a recent post from the MSN Search bloggers -- it noted that news and media sites would be searched more frequently so breaking news would show up in search results moments after events happen.
There's a new company called Scoopt that apparently acts as a photo broker between the press and citizen-photographers. Sounds sketchy, how do you determine original source, etc...
Take the money out of the equation. Google/Yahoo/Microsoft should have a simple SMS number, like Google's '46645' tool, where anyone can send photos with a keyword or two plus their name. The photo is then uploaded, flickr-style, where they are naturally clustered around breaking news stories bearing similar keywords. The photos could be viewed chronologically to relate as-it-happens news -- or better yet, organized like text search results according to how many people are linking to them. The better news photos float to the top of the News Photos site. Videos too when the tech allows for easy sending via cell phone.
8/23/2005 GoogleOS + GoogleNet = Thin-Client for MassesGoogle filed with the SEC to pave the way for a follow-on stock offering potentially worth $4 billion. It surprises me Google would seek to raise this money so soon after its initial public offering, especially when it's generating huge free cash flow.
The official Google statement about what it will use the cash for is typically cagey. No real info. Here are some moves I think would be interesting:
1) Polish that Linux distribution everyone knows you're working on. Make sure it's far more user-friendly than other alternatives and boots quickly into a browser with hooks for all your Web services and applications. Don't name it Winoogle.
2) Partner with Intel. Work together to develop a chipset that taps the new resources tied to the GoogleOS. As Intel's competitors gain more leverage in the industry, Intel should cosy up to tomorrow's software behemoths. Also Intel should be happy to sell a ton more wireless chipsets and CPUs (see below).
3) Be the one company that has the guts to roll out a national WiMax infrastructure. It can really be any wireless broadband, but it's got to be fast to be able to access the massive distributed computer that Google already uses to run its search services. Charge next to nothing for access to GoogleNet.
4) Deliver to computer makers a neat bundle of silicon from Intel that's married to GoogleOS and GoogleNet services. This is kind of like a thin-client -- a simple embedded system whose functionality is driven by software and Web services from the massive distributed "server" that already runs Google's search service.
Computer makers like Dell could finally sell a super-cheap, super-efficient all-in-one computer with Internet access that's tightly integrated with a full package of consumer software and Web services. Consumers could buy a cheap computer that's essentially subsidized by Google's advertising revenue. Google taps millions more users for longer sessions with deeper advertising. Who loses?
Granted, I think there's a lot of value in Windows that Google would need to replicate in this quasi-thin client model and its work is far from done. Just thinking...
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