Do you like what you see? (Oh, and don't pretend that you don't Google, or at least Bing, yourself. We all do. It's only natural.)
Why on earth are we talking about this? Well, it's late August, and there's not much else to talk about. But, beyond that, The Wall Street Journal published an interview this week with Google CEO Eric Schmidt that had some interesting stuff in it.
Notably, Schmidt seems to think that those darn kids today will be entirely different people tomorrow -- or, at least, people with entirely different names. Quoth the journal:
"Mr. Schmidt is surely right, though, that the questions go far beyond Google. 'I don't believe society understands what happens when everything is available, knowable and recorded by everyone all the time,' he says. He predicts, apparently seriously, that every young person one day will be entitled automatically to change his or her name on reaching adulthood in order to disown youthful hijinks stored on their friends' social media sites."
Interesting. Sow your wild (online) oats as a kid and then run away from it all as an adult. What a concept; most of us have had to live with the real-world consequences (or rewards) of the behavior of our youth. The thought that today's kids will be able to have a stupidity-filled virtual youth that they can just jettison when they're in their 20s or 30s is pretty darn intriguing.
And what if those of us who are past childhood (at least in terms of age) are still doing stupid things online now? Is there a statute of limitations on this name-change thing? How many changes do we get? Thoughts to ponder...thoughts to ponder. Eric Schmidt, philosopher. Who knew?
Oh, and by the way, in the worst transition ever, here's a story about Google possibly releasing a Chrome OS tablet the day after Thanksgiving. Just so you know.
Have you ever done anything that made you want to change your name? And what would you choose for a new name? Rattle stuff off at [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/19/2010 at 1:23 PM1 comments
Here's a quick back-to-school pop quiz. Choose the best answer.
Intel is:
a) a chip maker
b) a software company
c) a security company
d) all of the above
As of this week, the best answer is d). Intel is buying McAfee for $7.68 billion. That's right; the 'tel in the famous Wintel partnership now has a massive security presence.
The chip maker has been more than a chip maker for a while now, boasting a growing software lineup. But the move into security breaks new ground for Intel. And it suggests that security might be moving to a new home as well: to hardware, in the chip layer, rather than just at the operating-system or application level.
More than that, though, Intel -- if it can succeed in swallowing a pretty big bite in McAfee -- now has a new revenue source that could help boost its flagging financials. It turns out that Intel's core product (so to speak) is a bit commoditized these days, and margins on chip sales aren't what they used to be.
So, Intel is diversifying, expanding and, in buying McAfee, leaving Symantec as the last true monster of the security game. And by doing all of this now, Intel is also giving us at RCPU something to write about in late August. (To figure out what we mean by that, check out the next newsletter entry, which we wrote Wednesday night...) For that, Intel, we thank you.
What's your take on Intel and McAfee? What does it mean for the future of security software? Send it to [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/19/2010 at 1:23 PM2 comments
Here's a pretty interesting story that (once again) pounds home a theme: Come up with long, complex passwords. Of course, our password for everything is "RCPU." Just kidding. Or are we...?
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/19/2010 at 1:23 PM0 comments
This is that 'Aurora' thing you've been hearing so much about. Or if you haven't, check this out.
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/19/2010 at 1:23 PM0 comments
This isn't exactly right in RCPU's wheelhouse (whatever that is), but Wired magazine's assertion that the Web is dead -- having given way to apps -- still makes for pretty interesting reading. Plus, there's a cool chart. Will we look back on the browser someday with faint nostalgia? Do we already?
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/18/2010 at 1:23 PM0 comments
So, this morning, when your editor saw an e-mail from his colleague, Jeff Schwartz, with "HP" in the subject line, he naturally thought, "Yes! Another Mark Hurd story! Thank you, HP, for this gift that keeps on giving."
Alas, Jeff's story was "only" about HP buying a company called Fortify, a security-software company that... Oh, never mind. Our heart's not in it. Just when news in the dog days of summer was starting to dry up like the Red Sox' playoff chances, Hurd came along like a cool rain on yet another 90-plus-degree day.
But this darn 24-7 news cycle is pretty unforgiving (Do you still remember who Steve Slater is?), so HP is back to making dull corporate news now. Whoopee. At some point, though, the tech giant will have to name another CEO. (Where have you gone, Carly Fiorina? Oh, to the U.S. Senate, maybe? That's weird.) Anyway, Jeff did a nice job with the Fortify thing, so give it a read while we at RCPU scour the Web for Perez Hilton-like stories about tech CEOs.
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/18/2010 at 1:23 PM0 comments
So, Internet Explorer is 15 years old, and here we were thinking, "Really, 15 years? Are you sure is hasn't been 20? Maybe 25?" IE seems about as fresh as that milk we accidentally left on the counter before we took a two-week vacation last summer.
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/16/2010 at 1:23 PM1 comments
So, Oracle has sued Google over the use of Java in Android, and man, is Larry Ellison and his fiefdom taking it on the chin.
It's bad enough, apparently, that Oracle seems to be killing OpenSolaris, a move that has helped earn the company the nasty little nickname "SCOracle" (plus a comparison to Darth Vader—and, as you might imagine, we're not finished with those yet).
No, the Google suit has vaulted Oracle into full...well, into full Microsoft mode as the tech company to hate. Ellison and his not-so-merry band are all about "ego, money and power" now (Really? Larry Ellison, ego?), and have "raised [their] game to Sith level" with the Google suit. (See, there's the other Vader reference, and we're sure that there are more. We didn't even bother looking for Star Trek-related anti-Oracle rants.)
But we at RCPU aren't vilifying Oracle, even if, to be perfectly blunt, it has never been RCPU's favorite vendor. Quite the contrary, in fact. We're glad that Larry Ellison is taking legal action to prove that intellectual property should have monetary value -- even if all Oracle did was buy the intellectual property by purchasing the company that developed it and, incidentally, didn't really seem to care what other vendors did with it. (Maybe that's why Sun went down with the Oracle buyout.)
Besides that, we love Larry's willingness to play the bad guy and, in doing so, possibly perform the impossible and Microsoft's flailing mobile operating system relevant again. Oh, yes. You see, there are a couple of spectators laughing and doing high-fives over this whole thing. (Well, OK, they're probably not doing high-fives, but they are laughing.) One is Apple -- maker of the iPhone and the most proprietary software company ever. Whatever hurts Android is good for the iPhone, generally speaking.
The other is Microsoft, which, first of all, must be glad that somebody else is taking a beating in the press for once. Beyond that, a possibly weaker Android could bring Windows Phone 7 and the whole, mostly convoluted, Microsoft mobile strategy back to prominence -- if it was ever there to begin with. Oh, and, as the last article linked above points out, instability for Java is a potential bonus for .NET development. Â Â Â
So, we're not here to compare Oracle to Darth Vader, Khan or any other sci-fi villain (especially since those are the only two we can think of). No, we at RCPU applaud Oracle for its litigiousness, no matter how unnecessary, ill-conceived and ridiculous it might be. Any partner who works with Windows Phone 7 probably feels the same way.
What's your take on Oracle's Java patent suit? Send it to [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/16/2010 at 1:23 PM12 comments
Mark Hurd, you sly devil, you. Not only did you hire a kind-of, sort-of adult actress as a "marketing consultant" of some sort, you also -- allegedly -- went behind your board's back to settle her sexual harassment claim. HP's board wanted to probe (don't make a joke...don't make a joke) the claim itself, but you took care of it on the down low -- according to the Wall Street Journal, anyway.
This story just gets better all the time, especially now that it has led to a fantastic round of "respectful" (always respectful, of course) sniping in the press about why Hurd really got canned. The New York Times claims to have gotten to the bottom of things (oh, don't make a joke...), but SiliconBeat, which we think is part of the San Jose Mercury-News, has shot back with a respectful "columnist, please."
Who's right? We don't care. We just hope that know-it-all insiders will keep arguing over this stuff so that we'll have enough RCPU fodder to get through the month of August. (By the way, HP, call me.)
Posted on 08/16/2010 at 1:23 PM1 comments
Yes! It's finally happening. We're finally doing it. We're going to let reader feedback slide into your inbox like that JetBlue guy zooming down the escape slide.
Why? Well, because we love you and we appreciate what you have to say. Also, it's the middle of August, and Google News's Sci-Tech section is serving up headlines such as "Iceberg Four Times Size of Manhattan May Hamper Atlantic Ships." OK, granted, that's not uninteresting, but it would be a stretch to comment on it as IT news.
So, as your editor waits for a call from HP, he's going to copy and paste some of the best of recent reader e-mails. Enjoy.
We start with Windows Phone 7, not to be confused with the successful Windows 7. We've been a little rough on the still-morphing OS, but reader Brad says that it might very well work for businesses:
"I appreciated your article on Microsoft's challenges in this area. I would point to the Xbox as a device that Microsoft got right in a hypercompetitive environment but these days, that too may be falling behind.
In my role, we need devices that are designed to play strongly in the enterprise, and while Windows Mobile 6.1 and 6.5 are very dated, they do work seamlessly with our network management tools, and that is important to us. The iPhone and Android devices, at this point, are trying to infiltrate the corporate world via consumers. BlackBerry and Microsoft are trying to play in both areas, which is very hard to do. The same features that users love are not often part of the business environment's needs.
The saga of Palm illustrates how quickly market ownership can shift. Just because a company owns market today does not guarantee that you can keep that position. Droid has some glaring security issues, and iPhones have their own challenges these days.
I doubt Microsoft will get high grades for Windows 7 mobile, if for no other reason than it is still trendy to take shots at them. But if they can use this as a launching point for a more aggressive feature build and release schedule, they 'should' be able to vault back into the market and grow their share."
Brad, you make some superb points. The mobile market is not the operating-system market. It's still wide open, and it shifts constantly. (Look at Android making a run at the iPhone.) Microsoft has made a lot of money by providing the easiest platform for businesses to work with, and if companies decide that Windows Phone 7 is the only mobile OS they'll allow in their environment then Microsoft will be sitting in the catbird seat again. Hey, it could happen.
The question remains, though: Which providers will carry Windows Phone 7 devices? We know that AT&T will, as some sort of "premier" provider. Wally shares our confusion as to exactly what that means:
"I don't understand the logic behind exclusive deals with providers. Would it have not been better for Apple if the iPhone goodness was spread to Verizon? I think you are right; 'premiere' means exactly squat -- I can't imagine Sprint, Verizon and T-Mobile not participating."
Wally, we couldn't have said it better. In fact, for once, we have nothing to add.
Add your voice to whichever discussion interests you at [email protected]. See, we really do run your e-mails!
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/12/2010 at 1:23 PM7 comments
We asked readers to send us features that they'd like to see in Windows 8 (back in June...ahem), and wow, did Jon respond. This e-mail so is worth reading, but it's really long, so we're not going to comment at the end the way we usually do. So, enjoy, gentle readers, thanks again for your participation, and we'll see you next week.
"Thanks for asking about readers' wish-lists for Windows 8.
- When you open and modify an attachment, then Return or Forward it, your edits should not die somewhere in Windows' large intestine. Simply relay the edits, as intuition would suggest, then also ask if the user wants to Save/Save As the document.
- Retain common (and lost!) keyboard shortcuts from Word, and then propagate them throughout Excel, Outlook and PowerPoint -- because those aren't just all Windows programs. They're all in the same SUITE, so a command that works in Program A should do the same in Program B!
- (E.g., in Word, ALT-O, P opens up the Paragraph formatting box. In Outlook, it's ALT-O, K, P.) There are many other inconsistencies. Standardize on Word, not Excel, as Word is most widely used.
- Any user-defined Autotype or AutoCorrect entry should work in any/every Windows program.
- Windows 8 should require every Windows-compatible program to contain an understandable, popup, functional description of itself and what it does! That will tell us what the heck we're affecting when we're clearing out junk with Remove Programs, or switching off/demoting running services.
- E.g., since I will never buy a tablet PC, I removed the 'Tablet PC' listing. But doing so deleted Microsoft's very useful "Snipping Tool"—because obviously only people with tablet PCs will ever want to snip, paste and store copies of parts of their monitor screens. Grrr.
- In Remove Programs, Microsoft's idiot meter advising you whether a program is used Frequently, Occasionally, Seldom or Never needs its digital head examined. I could do better counting hash-marks on my wall. I don't see how so simple a function could be bonkers, but it is.
- The Windows EasyTransfer function from old to new PC, from old O/S to new O/S, from Outlook Express (or its new equivalent) to the newer, grander versions should actually retain email contacts' addresses.
- For Office: Outlook should automate the quick de-duping of addressees after one's second or third botched-up import from EasyTransfer.
- All e-mail clients should contain a warning telling senders when their precious graphics are most likely to be stripped out or turned into Deadly Red X's. Whatever 'Magical Rules' control that e-mail emasculation, senders should be pre-advised before sending, enabling (perhaps) one to remedy one's unintentional offense.
- Microsoft shouldn't be so giddy-up eager to run small companies out of business by writing others' good ideas for Windows improvements into each new version of Windows. It's okay if a few small forest animals survive the meteor.
- In Windows Explorer (or whatever more-fashionable new name it may have), when I define a certain viewing configuration for a folder -- including column widths and size-shape of the Explorer window -- please stop telling me I must be foolish by ignoring my preferences and returning it to a Windows default view each new time I open it.
- In Windows Explorer, allow a user to apply a viewing configuration -- all of it, including column width and size-shape of the Explorer window -- to an entire tree by a top-down definition capability.
Thanks! I feel better already!"
So do we, Jon. So do we.
Posted by Lee Pender on 08/12/2010 at 1:23 PM8 comments