Andrew Lark

Exactly Stacy…

You are right to be concerned:

Efforts such as this one and Cisco’s tie-up with VMware and EMC concern me, as they seem to indicate that the big players are using cloud computing as an excuse to partner with one another. In creating optimized systems of the type that Microsoft and HP will focus on, the danger of vendor lock-in rises. Is optimization becoming code for proprietary?

Whine...

So I want to use my ATT calling card.  The number provided by the operator doesn't work.  The url on the back of their calling card leads to a dead page.  A search on the term "direct access number" - the language they use on the back of their card - yields a stupid, "tell us more about yourself" page.  Web incompetence at its finest.  Back to Skype.

Sharepoint...

Sharepoint is going to be a major force in Corporate blogging and participatory platforms.

Blogging in a SME is very different to blogging in a medium to large Enterprise where, for the most part, IT professionals primary role is PREVENTING employees access to the outside world. Under the guise of security, supportability and a dozen other "abilities" tons of tools that power participatory media don't stand a chance.

Sharepoint could be come a key enabling platform for driving participation on the web. Interesting to see the Newsgator announcement today - and that by Confluence.

NewsGator Social Sites enables easy discovery of the core element of collaboration within a business – seeing what colleagues within an organization are doing and making easy connections between people

Now That's Got To Hurt...

iPod bursts into flames in mans pocket. Which means, I guess, he has a hot pocket...

Safari on Windows... Oh dear....

Turns out that Safari on Windows has been engineered to provide a very typical Windows experience. It's buggy, slow, and unusable on some of the systems I've installed it on.

Is this acceptable? Steve seems to think so - it's beta after all. Sorry, that just doesn't cut it for me. If Apple we're to use the same excuse, I'd label is a lame cop-out. I'm wondering if one of the realities that Apple has run into here is the extreme diversity of the Windows world. Diversity breeds complexity.

There is a vast difference between beta and useable software that the mainstream user can test - say, Google docs. Until it gets to that stage, tech companies have a responsibility to not to unleash broken software riddled with security holes onto the unwitting public (or Enterprises for that matter). That's not what Apple's brand or product promise is. I love Apple and have a ton of Apple kit, but this is a really sorry attempt on the Windows platform.

And, frankly, where I could get it to barely work, I.E. 7 appears vastly superior on a number of fronts. In my testing it's just as fast, Livewriter and del.icio.us plug-ins work great, and the interface is as slick. The bad news here is that there are so many cool competitive options I simply choose to uninstall Apple - and they'll have to do something wonderful to get me back to using Apple Safari on Windows.

Steve, business is in perpetual beta mode - we just choose not to make all our customers suffer through it.

Nice Analogy

I enjoyed this post over at Always On from Ezra Roizen - nice analogy:

The startup game is often one of aerodynamics and drag. The number of factors working against a new company is almost infinite, and most companies are unable to ever really achieve lift-off. Beating “startup drag” takes nearly perfect aerodynamics: a beautifully designed product, brilliant marketing, financial acumen, the whole shebang—all in concert and accompanied by great timing (and a bit of luck). It’s tough to think of a substantial Internet company that didn’t have a pretty sleek and aerodynamic concept at the start. Google (search), eBay (online markets) and Amazon (online shopping) were all elegantly designed and implemented.

To get the aerodynamics right, almost all startups require a combination of time, money, and experience. Normally, getting off the ground takes an excess of at least one of those ingredients. Investment capital for rapid expansion can be a surrogate for time spent slowly building a business through operations—just as experience can be a surrogate for money, allowing the company to skip wasteful steps on the learning curve, and so on.

Verizon Sucks...

Our DSL router recently self destructed. You'd think replacing it would be relatively straightforward. A month or so later our new, upgraded, super-duper router is running and close to or below dial-up speeds. Verizon's pathetic effort to resolve this issue is only matched by their bizarre business processes. Here are a few gems:

1. They send us not one but two routers. One wired, one wireless. Aside from the cost of shipping two routers and resulting customer confusion, you'd think they'd have some kind of common and single device standard to streamline support. Nope.
2. They want the old router back, or they are going to charge us. I dutifully pack the old fella up and ship it back. But wait! A week later the old router comes back home with a note. Seems it is "too old" for them to accept back. "Too old"? Nuts! It doesn't even work.
3. Then the service starts running sloooooooow. Seems they downgraded our service for no apparent reason. Quick fix... but why? ESPECIALLY WHEN THEY ARE STILL CHARGING US FOR THE PREMIUM SERVICE!
4. Seems that didn't fix the connection speed anyway. Is still pathetically slow.
5. Every call to inquire about the status of our pathetic speed is greeted with the same mindless drivel. "Sir, I can't do anything until you... Unplug from the wall... Sit and Wait...Plug back in... Open browser... Ahhhhh... I see you have an open ticket... Let me put you through to someone else.... Sir, I know you are frustrated, BUT .... Unplug from the wall... Sit and Wait...Plug back in... Open browser... Ahhhhh... I see you have an open ticket... Ahhhhh... The problem seems to be at our end... I've noted this... We'll see if we can find the problem..." How do possibly expect to a) make customers happy, b) charge them for a service you are not delivering and, c) make money providing such repetitive and mindless service?
6. And now, to top it all off, even though we are sill at speeds well below our service level agreement they are claiming to have fixed the problem and there is nothing more they can do. There is something I can do and that is, not pay for the service!

Here's the rub though - in this age of bountiful choice, it seems the only choice for consumer DSL is to wander into town and use the hyper fast FREE service and our local coffee shop.

Technology Is Like Oxygen

... It's everywhere and we can't live without it. Imagine what happened this week when Blackberry service was interupted here in the US (thank god I was on a plane from Melbourne to San Francisco at the time!). As Dean points out, this wasn't the only service interuption of late:

Millions of BlackBerry users lost access to their messages early Wednesday. People filing their taxes electronically at the last minute overloaded Intuit's servers Monday and Tuesday.

We see technology breakdowns in a lot of places. The security communications system wasn't fast enough at Virginia Tech. The White House has lost some e-mails relating to the firings of federal prosecutors. In February, a glitch at Dow Jones made some jittery traders wonder if the stock market was crashing. Even Intel, the tech giant, has had trouble locating the e-mails of top executives for an antitrust trial.

So, if you don't have a back-up plan, you'd better get one...

Forrester can't stand up for falling down over iTunes

 THe Reg takes Forrester to task for wimping out on some terrific research into Apple's iTunes' sales growth:

Forrester says it wants the spin today to focus on other aspects of its research other than the 65 per cent drop. It can't quite agree on the spin - "growth has slowed" says researcher Remy Fiorentino while Josh Bernoff says sales have "levelled".

Bernoff is correct when he urges caution: we reported his warning not to extrapolate from a few quarters in our reporting - and put the 'collapse' in inverted commas. A 'collapse' it is indeed - few businesses can afford to ignore a 65 per cent in sales - but when married to the Neilsen data, we suggested that this brief era in the history of digital music may be drawing to a close - and the next one beginning.

It's a pity today that beseiged by parties who have vested interests, and their own agendas, Forrester wants to downplay the implications of its valuable work - and instead it finds itself doing crisis management on behalf of Apple.

Source: Forrester can't stand up for falling down over iTunes | The Register

They'll Get Over It...

It's been interesting watching Kiwi's get all excited about the arrival of iTunes. Much like I was when it first arrived. Today though. it's a different story. iTunes still does the syncing and I love using it to get at all those podcasts. But that's it. Seems I'm not the only one as iTunes remain flat in the US market:

“IPods are not sitting around generating dozens and dozens of transactions every quarter,” said Josh Bernoff, a principal analyst for Forrester Research. “People buy a certain number of songs, and then they stop.”

I'm also one of the few people that watch video on their iPod - the downloading is just painful but on planes or treadmills, nothing beats watching TED speeches or Blade...

Why? Maybe they get frustrated with the DRM as I did. OK, buying songs one at a time seems cool until you realize how many you've bought and how unportable, limited in use and incompatible (e.g. with Sonos) they are.

Then you get a Sonos with Raphsody at home and it's pretty much game over inside the house as I simply pay a small monthly fee for all the music we can eat. Just love it. I use Raphsody for sampling and then buy CDs on Amazon.

iTunes has become a terrific music storage and management platform for me. But its no longer a place I shop.