Posts by TomMariner

Nokia Experience

Love the unencumbered Nokia experience.

More Powerful than Google

Google, using pressure to stop dissent? How about a Democrat-front single-issue group threatening so much damage that Google instantly fired a guy who wrote an internal memo?

Can you imagine a group so strong they can get State Legislators to reverse a law they had just written? North Carolina representatives caved to a group more powerful than the whole State Government.

Google is a wimp next to our Activist / Protest groups.

MY Computer

You can have my Surface Pro 3 when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers. Actually my second -- I trashed the screen on my first and replaced it recently with ... a Surface Pro 3.

Portable, quick start, quick stop, and now plugged into my 34 by 15 monitor. Will soon take two seconds to disconnect it, and open it in a meeting at a client's office.

The article is correct -- the laptop makers would not pay attention to Microsoft's advice to build a Surface, so the software company did. Now Microsoft is now concentrating on Cloud, IOT, and SAAS. The rest of us ignore their advice at our peril. And once again Redmond will tell us "We warned you".

Failure to Commercialize

This five year project is the poster child for big projects by big organization with leaders chosen for skills other than getting a great idea to a shipping product. IBM took $40 million, Price Waterhouse $30 million and produced a laboratory mock-up at best.

The leader was connected, with impeccable credentials for healing, for teaching, but NOT for managing a firm with the stated aims of producing a product.

The guy us still a month from inauguration, all our IBM colleagues have to go on is Democrat Campaign rhetoric, and they are SURE the guy will insist on racism and all forms of discrimination.

IBM's management may want to make sure there is no discrimination in their workplace based on political party. I'm certain the great Thomas Watson would not have been in favor of that form of pre-judging either.

Politics

Thank you for the "inconvenient truth" that the temperature recordings being the highest ever is not scientifically sound.

But don't interrupt a political party while it grabs anything it can to get or stay in office. Ethics and truth do not belong in a one-way discussion of pseudo-science.

Activists

If we elect a Community Activist as our leader, do you expect something different?

Here's the drill "The ______ are unfair to you. I will punish them. vote for me."

Battle of Giants

VHS vs. Betamax redux. Big company clubs trying to grab the patents and market share and set exclusionary standards. All the big "clubs" / consortia will beat each other bloody purposely giving us non-compatible things on the IoT.

The only way is for a single individual or company to wade in with a great idea and capture the market before the lumbering giants can turn those guns around to snuff out that cheeky little newbie.

Sometimes I wish technical media would just shut about about an emerging system and continue the scintillating banter about Windows vs. IOS, MacBook vs. Surface.

You are reading this because a seven layer definition of networking emerged with IP Addresses and TCP/IP let us connect any computer to any computer. Think of the fun if for example ArcNet token passing had instead won.

Fruits of patent lawsuit

Before Apple gave its relations with its suppliers to its patent lawyers, Samsung would possibly have reserved the great resolution, great contrast screens now in the Tab for the iPad. Now, it is innovator against IP attorney -- Samsung is determined to win that billion bucks judgement back -- and sink the company that got it.

Yes, we deserve to protect those who innovate, but Apple launched a vendetta and deserves to reap one in return.

The Tab looks like a nice product, but Apple folks will stay Apple folks -- they aren't buying those patented rectangles because they are thinner or have better resolution.

Here come the taxes

The Internet was the only part of US communications that was not divided into little pieces, with the high prices augmented by taxes. The FCC just served notice that the US government will now extract their tribute from that vital segment as well. In the guise of "Maintaining Net Neutrality'" that existed before they stuck in their noses.

Skully

Yeah, do away with hat innovative figurehead -- How about John Skully -- he came from a non-techie background to guide Apple to within a few months of insolvency. But Wall Street loved him.

My bet is that once Carl Icahn gets through getting his greenmail from Apple, he will target Microsoft with his 'divide up the company and give the profits to me" strategy.

What surprise

Microsoft gaining is no surprise. Yes we all love the iPhone, Android, et. al. for the interesting apps that come from where we are, letting us communicate on the go and keeping up to date. But the last I heard, there were this things call computers that let us conduct business, organize, etc. There are only two real reasons we still use these smaller, but still bigger than a phone beasts -- a) bigger screens and keyboards and b) run Windows programs (or their clones in the Linux world).

As the Ubuntu Edge crowdsourcing $13 billion showed, there are folks who believe that in a year your phone will have enough power to run PC stuff. Yeah, Windows will gain here, that's why the guy who everybody love to hate, Ballmer helped his company develop a touchscreen OS. Laugh at Windows 8 when it comes from the tiny slab in your pocket to a convenient screen and keypad ... and runs Android and IOS.

Apples approach to IP

Microsoft's behind the scenes approach to earning their patent revenue is in stark contrast to Apples public, ego-filled, try to kill the competition actions.

Competition!

Ya gotta love two innovation juggernauts competing on ... innovation. And fans yelling insults at each other in forums like these means a ready market where "early adopters" are not tiny numbers.

It could be like most other products where finance guys cut better deals and marketing folks come up with clever names, colors and packaging. Yeah, that stuff is important, but for once 'Shoot the engineer and go to market" doesn't seem to win.

The US gave up!

Sorry Congress -- 40 years ago, the US was on track to bases and exploration of the moon by the end of the century. But we decided that instead we would divide up the nation's treasure with the fiction that throwing money at poverty and other perceived ills would work. Actually the federal government knew (and know) the fiction, but also knew that giving free stuff to somebody gets their votes.

Fortunately, China and other nations have read the US history that the "manned space race" was an economic driver and picked up the baton that was thrown down. So yes, there will be a "national park", but it won't be under the US Department of the Interior. But everybody in the US will be able to equally send congratulations to the country that does put their stamp on whole areas of the moon.