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The InformationWeek July 2005 Archive « June 2005 | Main | August 2005 » |
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Bugs, Crime, And Punishment
Man, oh, man. This past week has been replete with one bug-filled, vulnerable moment after another. Vendors who weren't quashing bugs, or issuing antidotes, were setting out cash or good as same lures to track down even more bugs. The air was virtually thick with repellent and advice even as a counterevent, "What The Hack" conference, got under way. But the real excitement, it turns out, involved a critical vulnerability that not only wasn't fixed, but was actually made worse by the vendor involved, which in turn made matters even more difficult by attempting to censor a researcher who was trying to point out the fault in the fix. Adding to the drama is the fact that the vendor is industry heavy-weight Cisco, and the affected product its routers, which just happen to provide the underpinning of much of the nation's critical infrastructure. Man, oh, man, all right. Especially since, as it turns out, the researcher was right.
Continue reading "Bugs, Crime, And Punishment..."
California: Good At Technology, Stinks At Pizza
Why can't you get good pizza in California?
I lived in the Bay Area for 18 years and ordered many pizzas from Silicon Valley up to the Golden Gate. My experiences ranged from the limp and uninspired to doughy pies coated with an industrial layer of "cheese" and soggy toppings thrown haphazardly on top.
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Wanna Be A Certifiable Linux Geek?
This just flew over my transom: At LinuxWorld in San Francisco next month, the Linux Professional Institute will offer free or really cheap Linux certification testing to all takers:
Continue reading "Wanna Be A Certifiable Linux Geek?..."
Cisco Security Presentation Leaked To Web
Boing Boing says this is the security presentation that Cisco sued Michael Lynn to suppress, describing serious security flaws in Cisco routers. Cisco and Lynn settled the lawsuit yesterday.
The Future Of Content
There's a whole time-shifting aspect to content; people choose to see what they want to see, when they want to see it. If you want proof that we're in the midst of an on-demand revolution, check out the popularity of digital video recorders such as those sold by TiVo Inc., as well as mail-order movie house Netflix Inc. If you want proof that on-demand content is changing the news and entertainment business, check out InformationWeek's News Show or how much movie-rental monument Blockbuster has changed in the past year--a new perspective on late fees, plus a home-delivery service. What's next? Log on and find out.
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The First Open-Source Keyboard
I enjoyed Bill O'Brien's piece on new and interesting input devices over at Personal Tech Pipeline. But he missed what may be coolest thing to happen to a keyboard since, well, since there have been keyboards: Artemy Lebedev's Optimus.
When I first laid eyes on this thing about a month ago, I knew I had to have one. Why? If you have to ask, then I can't explain.
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Safeguard Podcasts Now, While The Technology Is New
Brian Livingston posts details on how a podcast might infect a PC. He writes: "Podcasts threaten to become another automated way hackers can put viruses and spyware onto your computer. As we all know only too well, Microsoft Word begat macro viruses, Microsoft Outlook begat e-mail viruses, and Internet Explorer begat ActiveX viruses."
Continue reading "Safeguard Podcasts Now, While The Technology Is New..."
Son Of 'Geek News Of The Weird'
My colleague Mike Elgan has a playful geek blog, The Raw Feed. He's been on a roll the past 24 hours:
If I had more money (and more space on my desk), I'd definitely start a collection of goofy USB drives. My favorite so far: A USB drive that looks like a tiki idol, complete with glowing eyes. It'd go ever so nicely with my tiki-head cover for a box of facial tissues (the tissues come out through the nose).
Mike is editor of Personal Tech Pipeline.
I am by no means qualified for the BeautifulPeople network, but when they start a network for people who are uglier than Ernest Borgnine, I'm so there.
Innovation In The Eye Of The Beholder?
After 20-something years in this business, I've pretty much given up making any (public) predictions about which new technology is going to fly. Some things I think are useful or at least cool seem never to pass muster with IT-ers, when other things I'm scratching my head over turn out to be best-sellers.
Still, this lack of pundit-ability doesn't keep me from wondering how the newest industry wares will fare. This week, much has been written about Microsoft's newest operating system, Vista, and I'm curious: what will it take you, the IT decision-makers and implementers, to decide to go this route?
Continue reading "Innovation In The Eye Of The Beholder?..."
The Downside Of Compliance
Please don't get me wrong. I realize that regulatory compliance is needed. Procedures are necessary to ensure data integrity and proper retention of critical information to protect consumers and businesses, too. Regulatory compliance has even spurred positive changes for companies, customers, and vendors by forcing the assessment of policies, procedures, and infrastructure. But there's a level of complexity that compliance adds to business processes that's difficult to foresee.
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Weird News For The Wired: Part II
It's summer. The tide is high, the humidity unrelenting, and the news keeps producing more twists as the weeks roll by. For your summer reading, I offer up a quick tour of some of the more recent weird news for the wired:
Talk about hiking up the distraction meter. Motorola has teamed up with Oakley on a combination sunglasses/cell-phone headset targeted at hands-free driving. Supposedly, you can cut the glare while chewing the fat safely. I dunno, you still have to take your hands off the wheel and fiddle with small buttons--now dangerously near your line of vision. And at $295, these glasses should offer X-ray vision, or at least a video link to whomever is calling. Already I can see a major drawback looming on the horizon--figuring out where you left the darn things.
Continue reading "Weird News For The Wired: Part II..."
Why Focus On Viruses Here?
You might wonder, as do some of my colleagues here at Techweb, why I’ve given so much space to coverage of ClamAV, the open source anti-virus filter technology. This is, after all Messaging Pipeline, and our focus here is on e-mail, instant messaging, and technology that promotes collaboration through messaging systems. Well, the answer is simple: virus transmission is a messaging phenomenon! In simple terms, we would not have the plague we have today without e-mail and instant messaging systems capable of wreaking havoc on a worldwide basis at the mere press of a button that sets off a virus transmission campaign.
Continue reading "Why Focus On Viruses Here?..."
Why Focus On Viruses Here?
You might wonder, as do some of my colleagues here at Techweb, why I’ve given so much space to coverage of ClamAV, the open source anti-virus filter technology. This is, after all Messaging Pipeline, and our focus here is on e-mail, instant messaging, and technology that promotes collaboration through messaging systems. Well, the answer is simple: virus transmission is a messaging phenomenon! In simple terms, we would not have the plague we have today without e-mail and instant messaging systems capable of wreaking havoc on a worldwide basis at the mere press of a button that sets off a virus transmission campaign.
Continue reading "Why Focus On Viruses Here?..."
Bloggers Weigh In On India Torrents
Through yesterday and today, parts of India have been hit by what can only be described as rainfall of Biblical proportions.
The city of Mumbai received three feet of rain yesterday. Some major IT outsourcing vendors, including Infosys and Wipro, have closed development centers in the affected areas.
At least one blog out of of India is capturing the experience of those affected by the torrents.
Global Shift: China Displacing U.S. In Engineering And Science, Paper Says
Further evidence that America's dominance in engineering and science is diminishing can be found in a working paper by a noted Harvard University economist.
Continue reading "Global Shift: China Displacing U.S. In Engineering And Science, Paper Says..."
At Least They're Not Linux Vendors
Microsoft is promoting the success of a company that migrated to Windows Server 2003. One problem: The company, Hong Kong-based GoldQuest International Ltd., is being investigated in Sri Lanka by police and the Central Bank for operating a pyramid scheme.
This page on Microsoft's website explains how Hong Kong-based GoldQuest International Ltd made big savings by moving to Windows Server 2003. The page proudly trumpets GoldQuest's achievements and "500,000 active customers in 120 countries"."GoldQuest has grown into a ecommerce powerhouse, generating 70 per cent of its $200m annual turnover online," the page gushes. Microsoft claims it has saved the company $82,000 a year in IT costs and helped it increase revenue by $10m a year.
(Via Fark.)
Another Scourge Menacing America's Youth
Steven Johnson, author of "Everything Bad Is Good For You," has a fascinating article calling for common sense in the furor over the video game "Grand Theft Auto." It starts provocatively enough, as an open letter to Hillary Rodham Clinton:
I'm writing to commend you for calling for a $90-million study on the effects of video games on children, and in particular the courageous stand you have taken in recent weeks against the notorious "Grand Theft Auto" series.I'd like to draw your attention to another game whose nonstop violence and hostility has captured the attention of millions of kids — a game that instills aggressive thoughts in the minds of its players, some of whom have gone on to commit real-world acts of violence and sexual assault after playing.
I'm talking, of course, about high school football.
(Via Boing Boing.)
Music Pirates Buy More
British researchers found that people who illegally share music files online spend 4-1/2 times as much on legal music downloads as do their law-abiding counterparts.
The British Phonographic Industry said piracy needs to be met with a carrot-and-stick approach--punishment to stop illegal file sharing and inducements to participate in legal services. (Via Boing Boing.)
InterBase: What Was The Chance...
My last column raised as many new questions as I had when I researched it. This one concerns the back-door login that had been compiled into Borland's InterBase code. If anyone knows the answer, or knows someone who might, give me a shout.
Continue reading "InterBase: What Was The Chance......"
Embrace, Extend, Annoy
Years ago, I spent enough time dealing with both Quark and its customers to get the gist of that company's end-user support philosophy: sit down, shut up, and do as you're told -- please.
Continue reading "Embrace, Extend, Annoy..."
Shake 'N Bake Your RSS Feeds
FeedShake lets you merge multiple RSS feeds, then sort and filter them. (Via LifeHacker.)
Google-ize Your Logo
Just for the fun of it: Logogle takes whatever text you input and makes it look like the Google home page. Like "InformationWeek," for instance. (Via Boing Boing and elsewhere.)
The Internet Worm
Earlier this afternon, I got an interesting email from Bill Whiting, a Linux Pipeline newsletter subscriber. After reading my editor's note -- also availble on the site as today's column, "Analyze This!" -- Bill wrote to suggest that Borland and Cisco might, in fact, have some prominent open-source company: Sendmail, courtesy of a once-infamouse worm that came simply to be known as "The Internet Bug."
Continue reading "The Internet Worm..."
Find Cell Towers With Google Maps
The popular blog BoingBoing pointed to a site today that combines cell phone tower location information registered with the FCC with Google Maps, enabling you to look zero in on cities and see where the towers are. Can you hear me now?
The Changing Threat
The days when distributed computing just meant users on different floors sharing the same server are long gone. Thanks to the advent of IP, wireless, and a host of security technologies that have expanded the bounds of the enterprise, a distributed corporate network can wrap around the block or around the world. With that expansiveness comes an incredible flexibility that has spawned entirely new business models.
But face it, for all the benefits that accessibility extends to the enterprise, networks are also more vulnerable to outside threats ranging from nuisance Trojans to devastating category 5 viruses. The end result is more stress for system administrators tasked with protecting network resources, guarding data integrity, and ensuring optimal network performance. These incidents can derail company operations for hours or longer, costing businesses time and money. They also can potentially do far worse, robbing companies and government agencies of classified information and threatening the very existence of that business or public sector entity.
Continue reading "The Changing Threat..."
The Changing Threat
The days when distributed computing just meant users on different floors sharing the same server are long gone. Thanks to the advent of IP, wireless, and a host of security technologies that have expanded the bounds of the enterprise, a distributed corporate network can wrap around the block or around the world. With that expansiveness comes an incredible flexibility that has spawned entirely new business models.
But face it, for all the benefits that accessibility extends to the enterprise, networks are also more vulnerable to outside threats ranging from nuisance Trojans to devastating category 5 viruses. The end result is more stress for system administrators tasked with protecting network resources, guarding data integrity, and ensuring optimal network performance. These incidents can derail company operations for hours or longer, costing businesses time and money. They also can potentially do far worse, robbing companies and government agencies of classified information and threatening the very existence of that business or public sector entity.
Continue reading "The Changing Threat..."
In The Chips
Today's news from several chip/processor bellwethers ranks among the most encouraging developments -- for the industry and its customers -- that we've seen in the post-bubble IT economy:
Continue reading "In The Chips..."
Privacy: Not Just Less, But Different
Our expectations about privacy aren't just lowered, they're also changed. We not only expect more surveillance, but we think differently about privacy than we used to. And those changes are only going to accelerate.
In the wake of the July 7 London attacks, elected officials in the U.S. are starting to call for more surveillance cameras to monitor streets and other public spaces for suspicious activity. Not too long ago, I would have bristled at this, seeing it as an invasion of privacy. Now, not so much. After all, they're talking about putting the cameras in public spaces. The very definition of a public space is that it's a place where you have no expectation of privacy. That's why they call it "public."
Continue reading "Privacy: Not Just Less, But Different..."
A Rose By Another Name . . .
A brief article on TechWeb says Microsoft registered domains related to several potential real names for Longhorn before it settled on Windows Vista.
Apparently the company considered calling it "Windows '07" because it registered "windows07.us" and "windowsseven.us." Maybe wiser heads decided that was risky at both ends -- it would mean they'd have to ship it before the end of 2007, which right now doesn't look like a sure thing, and in the out years, "Windows '07" is going to sound old-hat. Doesn't just hearing "Windows '95" fill you with nostalgia for the good old days when things were simpler, before phishing and trojans and vulnerabilities and Service Packs and all that other stuff?
Continue reading "A Rose By Another Name . . ...."
A Rose By Another Name . . .
A brief article on TechWeb says Microsoft registered domains related to several potential real names for Longhorn before it settled on Windows Vista.
Apparently the company considered calling it "Windows '07" because it registered "windows07.us" and "windowsseven.us." Maybe wiser heads decided that was risky at both ends -- it would mean they'd have to ship it before the end of 2007, which right now doesn't look like a sure thing, and in the out years, "Windows '07" is going to sound old-hat. Doesn't just hearing "Windows '95" fill you with nostalgia for the good old days when things were simpler, before phishing and trojans and vulnerabilities and Service Packs and all that other stuff?
Continue reading "A Rose By Another Name . . ...."
Outsourcing To (Native American) Indians
While the contracting of IT and business-process work to India is hardly news these days, here's an example of Indian outsourcing that is, well, a little different.
Continue reading "Outsourcing To (Native American) Indians..."
Russian Spammer Murdered
Russian news site MosNews.Com reports that infamous Russian spammer Vardan Kushnir was found dead in his apartment on Sunday, having been apparently beaten to death.
Kushnir reportedly headed several companies, including the Center for American English, the New York English Centre, and the Centre for Spoken English, that sent significant amounts of spam in Russia. According to Wikipedia.org, the "American Language Center was the most prominent and the most famous spammer in Russia around 2002-2003."
Continue reading "Russian Spammer Murdered..."
Avian Flu, Sweaty Shirts, And Love-Struck Bloggers At The Stanford Summit
Things got wild and wooly at Stanford University last week when tech author, supply-sider, and former Nixon speechwriter George Gilder squared off against Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers director and Sun Microsystems co-founder Bill Joy on a panel discussion on whether technology is making us safer. While parsing such sunny topics as bio- and nuclear terrorism, Gilder and Joy turned the panel at the Stanford Innovation Summit into a raucous, chaotic, hourlong slugfest of theories and barbs, while moderator Paul Saffo's role morphed into referee and third panelist Jaron Lanier hung on for the ride.
Continue reading "Avian Flu, Sweaty Shirts, And Love-Struck Bloggers At The Stanford Summit..."
Two Mergers, Two Circumstances, Two Results
Acquisitions and mergers are a sometimes-wonderful, sometimes-painful fact of enterprise life, and they tend to happen at two distinctly different times in the life of an industry and in the lives of companies in that industry: at the beginning, and at the end. At the beginning, companies that are growing in related, but distinct arenas of a growing industry can often find growth-giving synergy by merging their technological, intellectual, and manufacturing assets. At the end, companies that are no longer growing in the same area of an industry that is no longer expanding, merge in order to survive by sheer numbers -- they think that if only they can get bigger in sales, in employees, in profits, they'll survive.
Continue reading "Two Mergers, Two Circumstances, Two Results..."
Two Mergers, Two Circumstances, Two Results
Acquisitions and mergers are a sometimes-wonderful, sometimes-painful fact of enterprise life, and they tend to happen at two distinctly different times in the life of an industry and in the lives of companies in that industry: at the beginning, and at the end. At the beginning, companies that are growing in related, but distinct arenas of a growing industry can often find growth-giving synergy by merging their technological, intellectual, and manufacturing assets. At the end, companies that are no longer growing in the same area of an industry that is no longer expanding, merge in order to survive by sheer numbers -- they think that if only they can get bigger in sales, in employees, in profits, they'll survive.
Continue reading "Two Mergers, Two Circumstances, Two Results..."
Why Kids Aren't Getting Into IT
I am a huge admirer of Bill Gates. I think he's one of the towering great figures of the past 150 years or so, ranking with Franklin Roosevelt, Thomas Edison, and the Wright Brothers. But occasionally, the man does utter some monumentally stupid things.
I'll come back to that thought momentarily. But first, I want to talk about a classic science-fiction story called "Press Enter," by John Varley.
Continue reading "Why Kids Aren't Getting Into IT..."
Bye-bye Longhorn, Hello Vista
This just in: Redmond, Washington, July 22, 2005 -- Today Microsoft Corp. announced the official name of its next-generation Windows client operating system, formerly code-named "Longhorn:" Windows Vista.
And the delivery date of Beta 1, targeted at developers and IT professionals, has been officially pegged for August 3. Get those fingers on the download buttons.
Official marketing slogan: "Bringing clarity to your world."
Official Web site: //www.microsoft.com/windowsvista.
Bye-bye Longhorn, Hello Vista
This just in: Redmond, Washington, July 22, 2005 -- Today Microsoft Corp. announced the official name of its next-generation Windows client operating system, formerly code-named "Longhorn:" Windows Vista.
And the delivery date of Beta 1, targeted at developers and IT professionals, has been officially pegged for August 3. Get those fingers on the download buttons.
Official marketing slogan: "Bringing clarity to your world."
Official Web site: //www.microsoft.com/windowsvista.
Technology: Can't Leave Home Without It
As my wife, Laura, and I head north to Quebec for a vacation in a few weeks, we'll have a traveling companion: a laptop PC. We aren't alone. Lots of people bring their laptops on vacation.
Continue reading "Technology: Can't Leave Home Without It..."
More Bureaucracy Doesn't Solve Security Problems
Bruce Schneier points out that neither a Virginia proposal to require more paperwork for driver's licenses, nor REAL ID, will solve the problem of people getting phony driver's licenses. "Several of the 9/11 terrorists had Virginia driver's licenses in fake names. These were not forgeries; these were valid Virginia IDs that were illegally sold by Department of Motor Vehicle workers," he notes. Meanwhile, the REAL ID program will cost $100 million in the state of Pennsylvania alone.
The best locks in the world won't stop a burglar who knows a guy on the inside who will let him in.
Snowball, Welcome To Hell
I knew we wouldn't hear much about the usual suspects -- Symantec, McAfee, etc. -- when I set up this week's poll. But it's still interesting to see just how little these products matter to you : Out of about 100 votes so far, just one person says they use proprietary anti-virus sotware on their open-souce desktop system.
Continue reading "Snowball, Welcome To Hell..."
Keeping Tabs On RFID
Surprise! The early adopters of RFID are not all giant retailers and manufacturers. In fact, while many of these companies quietly run their pilot tests, RFID seems to be moving fastest into the people-tracking realm, and most especially in the area of monitoring children.
Continue reading "Keeping Tabs On RFID..."
Google Shoots The Moon
Google engineer Larry Schwimmer today announced the arrival of Google Moon, a lunar version of the map technology seen on Google Earth.
This is one small step for Google, one giant leap for lunar location-based marketing.
Continue reading "Google Shoots The Moon..."
John Roberts: A Supreme Choice For Business?
Odds are that John Roberts could become one of the most pro-business associate justices on the Supreme Court; he has all the right conservative and business-law credentials. But if I were a gambler, I'd be very careful how much to wager on that happening.
Continue reading "John Roberts: A Supreme Choice For Business?..."
Bill Gates Wants You -- Maybe
Bill Gates wonders why more students don't go into computer science. Salaries and job openings are on the rise, he says. Why heck, Microsoft can't hire as many people as it needs, he says.
Yesterday Hewlett Packard said it would lay off 14,500 people. Maybe that should give him a clue. Out here in the real world, computer jobs are still hard to come by, and really good computer jobs have just about become extinct since the Internet bubble burst in 2001.
Gates was speaking at Microsoft's Research Faculty Summit event in Redmond. Also on the podium was Maria Klawe, Princeton University's dean of engineering and applied science. Klaw said students she talks are afraid of computer science jobs -- afraid they would doom them to isolating workdays fraught with boredom -- nothing but writing reams of code.
Continue reading "Bill Gates Wants You -- Maybe..."
Bill Gates Wants You -- Maybe
Bill Gates wonders why more students don't go into computer science. Salaries and job openings are on the rise, he says. Why heck, Microsoft can't hire as many people as it needs, he says.
Yesterday Hewlett Packard said it would lay off 14,500 people. Maybe that should give him a clue. Out here in the real world, computer jobs are still hard to come by, and really good computer jobs have just about become extinct since the Internet bubble burst in 2001.
Gates was speaking at Microsoft's Research Faculty Summit event in Redmond. Also on the podium was Maria Klawe, Princeton University's dean of engineering and applied science. Klaw said students she talks are afraid of computer science jobs -- afraid they would doom them to isolating workdays fraught with boredom -- nothing but writing reams of code.
Continue reading "Bill Gates Wants You -- Maybe..."
Wi-Fi On The Road Leaves A Lot To Be Desired
Despite its unpredictable, frustrating nature, wireless Internet access has become more than just a nice perk available at some savvy hotels. It has become downright necessary to compete for corporate travel business. But based on my experiences with wireless while traveling, there really isn't any reason to rush just yet.
Continue reading "Wi-Fi On The Road Leaves A Lot To Be Desired..."
Is No News Good News For HP And Customers?
The announcements by new CEO and president Mark Hurd on Tuesday focused almost exclusively on operational efficiencies, primarily in the form of a 10% workforce reduction, and signaled to customers and other observers that the company has no plans to jettison product lines or businesses.
Continue reading "Is No News Good News For HP And Customers?..."
Two Versions of Vista?
I read over the list of feature that Microsoft is promoting in the first official beta-test release of Windows Vista (the OS formerly known as Longhorn) and was struck again by how little personal interest I had in them: the article mentions "user account protection services, simplified corporate image deployment, secure startup for protecting laptops and a Windows System Assessment Tool to analyze performance."
I run two PCs and a couple of laptops on a wireless network. I don't think I could be less interested in any of those features. But I know if I asked a dozen corporate IT managers what they wanted in an OS I'd hear that list read back to me 12 times.
I also know I'm going to have the megabytes of code and undecipherable registry entries those features require on my hard disk sooner or later. I know that some of it will cause me hours of trouble and lost productivity as I try to untangle default settings that keep me from doing what I want to do on my PC.
Continue reading "Two Versions of Vista?..."
Two Versions of Vista?
I read over the list of feature that Microsoft is promoting in the first official beta-test release of Windows Vista (the OS formerly known as Longhorn) and was struck again by how little personal interest I had in them: the article mentions "user account protection services, simplified corporate image deployment, secure startup for protecting laptops and a Windows System Assessment Tool to analyze performance."
I run two PCs and a couple of laptops on a wireless network. I don't think I could be less interested in any of those features. But I know if I asked a dozen corporate IT managers what they wanted in an OS I'd hear that list read back to me 12 times.
I also know I'm going to have the megabytes of code and undecipherable registry entries those features require on my hard disk sooner or later. I know that some of it will cause me hours of trouble and lost productivity as I try to untangle default settings that keep me from doing what I want to do on my PC.
Continue reading "Two Versions of Vista?..."
Your Tax Dollars At Work
The latest brainstorm from Capitol Hill is that American taxpayers should be denied access to information that we've already paid for with our tax dollars, because it's better that we should pay even more money to private companies before we can get access to the information. Not only does the legislation waste taxpayer money, but it also might kill people.
Continue reading "Your Tax Dollars At Work..."
Dumb As A Bag Of Hammers
Startup Blue Security is now the second vendor to enter in the thrill-packed contest for Dumbest Technology of 2005.
Blue Security introduced technology to hit back at spammers. When Blue Security receives spam, it follows the links contained in the message, looks for forms that accept text, and then automatically fills out the fields with messages demanding that the recipient's e-mail address be removed from the spammer's list.
The goal is to overwhelm the spammer with the volume of complaints.
Blue Security's idea is so monumentally crazy it makes Michael Jackson look sane.
Continue reading "Dumb As A Bag Of Hammers..."
U.S. Needs India For More Than Just Outsourcing
Today's meeting between President Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in Washington provides an opportunity for a big picture look at India's growing importance to America. What's quickly apparent is that efforts to limit the outsourcing of IT work to that country would be damaging to U.S. interests.
Continue reading "U.S. Needs India For More Than Just Outsourcing..."
Beta-Testing the Marketing?
The first official beta-test version of Microsoft's Longhorn, the next version of Windows, will omit several of the sexier features the company has been honking its horn about for the last six months -- and that throws the spotlight on what is going to be in the beta -- IT features such as user account protection services, simplified corporate image deployment, secure startup for protecting laptops and a Windows System Assessment Tool to analyze performance.
This news carries a message Microsoft needs to get out to its real customers: Longhorn is an OS to make managers' lives easier. If the company is going to have a prayer of convincing corporate customers to switch from Windows 2000 to Longhorn it's going to have to convince corporations that Longhorn is a manageable OS. So far it hasn't stressed this point. The beta marks a new, perhaps more focused management of the product. So far Longhorn has been a camel (a camel, you'll recall, is a horse created by a committee) -- overloaded with confusing features and proofs-of-concept code that has had a definite "hey, gang, let's put on an operating system!" feel about it. It looks like the freewheeling open-audition period is over and Longhorn is getting pared back to the feature set that Microsoft thinks will make the product a thoroughbred.
Beta-Testing the Marketing?
The first official beta-test version of Microsoft's Longhorn, the next version of Windows, will omit several of the sexier features the company has been honking its horn about for the last six months -- and that throws the spotlight on what is going to be in the beta -- IT features such as user account protection services, simplified corporate image deployment, secure startup for protecting laptops and a Windows System Assessment Tool to analyze performance.
This news carries a message Microsoft needs to get out to its real customers: Longhorn is an OS to make managers' lives easier. If the company is going to have a prayer of convincing corporate customers to switch from Windows 2000 to Longhorn it's going to have to convince corporations that Longhorn is a manageable OS. So far it hasn't stressed this point. The beta marks a new, perhaps more focused management of the product. So far Longhorn has been a camel (a camel, you'll recall, is a horse created by a committee) -- overloaded with confusing features and proofs-of-concept code that has had a definite "hey, gang, let's put on an operating system!" feel about it. It looks like the freewheeling open-audition period is over and Longhorn is getting pared back to the feature set that Microsoft thinks will make the product a thoroughbred.
Survey: M&A Activity Good For SOA Marketplace
We have the results of two recent polls from SOA Pipeline for you this week. The first was prompted by Sun's snapping up of SeeBeyond to strengthen its SOA hand; we asked if mergers and acquisitions are good or bad for the industry, and you overwhelming said that they were good. A full 70 percent of respondents agreed with the statement that "Mergers and acquisitions are good for the SOA market, they strengthen the resources behind critical technologies." Only 30 percent agreed with the statement that "Mergers and acquisitions are not good for the SOA market, they weaken competition and threaten innovation."
The second poll was about SOA initiatives and open source. We asked how important open source was to your SOA efforts, and almost half (47 percent) said open source was "very important." Twenty percent said open source was "moderately importantly"; and 33 percent said "not important at all."
Continue reading "Survey: M&A Activity Good For SOA Marketplace..."
Survey: M&A Activity Good For SOA Marketplace
We have the results of two recent polls from SOA Pipeline for you this week. The first was prompted by Sun's snapping up of SeeBeyond to strengthen its SOA hand; we asked if mergers and acquisitions are good or bad for the industry, and you overwhelming said that they were good. A full 70 percent of respondents agreed with the statement that "Mergers and acquisitions are good for the SOA market, they strengthen the resources behind critical technologies." Only 30 percent agreed with the statement that "Mergers and acquisitions are not good for the SOA market, they weaken competition and threaten innovation."
The second poll was about SOA initiatives and open source. We asked how important open source was to your SOA efforts, and almost half (47 percent) said open source was "very important." Twenty percent said open source was "moderately importantly"; and 33 percent said "not important at all."
Continue reading "Survey: M&A Activity Good For SOA Marketplace..."
Sender ID Is Used By Spammers -- Duhhhhh!
MX Logix says that spammers will be the primary users of e-mail sender authentication schemes, such as SPF and Sender ID. Well, Duhhhhhh! Who ever thought it would be any different? Certainly not I! (See Weapons Of Spam Destruction and Depending On Sender ID Is Whistling In The Dark). Who else stands to benefit as much from getting their sending identity legitimized? It’s like asking who’ll be first in line at the business license window when a town imposes a licensing requirement on retail vendors: Used car salespeople! Who else would you expect? Well, maybe barristers, but . . .
Continue reading "Sender ID Is Used By Spammers -- Duhhhhh!..."
Sender ID Is Used By Spammers -- Duhhhhh!
MX Logix says that spammers will be the primary users of e-mail sender authentication schemes, such as SPF and Sender ID. Well, Duhhhhhh! Who ever thought it would be any different? Certainly not I! (See Weapons Of Spam Destruction and Depending On Sender ID Is Whistling In The Dark). Who else stands to benefit as much from getting their sending identity legitimized? It’s like asking who’ll be first in line at the business license window when a town imposes a licensing requirement on retail vendors: Used car salespeople! Who else would you expect? Well, maybe barristers, but . . .
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Inappropriate Garb Unless You're Actually A Hobbit
And so my first week at InformationWeek draws to a close, and already I have learned many wonderful things about open source, stealing Wi-Fi, my colleagues' television-watching habits, and hobbit capes as fashion choices.
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Make Mine Hardcover, Please
Never a fan of science fiction in my voracious book-inhaling youth, I have nonetheless developed a love of sci-fi movies and TV series. I loved The Jetsons as a kid, and more recently, have been an enthusiastic viewer of the entire family of Star Trek spin-offs (TNG, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise), Farscape, and Stargate. Besides the adventures, among the fascinations of these programs is the enormous amount of complicated stuff the characters know as a matter of course, the processes that are automated, and all those nifty little gadgets. It wouldn't surprise me if the creators of electronic books got at least some of their creative flow from watching the Enterprise and Voyager crews reading books on tablets and online.
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Come On A (Web) Safari With Me!
I wasn't at all surprised to read that American workers admit to spending as much as two hours a day surfing the Internet, according to a survey released this week by AOL and Salary.com. (Now there is a site that probably gets a lot of hits...)
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Let's Move On
It seems incredibly silly to me, after 25 years of covering the business of IT and the technologists who make it happen, that we're still having to discuss, pitch, survey, or reaffirm the idea that CIOs have a role to play at the C-level of any company, never mind on a board of directors.
Nowadays, besides having a good merger strategy and an international presence, what could possibly be more competitive and strategic then IT? In fact, it's often IT that makes the other two variables--mergers and global branches--doable. I've actually seen mergers hinge on the technical synergy between companies mulling the plunge. IT matters all right--a whole lot.
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The Wedding's Off
The Web is buzzing this morning with rumors that Microsoft's rumored acquisition of Claria, the Adware Behemoth Formerly Known As Gator, has been deep-sixed by somebody at Microsoft -- probably the first adult who heard about the idea.
I liked Ed Bott's take on it best. He quotes the very apropos Stupid Mantra.
The big question, of course, is what will happen to the classification of Claria in Microsoft's Anti-Spyware app -- will it still be treated with kid gloves? Or will the scales miraculously fall from Microsoft's eyes allowing it to recognize malware when it sees it?
The Wedding's Off
The Web is buzzing this morning with rumors that Microsoft's rumored acquisition of Claria, the Adware Behemoth Formerly Known As Gator, has been deep-sixed by somebody at Microsoft -- probably the first adult who heard about the idea.
I liked Ed Bott's take on it best. He quotes the very apropos Stupid Mantra.
The big question, of course, is what will happen to the classification of Claria in Microsoft's Anti-Spyware app -- will it still be treated with kid gloves? Or will the scales miraculously fall from Microsoft's eyes allowing it to recognize malware when it sees it?
H-1B Visa Exemption Not Ready For Prime Time
Perhaps America no longer is the land of opportunity for many highly skilled foreigner workers.
Continue reading "H-1B Visa Exemption Not Ready For Prime Time..."
They Won't Be A Threat To Humans Until They Can Smoke Cigars, Chew Terbacky, And Spit
Larry Greenemeier has a nifty story on the World Series of Poker Robots, in which card-playing apps battle for a $100,000 jackpot. It's not all about fun and games and winning the swag; the software tests the limits of artificial intelligence's ability to make decisions when information is incomplete, or even misleading.
That's trickier than chess, which computers mastered when Deep Blue beat human champ Garry Kasparov. Chess is a "perfect information game": Every player knows the position of every piece on the board. Poker is a "misinformation game": You don't know what cards have yet to be dealt or what your opponents are holding, and your opponents are out to trick you.
Because of the mix of information and misinformation, poker proves to be an excellent model for other real-life, more serious problems, says Jonathan Schaeffer, a computer-science professor at Canada's University of Alberta and a researcher at the school's Computer Poker Research Group.
[The technology] could extend into areas with great business, political, and even military implications, Schaeffer says. Leaders are frequently challenged to make decisions based on incomplete information. "The highest-stakes game of poker that I ever followed started with the first Gulf War," Schaeffer says. "Saddam Hussein anted by invading Kuwait." President George H.W. Bush raised by moving in troops. Hussein would later counter by introducing the possibility of Iraq having weapons of mass destruction, and it was up to Bush and subsequent presidents to decide whether he was bluffing. "That's the real world," says Schaeffer, who doesn't play poker.
It Takes More Than Ethical People To Make An Ethical Company
OK, let's get serious, no quips about corporate ethics being an oxymoron. We all know that a lot of the recent regulatory fervor was the result of an unethical few engaging in downright illegal activities. And now we're all wearing this compliance monkey on our backs.
Continue reading "It Takes More Than Ethical People To Make An Ethical Company..."
It Takes More Than Ethical People To Make An Ethical Company
OK, let's get serious, no quips about corporate ethics being an oxymoron. We all know that a lot of the recent regulatory fervor was the result of an unethical few engaging in downright illegal activities. And now we're all wearing this compliance monkey on our backs.
Continue reading "It Takes More Than Ethical People To Make An Ethical Company..."
Death To Hackers!
What's the appropriate punishment for convicted hackers, a 21-month suspended sentence including 30 hours of community service, death, or something worse?
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It's These Kinds Of Insights That Make It Obvious Why They Hired Me
So today was my first day at InformationWeek, and, on top of everything else going on first-day-wise, my wife's monitor died. She needs it for a class project, and so she's been scrambling around to replace it. I'd like to be of more help, but, y'know, first day on the new job?
Several times, I've tried to point her to online resources for monitors, such as this review of 19" LCD monitors, only to stop short when I come the realization that you can't do online research about monitors if you don't already HAVE a monitor.
I tell you, the world is unfair.
But still: today is a good day to go monitor-shopping, as Philips exec Chris Pollitt predicts monitor prices are about to go up.
Offshore Outsourcing Can Help Win War on Terror
Last week's bombing of London's transportation system shows that the war on terror continues and that ultimate victory requires long term commitment and a long term plan. In addition to military tactics, the strategy needs to include political and economic weapons--like offshore outsourcing.
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Forgive me--I, too, have stolen Wi-Fi
With word that someone is being prosecuted for stealing Wi-Fi access, I just can't keep it in any longer. Yes, I feel a confession coming on. Do you have a tale of stolen Wi-Fi you need to get off your chest? Read mine, then share your own tale of misbegotten Wi-Fi access. We'll get through this together.
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What Wasn't Said, And What Was
Is Microsoft fiddling its Anti-Spyware product to give a free pass to adware from a company it intends to buy? Microsoft's "clarification" leaves two key points absolutely unclear, but we can draw some conclusions -- one because of what the company didn't say, and one because of what it did say.
The "Response to questions about Claria software" posted on the Microsoft Web site on Friday and addressed to "Dear Customer" doesn't acknowledge with a single word a recent news story that reports that Microsoft is seeking to buy Claria, the adware company formerly known officially as Gator and unofficially by far less polite names. Obvious Conclusion No. 1: The story is true, and Microsoft is intent on becoming an adware company. The reason is said to be that it is intent on catching up with Google in the ad space. My grandmother would have said, "You cannot elevate your position by lowering your standards."
Continue reading "What Wasn't Said, And What Was..."
What Wasn't Said, And What Was
Is Microsoft fiddling its Anti-Spyware product to give a free pass to adware from a company it intends to buy? Microsoft's "clarification" leaves two key points absolutely unclear, but we can draw some conclusions -- one because of what the company didn't say, and one because of what it did say.
The "Response to questions about Claria software" posted on the Microsoft Web site on Friday and addressed to "Dear Customer" doesn't acknowledge with a single word a recent news story that reports that Microsoft is seeking to buy Claria, the adware company formerly known officially as Gator and unofficially by far less polite names. Obvious Conclusion No. 1: The story is true, and Microsoft is intent on becoming an adware company. The reason is said to be that it is intent on catching up with Google in the ad space. My grandmother would have said, "You cannot elevate your position by lowering your standards."
Continue reading "What Wasn't Said, And What Was..."
"We Are Not Afraid"
London Web designer Alfie Dennen started the "We Are Not Afraid" Web site to show defiance to terrorists by displaying pictures of people going about their everyday business. CNN reports, "The photos show people, pets or London landmarks, all with the added message that 'We are not afraid.'" Also, Online photo-sharing sites like Flickr posted amateur London terror photos.
Feds Accuse Respected Corporate CEO Of Downloading Kiddie Porn
Bowne & Co. can serve as an example of what companies should do when their CEO, or some other high-powered exec, is charged with using corporate resources to download kiddie porn.
Unfortunately, it's a bad example.
Bowne is a financial printing firm with 18th century roots. According to our story by John Foley, Bowne's former CEO, Robert Johnson, was charged with downloading child pornography. The charges were part of a Homeland Security investigation into Regpay Co., a "company in Minsk, Belarus, that operated child-porn Web sites and handled credit-card payments for other such sites."
John writes: "Investigators and prosecutors have been working on the case for more than a year. Johnson is accused of accessing child-porn sites from Bowne computers over a two-year period, beginning around April 2002. Along the way, he bought 'memberships' to such sites and downloaded at least two child-porn movies, the indictment says. An Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent informed Bowne officials of the agency's investigation on May 4 of last year, without telling them Johnson was a suspect."
That's mind-boggling enough. What's worse (the story goes on to say) is that someone at Bowne, probably an IT manager, tipped Johnson off to the investigation:
Continue reading "Feds Accuse Respected Corporate CEO Of Downloading Kiddie Porn..."
Internet Was A Success Amidst London Disaster
Way back when, on 9/11, I was stunned and disappointed to see the poor performance of the Internet. In the midst of the most major and heinous attack ever launched on U.S. soil, the Internet more or less folded. In contrast to the 24x7 infrastructure that kept television news going, even in the physical midst of the chaotic aftermath of the attacks, the Internet news sites more or less collapsed, and messaging services seemed to all but stop.. About the only Internet source for news was AOL's Instant Messaging news service, and there wasn't much there. So it was heartening this week to see a much-improved news and messaging presence after the horrible subway and bus attacks in London this week.
Continue reading "Internet Was A Success Amidst London Disaster..."
Internet Was A Success Amidst London Disaster
Way back when, on 9/11, I was stunned and disappointed to see the poor performance of the Internet. In the midst of the most major and heinous attack ever launched on U.S. soil, the Internet more or less folded. In contrast to the 24x7 infrastructure that kept television news going, even in the physical midst of the chaotic aftermath of the attacks, the Internet news sites more or less collapsed, and messaging services seemed to all but stop.. About the only Internet source for news was AOL's Instant Messaging news service, and there wasn't much there. So it was heartening this week to see a much-improved news and messaging presence after the horrible subway and bus attacks in London this week.
Continue reading "Internet Was A Success Amidst London Disaster..."
Fighting Terrorism: IT, Not Bombs
In this space ordinarily reserved for analysis and commentary on IT topics, every now and again, there comes a news event that has such an impact, that it seems inappropriate not to make mention of it regardless of any link or lack thereof to IT. That's because in these cases, what links us as readers and editors to the story is our humanity.
Continue reading "Fighting Terrorism: IT, Not Bombs..."
Filtering Out Smut
The Government Accountability Office, in a recent report entitled File Sharing Programs: The Use of Peer-to-Peer Networks to Access Pornography, said Google and Yahoo search engines failed to effectively block pornographic and erotic images. The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, conducted its tests in February, as we reported last week. Much has changed since last winter's test.
Continue reading "Filtering Out Smut..."
WTO Gets It Right on Offshore Outsourcing
In its annual trade report, issued last week, the World Trade Organization concluded what many advocates of offshore outsourcing have been saying for some time: that offshoring is good for both buyers and sellers of IT and business-process services--and the countries in which they operate.
Continue reading "WTO Gets It Right on Offshore Outsourcing..."
The iPod Is The New Desktop
As editor of the Desktop Pipeline, I think a lot about -- naturally -- the desktop. And what do I think? That the desktop is splintering.
That's not exactly a deep insight. The so-called "desktop PC" is just as likely to be a laptop these days. The Palm, the Pocket PC, and the Blackberry have all grabbed a piece of the action that used to happen exclusively on the desktop. And now, of course, there's the iPod, which is taking its own chunk out of the desktop.
Last week the trend became clear, you read it here first: The iPod is the new desktop, and podcasting is the new word processing. (Faith Popcorn, eat your heart out.)
Continue reading "The iPod Is The New Desktop..."
The iPod Is The New Desktop
As editor of the Desktop Pipeline, I think a lot about -- naturally -- the desktop. And what do I think? That the desktop is splintering.
That's not exactly a deep insight. The so-called "desktop PC" is just as likely to be a laptop these days. The Palm, the Pocket PC, and the Blackberry have all grabbed a piece of the action that used to happen exclusively on the desktop. And now, of course, there's the iPod, which is taking its own chunk out of the desktop.
Last week the trend became clear, you read it here first: The iPod is the new desktop, and podcasting is the new word processing. (Faith Popcorn, eat your heart out.)
Continue reading "The iPod Is The New Desktop..."
The Next IT Generation?
This should make CIOs and HR professionals in our industry shudder: The population of potential IT workers is shrinking before our very eyes.
Continue reading "The Next IT Generation?..."
Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right
The United States government took two wrong turns this week in its stewardship of the Internet. Both will have long-term negative impact on the Internet's value here in the United States and around the world, and both could easily have been avoided.
The first was the Supreme Court's regrettable decision in MGM vs. Grokster.
The second, and arguably more serious, misstep was the Bush administration's announcement that it had changed its mind about turning over control of the DNS root servers to an international body.
On MGM vs. Grokster let me be as clear about this as I can: I am not in favor of the piracy of content. The people who steal music on Grokster are exactly like people who shoplift CDs in music stores. But instead of holding the person guilty the Supreme Court decision held technology guilty.
Continue reading "Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right..."
Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right
The United States government took two wrong turns this week in its stewardship of the Internet. Both will have long-term negative impact on the Internet's value here in the United States and around the world, and both could easily have been avoided.
The first was the Supreme Court's regrettable decision in MGM vs. Grokster.
The second, and arguably more serious, misstep was the Bush administration's announcement that it had changed its mind about turning over control of the DNS root servers to an international body.
On MGM vs. Grokster let me be as clear about this as I can: I am not in favor of the piracy of content. The people who steal music on Grokster are exactly like people who shoplift CDs in music stores. But instead of holding the person guilty the Supreme Court decision held technology guilty.
Continue reading "Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right..."
CIO Rolled Over By Passenger Train
Transportation CIO Dan Matthews and his aides could be job hunting if the Senate agrees with the House of Representatives.
Continue reading "CIO Rolled Over By Passenger Train..."
Damn You, Spammers!
"That's not worth the paper it's written on!" I don't remember when or why I first heard those words, but surely I was well under ten years old, and it was probably my father talking about some international treaty he didn't like, or perhaps even the dollar bill that his gold-standard-loving heart just plain hated. In any case, the point of the phrase -- which I still occasionally hear today -- is that paper isn't worth much money. But bits transmitted across the Internet are worth even less, which makes me wonder: why am I still getting so much paper in the postal mail? For that matter, why am I still receiving any postal mail at all?
Continue reading "Damn You, Spammers!..."
Damn You, Spammers!
"That's not worth the paper it's written on!" I don't remember when or why I first heard those words, but surely I was well under ten years old, and it was probably my father talking about some international treaty he didn't like, or perhaps even the dollar bill that his gold-standard-loving heart just plain hated. In any case, the point of the phrase -- which I still occasionally hear today -- is that paper isn't worth much money. But bits transmitted across the Internet are worth even less, which makes me wonder: why am I still getting so much paper in the postal mail? For that matter, why am I still receiving any postal mail at all?
Continue reading "Damn You, Spammers!..."
The Best Way To Find Out About Open Source: Roll Up Your Sleeves
There are no shortcuts when it comes to making a decision about whether to use open-source software. The good news is that IT managers don't have to endure cringe-worthy sales pitches or marketing materials when weighing their open-source options. Instead, open source allows IT professionals to go straight to the source to help them judge the merits of a particular application. Making a smart choice about open source depends upon your knowledge of the open-source community and how well you know your own IT staff.
Continue reading "The Best Way To Find Out About Open Source: Roll Up Your Sleeves..."
The Good, The Bad, The Microsoft
It has been another Microsoft week in desktop computing news -- and The World's Largest Software Company and Legend In It's Own Mind didn't even hold one of those week-long infomercials it's thrown so many of this spring. (We've had the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference, the CEO Summit, the Management Summit, and most recently TechEd, to name just those I can remember at the moment.)
Continue reading "The Good, The Bad, The Microsoft..."
The Good, The Bad, The Microsoft
It has been another Microsoft week in desktop computing news -- and The World's Largest Software Company and Legend In It's Own Mind didn't even hold one of those week-long infomercials it's thrown so many of this spring. (We've had the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference, the CEO Summit, the Management Summit, and most recently TechEd, to name just those I can remember at the moment.)
Continue reading "The Good, The Bad, The Microsoft..."
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