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Feb
22
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Microsoft have finally figured out that Metcalfe's Law applies to them as much as the next software company - despite their huge footprint. To quote Microsoft's CEO and CMM (Chief Mad-Monkey) Steve Balmer :
"In a more connected, services-oriented world...one of the greatest value-adds in some sense is what people do on the other end of the wire"
Bang-on Steve - couldn't have put it better myself. Let's see how wide the Kimono opens before Balmer get's shy. Ick - that's a poor choice of metaphor - sorry if I've spoiled your lunch.
[this entry was originally posted on my other blog-in-progress]
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May
15
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If you don't care about Intellectual Property law and don't think it affects you - think again. Who do you think ultimately pays for the increasingly expensive litigation that most product companies have to deal with ? Yup - us - consumers. If you had to add an "innovation tax" to each of the products you buy today - ie. you got to know the true cost - that would be eye opening and people would complain. Unfortunately it's a hidden cost - we just have to suck it up.
The recent proclamations of Microsoft this week has caused a flurry of postings on the subject of Patents - if you only have time to read two - I'd recommend reading Mike Dillon's "Cautiously Optimistic" (Mike is Sun's General Counsel) and Greg P's "Are Software Patents Useful ?" - Greg is Sun's CGO (Chief Geekery Officer).
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Nov
2
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I was just catching up on Microsoft's "live" announcements today - tipped off by the all-knowing John Rymer at Forrester - thanks John. Cutting straight through the press releases and opinions pieces I went straight to Microsoft's manifestation of "Live" - the Windows Live Beta - I hit reload a couple of times because I though my Google home page was somehow corrupted - it had a Windows logo and said something about not supporting Firefox just yet - weird - what's happening. After looking a bit more carefully I realized what I was actually looking at was Microsoft's AJAXy portal clone - it's stunningly similar to Google : very simple layout, draggable channels, AJAX, RSS, maps, mail, IM, search, etc. Incredible. Incredible lack of innovation and originality.
The best bit is the banner at the top - "Firefox support is coming soon. Please be patient :-)" - very PC.
One part of me wants to think that this site was quickly knocked-up by a couple of interns to upset Sergey and Larry. Then again I think there is some real meat behind other parts of the Live announcement - more on that when I get time.
It'll be interesting to see how the Google / Microsoft battle plays out - I hope Yahoo doesn't get caught in the cross-fire.
Technorati Tags : Microsoft+Live, Google, Web2.0
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Aug
31
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Image from Sharum's photostream
It seems that the consumer VOIP market is turning into a land-grab (or a subscriber grab). Three recent events really warm things up. The first was that Yahoo IM now includes VOIP, providing free IM to IM voice and voice mail and with their recent DialPad possibly a future premium (paid) service for calling land lines and cell phones. Basically that means that all the major Instant Messenger products (MSN, AIM and now Yahoo) support some form of voice service; though Yahoo's IM is different because it implements a standard protocol - SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) - this means adding additional future services (such as conference calling, video, etc.) should be easier in the future as should interoperability with existing phone network infrastructure.
The second event is that Google have also launched their Google talk beta - so Google are trying to get their share of the IM market *and* VOIP - quite how Google will attempt that (and how sucessful they'll be) remains to be seen. They are trying to enter two markets that already have some leadership - AIM in the IM market and Skype in the VOIP market. I'm not sure what will draw people to Google talk - maybe they'll leverage their GMail market share ?
The next piece of related news is that Microsoft have announced the acquisition of Teleo - this will give them the ability to take on Skype (from a feature perspective) - allowing PC -> land line or wireless handset VoIP - something that Google, and Yahoo don't offer today. To be fair though this was just a press release - Microsoft probably aren't releasing anything any time soon.
I should add, while writing this, I'm at home dialed into a 3 hour business review meeting using Skype.
