Been gone try to learn new stuff

I've been busy at work so I have not been posting. Kind of busy learning jquery, jquery mobile, phonegap and mvc3. Jquery makes javascript livable with.

The Humancentipad

South Park can be very blue but if often hits at the core of many things. Last year before Steve Jobs died it had a hilarious show in which one of south parks main characters was taped between two other unfortunate apple users because they failed to read the ULA (that legal notice you click so Apple will let you use its products). ULA are usually very long, not written in plain English and nobody reads them. One of the things Apple likes to do is hire lawyers. I heard rumors they have their own building in the Apple campus because there are so many of them.

Steve Jobs reportedly said he would spend his last dime suing Google out of existence. Steve Jobs may be dead but just like in the book DEAMON about a software pioneer who used a system to manipulate the world after his death. Steve Jobs may have unleashed his own Daemon in the form of an army of lawyers in Apple to make all our lives hell. It seems sad that a computer company need lawyers more than engineers.

Not Single Computer Market

Apple wants you to believe the PC is dead. Apple has great marketing and sales abilities but just because somebody tell you something it is not true. When a salesman keep hammering a point then you know he is bending the truth or just plain lying. Does an Ipad replace a PC, yes for certain functions such as browsing the internet casually, viewing videos and casual data entry. If you go into any office you will see desktops and laptops. Students working on term papers are using laptops. Serious work does not happen on a tablet. I have four monitors on my desktop providing me with increasable productivity gains, a laptop would not be able to do that.

The PC is not dead but it is evolving. Windows 8 is proof of that. Apple may have some land in Florida it wants you to buy its a little wet but its very expensive that why they are so profitable. I have a very nice rooted nook, it a lot cheaper than an Ipad, has full access to android market place. Its seven inch screen is perfect for bed. There are rumours that apple will introduce a eight inch tablet to compete with the Amazon fire. Is Apple finally seeing that the market does have competition.

History repeats itself

I usually talk about technology on this Blog, but today I'm going to the Economy but it has direct links to technology. The second world war had its start in the financial crash of the late twenties. The Nazi party grew out of the destruction of the German economy in the great depression. A lot of angry people and some terrible people (Nazis) who used it to blame the rich aka the Jewish population in Germany. They were a false target since many rich Germans were not Jewish and many Jewish Europeans were very poor.

America did a much better way of handling the thirties through huge social projects. This gave its population a chance to vent its anger with a job and a way forward. Britain too had social programs. We saw the formation of Unions to balance the power of Gilded Age super barons.

We are now in the biggest recession since the thirties and we are seeing some of the same tensions in Europe and the United States. The problems in Greece are similar to Germany in the thirties. There are some very different causes this time round though key similarity is that there is rising disparity between the super rich and the middle class. Financial obligations that people are refusing to withstand.

Unions are ineffective in a Globalized economy and they have hurt themselves with unrealistic work practices and demands on business in global market. Unions are pretty much regulated to service and public sector industries that are not subject to globalization (though we are seeing outsourcing).

We are seeing some of the same tensions between the super rich and a middle class that is seeing economic erosion of wages. Financial Companies and Conservatives have budded up with religion to control a large portion of the US heart land minds and wills. Built huge propaganda machines (Fox News and talk radio) to push their agenda.

In Europe they have a different problem in they've created huge social support benefits that they cannot afford. As the money dries up the coffers of European government the social programs will suffer. A large group who have become dependent upon government benefits will riot as they have in Greece as those funds disappear.

At the heart of these problems is globalization and the erosion of the middle class. But rather than meet at the middle we see politicians using class warfare on both side to further divide the populous. It may seem easier for politicians to blame somebody else than to address the true problems.

We discourage our politicians from making hard decisions because elections are less about performance but rather than getting elected through money (pathetic attack advertisements). The problem is that if we don't address the issues at the center of the problem and deffer from class warfare to a joint solution. The problems will mount and more people will get hurt.

So what technology got to do with this, in many ways it the cause, globalization has its heart in technology, companies can downsize because of increased automation. But technology can also be the solution through the exchange of information, more efficient food distribution and information/knowledge sharing.

The long tail, bell curve edge

I realized at school that I was not in the highest part of the social bell curve I was in the part where it tapers off. My tastes are very geeky, but I've often felt that I could see trends a little ahead of the curve. I was the first student in my high school with a computer, I was the first person in my office with a DVR, the first person in my office with a ROKU.

So when I read an article on the New York Times yesterday that people under 35 are watching less cable/broadcast TV and people older than 35 are watching more. It surprised me. A few years ago I stopped watching TV except when I was spending time with my wife. I'm a lot older than 35. Broadcast/cable TV even a DVR just seems like such an inefficient way to get what I wanted to watch. My viewing experience is much more like going into a library where I choose what I want when I want it rather than the old broadcast model where you choose.

So the question for broadcasters is am I an outlier or am I ahead of the curve. In ten years will television view drop of 50% or will a small part of the population stop watching cable.

Only time will tell. Or is Nielsen data used to source the NY times article not completely factual. Is the TV on and we are really doing something else and the new metric for TV watching be not that the TV is on but what percentage of the time are we focused on it.

Microsoft should buy Barnes & Noble

Barnes & Noble would be a perfect purchase for Microsoft. You may think I'm crazy but I'm not there are a lot of good synergies here and a few down sides.

• 1) It would put a presences for Microsoft in stores across the country. They don't have to sell PC but support staff and product information would be added overnight across the country.
• 2) The next nook could run Windows 8. Amazon Fire in taking over the low end tablet market. The Nook install base would make a perfect in road into the low end tablet market for windows 8.
• 3) Barnes & Noble need a savior. They just keep loosing money.

The Megaupload take down win or lose?

The timing of the mega upload servers take down was interesting but had nothing to do with SOPA. It was clearly political, the administration has a lot of friends who help him the creation content arena. They are not very happy with his recent SOPA position so the Mega-Upload take down should appease them. Mega Upload take down had nothing to do with SOPA, it was much more to do with the DMCA (since the servers and domain names where under US locations). It comes down to the simple fact that the government believes that mega upload breached the safe harbor provision by encouraging illegal uploads with financial incentives to pirates. Also that they were not swift enough/limited on take downs. This is up to a jury who probably don't have any understanding of technology. Getting 12 people to buy into this is going to be hard.

How different youtube was in its early days to megaupload today is an interesting question. Since this is a criminal prosecution not a civil, the level of guilt they need to prove is a lot higher. They may even not even win extradition from New Zealand given how weak their case seems. But Mega upload will be down for several years given the extradition and then the time for a criminal trial. This is decades in internet terms, meaning Mega Upload is history in any true sense of the word. Expect a NewMegaUpload to be online in less than a month by a proxy third party. Thus does not stop the multitude of other virtual hard drive sites. Given how easy it is to create and share a virtual hard drive on a multitude of current servers.

Aka the government just dropped a 500 lb bomb on mega upload but the pirates have already moved on to another site and legitimate users of Megaupload lost their files. So the only people who are happy about this are the content creators and the administration. Mega uploads fate will not be decided until after the election in the fall.

So a political win, but in the actual war on piracy it effect will be negligible.

Asymmetrical Warfare aka SOPA

Since everybody is talking about SOPA today and what a bad idea it is. They are right it reminds me of the carpet bombing of Vietnam. That sounds totally off the wall but piracy is very much like Asymmetrical Warfare a are very large well funded in-trenched industry verses a small agile opponent. Let's say that the film industry gets their way and gets to take a web site down and block it immediately. A little like bombing the hell out of a Viet Cong village with a bunch of 500 pound bombs (Aka $500 an hour lawyers). The Viet Cong are probably already deep in a cave with their weapons and you just killed a bunch of villagers who are stuck in the middle (the legitimate users of the site). The surviving villages now really hate you and join the Viet Cong (the users of the web site).

The US military had to adjust their tactics in Iraq to fight an asymmetrical, Hollywood has to as well, Spotify and Netflix/Crackle are much better weapons. Also use intelligence to identify the key players in Piracy and take them out (individuals behind the web sites).

The great CES non event

What if you held a disco and nobody played any music

Like any true geek I've been following CES but it been quiet. Many sources have pointed out that large companies now release new products outside these shows because they can better manage the news and there is less noise outside the event time. Consumer electronics is also consolidating so less small players. The cost to do anything is outside the ability of any company except a huge multi-national.

Had Microsoft planned a major announcement but the product fell through? Sources (Reuters) indicate that Microsoft had planned to release a Netflix competitor based off the Hulu model. The article indicates that cable companies forced the content providers to kill the idea using a high price. It's a lot like the record industry before itunes. Given that the cable companies have cut off programming to the internet companies like Netflix, YouTube etc have started to develop their own programming. I hear that HBO is in a panic over house of cards.

I compare $16 for Hulu and Netflix and $60 for a cable subscription. Somebody has to loose money if I switch over. Remember that most cable companies are vertically integrated, they share their programming with other cable companies (usually there is only one cable provider per area) but they are not going to allow competition. They have already been burned by Satellite (DirectTv/Dish) eating into their viewership and Telco's starting their own services but each has bundled programming.

Though it would be easy for a modern cable company to sell alacart since they now digitally encrypt all the channels except for OTA channels. They have fought the idea saying it is cheaper to bundle. Given that I'm forced to pay for expensive channels like ESPN, NFL, Fox News, Fox sports & Disney I highly doubt if my package would be sixty dollars. It reminds me that I had to buy an Album rather than a single before itunes.

If a company as large as Microsoft cannot break into this industry clearly market forces have broken down and the FCC needs to intervene.

Web OS vs Microsoft Tablet

A lot of people have given Microsoft criticism for their slow response to the iPad. But today the New York Times had a very interesting article on WebOS and it total failures. Microsoft has bet the the next three years on Windows 8 and its tablet features, but it has not rushed its development environment and application base like WebOS. When I pulled up the first Javascript application in the Windows 8 developer preview it had the same problems but Microsoft has bet big with Metro. With Windows 8 you get a unified UX from a PC, tablet and phone. Can Microsoft succeed where HP failed.

Choosing a skill set when some large tech companies survive and other die

The Problem

Anybody who works in the tech industry must invest his time in learning a technology. This is quite a gamble since technology is usually tied to a company (IBM) or a product (Linux). The profitable technology right now is IOS. If you can use Xcode on a mac you can easily find a job paying a good salary.

Choosing a company or a technology is not simple. The past is littered with defunct (or shadows of their former self's) IT companies Sun, DEC, Data General, Burroughs, Honeywell, Compaq, the list is endless. If you believe Apples hype then you can add Microsoft to that list. Though Apple should know better since they are a huge customer of Microsoft's services.

IOS looks good now and for a few years but a so did RIM/Blackberry a few years ago and Palm before them. Apple product line up has a very short lifespan of 3 years. Apple must have a hit ratio of 0.4 on product launches each year to keep their enviable 100% profit margin.

Its funny but IBM looks good, big companies are tied to their legacy systems like a Heroin addict. You can still do very well with COBOL/JCL which I thought was old fashioned 30 years ago (a Millennium in IT years).

The problem with Microsoft product like web page designers is that every kid with a college class thinks they can do it and so do a bunch of employers. It keeps salaries down and cheapens the skill set with a bunch of bad code. (The same can be said of PHP)

Java is still doing well even after the death of Sun its still lives on in the enterprise market and mobile markets.

I think the solution should be SQL, that a funny thing to say but its hard to code, few do it well and a well coded stored procedure can do amazing things. Its a language used on all platforms and companies from a smart phone to a IBM mainframe. Though their are many different flavors they are all pretty standard.

The solution is learn SQL and be good at it.

2012 is going to be interesting in the tablet space

Like just about everybody else I reading Steve Jobs Biography. That's why my blog posts have been so focused on him in the last month. The book gives a good insight to the tablet wars and a lot of what makes the Ipad such a success and the various Android tablets such a failure. What is interesting is that the Ipad pre-dated the iphone and that the iphone success as a user interface was from Apple's prior development of the Ipad. I'm probably the only person in the Western world who does not have an Ipad or used one much. This means that the IPad has about a 3 year development lead over Andriod 2002 verses 2005. Honeycomb was very pretty but not that usable, it was rushed to market. I had a hacked version on my Nook for a while and it was a step in the right direction. Most of the Android tablets used a 2.X versions designed for cell phones because Homecomb was not ready for primetime. I've never been a fan of the Java VM which is at the Androids core. So why is it such a success? The carrier/handset makers seem to be trying to customize it to death literally. It's interesting the market for custom roms that set the interface back to a standard android UX. I've heard that ICS has a much more polished UX but will we ever get to see it given the handset manufactures tinkering. CM9 where are you. Given all this why is Android a success two words "OPEN", "APPS". The world needed an OS to battle IOS and it was free. This created a critical mass for APPS as it was adopted. This makes it a success. The Iphone is out of the reach of a lot of people especially in the 3rd world. Android will run on an inexpensive ARM processor. Apple wants 100% mark up. They controlled the supply chain so they could hold up the prices. They also had the best SOC (system on a chip) in their own customer A processor. Their war with Samsung will free up that manufacturer to supply chips to 3rd parties and multiple ARM SOC at a low price will be available this year. The Android UX is improving with ICS. Apple needs to knock the Iphone 5/Ipad 3 out of the park if it want that three year development lead to continue. Ask your 10 year old if he wants a Kindle Fire or an Ipod touch. Most will say the fire a 7" screen verses a 3.5" to watch netflix or play games on. Remember they are the same price and they have a large installed APP base. Though people complain about the ergonomics of the Fire, it is very usable and probably by the time Amazon ships version 2.0 of the OS. Apple has iTunes but Android has spotify which is just as good as iTunes. I own a Nook which has evolved a lot of since last year. I restored the nook color to a stock ROM last weekend version 1.4.1 is a very usable UX. Everybody has counted out Microsoft. They took alot of false starts in the mid 2000's. Windows 8 and surface show a huge history that microsoft has had with touch interfaces. What is interesting is that the press has given Microsoft a lot of grief about how slow to market but Windows 8 will be a huge introduction to a lot of people for the Metro interface which works well and is very usable. Microsoft are not going to just give up like they did with the Zune, they bet the farm on Metro with Windows 8. What is interesting is that Apple focus on legal methods to kill Android. It was Steve's dying wish to sue Android(Google) out of existence or is Apple concerned that they cannot evolve the Ipad faster than the competition. It going an interesting year in 2012.

The post PC may not be a tablet at least in the 3rd world

A tablet is a wonderful device for the rich but I don't see it being the post PC device of the third world and that is where I see the growth in the future. I just saw a fascinating device called the Raspberry Pi and this is probably the PC of the next century. Flat panel displays are getting moderately inexpensive. When I was in Walmart on black friday the device sold was a 32" flat panel for $188. We are seeing computer monitors with HDMI inputs for $80. These will be the televisions for third world in the next 10 years. You can now create a cheap internet device for $25 dollars that can run a full version of linux with web browser and keyboard/mouse. A cloud based computer world will hook up to these devices to provide power to just about anybody. If you want to see what one of these devices look like just review a ROKU 2, a device the size of a hockey puck that has a very power micro-controller, memory, MicroSD, Wifi, USB and HDMI. You can pick up a cheap USB keyboard & mouse and HDMI cable for less than $8. It makes a $300 chrome book look like a joke.

I feel so sorry for you poor PC user. I've got a Mac.

Have you ever got the look or comment from an Apple user "I feel so sorry for you poor PC user. I've got a Mac and its wonderful". I'm not an average user so don't expect this to be an average experience. When I see a Mac user what goes through my mind is "I feel so sorry for you poor Mac user. I've got a PC and its wonderful.". Notice I did not say a Microsoft PC, because that's just a small part of it. Linux is a great OS too. OK first off Mac's are beautifully designed, easy too use and give a very cool impression. But to me that a lot like telling a Builder to use a current generation VW bug. It may get the average user from A to B but it does not cut it for my needs for hauling supplies and customizations. I build my own PC, change out operating systems and hardware parts every few months. This is enough for Steve Job to turn in his grave, he wanted to control the end user to his view of the world. That was great for a user that wants a web browser, spreadsheet and word processor (possibly video editing) with little worry over virus and maintenance for three years and can drop over $1,000 every three years. Pixar does not use Apple computers to render its movies, Apples backend servers may well be a Windows Azure cloud solution. I've heard it said that's a very first world view point about a certain situation. I feel that very close to people talking about Apple. The Apple store may be doing very well in Shanghai but in rural China an Apple Store is not going to be appropriate.

Siri may not have a long lead time

THe Apple 4S major roll out was a new voice activated service called Siri. If you remove Siri from the 4S you will see very little additional information mainly based on the faster processor and better camera. A lot of people have indicated that Siri will kill Google by bypassing the search engine. I expect Google to release a competitor for Android with the next major version release. Siri basically has a few main parts. 1) Speech recognition 2) An API access to a few key IOS application 3) A natural language search engine 4) A.I component that interprets the request. 5) A text to speech capability. So lets see what Google is not missing 1) Speech recognition Google chrome has had it for months. 2) An API access to applications, you know they have them. 5) Text to speech has been in the Android phone for quite a while. So that leaves them missing a natural language search engine. They are a search company primarily and they have extensive experience with translation software. I expect that a new meta language of Android API commands is being created to match a large number of queries and feed into that translation engine. There is little difference between translating English to French than English to API commands. Both required an understand of natural language and a model of a problem domain. So Google just needs to get a bunch of guys creating Android API scripts for all those features that are needed and then creating the English equivalent for their statistical engine to cross reference. this solves problems 3 & 4. Google has an advantage here unlike Apple that had to have a large number of people build create the mappings. Google already has the mappings and hundred of millions of users updating the knowledge base on an hourly basis. They can use their own search engine to provide the natural language learning with the results selection of the user. So unless Google is totally asleep at the wheel expect them to generate a Siri kill in less than a year.

Why did AT&T need T-Mobile so badly

In 1983 AT&T was broken up because it was seen as an Anti Trust issue. Over the next twenty years technology have turned the industry on its head. A move from Physical Plain Old Telephone (POT) lines using a TDM backbone to a mainly wireless and IP driven backbone. So why do we now have a huge company called AT&T. You can thank Steve Jobs in part because the Iphone gave AT&T a huge edge in competition. If you remember the 1984 Apple commercial, it was like Steve Jobs instead of taking a sledge hammer to the tyrant. Rather Steve walked up to the tyrant and handed him the golden key and got a huge pay off. Now AT&T is loosing the POT market to people going wireless only, it is no longer has the IPhone as a competitive edge. It is faced with a huge problem, with faster wireless data backbones it is just a matter of time that people bypass the Cellular phone network and go directly to VOIP on their cell phones. That why you've seen those unlimited plans since this a preemptive move to stop somebody turning a 2 GB data plan is 2100 minutes of 16kbps compressed VOIP traffic. It's hard to charge a $100 dollars a month when you are using just $30 dollar data plan worth of connectivity. We've seen moves to third party providers such a Cricket or Simple mobile start to drive prices down with competition. A lot of these providers use the T-Mobile and Sprint networks to provide their service. If AT&T can create an oligopoly between itself and Verizon it stands a good chance of blocking the move to the commoditization of wireless services. This will put the USA at a huge competitive disadvantage it the infrastructure that powers the next fifty years of growth is in the hands of a few companies trying to maximize profit by creating an artificial scarcity of wired and wireless data networks. The only real solution to this problem is to break up the vertical integration of both phone and cable companies. Separate the infrastructure from the product by having a matrix of product providers and infrastructure providers to create a low cost generic solution. A product driven by separating the content from the transport providers. A simple calculation is $100 per month two year contact with a $200 iphone is $2,600. A $40 dollar per month plan with a $600 phone is $1,560. You are paying over $1,000 dollars more for that phone given the current system. Can you see why AT&T will spend $39 Billion. With 100 million customers with a $500 premium is $50 billion dollars of profit per year. Why is nobody crying fowl in Washington except the Justice department and FFC. Well AT&T is one of the largest political/lobbyists in the DC area. The fact that AT&T went ahead with a merger so much not in the public good shows how little they thought of the current political system.

Windows 8

I've been using Windows 8 a lot. Corporate America will total ignore this release and given that most large corporations of on a 3 to 5 year upgrade cycle on Windows Desktops and most are still fighting too upgrade from XP to windows 7. Its not surprising, they totally skipped Vista and they will totally skip Windows 8. Microsoft does not care since that's not who this version of Windows is aimed at. Like Vista which was a painful upgrade of the windows internals, windows 8 is another painful upgrade but of the interface. Microsoft has several problems to deal with. The rise of the ARM architecture, the touch interface and the death of the "windows" interface on tablet devices (or still birth). Windows has quotes because I'm talking about the UI style rather than the OS. Tablet are not about multi tasking, or a desktop experience they are about a different model of computing. Tablets have a place in business but not replacing desktops. Laptops yes but not desktops. It will take another generation before these models will co exist happily in the same OS, but remember that Windows Server and Window 7 have the same code base.

Should the saying go "Too Big To Succeed"

I was listening to a horror story on the radio about a family who was foreclosed on by a large bank due to problem with the paper work. By the time the mistakes where discovered the house was horribly damaged due to winter in a unheated home. It seems that we've all been frustrated by dealing with a large companies and it takes 5 or 6 phone calls to resolve a problems not because customer service people are unhelpful bu because they cannot navigate the maze that is the complexities of the company. I keep hearing the phrase "Too Big To Fail", but in many ways it rather seems that they are "To Big To Succeed". When I was in college we learn't about the economies of scale, but we also learned that after a period growth when an organization becomes too big those economies diminish and become negative. From a profit perspective these companies are great, they make more money each year. I'd rather not do business with these huge companies but you often have no choice because consolidation has left so few players in a particular industry that no true free market exists. It seems to me that these companies are succeeding because there is no true free market because there are too few players in the market sector. As a customer I feel like an ant stuck on a huge super tanker in an ocean unable to turn quickly and a large storm is approaching of change. I don't know if I will make it or even the ship will through the storm.

Browsers need another language other than javascript

I've been programming for a long time. I've been programming for over 32 years. I'm saddened by the push for HTML 5. Actually its not HTML5 that upsets me it's Javascript. It's a great technology for putting simple little scripts into your browser but writing large object oriented programs it basically is horrible. It's been done just look at google maps but just look at the ugly code it took. It will push more and more programming to the cloud, which make sense for mobile platforms with the smaller cpu's but it will drive up traffic on the mobile nets. Microsoft/Google/Apple put a modern language (not basic) into a browser so we can efficiently code, sandbox it so bad scripts will not use CPU and memory.

Stop blaming Washington and blame ourselves

You sometimes hear something on the radio that just clicks with you. NPR had that this morning with a segment on which countries are doing well right now and which are doing poorly. I don't agree with all its findings but a clear factor indicator is the US dollar to Canadian dollar. Its pretty much 1=1 right now. There are lots of variables involved and such macro economic indicators put the Canadian dollar so high are complex. Also during a recession you expect the more fiscally conservative to do better. What's interesting is that fiscally conservative countries that are doing so well are socialist. America is capitalist country and at that its doing very well, most corporations have record profit and those that are rich are doing better than they ever have. So if you are a Republican stop complaining about the economy it working for you low taxes, cheaper and abundant labor. If you feel that the recession has hurt you and your voting republican you have to ask yourself why. I'm not saying vote Democrat or for the tea party. But just understand that if you stop thinking and just use rhetoric provided by Political commercials and talk show hosts on both sides of the argument then when we voted the current politicians into office don't expect them to hold any loyalty to you but to those talking heads and their interests. If we stop asking the tough questions and outsourced our think to somebody else don't be surprised when the politicians stop respecting the general public. Don't blame the politicians blame ourselves for not bothering to vote in primaries and understand the issues. Don't expect Washington to respect you if your world focuses on Sports or Hollywood or Talk Radio and the only contact you send to your congressman is a canned email forwarded from a action group based on a 30 second ad. Read/Listen to real news sources guys. If Rush or Fox News tells you how bad the New York Times, Washington Post, the Standard or Economist is he's doing so don't learn the truth and will continue to vote for interests who make them rich.