Reading into the future of Tech
For the economist, futurist, visionaries out there seeking all truth and knowledge in where technology is heading, I think Tim O’Reilly is on to something big.
O’Reilly is tracking book sales on tech topics and leveraging this data to see the shifts in market interest. Brilliant. Kinda like dah.
The coolest part is that this research is truly a “futurist” prospective because in technology, it takes time to develop and deliver solutions. So if the research says a certain category of book sales is flying off the shelf, you’ve to conclude that something is going to come from it. An output. A finished good.
Read it and watch. We might just have a new insight into predicting the future.
Running Windows on my Mac — Thanks Parallels!
Is work “work” when it’s fun? Three words: Parallels is amazing.
Tonight I configured Parallels so I can launch and run Windows on my Mac. Have I said “amazing” yet?
It was super cool to watch the install process in a “window” on my Mac. And then when I heard the famous Windows first-launch start up sound on my MacBook speakers, I was grins from ear to shining ear.
Amazing…it’s all I can say. Who would want to “boot” into Windows when you can run it side-by-side with Mac OS X?
I’m sharing screenshots like crazy tonight. Sorry for the space, but please do enjoy!
Funny to see “DOS-like” stuff on OS X.
Windows XP install promoting “Hardware” support š
Click to see larger image
To steal the words from Mick Jagger and the theme song
for the Windows XP launch: “Start Me Up”
Click to see larger image
VPNed into network at work, downloading files off the
network, all from my MacBook running OS X,
Parallels, and Windows XP
Installing Blackboard Backpack on my Mac…
a Window XP-only application.
Taking Notes with Blackboard Backpack — on a
document created with the special Pickler printer
that converts PDF, Office, web pages, and
more to what looks like “digital paper.”
Facebook takes $25MM … not up for sale
According to Silcon Beat, Facebook isn’t looking for suitors, but instead took $25MM in cash from Greylock Partners, Meritech, Accel Partners, and Peter Thiel, a former chief exec from PayPal. The article reports that David Sze from Greylock said, “is a ‘winner-circle’ company.” Ya…like you wouldn’t say that after dumping cash into Facebook.
I’d agree with Sze. I still like Facebook’s odds for big financial win in the future while continuing to collect new site visitors and users.
Did BusinessWeek and Wall Street Journal fail me? Looks like I took another ride through the Blogosphere with lots of others. Hard to imagine the big guys getting their facts wrong. But if it can happen to Dan Rather, it can happen to the best of us. Aside: I hate that Dan was sent to 60 Minutes as part of CBS’s out-to-pasture strategy for Dan. I love 60 Minutes but can’t watch stories were Dan is reporting. He really should take his drama tactics to Broadway — it’s not all that far from his NYC CBS office.
Parallels to the rescue
I’m one step closer to living entirely off my MacBook. I’d read about Parallels before and became more interested when BootCamp appeared on the scene. Scott Lemon has an inside contact at Apple who said the Parallels was the real deal and was awesome. So with this recommendation, I’ve moved forward. Downloaded the beta 4. Then went ahead and pre-bought in anticipation of the GA. Also used this as a perfect excuse to make the move for that extra 1GB of RAM…:-)
$70+ for a barrel of dinosaur bones
I love the line in Soundgarden’s song Rusty Cage: I’m burning diesel, I burning dinosaur bones. I think about it more each time I fill my gas tank.
With crude moving past $70 a barrel, will the likes of ExxonMobile and BP ever let the price go lower? I shouldn’t finger (in more way than one) them as big oil companies claim they have nothing to do with the price of crude. It’s also unfortunate that we spite the corner gas station attendant and take our frustrations out on them. But just like a pit bull that has tasted blood, I can’t imagine ever getting out of the clutches of high gas prices because there are too many dollars in it. I’m sure big oil is doing all they can to make sure the world “thinks” there is a shortage of oil — because it benefits them.
I can’t complain too much though. I learned last week that Utah has the lowest price of gas in the nation (WSJ, April 11, see article). And it’s a whole lot lower than my friends in Europe are paying!
Wall Street Journal article promotes government-funded health solution
Wow. I have a hard time believing that the WSJ covered this story. However, if you want to read one doctor’s opinion of fixing healthcare cost and overhead, check out the article in The Wall Street Journal, Government-Funded Care Is the Best Health Solution.
If you’re like me, sick of changing healthcare plans and providers every 12 months, you may be looking for a solution to healthcare too. After leaving a company that had to shut it’s doors from a lack of revenue/funding, and then spending about 6 months with only high-deductable, short-term health insurance plan for my family. I then faced the challenge of moving from this “emergency only” insurance to a standard provider. I then learned that any issue that my family members had during this short period now became pre-existing conditions and not covered by my new insurance provider.
Healthcare is crazy in the USA. I’m watching the Healthcare Reform Initatives in Massachusetts with interest. More importantly, I’m wondering who will stand up to the health insurance companies. They’ve pocketed so much money from almost all of us.
As Benjamin Brewer writes in The Journal, we’ve got to find a way to remove the layers of overhead in the health insurance system so that we get the value for our expenses.
My Google Calendar is up and running
I was fortunate to be online late last night catching up on my Web 2.0 reading. I saw the report posted at 9:00 PM PST from Elinor Mills at CNET and similar announcement by Michael Arrington at TechCrunch that the Google Calendar was live.
I quickly jumped in and created my account. As reported by others, the calendar is fast and full featured. I added three calendars, each with its own visual “color” identity. Invited different friends to see and jointly manage different calendars. Set up SMS alerts. Subscribed to the US Holidays calendar. Added appointments using the quick add.
In fact, sharing, one of the buzz marketing requirements, is core to the calendar. I believe Google will quickly establish marketshare of millions of individuals and home business owners.
Next up for me today, importing my iCal and various Exchange/Outlook data.
MacWinTel
Apple’s Boot Camp was exciting news. I’ve watched with interest the efforts of the best programmers/hackers getting Windows on the new Intel-based iMacs and MacBook Pro.
I wrote about this earlier, but as a new Mac user, I’m not sure that being able to boot Windows would be a big incentive for me personally. However, if a corporate IT person allows more Apple machines in the organization because of this, then it’s a good thing. I think that this is a trojan horse strategy for getting more adoption.
Marc Orchant, who I’ve spoken with a number of times with his Tablet PC and Getting Things Done experience, was able to get Vista installer to boot on the MacBook — follow to see the pictures.
Vista on a MacBook Pro by ZDNet‘s Marc Orchant — In the “Just Because We Can” Department: we decided to see if we could boot the latest Vista installer on a Bootcamp-equipped Macbook Pro.
Since Boot Camp was released by Apple, it’s more than a “minor” thing. In fact, the market reacted favorably to this with a 10% increase in stock value. Just imagine what will happen to the market valuationĀ of Apple when a 90-day trial of OS X boots on a Dell laptop. Millions of would be techies will download the “Boot Camp MacTel” enabler, enjoy the amazing user experience of configuring OS X, and immediately get creative with the out-of-the box simplicity and power of iLife. And a bonus will be how nice it will be to connect their iPod with iTunes on it’s “home” turf.
WSJ article on Facebook value and potential sale
Looks like Facebook has 100 employess. Bigger than I thought, but still a very small group for a $750M+ acquisition target.
Today’s Wall Street Journal reports that Accel, the VC that placed ~$13M in Facebok thinks there’s “the potential to be worth more than $2 billion, based on economic fundamentals and the value of its audience.” And why shouldn’t he? Accel’s gonna take a truckload of money back to the fund with any acquisition.
MySpace’s new boss Ross Levinsohn also offered his own perspective on Facebook: “certainly we’re not paying $2 billion for Facebook. That makes no sense for us.”
The buzz is a sure sign of something going down. I’d expect to see something happen soon. I wonder if the Facebook will continue to be seen as “underground and private” if a big player comes in and drops a load of cash and leverages the property for a return on its investment?
I spent some time on MySpace…they’re cleaning up a bit
I spent some time on MySpace over the weekend. As I was working on a new site for our golf group (www.darksidegolf.com), I needed to visit a buddy’s site to pull down an image he created. It looks like a minor facelift and some improvments. Still found the site to be dog slow and a pain to use. Tagworld is a much better implementation for me personally.
« go back — keep looking »