Archives for 2007

Some iPhone Buyers May Want a Refund Now

Posted on September 5, 2007 ·

(Updated, see below)
Did you buy a $1,500 iPhone? Did you, like so many others just want a cool iPod with a killer browser ?

Now it’s here: the iPod Touch: 8GB for $299 and 16GB for $399. CrunchGear follows the announcement.

Hm … looks like an iPhone without the At&T baggage I still wonder: why would you *not* want your phone and iPod in one box? (network-free, of course).

Update: At the time of originally writing this, I had no idea just how correct the title would prove to be. Apparently Apple has just cut the price of the 8G iPhone from $599 to $399, and the 4G model, which no-one quite wanted is to be discontinued. Here’s OM’s tip on getting your refund.

Update#2. Wow, this post is getting hundreds of hits coming from the Google search “iPhone refund”. I suppose it’s all because I wrote about refund before Steve Jobs announced the price-cut.. originally simply because of the iPod Touch = iPhone less the phone equation.

Update#3. Is the iPod Touch cannibalizing iPhone sales?

Related posts: the whole world… including, but not limited to: Engadget, geeksugar, The Unofficial Apple Weblog, BloggingStocks, The iPhone Blog, Lost Remote, PalmAddicts, Switched , Paul Kedrosky’s …, Ars Technica..etc.

Filed Under: Technology · Tagged: Apple, iPhone, ipod

CrunchGear Site All Messed Up

Posted on September 5, 2007 ·

Yes, it is Apple Day, so I think it’s OK for CrunchGear to temporarily convert its main site to “Apple Live“.

CrunchGear will return to its normal format after the Apple announcement. This page will refresh automatically.

However, I doubt they intended to kill access to ALL previous posts, and that’s exactly what happened. Crunchgear is practically off-line, except of course the Apple Show.

Several of Crunchgear’s posts hit Techmeme today, including one where they have the LEAD STORY, yet even the permalink to those stories is a dead end: it’s Apple only for now.

But that’s not all, look at this screenprint. Do you find anything unusal? (hint: lower right corner)

Yes, of course I clicked “edit this entry” and nothing happened since it would require a WordPress logon, but as a user I shouldn’t be seeing that option at all…

Filed Under: Blogging · Tagged: Apple, crunchgear, techcrunch

The Whole World Knows Microsoft Lost the Open XML Vote – Except the New York Times

Posted on September 4, 2007 ·

Screenprint from today’s TechMeme:

Did MS Win or Lose? Of course by now we know they lost, so what’s wrong here? It’s not Techmeme’s fault, the article they linked here is dated today (Sept 4th), but when you actually look at it, it’s obvious that the Times published a day-old material which simply “expired” before publication.

It’s not everyday to see such obvious contradiction, but since TechMeme started to lean more heavily towards traditional media, it’s quite typical to see the same news twice: first by bloggers, who publish it on the weekend, as the news occur, then by the big papers two days later as journalists come back to work.

Food for thought, Gabe. (Who, incidentally is not this Gabe).

Update: While the NYT clearly just stumbled publishing old information, Microsoft’s reaction: Strong Global Support for Open XML as It Enters Final Phase of ISO Standards Process is clearly a showcase of doctoring the facts.

The results show that 51 ISO members, representing 74 percent of all qualified votes, stated their support for ratification of Open XML…

You have to read through a full page to find this little hint:

Although no date has been formally set, the final tally is likely to take place in March 2008. ISO/IEC requires that at least 75 percent of all “yes” or “no” votes (qualified votes) and at least two-thirds of “P” members that vote “yes” or “no” support ratification of a format in the Fast Track process.

It’s up to the reader to figure out what really happened, as nowhere in the full-page document does Microsoft mention they actually lost a vote.

Update (9/5): Today’s New York Times correctly prints: Panel Rejects Microsoft’s Open Format but this is published as news, without any reference to the previous. conflicting article by the same journalist. Techmeme list it as new…

Filed Under: Blogging, Software, Technology · Tagged: bloggers, Blogging, media, newspapers, online news, open xml, techmeme. microsoft

JotSpot…Gspot … Google Wiki

Posted on September 3, 2007 ·

So they figured Gspot would be too risky a name for Google’s JotSpot, it’s now (almost) official: the new name will be Google Wiki.

JotSpot was (I assume still is) a good, user-friendly wiki, and if it comes back now, it took Google almost an entire year to release it after the acquisition. I hope that means they rethought everything and integrated JotSpot well into a number of offerings.

It could provide for much better document management than the current Docs & Spreadsheets UI.
It overlaps with Page Creator, also with the simplified version found in Google Groups – in fact Groups which is no longer just email lists but a rudimentary collaboration platform and JotSpot could very well be merged / integrated.
Finally JotSpot tried to provide primitive applications (spreadsheet, calendar..etc) all of which have a better Google counterpart, so one would hope they will be replaced, too.

In fact there are so many opportunities to waive the wiki into Google’s current offerings, I can’t even imagine what it would look like… or, perhaps, are we going to see a standalone wiki?

Filed Under: Collaboration, Personal Productivity, SaaS · Tagged: Collaboration, document management, flow, Google, google wiki, gspot, Integration, Jotspot, Web Applications, wiki

Still Confused about Windows Live

Posted on September 3, 2007 ·

Ever since it’s inception the Windows Live brand was a source of confusion: is it web-based computing, new desktop tools, or just a fancy name for MSN services? The confusion apparently continues even as The New York Times heralds Microsoft Windows Live, which is to receive a new unified installer this week as a major move to “Cloud Computing”. “The empire is preparing to strike back” – a clear reference to Google.. don’t you just love the illustration?

Whether this is a Google-killer move or not (personally I doubt it), I welcome any major player’s move to the Cloud. I’ve been a long-time advocate of on-demand computing, which got only reinforced by the painful experience of adding a third PC to the household. Trying to keep three computers (and two operating systems) in sync is a major nightmare, and ironically some of the Windows Live components come to my rescue, exactly because they are not in the cloud .

Foldershare is a very handy tool that keeps several PC’s in sync. Configuring your folders to be synchronized takes places on the Web, but the actual synchronization process is P2P, in fact in a local network your data typically stays behind the firewall throughout the entire process. It’s not magic though, as sometimes it fails to synchronize, and leaves only placeholder *.p2p files. Too bad it never tells you, and while you think your data is safely synchronized, you can never know. Another “shortcoming” (although by design, and some might actually find it an advantage) is that sync can only occur with at least two computers on simultaneously, since the data is not stored anywhere. Now that Microsoft announced their Skydrive, I hope they will tie in Foldershare, offering the option of either direct P2P or web-based sync, which could also become your online backup.

Talk about irony, how about this: although Google is the champion of moving to the cloud and Microsoft the defender of PC-based computing, I am struggling to use Google’s otherwise excellent but single PC-based product, Picasa over several PCs, and if Windows Live Photo Gallery has a better architecture, I’ll switch in a split second. What an upside-down world!

Windows Live Onecare is another important piece of the Live package – but it has nothing to do with on-demand computing, being a package that needs to be downloaded, aimed at keeping your local PC safe.

How about Windows Live Writer? It’s the best offline blog editor I’ve seen for along time – but again, strictly offline.

Actually, we don’t even have to look at the individual applications: this week’s news that triggered a flurry of posts is about a Unified Live Installer, which by definition is the good old model of downloads, updates, patches went wrong, reboots..etc – there is no install in the on-demand world.

All in all it’s safe to conclude that Windows Live offers a number of very good applications, but in the Cloud it is NOT.

Filed Under: Marketing / PR, SaaS, Technology · Tagged: cloud computing, foldershare, Google, microsoft, On-Demand, onecare, picasa, SaaS, windows live

Did YOU Invent Facebook? Take a Number.

Posted on September 1, 2007 ·

The ConnectU vs. Zuckerberg case is still open, but The New York Times reports Facebook’s real inventor, at least on a conceptual level might very well be another Harvard graduate, Aaron J. Greenspan, who established a Web service at Harvard, which he called houseSYSTEM:

An e-mail message, circulated widely by Mr. Greenspan to Harvard students on Sept. 19, 2003, describes the newest feature of houseSYSTEM, as “the Face Book,” an online system for quickly locating other students. The date was four months before Mr. Zuckerberg started his own site, originally “thefacebook.com.” (Mr. Greenspan retained his college e-mail messages and provided The New York Times with copies of his communications with Mr. Zuckerberg.)

So Greenspan (Aaron, not Alan) is claimant #3… but wait, perhaps it was ~~Your Momma~~ Nick O’Neill:

For all those that think they came up with an idea similar to Facebook before it was launched: congratulations! Unfortunately you didn’t have the same luck or resources that Mark Zuckerberg had at the time. Oh and by the way: I was one of the founders of Google. Just thought you should know.

They will all have to fight it out with Pete Cashmore, though, whose claim dates back to 1997:

I can only conclude that Zuckerberg used a mind-reading contraption to literally steal the idea from my brain. This will be the basis of my $1 billion lawsuit to be filed later this month.

But thoughts are not enough.. so Zoho CEO Sridhar Vembu’s claim may be stronger, since he has a Thought-ent (thought-patent) on it:

That very moment, his eyes lit up, and he screamed “Yes, YES, OMIGOD, Face on the book, FACE BOOK, I Got It, Now I Really Got It, That’s what I am going to do, Facebook. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you, I LOVE YOU!”

…So naturally I went to my lawyer, because I remember being told that is the first thing you are supposed to do in these situations. You know, like, billions could be at stake here.
He listened to my story intently, and started explaining the legal situation, in that measured, precisely crafted manner that I had come to associate with him: “Clearly you brought the two distinct ideas “FACE” and “BOOK” together in one sentence, on which the whole Facebook foundation rests, and which Mark Zuckerberg took from you, as proved by the reaction he had when the idea was transmitted to him. In legal terms, what you had was a THOUGHT-ent, also known as a thought-patent, which are considered legally equivalent to patents.”

(It’s a long but humorous post, I don’t even know which part to quote, you might as well read the whole story)

Last, but not least, my own claim:

I graduated in ~~CENSORED~~ when Mark Zuckerberg was likely in diapers. I really did not like our facebook on paper – I was seriously considering moving it on the Net. There was only one problem: the Internet did not exist. So first I had to invent it. Now you know: Al Gore did not invent the Web. I did.

Additional reading (claimants?): Insider Chatter, Mark Evans, muhammad.saleem, TechCrunch, Mashable!, Techomical and New Scientist Technology Blog.

Filed Under: Humor, Startups · Tagged: al gore, connectu, facebook, Humor, internet, lawsuit, mark zuckerberg, patent system, patents, thoughtent

iPhone SE 007

Posted on September 1, 2007 ·

Apple released the limited, hand-made iPhone Special Edition 007.

The booby-trapped device which can explode in the wrong hands is in high demand by Intelligence Agencies.

Attendees to next week’s Office 2.0 Conference beware: there will be 500 of these devices on premise, so anything can happen…

Other Intelligence Reports: Infinite Loop, Techomical, Gizmodo, TECH.BLORGE.com, The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, MacSlash, iPhone Atlas.

Filed Under: Humor, Technology · Tagged: Humor, iPhone

Iraqi WMD are Found After All – in New York

Posted on August 31, 2007 ·

It doesn’t get more bizarre then this: Iraqi chemical weapons were discovered, of all places, in the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission in downtown Manhattan.

Apparently they were brought back from Iraq after the previous war, stashed away in storage and forgotten. They were now rediscovered only as the Comission were closing their offices. (full story: The New York Times)

Filed Under: Politics · Tagged: Iraq, Iraq war, United Nations, Weapons, WMD

Is Your Online Content Really Yours?

Posted on August 29, 2007 ·

Industry Analyst and fellow Enterprise Irregular Josh Greenbaum had a shocking discovery:

…the Terms of Service posted on the Google Docs and Spreadsheets site assigns content rights of anything saved on Doc and Spreadsheets to Google. It’s almost too incredible to believe, so here’s the wording from the mighty Google maw itself:

“… you grant Google a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to reproduce, adapt, modify, publish and distribute such Content on Google services for the purpose of displaying, distributing and promoting Google services…”

His conclusion:

I’ve said it before – Google is the new evil empire – but now I really am beginning to believe it. I know that user agreements are typically ignored by most users, but anyone in the corporate world who ignores this risks seeing their IP in a Google marketing campaign, or worse.

All I can say is this: Are they out of their minds?

Unlike Josh, I’m not sure this is part of Google’s Evil Master Plan, more a case of careless wording. Google’s very own Privacy Policy spells out more proper intent:

Files you create with Google Docs & Spreadsheets may, if you choose, be read, copied, used and redistributed by people you know or, again if you choose, by people you do not know. Information you disclose using the chat function of Google Docs & Spreadsheets may be read, copied, used and redistributed by people participating in the chat. Use care when including sensitive personal information in documents you share or in chat sessions, such as social security numbers, financial account information, home addresses or phone numbers.

It’s all about warning me and you, users, to be careful about protecting our content, which to me would be contrary to the “Evil Plan”. I think in this case Dennis Howlett is right, there are inconsistencies between the legal terms of various Google Services, that’s all:

I leave it to the lawyerly brethern to chew over this lot but as an advisor to business decision makers, I don’t need a lawyer to tell me this is an unholy mess where my rights are unclear and where my privacy is at risk. Unlike Josh, I find it hard to believe Google wants part ownership of my data. It wants to send contextual advertising. To that extent, it needs to analyze and understand what’s going on in the things I commit to GAPE. The conclusion I’ve come to is that like so much that comes out of Google, it is half baked and poorly thought through.

In the above Dennis refers to Google Apps for the Enterprise. Now, Google and other online services are certainly targeted to small businesses, too (some more than others), which will look at usability, convenience, cost, and don’t typically comb through legal documents. This is not very reassuring. In fact it got me outright worried – are my friends at Zoho equally lax about legalities? I’m using their services and never bothered to check the TOS. Ignorant, I know – but you see, I am a Very Small Business.

My worries only lasted 5 minutes, until I found this in Zoho’s Privacy Policy:

We assure you that the contents of your Account will not be disclosed to anyone and will not be accessible to employees of AdventNet. Neither do we process the contents of your Account for serving targeted advertisements.

It’s affirmative, plain and simple, black and white: does not take a lawyer to decipher . This may very well be one of the differentiators I’ve hinted at before. Case closed.