I just finished watching the webcast of Bill Gates keynote tonight at CES (not Steve Ballmer – yes Bill Gates).  I love watching Gates … he is consummate spokesperson for technology.  Ok, lets move to the content of Bill speech. He had four themes: music (Zune) mobility (phones – MS outsells Blackberry) games (200 million users) TV (mind boggling combinations of games, IP TV, interactive walls – wow!) Windows Home Server can quickly grow the pool of storage from which all of your shared files for each of your users lives. The backup engine in Windows Home Server also silently backs … Continue reading Windows Home Server – announced at CES

Bloggers are an idealistic lot, often with very thin skin.  Is it just me or during the run up to Xmas, and the light blogging period during the holidays, the negativism that set in suggested a few were getting punchy. We had; “Google in trouble” meme (is their blog a blog, and another one that I misplaced, but concerning Googles method for determining what is #1 on their search list, and suggesting they are manipulating it) (Incidentally, check out this search “google in trouble” – it appears Google have been in trouble for years) “Social Media is no mo“, followed by, … Continue reading Rumours of Googles death are greatly exaggerated

There are some interesting posts arising from the Pulver 5 meme thing.  Pulver is receiving some criticism for self gratification and promotion from the meme. I will stay out of that one and don’t know the participants. However the matter of identity, and willingness to post “5 things that you didn’t know about me” was raised here by Confused. He stated something that struck me as deep and thoughtful when he pointed out that identity is defined in different ways, depending on your culture. In many cultures identity is defined by what you stand for, what groups you belong to. … Continue reading The "5 things meme" and identity

 So its official on the much debated Scoble secret trip.  Scoble is throwing his blogging weight, behind John Edwards in the expected bid for US President, that will be announced tomorrow. Scoble is one of the top independent bloggers in the world, and this is an interesting transition. Tech Chronicles has confirmed with Robert Scoble that he’s embarking on an out-of-state trip into the world of politics: He’s been invited to help former Democratic VP candidate John Edwards announce his presidential bid in New Orleans tomorrow. He flies out today. Source: The Technology Chronicles : The secret Scoble mission revealed … Continue reading The Technology Chronicles uncovers the secret Scoble trip

 This article in the NYT outlines some incredible situations with payroll lending operations, that can only be described as absolutely usurious – otherwise known as loan sharking.  This is the absolute antithesis of responsible lending.  But what is frightengly, almost funny, because its so unbelievable, is the pride expressed in the regulation that restricts fees to a mere annual percentage rate of 442% per annum.  Please note there is no error there … no missed decimal point.  Thank god the legislators  in Florida, Illinois, and Minnesota are taking care of things. He said the association supported fair regulations, including a cap on two-week … Continue reading Seductively Easy, Payday Loans Often Snowball

This talk from Ryan at Unspace is highly relevant to how technology projects ought to proceed.  The most telling comment he makes is that most software sucks, even though its on time and budget.  Its 38 mins, but the talk is only abut 17 mins.  He talks about Rails but the real substance is the process. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6479473876822587034 He speaks of agile development, and raises some methods that will make Bank technology groups curl up and die. no requirements documents no contracts no detailed estimates His reasons are valid, when he reflects on old ways no-one is happy – not the … Continue reading How technology work should get done