Last week's post on the
ultimate
demise of Netscape got readers into a nostalgic mood. Since it's a slow-ish
news day, let's jump right into your Internet memories:
First off, Mike from Finland writes again, this time to correct RCPU on an
extremely important point. RCPU referred to pop legends ABBA as "four singing
Swedes" -- when, in fact, one of the ladies in the group was actually Norwegian
(and therefore probably should have had a place in another
recent entry).
"Completely irrelevant to anything, of course, but Anni-Frid was
Norwegian, not Swedish. I worked in Sweden in those long-off days (in my case
'75 to '80), and my memories of that song include driving a Volvo (what else?)
through Paris with the windows wide open and playing that song [in this
case, 'Fernando' -LP] at semi-full power. (I worked three weeks in Paris,
three weeks back in Sweden for about 18 months in '78 to '79)."
Semi-full power, Mike? Heck, you should have cranked it! Your editor is an
unashamed ABBA fan and actually knew that one of the band members was Norwegian
but simply made a careless, sloppy error last week. So, we thank Mike for his
diligence in sorting Scandinavian singers. That's what RCPU is all about.
Mitch, presumably not Norwegian, wrote to say that he was on the Internet before
he wasn't on it...or something like that:
"In 1984, I was thrown into IT with an assignment to become the administrator
of a BSD UNIX system. One of my jobs was to log in to the University of California
at Berkeley to get periodic OS patches, updates and, of course, the latest
database of jokes for the 'fortune' application. I went through a whole transition
of connection methods from ARPAnet, UUCP and NSF connection betas as part
of my monthly routines. I recall doing a 'who' statement while logged in to
find someone at Berkeley who was online to get support. At that time, between
2 and 4 a.m. CST, there would be less than a screen full (yes, 25 lines) of
people active.
"In 1993/1994, I was out of the country on business for an extended
period. A gentleman from the local phone company and I struck up a conversation
over breakfast and he posed the question, 'How do I get on the Internet?'
At the time, I had taken off my IT hat for a new occupation, and I didn't
even know what he was talking about! A year later, after returning back to
the U.S., it seemed like the term 'Internet' was in everything I read. I was
moving back into IT and it seemed the world had passed me by in the two years
I was away."
It did explode quickly, didn't it? Peter, RCPU's neighbor here in Greater Boston,
said that being an "early adopter" of the Internet got him at least
one, uh, perk:
"At a meeting of a hundred or so folks way back in the '80s, the
meeting sponsor was looking for a few people to test a beta. This was before
beta testing became an event for the masses; back then, you needed to sign
your first born away along with a few hundred non-disclosure statements. Anyway,
I was chosen for one reason: I was the only person there who had an e-mail
address printed on my business card."
Another Mike, probably not from Finland, finishes off our trip down memory
lane with some pleasant ramblings that should be followed by a sigh and maybe
a sip of a lovely beverage:
"Well, there were many DARPA users (and hackers), and many probably
still really hate the fact that it changed. As you know, most were .gov- and
.edu-type in those days (UNIX mostly). So, not to take away anything from
Andreessen (and Clark), but for those of us who were in the corporate world
on protected networks (IBM SNA in my case all the way through the '80s), I
think the real introduction to public networking and access to many useful
resources and collaboration came through the old bulletin-board systems.
"Xmodem and its derivatives were the downloading tool of choice for
binary stuff when PCs became popular in the early '80s. I would venture to
say that these same folks populated many of the Inet communities starting
in 1990 or thereabouts and heavily influenced the Inet world as we know it
today (along with folks like Bob Metcalf of Ethernet fame and his contemporaries).
When the corporate nets started converting to IP, the Inet received a lot
of business traffic (sometimes disguised as personal use)...anyway, not necessarily
the driving force, so to speak, but certainly related and a different perspective.
"I do remember Netscape (and Sun, I guess) and its JavaScript 1.2
implementations, and it is certainly true that for many the Web browser and
the Inet were synonymous...and probably still are for many of today's users.
'The king is dead; long live the king.'"
Long indeed, Mike. Thanks to all who shared their memories. If you've got anything
to add on this topic or any other you see in RCPU, add it at [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on January 10, 20080 comments
More news from a big distributor: Tech Data has inked (sorry, we couldn't resist)
a
deal
with FMAudit to offer managed printing services.
Posted by Lee Pender on January 10, 20080 comments
Let's see...hockey joke or
McKenzie
brothers joke? Ah, heck, we love Canada. We'll just
give
you the link so you can see what this workstation thing is all aboot, eh.
(There's no cliché like a Canadian cliché.)
Posted by Lee Pender on January 09, 20080 comments
Norway has always been a country of searchers:
Edvard
Munch searching in his expressionist art for some outlet for his anxiety,
energy companies searching for oil in Norway's fossil-rich waters,
Henrik
Ibsen searching for hidden truth in the rigid morals of Victorian society...
Oh, you thought this newsletter was all football references and pop-culture
quotes, didn't you? Well, think again -- we have patches on the sleeves of our
tweed jackets today. And note that somehow a site dedicated to the art of Munch
has a link labeled "Fun Stuff." Yes, Munch is always a lot of...fun.
You have to love the Internet.
Anyway, just as Norwegians have always searched for...something, Microsoft
is making a pilgrimage to Oslo in search of...well, search. Redmond is planning
to splash out $1.2
billion on Fast Search & Transfer, a provider of enterprise search based
in the capital of Norway.
Long a laggard behind Google and Yahoo in consumer search, Microsoft actually
has a shot at making an impact among enterprise info seekers. After all, most
companies already have a huge investment in Microsoft infrastructure, anyway,
so why not offer a (hopefully) pre-integrated Microsoft enterprise-search tool
to set on top of the whole thing? It makes sense, at least on the surface --
and Redmond is hoping that Fast will provide a more robust platform for developers
creating enterprise-search functionality.
Normally, $1.2 billion would be an eyebrow-raising sum, but with Microsoft
having raked in about $50 billion in its last fiscal year alone, it's not much
more than lunch money for Redmond. And given that enterprise search seems a
more open, accessible market than its consumer cousin at the moment, it might
just be money well-spent in search (see, everything ties back to the beginning)
of market share.
Do you have any experience with Microsoft enterprise search tools? What's your
take on the market? Shoot me your views at [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on January 09, 20080 comments
Mac
Pro and Xserve are big horses for enterprise-type stuff. They also have
new Intel chips inside. See, Mac people, we do know that you're out there.
Posted by Lee Pender on January 09, 20081 comments
If you caught the results of
RCP the magazine's
reader
survey in our December issue, then you know that one of the few things partners
don't like about working with Microsoft is Redmond's rarely simple, sometimes
arcane licensing policies. In our survey, more than 60 percent of you said that
Microsoft's licensing procedures make its products difficult to sell.
Given that the respondents to our survey make at least part -- and, in most
cases, probably a large part -- of their living selling Microsoft's wares, licensing
issues and the hassles associated with them are a big deal. Well, late last
week, Microsoft eased partners' pain a little bit with some loosening of its
licensing procedures.
Of primary interest to partners will be Microsoft's Open Value Subscription
Program, through which partners will be able to offer customers subscriptions
-- which will function
almost like a lease -- for Microsoft applications. (We're projecting to
the future here because OVSP will be available in March.)
A company interested in Microsoft's stuff will be able to pay for it -- through
a partner, naturally -- on an annual-subscription basis rather than having to
fork over the money for it all at once and up front. At the end of the year,
the company will have the option of canceling the subscription, renewing it
or just buying the licenses outright.
The OVSP won't really ease the headaches caused by Microsoft's complex licensing
policies, but it will give partners a less-expensive and perhaps more manageable
option to offer to those customers that are reticent about paying the -- let's
face it -- high price to invest in Microsoft applications. It won't necessarily
make the purchase of Microsoft products cheaper, either, but it will make it
more flexible -- and flexibility is almost always a good thing for both partners
and customers.
Of secondary interest, we're guessing, to partners is the loosening
of licensing restrictions on Windows Web Server 2008 (which, we must confess,
some
"other" channel publication first reported on last week). Redmond
is making Web
Server 2008 -- a Windows Server 2008 SKU...what, you haven't heard of it?
-- easier to license in order to make it more competitive with open-source competition.
Whatever Microsoft can do to make licensing easier and more flexible seems
to RCPU like good idea, so we're chalking this up as good news to start 2008.
Now, if Microsoft can just get its server bonanza launched without any (more)
delays...
How interested will your clients be in a subscription model from Microsoft?
How interested are you? Let me know at [email protected].
Posted by Lee Pender on January 08, 20081 comments
The first Patch Tuesday of the year is
looking
like a cake walk. By the way, when's the last time somebody actually organized
a cake walk?
Posted by Lee Pender on January 08, 20080 comments
Funny
tribute
videos aside, Bill Gates, who's finally pretty much done as Microsoft's
chairman,
didn't
really have a whole lot to say at this week's big, headline-grabbing trade
show, CES. Of course, Gates'
somewhat
mundane speech gave rise to a whole new round of criticism of Microsoft
for not innovating...which leads us to wonder, to what extent has Microsoft
ever innovated?
Microsoft has always been about sales, marketing and, uh, "dealing with"
its competition. It has rarely been on the cutting edge of much of anything
-- nor has it needed to be. And Redmond's not hurting financially now. So Gates
didn't set the world on fire in one of his big farewell appearances. So what?
He can still play big-money whip-out with just about anybody on the planet,
and, fortunately for much of the world, he's doing a lot of good with his money.
Posted by Lee Pender on January 08, 20080 comments
Some enterprising reporter pored over a bunch of numbers over the holidays
and figured that Microsoft must be making a killing on its Novell SuSE Linux
deal. In the spirit of the Internet, your somewhat less enterprising newsletter
writer (hey, there's been lots of football on TV these last couple of weeks)
is
linking
to the story. Enjoy.
Posted by Lee Pender on January 03, 20080 comments
Welcome back! And welcome to 2008 -- an Olympic year, an election year (in
the U.S., anyway), a year when there'll be a European Championship soccer tournament
and a year in which you'll see a few new wrinkles in what we hope is your favorite
e-mail newsletter, or at least your favorite newsletter written by a Texan working
in an office on Route 9 in Framingham, Mass. (We're guessing that we've got
that last category nailed.)
Yes, we're making some changes to RCPU. Oh, it's not going to be that big a
deal. In fact, we think that you'll like the new, more focused, (somewhat) less
random RCPU for 2008 (and, we hope, beyond). First off, we're going to run the
newsletter three times per week rather than four most weeks this year in hopes
of at least postponing your editor's inevitable development of carpal tunnel
syndrome.
Beyond that, we're going to reorganize things just a bit. You'll still get
the opening RCPU rant du jour at the top of the newsletter that you've come
to know and tolerate, but, after that, we'll be sorting news and commentary
into categories, a different one for each day of the week the newsletter runs.
(Collect them all! It'll make a fun game!)
The opening item of the newsletter will, as promised, continue to be a comment
on whatever big thing happens to be happening right then. We'll start breaking
stuff down after that. On Tuesdays, we'll come in with general tech industry
news -- stuff like financial results, vendor executive moves, analyst blather,
nasty little wars of words between industry players and the like. On Wednesdays,
we'll deliver product news, which seems pretty self-explanatory. And on Thursdays,
we'll hit you with channel news -- all partner stuff, all the time.
So, you say, whither Reader Feedback Friday? Alas, like the year 2007 just
passed, it is but a pleasant memory now. But we'll still be running tons of
reader e-mails (probably on Thursdays, mostly, but you'll have to keep reading
to find out), so please keep sending them to [email protected].
All of this will start next week. Until then, enjoy your leftover New Year's
champagne (and the last few college football bowl games), and get that tree
out of the living room before you burn the house down.
-- Lee
Posted by Lee Pender on January 03, 20080 comments