Watch what you say, but also watch what you don't say. Case in point: Windows Phone 7 sales aren't at the levels that Microsoft would like them to be, it seems. As editor Keith Ward writes, Redmond has reveled in the fact that Kinect exceeded a million units in sales. But in regards to phone figures and Ballmer during the big shareholder meeting says sales are "fantastic." In other news, Ballmer sells about a billion dollars worth of stock, for financial reasons.
(Sidenote: I'd like to point out that I'm considering taking one for the team and upgrading to an HTC HD7, but I have yet to pull the trigger. Should I?)
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/18/2010 at 11:59 AM13 comments
Microsoft Lync
officially launched today. The company has
posted a nifty infographic on the many ways to use it, so we're curious to know how many of you are using it and to what extent. Check out the graphic and then vote in our poll:
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/17/2010 at 11:59 AM0 comments
It's hard to imagine IT admins in Iraq worrying about anything more than staying alive. Apparently, there are enough with certification aspirations that a Microsoft training and certification center has opened up in Baghdad, according to this quick but informative
blog post at Fast Company. Just imagine: The center can churn out 3,000 Microsoft-certified graduates a year, who otherwise have to travel out of country to obtain high-tech skills.
So, you might be thinking that for a country flirting with civil war and amid political upheaval, "IT is the last thing I'd worry about." For the most part, you'd be right. IT can't solve all of Iraq's problems, but at least the country's IT infrastructure can attain a bit of stability, which in turn means providing some quick assistance via computing power to those who are trying to help the country out of crisis.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/17/2010 at 11:59 AM4 comments
Intel released the 4004, a single-chip microprocessor, on Nov. 15, 1971. It's considered among one of the most influential chips in the Intel line, since it helped spur Intel's growth in the early years. Even though the chip had one function -- to operate as a calculator -- Intel sold millions of them to companies like Busicom, who incorporated them into desktop calculators. (You might be more familiar with calculators from NCR, which were manufactured by Busicom.)
Years ago, a rumor had circulated that the 4004 chip found its way on board the Pioneer 10 deep space probe, but the rocket scientists who built the probe denied it. Perhaps it would have been a fitting tribute.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/15/2010 at 11:59 AM0 comments
Microsoft Learning Group is taking a new approach with the highly coveted Microsoft Certified Master SQL Server 2008. To complete the requirements, training is optional, and you no longer are required to travel to Redmond to take it or the exams. Right now, it applies only to the SQL Server version of the certification and not the other versions, which Don Field, Microsoft Learning's certification director, briefed me on in a phone call yesterday. More details
here.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/09/2010 at 11:59 AM0 comments
The cautious among you will take this news with a grain of salt (pun fully intended): ESJ.com, one of our sibling 1105 Media sites,
carries an optimistic piece on IT salaries seeing a slight uptick of 3.4 percent heading into next year. The piece cites data from staffing company Robert Half Technology, who publishes its guide yearly. For those who tend to throw caution to the wind, such good news is cause for celebration, yes?
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/09/2010 at 11:59 AM1 comments
In 1895, William Roentgen discovered x-rays while experimenting with electrical effects on vacuum tubes. His wife must have been incredibly trusting of his work, as she literally lent her hand to produce the first ever x-ray. Six years later, Roentgen's discovery earned him a Nobel Prize in physics. X-rays been incredibly important in medicine but also had practical application in astronomy, as scientists determined that just about every object in the universe, particularly those in deep space, gives off x-rays.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/08/2010 at 11:59 AM0 comments
For most of North America, Daylight Savings Time rolls up on us this weekend (most of the world started without us, changing their clocks last weekend). So, just a reminder that it's time once again to make sure your systems and applications are in sync.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/04/2010 at 11:59 AM2 comments
Microsoft
released a report today that shows that cloud computing, while it might save your budget, might also have a positive impact on the environment. I see one problem with that at the moment: green was a sexy topic about two years ago. Now, not so much. If the report showed immense job growth as a result of cloud computing, now that might pique our collective interest.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/04/2010 at 11:59 AM1 comments
Microsoft's Windows franchise has been the company's mainstay for so long, it's difficult for those of us who are intimately familiar with the company to think that anything would change there. Yet, the changes have been many and will affect the company in profound ways into the future: Bill Gates left the helm and so did the vision; a dozen or so key movers have moved on to other companies, some with a bit of success; and companies with new and innovative technologies have mounted challenges to Redmond's cash cow product lines. Add to that, Microsoft has pointed some of its business cloudward, and who ever thought they'd do that?
With that in mind and with this year drawing this decade to a close, we predict a few possible and farfetched scenarios for the company in the next 10 years (not all of them dependent on the other).
Ballmer Retires from Helm
Prediction Scale: 10 (Highly likely)
Scenario: Ten years from now, Ballmer will have cashed out some of his stock options five years hence and headed out to greener pastures back in his home state. During the 5 years, he helps to rebuild Detroit, putting in lots of money to replace the city's long-gone auto industry with IT help desk centers.
At the helm, will be someone young with a ponytail (unfortunately, that 'do is back in style), and not anyone we've ever heard of who has worked with Microsoft -- yet.
Microsoft's Biggest Revenue Market? China
Prediction Scale: 3
Scenario: With the rest of the world cooling to Microsoft's core software, it only stands to reason that Microsoft would take drastic measures to generate revenue in the Chinese market by getting the backing of the government to crack down on software piracy and turn some of that free software into revenue. How? Microsoft gets a secret deal with the government that it gets a nice percentage of the licensing fees catching pirates and converting them to legit copies of Windows and Office.
As a result of that coup, Microsoft and Baidu.com work out an ad revenue sharing deal that helps Baidu expand into Western markets through Bing.com, a scenario that seems all too familiar for some reason.
Microsoft Merges with Apple
Prediction Scale: 1 (Not very likely, but never say never)
Scenario: Apple's market cap continues to go up, and that might not mean much now. But if trends are what they are, five years from now, Apple's bar on the chart might be towering over Redmond's. Apple has been incredibly strong in areas that Microsoft wants to play in -- mobile and consumer goods -- and it has been able to show it can sustain a winning streak. Microsoft's smartphone strategy hasn't worked, and lags far behind Google and even Nokia.
Meanwhile, Apple's Mac and iPad hardware have been assuming their positions onto more corporate desktops and now it seems like a merger with a dwindling Microsoft, whose Windows 9 still has 60 percent of the enterprise desktops, is a credible move against Google.
Microsoft is playing in and gaining momentum in the cloud, but competition from Google and Amazon is stiff and some other smaller players who'll emerge in the coming years will gobble up shares there. Meanwhile, Apple sees the writing on the wall, with more than half its profits coming from the newer generation iPhone and iPad, and those products are getting long in the tooth and Google's Android just keeps making things tough for everyone. With Apple and Microsoft looking up at Google (and Jobs no longer at the helm), a merger is starting to make sense.
Microsoft Splits Up
Prediction Scale: 5
Scenario: The Redmond giant finally does the sensible thing and becomes three new companies -- business solutions, developer solutions, and entertainment.
Curiously, the business solutions company excludes IE, which is Microsoft's way of telling the world that the browser wasn't integral to the OS.
The breakout division, though, is the developer solutions splinter group, which finally figures out how to create tools as well as provides better ways to market solutions to customers. Its custom consulting arm begins to rival IBM in the consulting market.
The entertainment company begins a downward spiral as it tries to compete with Google Games, a virtual gaming platform built out of a merger with Electronic Arts and Blizzard Entertainment.
Microsoft's Biggest Product: Microsoft Cumulus 3.51
Prediction Scale: 7
Scenario: The company once known for looking outward is now known for looking upward. It's taken five years to become the "cloud company," and folks remember VMware like they remember Stac Electronics. Its aptly named cloud OS is a hit, whereas its Azure 2015 R3 misses.
So, what happened with Windows? It still dominates the file server and database market. And we all know what misfortune lies ahead for companies that claim to dominate those segments.
Got any other ideas where Microsoft will be? Add your comments here or send me an e-mail. I'll pick the coolest ones to receive a Redmond T-Shirt.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/04/2010 at 11:59 AM4 comments
The date was Nov. 2, back in 1988, that Robert Morris, a Cornell University student, unleashed the very first known computer worm onto the electronic ether. That's right -- he's responsible for the worm that bears his name, the Morris Worm, launched from the campus of MIT.
His creation got him three years of probation, the first such sentence handed down for a cybercrime under the federal government's Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, which was signed into law two years earlier.
More interesting factoids in this week's IT Webgems segment on Redmond Radio. Listen now!
Posted by Michael Domingo on 11/02/2010 at 11:59 AM0 comments
It's released, but
not officially until next year. Two new features are dynamic memory and RemoteFX. Are those features you've been wanting to check out or deploy now? Tell us about it
here.
Posted by Michael Domingo on 10/28/2010 at 11:59 AM0 comments