Huibert Aalbers Portfolio

Blogging is easy

October 28, 2006

Although I am not a heavy blogger, I post entries to my blog three or four times a week, I have found it easy to keep it updated. After all, every day I get exposed to situations or news I would like to react to. That is the way most blogs work, we receive information and we like to be able to tell others what we think about it. That is easy, and that is why there are also daily radio and tv talk shows where people express their opinions on what happened a day before. These shows do not require a lot of preparation, participants just listen to or read the facts a couple of minutes in advance and then start talking about the subject. Of course, there are differences, some people know more about a particular subject than others and therefore are able to say more interesting things than others. Like many, I spend some time reading those blogs and sometimes watching TV programs like Crossfire on CNN.

As many of you know, I also publish a podcast, IT Insight. Maintaining that podcast has proved to be much harder. Why? Well, each podcast material is original. I have to select a subject, prepare a presentation and check my facts. That takes time. I have found that I am not able to produce more that one episode a month.

What does that mean for the future of blogs, newspapers and talk shows? There certainly is a market for content that is published in reaction to what other people say or do. However, that market is going to be over crowded since this is something really easy to do. Differentiation will be hard to achieve, but is possible based on subject knowledge and personality which will however inevitably lead to market fragmentation. On the other hand, news consolidation, which is what most newspapers and TV news shows offer today, is less and less valuable as all RSS users know. Finally, news gathering is still crucial as is original content production.

Today, most newspapers survive mainly because of the trust relationship they have established with their readership. However, since most have given up on generating original content, relying instead on syndication to become more profitable, they are finding themselves in the same uncomfortable situation as TV broadcasters who have no control over their content and are finding out that their customers do no longer need them to access it. If newspapers (both physical and online) want to survive they need to get back to the basics, gathering information from the source and producing original content, even if it is expensive. Otherwise, their feature looks bleak.

New Mac Book Pro models

October 26, 2006

On Tuesday Apple released new Mac Book Pro Models. This wasn’t a big surprise as as Intel had announced the new Core 2 Duo chip months ago and speculation was running high that new models would arrive in time for Christmas. What strikes me is that while everyone expected this announcement, rumor sites had to resort to inventory checks at the retail and reseller levels to predict the announcement date. Nobody outside Apple knew in advance the specs of the new notebooks. It seems that Apple has finally been able to totally eliminate confidential information leaks. Sure, there have been screenshots of the latest Leopard developers release but this was expected as it is very difficult to control a relatively large community of programmers working outside of Apple, but that is it.

It seems therefore that rumor sites are left with few elements to work with, namely public information from Intel, inventory checks, patents and, of course, speculation and wishful thinking.

Is open-source software innovative?

October 25, 2006

Software vendors like to talk about innovation. They usually mention their R&D budget as a proof of their commitment to creating new exciting technologies. However, the truth is that most large companies are turning to A&D (Acquisition and Development) strategies to quickly incorporate new ideas into their products. Buying startups that have developed new ideas and proved their value at a small scale in the market seems to be cheaper than maintaining large labs which produce inconsistent results.

However, even with shrinking research funds, large companies have been able to set the pace of technological innovation. In the enterprise for example, it is hard to believe that the Web Services revolution could have occurred without the large investments made by companies like IBM and Microsoft. The same goes for BPM (Business Process Management). Something similar happens on the desktop, where most innovations seem to come from Apple and to a lesser degree Adobe and other smaller companies.

So, where is the innovation within the open-source movement? The truth is that I do not really see it. The engineers that work on open-source projects seem to focus on doing things faster, better and cheaper (with mixed results). That is great but I would like to see more innovation. Take for example the just released Firefox 2. Take a look at the new features offered in this release. You will find new exciting features such as Inline spell checking, RSS support and much more. Not excited? You are not alone. Most of these features are already available elsewhere. If you want real innovation in browser technologies you better look at companies such as Flock, OmniGroup or Opera.

Do not get me wrong. I love open-source software. I am an avid Firefox user as well as an Apache Foundation fan when it comes to looking for solid Java or C APIs for my applications. However, I really believe that if the open-source movement really wants to take over commercial software companies it needs an improved value proposition. Faster, better and cheaper is good, but it is innovation that get people excited.

The iPod. Five years innovating?

October 25, 2006

The iPod just turned five. I remember buying mine in Orlando at a CompUSA store just a couple of weeks after Apple launched it. At the time there were no podcasts so I used it the way it was intended to be used, to listen to my music library and it was a vast improvement over anything I had used before. At the beginning, my IBM colleagues where not impressed. Today they all have iPods. The revolution that the iPod caused can only be compared to the launch of the original Sony Walkman during the seventies.

Five years later, the iPod hasn’t changed much. Sure, the scroll wheel isn’t really a wheel anymore, the HD capacity as grown steadily, iPods now play videos and can even play games but even with all the innovation talk that surround Apple, technology improvements are incremental. Turning great ideas into actual products takes time and since companies like Apple usually depend on off-the-shelves components they really cannot create revolutionary products easily. Of course, where Apple is really shines is in the area of software development. During the last five years iTunes has evolved much faster than the iPod and gone from a simple MP3 player and CD ripper to a fully fledge digital media library. There are decent competitors to the iPod on the hardware side, but no real iTunes competitors.

It is clear to me that the iPod is ready for a major overhaul. The rumored iPhone, coupled with a successful iTV could give the iPod another couple of years of success with the public in a highly competitive marketplace. Once released, the iPhone will be greeted with cheers by expectant crowds. However, the iPhone already exists. In fact there are many iPhones, created Sony-Ericsson, LG and BenQ, among others. When Apple announces the new iPhone it will likely bear many similarities to those existing products. However, what we are looking for is better software that will allow for a better user experience, better integration with existing applications such as iTunes and iChat. Those who say that software cannot help make a company differentiate itself from the competition are wrong, dead wrong. They just cannot write good software. This is true in the Consumer Electronics space, but also in the Enterprise.

Leadership Readiness training

October 21, 2006

I have been a manager for a couple of months now and I was invited to participate in the Leadership Readiness Program. The material was really interesting. It is clear that IBM intends its people managers (managers who are responsible for teams with at least four members to devote all their resources to devote all their efforts to make them successful. That is great but at the same time it means that once you are a manager you automatically have to leave the field.

Personally, I do not like the idea to stop visiting customers and stop learning technical stuff. I feel that this is essential if I have to evaluate the performance of everyone within my team and also serve as a mentor. Therefore, I plan to keep learning about the new technologies that IBM releases and spend at least a couple of hours a day on the field.

Fellow managers tell me that cannot be achieved. They say that administrative tasks are too demanding. They may be right. Since becoming a manager I am actually working harder but it isn’t that bad, since I still have enough time time to spend it with my family. I had to reduce the time I spend developing, though. However, I am still working on my Cocoa projects and hope to be able o release something before Christmas. I will let you know.

How would a wireless iPod operate?

October 15, 2006

Steve Jobs recently gave Newsweek an interesting interview. In it he spoke about the development of the iPod as well as the impact the device has had on how we listen to music.

To me, the most interesting part of the article is where Jobs talks about the Zune, and in particular its wireless music sharing feature. This is what he had to say:

“I’ve seen the demonstrations on the Internet about how you can find another person using a Zune and give them a song they can play three times. It takes forever. By the time you’ve gone through all that, the girl’s got up and left! You’re much better off to take one of your earbuds out and put it in her ear. Then you’re connected with about two feet of headphone cable.”

I tend to agree with Steve, the younger generations are not very patient. However, what I find really interesting is that Mr. Jobs never says that sharing music is bad idea, what he says is that Microsoft’s implementation of this concept is bad. So, the question is, how would Apple implement such a feature?

The way I see it, it would have to be very simple and quick. You go to a menu, you select your friend’s iPod from a list of devices near you and you immediately hear what your friend is listening to. The songs are never stored in your iPod, just the meta data. When you get home, after syncing your device with iTunes you get a chance to buy the songs you listened to from the iTunes Store. If engadget is correct and Apple releases a new wireless video iPod before the holidays we will know very soon if they can improve the ease of use of wireless music sharing over what Microsoft plans to offer. My guess is that they will, as usual.

What politics should mean

October 14, 2006

I just finished reading an article over Air America Radio filing for bankruptcy. I did not expect readers to analyze this information in the context of a general reduction of audiences for this particular media, after all, Air America was planned from its inception as a platform for liberals to communicate their message and counter the influence of conservatives such as Rush Limbaugh who had dominated the air waves for many years and helped put George W Bush into the White House. So, with the November elections just around the corners I expect this articles to generate sparkles and some productive political debate.

I was wrong, dead wrong. Sure there were sparkles, the animosity between liberals and conservatives is at its high, but there was no debate, no debate at all. Don’t get me wrong, the usual issues about the War in Irak, the honesty of the President, the need for a strong leader in a period of war and the price of gas were all risen, but the debate was shallow.

What I do not understand is how Americans can be so divided, when both sides are so alike. Doesn’t everyone realize that there is a consensus on most major issues? Both parties want lower taxes, better security, lower gas prices, etc. and the proposed solutions are almost similar. So, basically Americans are arguing about leadership, not ideas. Most Americans despise the French but in France at least there is some true political going on. Right and Left do actually have some meaning (and I am not talking about the right to wear a gun or discussing if Evolution is science or a theory). This is good because political discussions get deeper and more interesting.

Political correctness has limited the debate to minor topics. The only reason most Americans will likely vote Democrat next month is because they do not like the way the Irak war is unraveling, not because you were against it in the first place. That could have been a good opportunity for debate, but since it is politically incorrect not to support the President in times of war, almost no one questioned George W Bush decisions. When it became clear that Iraq had no WMDs, the debate could have shifted to the possibility of bringing the troops home. However, that couldn’t be discussed either because it could embolden terrorists and endanger the soldiers. Finally, when the Abu Ghraib prison scandal surfaced, the politically correct media was quick to mention that this should not be used to criticize the military because that would be un-American. So, what can be discussed in American Politics? Gas price? No wonder all news channels spend so much time discussing this incredibly important topic, even if Americans pay less for their gas than any other developed country.

It is clear to me that political correctness limits liberty, because even if you are allowed to say things that are politically incorrect, you will find yourself quickly labeled as an extremist. However, even if people decide to stay within the narrow margins set by the political correctness rules, the are many subjects which deserve discussion. My goal here is not to enumerate all the possible topics that could be debated in American Politics, just to demonstrate that there are more interesting and relevant subjects than the price of oil.

Take for example the Constitution. It was written over 200 years ago. Does it need to be rewritten? For many, this is a ridiculous question, the Constitution has served the U.S. well. However, there are many things that I do not like about the U.S. Constitution. The people of the United States (the same ones mentioned in “We the people…”) actually never got to vote on the subjects of slavery and child labor. The decision to eliminate these abominable practices were taken by the Supreme Court, nine judges who supposedly interpret the meaning of the Constitution but in reality take political decisions without asking the People. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a Constitution that explicitly prohibits child labor and have that Constitution approved by the American citizens? I think so. I believe that Americans would feel better knowing that it was the People who declared slavery illegal instead of nine judges who have not been directly elected.

So, wake up, there are many interesting and important debates in Politics. Things can change. Everything should be open to debate. Use your liberty and democracy to discuss real issues not just management styles and results. Finally, respect those who think different, they may not be morons and you can probably learn something from them.

More on the iTV device

October 12, 2006

From the unprecedented volume of response I have a received to my previous iTV blog entry, it is clear that Apple has generated a lot of interest around their latest gadget.

I have been a proud owner of an eyeTV set-top box since early last year. I must say that I have been very pleased with it, although I have had occasional problems playing some MP3 files which bugs me since the same songs sound fine both on the Mac and on my iPod. The other problem is video. Although most common codecs are supported, there are still many video sources that I cannot view easily on that device (Real video, YouTube and podcasts come to mind).

It is an expectation for improved video quality (my EyeTV device does not include a DVI interface) as well as improved integration with all the iApps that gets me excited about the iTV. Don’t get me wrong, I do not expect Apple to offer DivX and Real Video support out of the box, but I hope that they will allow users to stream any video type supported by Quicktime. Since Quicktime can be extended to support additional codecs (take a look at Perian).

For tech-savy consumers, a new device such as the iTV can seem very attractive, but to reach the rest of the market, more functionality may not be as important as many seem to believe. In fact, less may mean more.

Take a look for example at the number of cables crawling behind any 42” plasma TV. My wife enjoys the usefulness of all these new technologies but she does not like the incredible amount of garbage that is currently required for a complete setup and I agree. I would be very happy if I could get a single device that offered all the functionality that I require. Since the iTV is expected to be an 802.11n base station, I will be able to get rid of my EyeTV and Airport Extreme as well as their related power bricks and the Ethernet cable connecting both devices. That is a great start, but who knows, in the future Apple or their partners could even travel further down this road by offering big screens with an integrated iTV. How likely are we to see such a product in the future? Who knows, but it looks like something I would be interested in.

The new patent just awarded to Apple covers a new type of Universal Remote Control is another step in the same direction. For years we have been dealing with multiple devices and it has been inconvenient. It really seems that Apple has understood that they have a big opportunity improving on all those devices that offer poor human interfaces and have accepted the challenge now that the iPod has propelled them in the consumer electronics space. It is incredible that companies like Sony have not been up to the challenge to solve these obvious problems.

We must learn to live in virtual worlds

October 7, 2006

When you write a blog you quickly learn that on the Internet not everyone is nice. There are simply tons of rude people out there that will not hesitate to insult you just for expressing opinions that do not closely match theirs. They usually hide themselves behind the anonymity that the web provides.

The problem is so widespread that I have to eliminate almost half of the messages posted on my blog (that is after deleting all the spam that I get almost daily). I used to work at HSBC back in the web early days, creating their banking portal, and I recall that most of the customer feedback sent to the bank through the Internet could mostly be described as a collection of insults. It was clear that they did not expect that someone would actually read their e-mails not to mention receiving a call from a senior manager. It was only then that they realized what they had done and apologized for the tone of their complaints.

These examples clearly show that most people behave differently online than in the real world. Why is that? How is it possible that polite persons suddenly behave like children? Well, it may be that some of those actually are children, but more seriously, the answer is obviously anonymity. We bloggers tend to behave better online simply because we know that anything we write will never be forgotten by search engines such as Google and that some of our posts may come back to byte us sometime in the future. On the other hand, anonymous users are not compelled to behave correctly.

So, how do we reign in these barbarians? As in real life, the best way to control bad behavior is social disapproval. I sincerely believe that kicking someone out of a mailing list for not following netiquette rules has positive effects, even if that person can easily rejoin the group under a new fake identity. Other options are reputation systems like the one used by eBay but based on the quality of the posts written by each member instead of their trustworthiness.

However, despite its flaws, the Internet is currently the only medium that allows for true discussion of all major themes without censorship, taboos or the interference of political correctness. This is something invaluable that we cannot afford to lose by implementing secure identity validation systems. If the price to pay for true liberty is having to live with rude people I am more than happy to pay it. I still hope though that sometime in the future we will all learn to live in virtual worlds behaving with respect for others so that no one can ever be tempted to curtail our liberties on this wonderful media.

Netcasts?

October 4, 2006

Leo Laporte has been pushing lately for renaming podcasts as netcasts. He argues that non technical people believe that they need an iPod to listen to podcasts and that this limits the potential audience of podcasts. I am not convinced. By looking at my logs, I know that I have IT Insight listeners who download the show using Juice as well as other alternatives to iTunes. Of course, most of my listeners use iTunes, but this only reflects the size of the market share that the iPod has captured.

However, this is not the whole story. Leo Laporte also argues that the dominance of iTunes is bad for podcasters. He seems to believe that a more fragmented market is better for podcasters. He goes as far as asking help from Microsoft to fight Apple dominance. This is ridiculous, it is like asking a wolf for help to keep the sheep under control.

As a podcaster who gets most of my traffic through iTunes, I understand why he may want to depend less on Apple. If your podcast is not featured regularly on the iTunes store or your podcast does not appear in the Top 100 list, you are out of luck and it is hard to get people to listen to your shows. However, Leo can hardly complain from lack of cooperation from Apple as they regularly feature TWiT and MacBreak among their top picks.

So, the question is, what does he expect from a fragmented market? Probably more power for podcasters. It is well known that he is currently in the process of building a network of podcasts and he probably would like people to go to his network page to select their content from a limited number of channels instead of a large directory containing thousands of podcasts where his products can easily get lost.

Will it help if Microsoft gets into the game? Most likely not. Instead of a de facto monopoly we will get either a duopoly or a fragmented market. The difference is that instead of the benevolent dictatorship we have today, we will get a known monopolist who will fight for its own financial benefit, competing not only for hardware supremacy but also for revenue from its own content (think MSN, MSNBC, etc). The same applies to companies such as Time-Warner.

From my point of view, I largely prefer a neutral directory that dominates the market where it is difficult to compete, but everyone faces the same difficulties, over a myriad of services where only professional podcasters, with a enough resources to publicize their shows on all existing directories, can reach all the potential listeners. I also sincerely believe that this scenario is also worse for consumers, at least for now, since the technology is still in its infancy.

I do not think that asking Microsoft for help is particularly wise. They are not known for defending the community interests. Besides, they also have enough interests in the content market for us to expect them to be impartial. Yes, I know, so does Steve Jobs, but since Apple and Disney are separate companies, any coordinated move is likely to go through high scrutiny by investors.

Leo Laporte claims to defend the interests of the podcaster community. He certainly does not represent me. I feel that he has already lost a lot of credibility by endorsing Dell computers on his TWiT show, when everyone knows that he is a Mac user. This is even worse. I feel that he is pursuing his own interests by trying to gain independence from Apple. I do not criticize him for that. I simply believe he should be more open about his true motives.