Nice to see an example of a reporter actually fact-checking details instead of simply repeating text from Google blog posts
Most of the PC vendors Google listed on its blog as partners for the new Chrome operating system say they're evaluating the software but have not committed to creating devices around it, a far less upbeat message than Google had portrayed.
See the full article for more details
But he admits his excitement is a relatively recent phenomenon, having spent his first six years as Google's CEO trying to convince company co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin that developing an operating system to compete against Microsoft Corp.'s dominant Windows franchise would be a terrible idea.
Schmidt didn't think the timing was right and, worse, he didn't want Google to get into a potentially bruising battle with the world's largest software maker. His change of heart shows how far Google has come since Page and Brin started the Mountain View, Calif.-based company in a Silicon Valley garage nearly 11 years ago.
Google CEO: New operating system changes the game by AP: Yahoo! Tech
More Chrome OS perspectives
So it’s not weird that Chrome was announced. But what is weird is how it was announced. And, despite the title of the weblog post in which the announcement was made — “Introducing the Google Chrome OS” — nothing has actually been introduced. There aren’t even any screenshots, let alone a demo or any specific technical information. With an expected ship date of “the second half of 2010”, it’s a textbook example of vaporware.
I don’t get the timing. Why announce it now, when it clearly isn’t close to ready? Why not at I/O, Google’s developer conference six weeks ago? Or why not wait until it’s ready to release to developers? I like facts, demos, and best of all, shipping products. I don’t like vague promises.
For very little additional useful information, also see the Google Chrome OS FAQ
Daring Fireball: Putting What Little We Actually Know About Chrome OS Into Context
Antisocial behavior?…
Power.com is suing its frenemy, Facebook.
On Friday, Power.com, a site that lets users sign in to several social networks from one place, plans to respond to the lawsuit that Facebook filed against it with its own suit. It alleges that Facebook is prohibiting its users from accessing their Facebook content through Power.com and that it is attempting to monopolize the social networking market.
Power.com Fights Back Against Facebook - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com
More Chrome OS scrutiny; see the full post
However, after reading the very few Chrome OS details that Google smartly dropped a couple of weeks before Microsoft is expected to announce the release to manufacturing of Windows 7, I’ve got a few doubts…. And quite a few more than the huge number of Google fanboys and girls who seem to forget for all its product debuts, Google hasn’t had any home runs other than search.
Will Google's Chrome OS look rusty by late 2010? | All about Microsoft | ZDNet.com
See the full article
Google and Apple display the corporate equivalent of dark glasses and celebrity insouciance, gaining reams of free publicity with their every move. Yet while Apple need only step on stage with a product ready for sale, Google gets attention for merely mentioning its intentions. Dominance of search, piles of cash and an army of engineers do make it too powerful to be ignored. But there is no clear reason why Microsoft should quake over Wednesday’s announcement that Google intends to launch a free, fully fledged operating system by next year.
FT.com / Lex / Technology, media & telecoms - Google / Microsoft
See the full article for more details
In an interview Wednesday, Mr. Schmidt said he isn't obsessed with competing with Microsoft, and that the company's strategy is to create new markets for online applications. "This is about opening up a whole new area," he said. "Google is not about doing the same thing that everyone else has done," he said. He also said it is natural for Google to think about competing with Microsoft but that doing so takes up "very little" of his time. Microsoft declined to comment about the new Google software.
But some people familiar with the matter have said Mr. Schmidt has tried to dent Microsoft's business throughout his tenure at Google.
A FSJ classic – check out the full post
So everyone is worked up about this new browser operating system from Google. Drudge apparently has gone off his meds again and calls it a "death blow" to the Borg. No spinning red light, but still, pretty over the top. I guess it's supposedly going to destroy us too -- like we're some kind of collateral damage. Man oh man. Where to begin?
The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs: Let's all take a deep breath and get some perspective
Check the full article for an extensive reality check; excerpt:
Do you notice the common thread? Not much by way of facts to back up the stories. Nor any rational analysis of what’s going on in the market. Pure opinion with zippo to make sense of the story other than what appears to be a Wisdom of Crowds attempt to parse Googles’ smartly worded announcement.
Google ChromeOS: have people given leave of their senses? | Irregular Enterprise | ZDNet.com
A timely reality check; see the full article for details
Yet Hulu, founded in March 2007, is triumphant when most other video sites have languished.
Most recently, Joost has retrenched and its chief executive, Mike Volpi, has left that spot to join Index Ventures, one of the company’s backers. Joost was notable mainly for the pedigree of its founders, Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis, who had quite a pedigree of upending traditional industries. Their free Kazaa file-sharing service continued the work of Napster in undercutting the $15 price for CDs. And Skype, the Internet phone service, continues to cause trouble for the cartel of phone companies and governments that keep international phone rates high.
In television, however, the empire struck back. Here are a few reasons why Hulu has been successful where others failed
Why Hulu Succeeded As Other Video Sites Failed - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com
Sign of the times
If you thought a $99 Netbook was a bargain, Sprint Nextel's plan to sell Netbooks for a buck is a real steal.
Sprint has teamed up with mega-retailer Best Buy to sell the Compaq Mini 110c-1040DX Netbook for 99 cents with a two-year service contract. The offer is good at participating Best Buy stores.
Best Buy plans to sell the same Netbook for Verizon Wireless and AT&T for $199.99 with a two-year contract. Without any service contract, the Netbook costs $389.99, according to Best Buy's Web site.
Somehow this seems appropriate, especially relative to the Navio thread in the previous post…
Google said Tuesday night that it still had work to do to develop a full-fledged operating system. In a recent interview, Marc Andreessen, who created the first commercial Web browser and co-founded Netscape, said Chrome itself was already well along that path.
“Chrome is basically a modern operating system,” Mr. Andreessen said.
I’m getting a strong sense of déjà vu on this one…
Google Inc. is preparing to launch an operating system for personal computers, a direct assault on the turf of software giant Microsoft Corp., which has long dominated the market for software that runs PC applications.
The Silicon Valley Internet giant announced the new move in a blog post late Tuesday night. It said the software, which will initially target low-end portable PCs called netbooks, would be based on its Chrome Web browser and available to consumers in the second-half of 2010.
(p.s. the Navio press release linked above is from 1996; also see here and here for more Navio history)
More on Microsoft’s browser research; also see this CACM article
Microsoft first outlined Gazelle earlier this year, but has only recently started to detail its thinking. Wang plans to present a paper on Gazelle at the Usenix security conference next month, and last week Microsoft posted an article on its Web site explaining more about Gazelle.
Wang isn't trying to suggest Windows is going away. Indeed, she says, Gazelle depends on Windows, acting merely as the middleman for Web pages seeking to access a computer's resources.
"We're really trying to leverage the decades of operating system experience and apply that in the Web and browser setting," Wang said.
Microsoft's Gazelle browser takes a radical path | Beyond Binary - CNET News
Sign of the times…
Like many teenagers, Ari Weinstein spends his summers riding his bike and swimming. This year, the 15-year-old had another item on his to-do list: Foil Apple Inc.'s brightest engineers and annoy chief executive Steve Jobs.
Ari is part of a loose-knit group of hackers that has made it a mission to "jailbreak" Apple's iPhone and iPod touch. The term refers to installing unapproved software that lets people download a range of programs, including those not sanctioned by Apple.
How I Spent My Summer: Hacking Into iPhones With Friends - WSJ.com
Check the full post for a timely and extensive XQuery reality check
Oracle's Daniela Florescu gave a talk at UC Irvine this May entitled The Magic Is In The Glue: XQuery + Cloud. A coworker pointed me to the slides here, which I thought I'd share in a more convenient SlideShare-based format and agree with violently in more than a few respects.
Mark Logic CEO Blog: XQuery's Real Potential: Transforming Application Development
A timely Facebook snapshot
But admirers say Mark Zuckerberg's five-year-old startup is poised to fulfill hype as the next big thing — that it will power online social interaction the way Google drives online search. Facebook is aggressively moving beyond the home page to pursue its mission to become a "social utility" that helps people "connect and share."
To typical users, Facebook may seem a stand-alone Web site — a vehicle for people to renew and revitalize personal relationships, to post comments and photos and perhaps play games. But more than 10,000 Web sites now recognize a service called Facebook Connect, which enables users to use their Facebook ID and password to move fluidly among sites where registration is required.
Business & Technology | Facebook's future: Web 3.0? | Seattle Times Newspaper
Conclusion of an article on the Google Book Search settlement (you’ll need to be a CACM subscriber to read the full text):
In the short run, the Google Book Search settlement will unquestionably bring about greater access to books that major research libraries collected over the years. But it is very worrisome that this agreement, which was negotiated in secret by Google and a few lawyers working for the Authors Guild and AAP (who will, incidentally, receive up to $45.5 million in fees for their work on the settlement—more than all of the authors combined!), will create two complementary monopolies with exclusive rights over a research corpus of this magnitude. Monopolies are prone to engage in many abuses.
The Book Search agreement under consideration is not really a settlement of a dispute over whether scanning books to index them is fair use. It is a massive restructuring of the book industry's future without meaningful government oversight. The market for digitized orphan books could be competitive, but will not be if this settlement is approved in its current form without modification.
The Dead Souls of the Google Book Search Settlement | July 2009 | Communications of the ACM
Sign of the times
It is always a case of some considerable concern when a lady reveals too much on Facebook. The site has standards, after all.
The lady in question this time is Lady Shelley Sawers, the wife of Sir John Sawers, the new head of British spy agency MI6.
According to reports in the Mail and numerous other media outlets, the fair lady may not have been quite aware that Facebook can be seen by a rather large number of people if you don't specify that you want to keep your information vaguely private
Wife exposes chief spy's personal life on Facebook | Technically Incorrect - CNET News
