Wednesday, January 5, 2011
IBM Patents, er, Patenting
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Intel's Retiring Chair's Zen Business Rules
Often, because the workload is too heavy, I'll clip an article I want to read and hold off reading it because I deem it's not urgent. That's why I'm sending you this link two weeks later to "From Moore's Law to Barrett's Rules", from the May 16 WSJ (registration required). The thing that strikes me hard about it is this: When you read Craig Barrett's Rules, you discover that each one is like a Zen Koan. Here are two examples:
* "The business is bigger than the business."
* "Consensus is good--except when it isn't."
Each of Barrett's Rules (not just these two) is ambiguous, in and of itself, or in its application.
And yet at the same time each of them are powerful and, at some level, obvious.
Before the end of the article, strangely, I was thinking about IFRS - International Financial Reporting Standards. I do a bit of thought leadership content creation for a household name professional services firm, see, so I have to think about stuff like this from time to time. There is a transition going on in US financial reporting from GAAP to IFRS, and at least in part it is a transition from "rules" to "intent", if you will. It seems like now is an apt time for that change.
Everyone is talking about how so many markets are in flux right now, and that there are "new rules that haven't been written yet." But what if that concept is totally off base - it's just as far as our poor minds are able to go, for the moment. Perhaps the truth of what's happening is that our future will have no "rules" in this sense; instead, there will only be intent, and behavior. The rest you have to figure out as you go along, as each new situation, opportunity and market emerges.
I realize at some level that Barrett is grandstanding a bit in this article as he sits on the brink of retirement (his last day was May 20). Somehow, that did not lessen the impact of it for me.
From Moore's Law to Barrett's Rules
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Is business really personal?
Friday, April 3, 2009
Brand and Demand Survey
Friday, March 20, 2009
A New Search Engine? Can anyone make sense of this?
I just don't know what to make of this new search engine from Financial Times called Newssift, a new business-oriented search engine. The beta is at www.newssift.com.
I read the stories and press release and I TRIED to use the beta site but it is way too complicated to parse out. They are trying to add value to business searches, but I think they have way overthought the problem. They are forcing users to navigate through the FT's own view of what a hierarchical path of information needs might be, instead of allowing the user to define his or her own path with their search string.
But after reading that sentence, the flaw seems so absurdly obvious that it is hard for me to believe it is possible. I keep thinking I'm missing something, but so far I haven't found it. What do you guys think?
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Eyestrain and your monitor
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
All Headset, All The Time
Everything works as advertised, but like I said in the first post on this topic, the real magic comes from having stereo sound on a regular-old-phone-call. The clarity with which I can hear and understand the other party is unmatched by any single-ear solution. So my experience has bewildered me further about why these binaural headsets aren't more popular.
Working with the included universal adapater attached to my iPod, I can listen to music and when the Blackberry rings, the headset beeps to let me know. Pressing the headset's call-answer button, er, answers the call. The iPod keeps playing (it can't pause the iPod).
The new office phone (Vtech Model LS5145) is a bit kludgey, and has no jack for a wired headset. If it didn't work with the Bluetooth headset I'd never own it. But mated with the Platronics, it is a news reporter's dream (or anyone's dream who spends hours on the phone every day). I paid a few dollars less for the phone than the Amazon price at the other end of that link, at a Best Buy RL store.
The picture above shows the whole setup on my desk - the weird-looking unergonomic Vtech, the Plantronics headset with the clear voice tube and the Blackberry. Oh, and the empty half bottle of Presecco that's been there for months to remind me to order up another!