IBM on Thursday provided more details of its robust fourth-quarter and 2007 financial performance, following an early preview of the figures on Monday.
IBM expects its overall growth to continue significantly in 2008, with earnings per share rising to between $8.20 and $8.30 this year, and between $10 and $11 by 2010. That would compare to $7.18 per share reported for 2007.
"I realize this is a challenging environment, with economic uncertainty, but I think there are still opportunities for growth," Mark Loughridge, IBM's chief financial officer, said during a conference call.
IBM is in good position even in the event of a downturn, Loughridge argued, because of its global reach, its status as a "proven infrastructure provider," and the capital it has for investments. The company ended 2007 with $16.1 billion in cash on hand.
IBM's pending acquisitions of Telelogic and Cognos will add further to the bottom line in 2008, he said. "We expect to provide synergies not only in software but [also in] services, servers and storage," Loughridge said of the Cognos deal.
IBM's fourth-quarter growth was especially strong in emerging markets and in its services and software groups, Loughridge said, though the company's System z mainframe business didn't perform as well.
As reported on Monday, IBM's fourth-quarter revenue, aided by exchange rates and sales outside the U.S., stood at $28.9 billion, an increase of 10 percent over the same period in 2006. The figure beat the forecast of $27.82 billion from analysts polled by Thomson First Call, and was aided by the ongoing weakness in the dollar.
Earnings per share for the quarter was $2.80, topping the analysts' forecast of $2.60 per share. The results represent a 24 percent increase over the same period in 2006, when IBM earned $2.26 per share.
IBM's services and software divisions showed particular strength in the quarter. Revenue from Global Technology Services grew 16 percent to $10 billion, reflecting strength around the globe and in various industries, IBM said. Global Business Services rose 17 percent to $4.9 billion, the company said.
IBM's Software Group had fourth-quarter revenue of $6.3 billion, an increase of 12 percent compared to 2006. WebSphere revenue climbed by 23 percent; Information Management sales, 11 percent; Tivoli software, 19 percent; Lotus, 7 percent; and Rational, 22 percent, compared with the same quarter in 2006.
Revenue from the Systems and Technology segment totaled $6.8 billion for the quarter, down 4 percent. System p UNIX server products grew by 9 percent from a year earlier, and System x server revenue increased 6 percent. But System z revenue fell by 15 percent.
The drop in System z sales will be mitigated by the upcoming launch in February of IBM's next-generation mainframe, according to Loughridge. "We expect the first quarter to be a period of product transition, with growth coming in the second quarter."
The Americas generated $11.7 billion in revenue, up 5 percent over 2006. Revenue from Europe/Middle East/Africa was $10.8 billion, up 16 percent. Asia-Pacific revenue increased 15 percent to $5.5 billion. OEM revenues were $894 million, a drop of 13 percent compared to the same period in 2006.
In some developing countries, including Malaysia and Ecuador, IBM is seeing "insatiable demand" due to strong economies powered by a growing middle class, Loughridge said.
"To me, this is a virtual gold rush in these rapidly emerging economies," he said. "In the past, IBM built much of the infrastructure for the developed world. We see a new area of growth in these emerging markets."
For the full year, total 2007 revenue was $98.8 billion, an 8 percent increase from 2006. The overall earnings for 2007, at $7.18 per share, marked an increase of 18 percent over 2006, IBM said. Net income for the year stood at $10.4 billion, up from $9.5 billion in 2006.
IBM's stock was up $5.60 in after-hours trading to $106.50.
Friday, January 18, 2008
Mozilla interfaces to get 'humanized,' developer says
Mozilla should soon be experimenting with some novel user-interface technologies for its browser and other products, according to a UI developer that joined Mozilla this week from startup company Humanized.
Aza Raskin, who until Wednesday was president of Humanized, a five-person startup in Chicago, is now user experience lead for the Mozilla Labs team, he said Thursday. He will be working on technology to let people "do anything you want to do, anywhere, anytime on your computer," he said.
Mozilla announced Wednesday that it had hired three of the principals from Humanized, which is known for its innovative work with the Enso project to create more intuitive user interfaces. Mozilla did not identify the people it hired, and Raskin was hesitant at first to say which of his colleagues had joined him at Mozilla. Eventually he acknowledged that Humanized's Jono DiCarlo and Atul Varma also have joined the company known for its Firefox browser.
Enso user-interface software was designed to make it easier to perform daily tasks that require the use of multiple applications or functions. The software runs in the background and allows users to type in simple commands to access applications, instead of leaving the window or application they are in to use another one.
For example, if a user wants to open Firefox from the current screen, instead of having to find the Firefox icon or go to the Start menu in Windows, Firefox can be opened by pressing the Caps Lock key and typing "open firefox." Performing calculations and acquiring word definitions can be executed in a similar way from whichever window the user is in at the time.
"Those ideas need to be explored at Mozilla," Raskin said, though "it's unclear yet what form that will take."
He and his Humanized colleagues were attracted to Mozilla because the company "has a lot of vision" to extend the Web beyond the browser, he said. The Firefox browser remains the company's primary product for now, however, although it also offers the Thunderbird open-source e-mail client.
Raskin said that many advances on the Web, in terms of online services and mashups, have been designed with the developer in mind, and because of that they run the risk of making the browser a mere delivery vehicle for streaming applications -- much like what the desktop has become. He aims to use technology and ideas from the Enso project to add more human interaction not just to the browser, but to anything people do on the Web itself.
"I want the power of mashups not in the hands of the developer but in the hands of end-users -- in the hands of your grandmothers and your teen-aged son," he said. "So you really can be writing an e-mail and say, 'Now I want a map in there.' Things like that -- a place where you can actually start having a conversation with your computer."
Raskin said that most people, whether they know it or not, are captive to their computer -- they do their work on it or use it only in the way the computer allows, and have very little control over that interaction. The idea behind Humanized, and now the work Raskin and his colleagues will do at Mozilla, is to change that for everyone, not just people who know their way around a computer.
Mozilla did not actually acquire Humanized, and Raskin said its Web site will be up for some time, but the company is effectively now part of Mozilla. He and his colleagues are working out which pieces of the Enso project will be relevant to their work at Mozilla, he said. Raskin posted on his blog about his new position.
Of the remaining Humanized employees -- systems architect Scott Robbin and Treasurer Andrew Wilson -- only Robbin's next move is clear for now. Raskin said Robbin is running the company's music-search-engine project, Songza.
Aza Raskin, who until Wednesday was president of Humanized, a five-person startup in Chicago, is now user experience lead for the Mozilla Labs team, he said Thursday. He will be working on technology to let people "do anything you want to do, anywhere, anytime on your computer," he said.
Mozilla announced Wednesday that it had hired three of the principals from Humanized, which is known for its innovative work with the Enso project to create more intuitive user interfaces. Mozilla did not identify the people it hired, and Raskin was hesitant at first to say which of his colleagues had joined him at Mozilla. Eventually he acknowledged that Humanized's Jono DiCarlo and Atul Varma also have joined the company known for its Firefox browser.
Enso user-interface software was designed to make it easier to perform daily tasks that require the use of multiple applications or functions. The software runs in the background and allows users to type in simple commands to access applications, instead of leaving the window or application they are in to use another one.
For example, if a user wants to open Firefox from the current screen, instead of having to find the Firefox icon or go to the Start menu in Windows, Firefox can be opened by pressing the Caps Lock key and typing "open firefox." Performing calculations and acquiring word definitions can be executed in a similar way from whichever window the user is in at the time.
"Those ideas need to be explored at Mozilla," Raskin said, though "it's unclear yet what form that will take."
He and his Humanized colleagues were attracted to Mozilla because the company "has a lot of vision" to extend the Web beyond the browser, he said. The Firefox browser remains the company's primary product for now, however, although it also offers the Thunderbird open-source e-mail client.
Raskin said that many advances on the Web, in terms of online services and mashups, have been designed with the developer in mind, and because of that they run the risk of making the browser a mere delivery vehicle for streaming applications -- much like what the desktop has become. He aims to use technology and ideas from the Enso project to add more human interaction not just to the browser, but to anything people do on the Web itself.
"I want the power of mashups not in the hands of the developer but in the hands of end-users -- in the hands of your grandmothers and your teen-aged son," he said. "So you really can be writing an e-mail and say, 'Now I want a map in there.' Things like that -- a place where you can actually start having a conversation with your computer."
Raskin said that most people, whether they know it or not, are captive to their computer -- they do their work on it or use it only in the way the computer allows, and have very little control over that interaction. The idea behind Humanized, and now the work Raskin and his colleagues will do at Mozilla, is to change that for everyone, not just people who know their way around a computer.
Mozilla did not actually acquire Humanized, and Raskin said its Web site will be up for some time, but the company is effectively now part of Mozilla. He and his colleagues are working out which pieces of the Enso project will be relevant to their work at Mozilla, he said. Raskin posted on his blog about his new position.
Of the remaining Humanized employees -- systems architect Scott Robbin and Treasurer Andrew Wilson -- only Robbin's next move is clear for now. Raskin said Robbin is running the company's music-search-engine project, Songza.
Time Warner to try tiered cable pricing
Time Warner Cable will try selling consumers broadband service based on how much bandwidth they use, a move that could turn the home broadband pricing model in the U.S. on its head.
In a trial planned for later this year in Beaumont, Texas, the service provider will offer four tiers of service at different prices. Customers who used more bandwidth would pay more.
The details of the tiered pricing plan haven't yet been set, according to Time Warner spokesman Alex Dudley. The offer will only go out to new customers, he said.
Some service providers charge different rates based on the speed of a service, but in the U.S. they typically allow each customer to send and download as many bits as they like in a month. Under that model, some subscribers who exchanged large files through peer-to-peer services reportedly have been cut off. Comcast, the biggest U.S. cable operator, has said it sometimes slows peer-to-peer traffic during peak demand periods.
In some other countries, Internet users have long endured bandwidth caps. And Web hosting companies typically charge site owners based on how much data they exchange with visitors.
Tiered pricing could help settle the ongoing argument over the fairness of certain subscribers and online content providers using up more network capacity than others, according to Ovum analyst Mark Seery. In fact, he thinks the whole industry will go down this path eventually.
"It's difficult to charge, appropriately, different customers if they have such widely divergent uses of bandwidth," Seery said. And trying to target one type of application, such as illegal peer-to-peer file sharing, raises political issues, he added.
"There's no justification for blocking legitimate uses of peer-to-peer," Seery said. "The right focus is on who's using what (bandwidth) and what they should be charged for it."
Many other transport industries, such as shipping, rail and courier services, charge different rates based on how much the customer uses, Seery said. Some have shifted to that system over time. For example, toll bridge operators once charged trucks based on the value of what they wanted to carry over, and U.S. railroads could arbitrarily carry goods from one customer and not from another, according to Seery. Neither model lasted.
Time Warner operates in 33 states but is a relative underdog in the U.S. broadband industry, with 7.4 million high-speed data customers. Comcast has 12.9 million.
In a trial planned for later this year in Beaumont, Texas, the service provider will offer four tiers of service at different prices. Customers who used more bandwidth would pay more.
The details of the tiered pricing plan haven't yet been set, according to Time Warner spokesman Alex Dudley. The offer will only go out to new customers, he said.
Some service providers charge different rates based on the speed of a service, but in the U.S. they typically allow each customer to send and download as many bits as they like in a month. Under that model, some subscribers who exchanged large files through peer-to-peer services reportedly have been cut off. Comcast, the biggest U.S. cable operator, has said it sometimes slows peer-to-peer traffic during peak demand periods.
In some other countries, Internet users have long endured bandwidth caps. And Web hosting companies typically charge site owners based on how much data they exchange with visitors.
Tiered pricing could help settle the ongoing argument over the fairness of certain subscribers and online content providers using up more network capacity than others, according to Ovum analyst Mark Seery. In fact, he thinks the whole industry will go down this path eventually.
"It's difficult to charge, appropriately, different customers if they have such widely divergent uses of bandwidth," Seery said. And trying to target one type of application, such as illegal peer-to-peer file sharing, raises political issues, he added.
"There's no justification for blocking legitimate uses of peer-to-peer," Seery said. "The right focus is on who's using what (bandwidth) and what they should be charged for it."
Many other transport industries, such as shipping, rail and courier services, charge different rates based on how much the customer uses, Seery said. Some have shifted to that system over time. For example, toll bridge operators once charged trucks based on the value of what they wanted to carry over, and U.S. railroads could arbitrarily carry goods from one customer and not from another, according to Seery. Neither model lasted.
Time Warner operates in 33 states but is a relative underdog in the U.S. broadband industry, with 7.4 million high-speed data customers. Comcast has 12.9 million.
AMD reports fifth-straight quarterly loss
Advanced Micro Devices on Thursday reported a heavy loss for its fourth quarter, due mostly to charges connected to its acquisition of graphics chip maker ATI.
AMD reported a net loss of $1.772 billion -- greater than its revenue for the quarter, which was $1.770 billion. The figures compare to a loss in the fourth quarter last year of $576 million on revenue of $1.773 million.
The net loss included charges of $1.675 billion, mostly related to AMD's acquisition of ATI in 2006. Excluding the charges, AMD said its loss would have been $97 million, greater than the $25 million it lost in the fourth quarter a year earlier.
This is the fifth-straight quarterly loss for AMD, which has been struggling to get its newest processors to market on time.
AMD delayed volume shipments of its quad-core Opteron processors, code-named Barcelona, in early December when it said it found a bug in the chip's Level 3 cache memory. Earlier this month, AMD said it was pushing back the release of its quad-core Phenom 9700 and 9900 processors.
The company has replaced some Opteron chips that it sold, although it was under no obligation to do so, said Dirk Meyer, AMD's president and chief operating officer, on a conference call to discuss the results. AMD has patched the bug in its quad-core chips and fixed the problem in updated processors, Meyer said. AMD issued a BIOS fix for the bug in December and offered users a workaround.
The company still managed to ship a record number of microprocessors in the quarter, it said Thursday, including nearly 400,000 of its quad-core chips.
AMD hopes to double its Opteron shipments in the first quarter of 2008 compared to the fourth quarter, said Bob Rivet, executive vice president and chief financial officer at AMD.
It will ship sample Barcelona processors in larger volume to OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) in the next month to put in systems, said Hector Ruiz, AMD's chairman and CEO.
Intel reported lower-than-expected earnings this week, in part because of weak prices for memory chips, but it has been selling more quad-core chips than AMD. It is also ahead of AMD in chip production, rolling out more than 30 Penryn-based chips based on the 45-nanometer process, with AMD still producing chips using the older 65-nm process.
AMD is putting samples of 45-nm processors through the paces and hopes to ship the chips later this year, Meyer said.
Brushing off a question about price pressure from Intel, Ruiz said AMD's first priority was to return to profitability. AMD executives speculated that it had gained processor market share, but said the company wasn't going after market share in unit shipments, instead focusing on meeting customer needs.
AMD hopes to return to profitability by the second quarter of 2008, Rivet said.
The ongoing chip demand will be a growth driver, Ruiz said. Though there is trepidation in the global economy, microprocessors will remain under demand. Emerging markets such as India, China and Brazil need chips to establish an infrastructure even if the economies slows down, Ruiz said.
AMD reported a net loss of $1.772 billion -- greater than its revenue for the quarter, which was $1.770 billion. The figures compare to a loss in the fourth quarter last year of $576 million on revenue of $1.773 million.
The net loss included charges of $1.675 billion, mostly related to AMD's acquisition of ATI in 2006. Excluding the charges, AMD said its loss would have been $97 million, greater than the $25 million it lost in the fourth quarter a year earlier.
This is the fifth-straight quarterly loss for AMD, which has been struggling to get its newest processors to market on time.
AMD delayed volume shipments of its quad-core Opteron processors, code-named Barcelona, in early December when it said it found a bug in the chip's Level 3 cache memory. Earlier this month, AMD said it was pushing back the release of its quad-core Phenom 9700 and 9900 processors.
The company has replaced some Opteron chips that it sold, although it was under no obligation to do so, said Dirk Meyer, AMD's president and chief operating officer, on a conference call to discuss the results. AMD has patched the bug in its quad-core chips and fixed the problem in updated processors, Meyer said. AMD issued a BIOS fix for the bug in December and offered users a workaround.
The company still managed to ship a record number of microprocessors in the quarter, it said Thursday, including nearly 400,000 of its quad-core chips.
AMD hopes to double its Opteron shipments in the first quarter of 2008 compared to the fourth quarter, said Bob Rivet, executive vice president and chief financial officer at AMD.
It will ship sample Barcelona processors in larger volume to OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) in the next month to put in systems, said Hector Ruiz, AMD's chairman and CEO.
Intel reported lower-than-expected earnings this week, in part because of weak prices for memory chips, but it has been selling more quad-core chips than AMD. It is also ahead of AMD in chip production, rolling out more than 30 Penryn-based chips based on the 45-nanometer process, with AMD still producing chips using the older 65-nm process.
AMD is putting samples of 45-nm processors through the paces and hopes to ship the chips later this year, Meyer said.
Brushing off a question about price pressure from Intel, Ruiz said AMD's first priority was to return to profitability. AMD executives speculated that it had gained processor market share, but said the company wasn't going after market share in unit shipments, instead focusing on meeting customer needs.
AMD hopes to return to profitability by the second quarter of 2008, Rivet said.
The ongoing chip demand will be a growth driver, Ruiz said. Though there is trepidation in the global economy, microprocessors will remain under demand. Emerging markets such as India, China and Brazil need chips to establish an infrastructure even if the economies slows down, Ruiz said.
Attack code released for critical Windows flaw
In what may be the first step toward a major security problem, security researchers have released attack code that will crash Windows machines that are susceptible to a recently patched bug in the operating system.
The code is not available to the general public. It was released Thursday to security professionals who use Immunity's Canvas computer security testing software. It causes the Windows system to crash but does not let the attacker run malicious software on the victim's system.
"It reliably crashes Windows machines," said Dave Aitel, Immunity's chief technology officer, in an e-mail interview. "In fact, it blue-screened our print server by accident -- this is a broadcast attack, after all."
That's the biggest concern for security experts who worry that a more dangerous attack may soon follow as researchers dig further into the vulnerability. The bug is particularly troublesome for two reasons. First, it affects a widely used Windows component that is turned on by default. Worse, no user interaction is required to trigger the flaw, meaning that it could be exploited in a self-copying worm attack.
Microsoft patched the flaw in its MS08-001 update, released last week, but it takes time for enterprise users to test and install Microsoft's patches.
The flaw lies in the way Windows processes networking traffic that uses IGMP (Internet Group Management Protocol) and the MLD (Multicast Listener Discovery) protocol, which are used to send data to many systems at the same time. The protocols are used by a range of applications including messaging, Web conferencing and software distribution products.
For a worm attack to work, the attacker would have to send specially crafted packets to a victim's machine, which could then allow the attacker to run unauthorized code on the PC. The worm could then spread from computer to computer within a LAN, but would generally be stopped from travelling to another network by a firewall.
A reliable exploit could be combined with malicious botnet software, giving attackers a way to widen the size of their networks of infected computers. The flaw is rated critical for Windows XP and Vista systems, according to Microsoft.
After patching the flaw, Microsoft published some technical research indicating that it would be hard for an attacker to exploit this vulnerability.
But Aitel believes that Microsoft may have overestimated how difficult it would be to create reliable attack code. Because it could spread so quickly through a network, a reliable exploit "is going to be worth the effort," Aitel said. "You can be assured lots of smart people are working on it."
Part of the problem is that IT staff may not be aware of how widely these multicasting protocols are used within their companies, said Russ Cooper, a senior network consultant with Verizon Business. "I am extremely worried that this becomes a problem simply because people are unaware of what they're already allowing," he said.
If one machine were infected within a network subnet, its attempt to attack other machines might not even be noticeable, he added. "It may look like a large file transfer."
The code is not available to the general public. It was released Thursday to security professionals who use Immunity's Canvas computer security testing software. It causes the Windows system to crash but does not let the attacker run malicious software on the victim's system.
"It reliably crashes Windows machines," said Dave Aitel, Immunity's chief technology officer, in an e-mail interview. "In fact, it blue-screened our print server by accident -- this is a broadcast attack, after all."
That's the biggest concern for security experts who worry that a more dangerous attack may soon follow as researchers dig further into the vulnerability. The bug is particularly troublesome for two reasons. First, it affects a widely used Windows component that is turned on by default. Worse, no user interaction is required to trigger the flaw, meaning that it could be exploited in a self-copying worm attack.
Microsoft patched the flaw in its MS08-001 update, released last week, but it takes time for enterprise users to test and install Microsoft's patches.
The flaw lies in the way Windows processes networking traffic that uses IGMP (Internet Group Management Protocol) and the MLD (Multicast Listener Discovery) protocol, which are used to send data to many systems at the same time. The protocols are used by a range of applications including messaging, Web conferencing and software distribution products.
For a worm attack to work, the attacker would have to send specially crafted packets to a victim's machine, which could then allow the attacker to run unauthorized code on the PC. The worm could then spread from computer to computer within a LAN, but would generally be stopped from travelling to another network by a firewall.
A reliable exploit could be combined with malicious botnet software, giving attackers a way to widen the size of their networks of infected computers. The flaw is rated critical for Windows XP and Vista systems, according to Microsoft.
After patching the flaw, Microsoft published some technical research indicating that it would be hard for an attacker to exploit this vulnerability.
But Aitel believes that Microsoft may have overestimated how difficult it would be to create reliable attack code. Because it could spread so quickly through a network, a reliable exploit "is going to be worth the effort," Aitel said. "You can be assured lots of smart people are working on it."
Part of the problem is that IT staff may not be aware of how widely these multicasting protocols are used within their companies, said Russ Cooper, a senior network consultant with Verizon Business. "I am extremely worried that this becomes a problem simply because people are unaware of what they're already allowing," he said.
If one machine were infected within a network subnet, its attempt to attack other machines might not even be noticeable, he added. "It may look like a large file transfer."
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Ex-Brocade CEO Reyes gets 21 months in backdating case
Former Brocade Communications Systems CEO Gregory Reyes has been sentenced to 21 months in prison and a $15 million fine for fraud related to backdating of the storage networking company's stock options.
Reyes was convicted last August in the most prominent of many criminal and civil cases in the past two years related to backdating by high-tech companies. Apple, McAfee, Rambus and scores of other vendors have faced either internal or external probes. Reyes' conviction was the first by the U.S. Department of Justice in a backdating case. Reyes was found guilty on 10 charges including securities fraud, conspiracy and falsifying financial records. He could have faced as much as 20 years in prison.
The sentencing order on Wednesday from Judge Charles Breyer of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California has been stayed pending an expected appeal, which has not yet been filed, according to the court.
Backdating, which involves changing the date that stock options grants were made to certain employees so they can later get a bigger profit, is not illegal but has to be accounted for properly. Many high-tech companies used the practice during the Internet boom early in this decade to attract prized employees.
In the wake of Brocade's backdating problems, the company restated its results from 1999 to 2004. The scandal also led to charges against Stephanie Jensen, former vice president of human resources, and Michael Byrd, the company's former chief financial officer and chief operating officer.
Reyes was convicted last August in the most prominent of many criminal and civil cases in the past two years related to backdating by high-tech companies. Apple, McAfee, Rambus and scores of other vendors have faced either internal or external probes. Reyes' conviction was the first by the U.S. Department of Justice in a backdating case. Reyes was found guilty on 10 charges including securities fraud, conspiracy and falsifying financial records. He could have faced as much as 20 years in prison.
The sentencing order on Wednesday from Judge Charles Breyer of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California has been stayed pending an expected appeal, which has not yet been filed, according to the court.
Backdating, which involves changing the date that stock options grants were made to certain employees so they can later get a bigger profit, is not illegal but has to be accounted for properly. Many high-tech companies used the practice during the Internet boom early in this decade to attract prized employees.
In the wake of Brocade's backdating problems, the company restated its results from 1999 to 2004. The scandal also led to charges against Stephanie Jensen, former vice president of human resources, and Michael Byrd, the company's former chief financial officer and chief operating officer.
Mac users more open, liberal than PC users
People who prefer Apple's Macintosh computers over PCs have long been considered to be on the artsy, hip end of the personality spectrum -- and now a study proves that "Mac people" indeed are more liberal and open-minded than average folks.
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According to Mindset Media, people who purchase Macs fall into what the branding company calls the "Openness 5" personality category -- which means they are more liberal, less modest and more assured of their own superiority than the population at large. Mindset Media helps companies with strong brands develop ads targeted to people based on personality traits or people's "mindsets," and does research to that effect.
So-called Openness 5 types tend to seek rich, varied and novel experiences, according to the company, and believe that imagination and intellectual curiosity are as important to life as more rational or pragmatic endeavors. They also are receptive to their own inner feelings and may experience life with more emotional intensity.
The company uses Nielsen Online's panel for the Mac mindset study, the results of which are based on responses from 7,500 participants.
It's no great secret that Macs have always been popular with creative types -- the computers have been the mainstay of creative agencies and video- and sound-editing houses for years. This probably has as much to do with the fact that Apple and partners have delivered popular software for graphic and multimedia designers and artists as it does with the contemporary industrial design Macs have long reflected.
Mac users are quick to agree there is definitely a mindset among their kind of people, and aren't offended by a company profiling them according to their enthusiasm for Apple computers.
MacBook Pro user Reatha Braxton said much of the Mac mindset stems from how Apple has projected the image of its products through advertising -- natch, as she runs her own New York-based media planning and buying agency, Braxton Strategic Group.
"The whole [Mac] package -- the advertising, the design, the whole image of that is creativity," she said. Braxton, who has been in the advertising business for more than 20 years, said Macs were almost exclusively used in ad agencies, from the people designing the ads to top executives like "the CFO to the CEO."
As for the idea that Mac users possess an air of superiority, Braxton was less inclined to agree. She said that Macs actually have a pragmatic draw for their faithful because "most people who use Macs will tell you they are smarter machines than PCs, and they want to take advantage of that."
Still, Braxton did acknowledge that the idea of using the PC "alternative" has an element of cool factor that lures creative types to use Macs over more run-of-the-mill PCs. "It's cooler not to be a lemming," she said.
Igor Berstein, a computer programmer for a Web-based startup in New York, also agreed there is a Mac mindset, but he doesn't think he necessarily fits into it. He started using his MacBook Pro because, with the Unix base of the OS starting with Mac OS X, it was more convenient for him as a Linux user than a PC was.
But "since Apple thinks a lot about aesthetics, style-oriented people go for [Macs]," Berstein said. Macs also are more expensive than PCs, so people in the middle-class or upper-class who have accumulated a certain amount of wealth are mostly likely the people who can afford them, he said.
Berstein also noted that people who care more about brands are also more likely to purchase Macs over PCs. While the term "PC" refers to a computer architecture tied to more than one vendor, Macs are a subbrand tied to the strong Apple brand -- which to some is a catalyst for purchasing a Mac in and of itself, he said.
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According to Mindset Media, people who purchase Macs fall into what the branding company calls the "Openness 5" personality category -- which means they are more liberal, less modest and more assured of their own superiority than the population at large. Mindset Media helps companies with strong brands develop ads targeted to people based on personality traits or people's "mindsets," and does research to that effect.
So-called Openness 5 types tend to seek rich, varied and novel experiences, according to the company, and believe that imagination and intellectual curiosity are as important to life as more rational or pragmatic endeavors. They also are receptive to their own inner feelings and may experience life with more emotional intensity.
The company uses Nielsen Online's panel for the Mac mindset study, the results of which are based on responses from 7,500 participants.
It's no great secret that Macs have always been popular with creative types -- the computers have been the mainstay of creative agencies and video- and sound-editing houses for years. This probably has as much to do with the fact that Apple and partners have delivered popular software for graphic and multimedia designers and artists as it does with the contemporary industrial design Macs have long reflected.
Mac users are quick to agree there is definitely a mindset among their kind of people, and aren't offended by a company profiling them according to their enthusiasm for Apple computers.
MacBook Pro user Reatha Braxton said much of the Mac mindset stems from how Apple has projected the image of its products through advertising -- natch, as she runs her own New York-based media planning and buying agency, Braxton Strategic Group.
"The whole [Mac] package -- the advertising, the design, the whole image of that is creativity," she said. Braxton, who has been in the advertising business for more than 20 years, said Macs were almost exclusively used in ad agencies, from the people designing the ads to top executives like "the CFO to the CEO."
As for the idea that Mac users possess an air of superiority, Braxton was less inclined to agree. She said that Macs actually have a pragmatic draw for their faithful because "most people who use Macs will tell you they are smarter machines than PCs, and they want to take advantage of that."
Still, Braxton did acknowledge that the idea of using the PC "alternative" has an element of cool factor that lures creative types to use Macs over more run-of-the-mill PCs. "It's cooler not to be a lemming," she said.
Igor Berstein, a computer programmer for a Web-based startup in New York, also agreed there is a Mac mindset, but he doesn't think he necessarily fits into it. He started using his MacBook Pro because, with the Unix base of the OS starting with Mac OS X, it was more convenient for him as a Linux user than a PC was.
But "since Apple thinks a lot about aesthetics, style-oriented people go for [Macs]," Berstein said. Macs also are more expensive than PCs, so people in the middle-class or upper-class who have accumulated a certain amount of wealth are mostly likely the people who can afford them, he said.
Berstein also noted that people who care more about brands are also more likely to purchase Macs over PCs. While the term "PC" refers to a computer architecture tied to more than one vendor, Macs are a subbrand tied to the strong Apple brand -- which to some is a catalyst for purchasing a Mac in and of itself, he said.
Sun needs to fix what's broken at MySQL, users say
In agreeing this week to pay US$1 billion for MySQL AB, Sun Microsystems Inc. said it hopes to make MySQL's open-source database more attractive to enterprise users. But Sun has a lot of work to do, according to some MySQL users.
And it isn't just technical fixes that are needed, they said. Although Sun described MySQL as "an open-source icon," it also will have to mend fences with users who are unhappy about the database vendor's sales tactics and complain that it has ignored their development suggestions.
For instance, within hours of the proposed acquisition's announcement on Wednesday, Don MacAskill, CEO and "chief geek" at SmugMug Inc., said in a blog posting that he is "seriously considering" not renewing the online photo-sharing service's platinum-level MySQL Enterprise support contract. "I probably wouldn't pay for MySQL as it stands today," he wrote.
In an interview, MacAskill said MySQL has performance and concurrency issues when it's paired with InnoDB, the most widely used storage engine for the database. In particular, the problems affect systems with multicore processors. "That's turning out to be a pretty major scalability roadblock for a lot of us," he said.
Google Inc. and other MySQL users have created patches designed to fix the performance problems. But MacAskill said that the open-source vendor has yet to add the patches to the database, despite requests that it do so from him and other users.
"I often wonder why they haven't been accepted and just pushed into the MySQL release," he said, adding that it will be "in [Sun's] best interest to see MySQL get really good at concurrency really fast."
MySQL officials said the patch question is now Sun's to answer - even though the acquisition isn't expected to be completed until late this quarter or early in the second quarter.
A Sun spokeswoman said today via e-mail that it's "too early to discuss specific plans" for updating the database. "What we can say," she added, "is that we actively engage with both our customers and developer base to hear their feedback regarding the direction of product plans and services, and will continue to do so."
There are plenty of other things that also need fixing in MySQL, according to a blog posting by Jeremy Cole, a former user of the database at Yahoo Inc. who now is a MySQL consultant at Proven Scaling LLC.
"There are a lot of areas where MySQL has been lacking for a long time, and the power users have been either crying in their beer or doing the work themselves," Cole wrote. For instance, he cited problems with the database's replication, logging and internal memory allocation features.
In addition, Cole criticized MySQL's sales and marketing team and said that the company's development model for MySQL Enterprise is "broken."
Jonathan Schwartz, Sun's CEO and president, said during a teleconference Wednesday that the biggest impediment to MySQL's growth has been its inability "to give peace of mind to a global company that wants to put MySQL into mission-critical deployments." Schwartz added that the open-source database will benefit from Sun's broader enterprise reach.
Sun already distributes the PostgreSQL open-source database on its Solaris-based servers; on the company's Web site, it touts PostgreSQL for Solaris 10 as "the open-source enterprise database platform of choice." But Schwartz described the purchase of MySQL as "the most important acquisition" ever made by Sun -- indicating that MySQL's software likely will eclipse PostgreSQL on Sun's priority list.
In addition to the internal issues that Sun faces at MySQL, the deal could complicate its relationship with Oracle Corp., which is Sun's largest database partner. MySQL competes directly with Oracle and other database vendors. Also, Oracle owns InnoDB after buying the storage engine's developer, Innobase Oy, in late 2005.
"Now that [MySQL] is going to be supported by a major vendor, there's lots of companies that are going to give it a serious look," said Robert Lepanto, Oracle applications manager at AppCentric Solutions LLC in Stamford, Conn. "I would think that's a serious long-term threat to Oracle."
Lepanto, who also is president of the New York City Metro Oracle Applications Users Group, added that he's surprised that Oracle "didn't buy [MySQL] first to squash the competition."
Daniel Grim, executive director of networks and systems at the University of Delaware in Newark, has an enterprisewide license for Oracle databases but also sees value in the open-source alternatives.
"We've often found Oracle is more complex and more cumbersome than things like PostgreSQL and MySQL are," Grim said. "So we use those for small applications, although some of [the] applications are quite large, such as monitoring networking traffic."
In addition to Google, Yahoo and SmugMug, MySQL's wide-ranging customer list includes some of the darlings of the Web 2.0 era, such as Facebook Inc. and YouTube Inc., as well as more traditional businesses like Toyota Motor Corp. and Southwest Airlines Co.
The buyout deal ends widespread speculation about the future of MySQL. Before agreeing to sell to Sun, the company had been on track for an initial public offering, said Kevin Harvey, a partner at venture firm Benchmark Capital and chairman of MySQL's board of directors. Menlo Park, Calif.-based Benchmark has a 26% stake in MySQL, and it uses the open-source database to help power its Web site.
One of the questions that Sun continually faces is how it can improve its bottom line while offering key technologies such as Solaris and Java on an open-source basis. But Harvey said that from his perspective, open source "very clearly" can be "turned into a fantastic business model."
And it isn't just technical fixes that are needed, they said. Although Sun described MySQL as "an open-source icon," it also will have to mend fences with users who are unhappy about the database vendor's sales tactics and complain that it has ignored their development suggestions.
For instance, within hours of the proposed acquisition's announcement on Wednesday, Don MacAskill, CEO and "chief geek" at SmugMug Inc., said in a blog posting that he is "seriously considering" not renewing the online photo-sharing service's platinum-level MySQL Enterprise support contract. "I probably wouldn't pay for MySQL as it stands today," he wrote.
In an interview, MacAskill said MySQL has performance and concurrency issues when it's paired with InnoDB, the most widely used storage engine for the database. In particular, the problems affect systems with multicore processors. "That's turning out to be a pretty major scalability roadblock for a lot of us," he said.
Google Inc. and other MySQL users have created patches designed to fix the performance problems. But MacAskill said that the open-source vendor has yet to add the patches to the database, despite requests that it do so from him and other users.
"I often wonder why they haven't been accepted and just pushed into the MySQL release," he said, adding that it will be "in [Sun's] best interest to see MySQL get really good at concurrency really fast."
MySQL officials said the patch question is now Sun's to answer - even though the acquisition isn't expected to be completed until late this quarter or early in the second quarter.
A Sun spokeswoman said today via e-mail that it's "too early to discuss specific plans" for updating the database. "What we can say," she added, "is that we actively engage with both our customers and developer base to hear their feedback regarding the direction of product plans and services, and will continue to do so."
There are plenty of other things that also need fixing in MySQL, according to a blog posting by Jeremy Cole, a former user of the database at Yahoo Inc. who now is a MySQL consultant at Proven Scaling LLC.
"There are a lot of areas where MySQL has been lacking for a long time, and the power users have been either crying in their beer or doing the work themselves," Cole wrote. For instance, he cited problems with the database's replication, logging and internal memory allocation features.
In addition, Cole criticized MySQL's sales and marketing team and said that the company's development model for MySQL Enterprise is "broken."
Jonathan Schwartz, Sun's CEO and president, said during a teleconference Wednesday that the biggest impediment to MySQL's growth has been its inability "to give peace of mind to a global company that wants to put MySQL into mission-critical deployments." Schwartz added that the open-source database will benefit from Sun's broader enterprise reach.
Sun already distributes the PostgreSQL open-source database on its Solaris-based servers; on the company's Web site, it touts PostgreSQL for Solaris 10 as "the open-source enterprise database platform of choice." But Schwartz described the purchase of MySQL as "the most important acquisition" ever made by Sun -- indicating that MySQL's software likely will eclipse PostgreSQL on Sun's priority list.
In addition to the internal issues that Sun faces at MySQL, the deal could complicate its relationship with Oracle Corp., which is Sun's largest database partner. MySQL competes directly with Oracle and other database vendors. Also, Oracle owns InnoDB after buying the storage engine's developer, Innobase Oy, in late 2005.
"Now that [MySQL] is going to be supported by a major vendor, there's lots of companies that are going to give it a serious look," said Robert Lepanto, Oracle applications manager at AppCentric Solutions LLC in Stamford, Conn. "I would think that's a serious long-term threat to Oracle."
Lepanto, who also is president of the New York City Metro Oracle Applications Users Group, added that he's surprised that Oracle "didn't buy [MySQL] first to squash the competition."
Daniel Grim, executive director of networks and systems at the University of Delaware in Newark, has an enterprisewide license for Oracle databases but also sees value in the open-source alternatives.
"We've often found Oracle is more complex and more cumbersome than things like PostgreSQL and MySQL are," Grim said. "So we use those for small applications, although some of [the] applications are quite large, such as monitoring networking traffic."
In addition to Google, Yahoo and SmugMug, MySQL's wide-ranging customer list includes some of the darlings of the Web 2.0 era, such as Facebook Inc. and YouTube Inc., as well as more traditional businesses like Toyota Motor Corp. and Southwest Airlines Co.
The buyout deal ends widespread speculation about the future of MySQL. Before agreeing to sell to Sun, the company had been on track for an initial public offering, said Kevin Harvey, a partner at venture firm Benchmark Capital and chairman of MySQL's board of directors. Menlo Park, Calif.-based Benchmark has a 26% stake in MySQL, and it uses the open-source database to help power its Web site.
One of the questions that Sun continually faces is how it can improve its bottom line while offering key technologies such as Solaris and Java on an open-source basis. But Harvey said that from his perspective, open source "very clearly" can be "turned into a fantastic business model."
Firefox, Red Hat more buggy than Microsoft
Secunia has found that the number of security bugs in the open source Red Hat Linux operating system and Firefox browsers far outstripped comparable products from Microsoft last year.
In a report released this week, Secunia also criticized CA for the quality of the code in its anti-virus products, saying that "inherent" code problems are exposing CA products to ongoing security vulnerabilities.
On the other hand, "zero-day" security bugs in Firefox were patched more quickly than in Microsoft Internet Explorer, according to the Secunia 2007 Report, released this week.
In a review of the number of vulnerabilities found in enterprise anti-virus vendors' products, Secunia found that CA was by far the leader, with 187 vulnerabilities, followed by Symantec with 73. Trend Micro (34), ClamAV (15), McAfee (13) and F-Secure (6) ranked lower on the list.
The high figures for Symantec and CA are partly due to their wide range of products, some of which cover areas other than anti-virus, Secunia said.
However, the majority of the CA bugs were due to "inherent code problems with some CA products", Secunia said in the report.
Of particular concern is CA's range of ARCServe Backup products for laptops and desktops, which Secunia submitted to its Binary Analysis process after several bugs were reported and fixed. The bugs involved errors in processing particular arguments and requests.
The analysis found that about 60 reported bugs were still present in the supposedly patched versions.
What's more, the analysis found that the vulnerabilities were partly due to "the nature of the product code itself", Secunia said.
"Unless an overhaul of the code is undertaken, then the product remains susceptible to similar types of vulnerabilities," Secunia said.
However CA said in a statement that it has rigorous quality-control measures in place for its software and continues to improve those measures.
A number of the vulnerabilities found in Symantec products were due to their use of vulnerable software from third-party developers, Secunia said.
One of these is the Autonomy Keyview SDK (software development kit), used in Symantec Mail to view Lotus 1-2-3 files. The component was reported to have a "highly critical" flaw on 12 December, but hasn't yet been patched, leaving some Symantec products vulnerable.
Symantec said in a statement that it has published instructions for mitigating the problem and has issued product updates for some affected vendors. IBM, whose Lotus Notes was also affected by the Autonomy bug, has issued its own patch.
Operating systems and browsers
Out of the operating systems monitored by Secunia - Windows (98 and onwards), Mac OS X, HP-UX 10.x and 11.x, Solaris 8, 9, and 10 and Red Hat (excluding Fedora) - Red Hat was found to have by far the most vulnerabilities, at 633, with 99 percent found in third-party components. (Linux distributions are generally composed mostly of third-party software, which is integrated by the distributor.)
Red Hat has taken issue with the figures, claiming the accurate number should be 404 vulnerabilities for last year.
Solaris came next, with 252 bugs, 80 percent of which were in third-party components. Mac OS X came after that with 235, 62 percent of which were third-party.
Windows had only 123 bugs reported, but 96 percent of those were found in the operating system itself. HP-UX had 75 bugs reported, 81 percent of which were in third-party code.
Last week, a US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) bug-fixing scheme uncovered an average of one security glitch per 1,000 lines of code in 180 widely used open source software projects.
The large number of Red Hat flaws is partly due to the large number and wide variety of components it includes.
"Red Hat contains two different browsers and graphic interfaces, a number of PDF readers and image editors, and so on," the report said. "Red Hat, HP-UX, and Solaris can easily be used as servers, and as such include and support a large number of third party components, while the same cannot be said of all versions of Windows and Mac OS X."
Any consideration of relative OS security should look at factors not covered by the report, such as average patching time for vulnerabilities, Secunia said.
In the browser field, Firefox led the way with 64 bugs, compared to 43 for Internet Explorer, and 14 each for Opera and Safari.
However, in an examination of zero-day flaws - reported by third parties before a patch was available - Secunia found that Firefox tended to get more patches, sooner, compared to IE.
Out of eight zero-day bugs reported for Firefox in 2007, five have been patched, three of those in just over a week. Out of 10 zero-day IE bugs, only three were patched and the shortest patch time was 85 days.
ActiveX was hit by the largest number of browser add-on bugs in 2007, with 339 (compared to 45 last year), Secunia said.
The figure was propped up by the Month of ActiveX Controls Bugs in May 2007, and by Secunia's discovery of a vulnerable ActiveX component that was used in 40 different products.
QuickTime followed with 35 bugs and Java with 21 bugs.
In a report released this week, Secunia also criticized CA for the quality of the code in its anti-virus products, saying that "inherent" code problems are exposing CA products to ongoing security vulnerabilities.
On the other hand, "zero-day" security bugs in Firefox were patched more quickly than in Microsoft Internet Explorer, according to the Secunia 2007 Report, released this week.
In a review of the number of vulnerabilities found in enterprise anti-virus vendors' products, Secunia found that CA was by far the leader, with 187 vulnerabilities, followed by Symantec with 73. Trend Micro (34), ClamAV (15), McAfee (13) and F-Secure (6) ranked lower on the list.
The high figures for Symantec and CA are partly due to their wide range of products, some of which cover areas other than anti-virus, Secunia said.
However, the majority of the CA bugs were due to "inherent code problems with some CA products", Secunia said in the report.
Of particular concern is CA's range of ARCServe Backup products for laptops and desktops, which Secunia submitted to its Binary Analysis process after several bugs were reported and fixed. The bugs involved errors in processing particular arguments and requests.
The analysis found that about 60 reported bugs were still present in the supposedly patched versions.
What's more, the analysis found that the vulnerabilities were partly due to "the nature of the product code itself", Secunia said.
"Unless an overhaul of the code is undertaken, then the product remains susceptible to similar types of vulnerabilities," Secunia said.
However CA said in a statement that it has rigorous quality-control measures in place for its software and continues to improve those measures.
A number of the vulnerabilities found in Symantec products were due to their use of vulnerable software from third-party developers, Secunia said.
One of these is the Autonomy Keyview SDK (software development kit), used in Symantec Mail to view Lotus 1-2-3 files. The component was reported to have a "highly critical" flaw on 12 December, but hasn't yet been patched, leaving some Symantec products vulnerable.
Symantec said in a statement that it has published instructions for mitigating the problem and has issued product updates for some affected vendors. IBM, whose Lotus Notes was also affected by the Autonomy bug, has issued its own patch.
Operating systems and browsers
Out of the operating systems monitored by Secunia - Windows (98 and onwards), Mac OS X, HP-UX 10.x and 11.x, Solaris 8, 9, and 10 and Red Hat (excluding Fedora) - Red Hat was found to have by far the most vulnerabilities, at 633, with 99 percent found in third-party components. (Linux distributions are generally composed mostly of third-party software, which is integrated by the distributor.)
Red Hat has taken issue with the figures, claiming the accurate number should be 404 vulnerabilities for last year.
Solaris came next, with 252 bugs, 80 percent of which were in third-party components. Mac OS X came after that with 235, 62 percent of which were third-party.
Windows had only 123 bugs reported, but 96 percent of those were found in the operating system itself. HP-UX had 75 bugs reported, 81 percent of which were in third-party code.
Last week, a US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) bug-fixing scheme uncovered an average of one security glitch per 1,000 lines of code in 180 widely used open source software projects.
The large number of Red Hat flaws is partly due to the large number and wide variety of components it includes.
"Red Hat contains two different browsers and graphic interfaces, a number of PDF readers and image editors, and so on," the report said. "Red Hat, HP-UX, and Solaris can easily be used as servers, and as such include and support a large number of third party components, while the same cannot be said of all versions of Windows and Mac OS X."
Any consideration of relative OS security should look at factors not covered by the report, such as average patching time for vulnerabilities, Secunia said.
In the browser field, Firefox led the way with 64 bugs, compared to 43 for Internet Explorer, and 14 each for Opera and Safari.
However, in an examination of zero-day flaws - reported by third parties before a patch was available - Secunia found that Firefox tended to get more patches, sooner, compared to IE.
Out of eight zero-day bugs reported for Firefox in 2007, five have been patched, three of those in just over a week. Out of 10 zero-day IE bugs, only three were patched and the shortest patch time was 85 days.
ActiveX was hit by the largest number of browser add-on bugs in 2007, with 339 (compared to 45 last year), Secunia said.
The figure was propped up by the Month of ActiveX Controls Bugs in May 2007, and by Secunia's discovery of a vulnerable ActiveX component that was used in 40 different products.
QuickTime followed with 35 bugs and Java with 21 bugs.
Yahoo to support OpenID single sign-on
People with a Yahoo user name and password will be able to use that ID information to access non-Yahoo Web sites that support the OpenID 2.0 digital identity framework, reducing the amount of different log-in information people need to create, remember and enter online.
Already, almost 10,000 Web sites support OpenID, an open framework available for free to end users and Web site operators alike, according to the OpenID Foundation.
Yahoo's move will triple the number of OpenID accounts to 368 million by adding its 248 million active registered users to the rolls, the company said Thursday.
OpenID addresses one of several issues related to giving people more control of their online activities. Other groups are focusing on data portability, to let people move around the data and content they create online, so that they don't have to enter it manually in, say, every social-networking site they sign up for.
Yet other initiatives, like Google's OpenSocial, aim to create standard interfaces so that developers can create applications that run in multiple social-networking sites, instead of having to rewrite the same application multiple times for every site.
For all of these initiatives, it's critical for major Internet players to get involved, so that the benefits of standard technology and methods developed by groups like OpenID can have a real-world impact.
Unsurprisingly, in Thursday's statement, Scott Kveton, the OpenID Foundation's chairman, hailed Yahoo's support as a crucial validation of the framework that will help spur its adoption by other large Web site operators.
Other major players that have expressed interest and gotten involved in varying degrees with OpenID include Google, Six Apart, AOL, Sun, Novell and Microsoft.
Yahoo's announcement doesn't come as a complete surprise, since signs that it had been working on an OpenID implementation had surfaced. For example, a short message in the domain me.yahoo.com indicating the company would act as an identity provider for OpenID was spotted last week.
Yahoo participated in the development of version 2.0 of the OpenID framework, which the company said provides new security features. Yahoo users who log in to third-party OpenID sites should know that the log-in process doesn't reveal e-mail or instant-message addresses, Yahoo said Thursday.
Yahoo's initial OpenID service will be available in public beta on Jan. 30 and the company is working with several partners, including Plaxo, so that the Yahoo ID will work on their sites that day.
Already, almost 10,000 Web sites support OpenID, an open framework available for free to end users and Web site operators alike, according to the OpenID Foundation.
Yahoo's move will triple the number of OpenID accounts to 368 million by adding its 248 million active registered users to the rolls, the company said Thursday.
OpenID addresses one of several issues related to giving people more control of their online activities. Other groups are focusing on data portability, to let people move around the data and content they create online, so that they don't have to enter it manually in, say, every social-networking site they sign up for.
Yet other initiatives, like Google's OpenSocial, aim to create standard interfaces so that developers can create applications that run in multiple social-networking sites, instead of having to rewrite the same application multiple times for every site.
For all of these initiatives, it's critical for major Internet players to get involved, so that the benefits of standard technology and methods developed by groups like OpenID can have a real-world impact.
Unsurprisingly, in Thursday's statement, Scott Kveton, the OpenID Foundation's chairman, hailed Yahoo's support as a crucial validation of the framework that will help spur its adoption by other large Web site operators.
Other major players that have expressed interest and gotten involved in varying degrees with OpenID include Google, Six Apart, AOL, Sun, Novell and Microsoft.
Yahoo's announcement doesn't come as a complete surprise, since signs that it had been working on an OpenID implementation had surfaced. For example, a short message in the domain me.yahoo.com indicating the company would act as an identity provider for OpenID was spotted last week.
Yahoo participated in the development of version 2.0 of the OpenID framework, which the company said provides new security features. Yahoo users who log in to third-party OpenID sites should know that the log-in process doesn't reveal e-mail or instant-message addresses, Yahoo said Thursday.
Yahoo's initial OpenID service will be available in public beta on Jan. 30 and the company is working with several partners, including Plaxo, so that the Yahoo ID will work on their sites that day.
Environmental protests take high-tech to the high-seas
When environmental protestors boarded a Japanese whaling ship in the Southern Ocean, images of the action quickly flashed on the world's TV sets, followed by photos from the Japanese ship after the protestors were taken into custody. Getting these images out is crucial if either side is to win the global PR battle, but doing so can be problematic when you're at sea, thousands of kilometers from the nearest cell phone network or broadband connection.
To solve their problems, both sides take advantage of digital video and photo technology to get the footage, then look to the skies and tap into the global satellite communications network run by London-based Inmarsat. The company specializes in providing voice and data services to maritime vessels and other users at sea, or in remote areas that traditional telecommunications networks don't reach.
On Tuesday, as the protestors approached the Japanese whaling vessel "Yushin Maru 2," a digital video camera was rolling onboard the small inflatable craft sent from the Sea Shepard Conservation Society's ship, "Steve Irwin." The camera caught the moment when two of the conservationists jumped aboard, and within seconds the video was speeding back toward the Steve Irwin on the inflatable.
Once back onboard, the video was fed into a Macbook Pro laptop and edited into a 13M-byte MPEG2 clip that was just 12 seconds long, said Jonny Vasic, a spokesman for the society.
"One of our big tools in these whale wars is these video and digital still cameras. They really help us expose the bad guys," said Vasic.
The clip was then sent via satellite to the society's FTP server and made available to the world's media.
The ship's satellite communications system is a US$35,000 "Sailor Fleet 77" unit that was donated to the society last year by Australia's Bluetongue Brewery. It supports up to 256k bps (bits per second) transmission, although actually getting that speed depends on several factors. In calm seas, a gyro-based mount keeps the antenna pointed at the satellite, but in heavy seas, maintaining a reliable signal can be a problem. Keeping the link gets increasingly difficult as the ship goes further south because the satellite appears very low on the horizon.
"It's about 90 percent reliable," said Vasic.
Crew onboard the "Steve Irwin" are also using the satellite link to attempt to send e-mail to the Japanese ship, in addition to marine-band radio calls, in an attempt to secure the release of their two members, who remain aboard the "Yushin Maru 2."
The Institute of Cetacean Research, the Tokyo-based organization that operates the "Yushin Maru 2," declined to comment on the technology at its disposal, citing security reasons.
"I'm sorry to say, you might be Greenpeace posing as a journalist," said Gabriel Gomez, a spokesman for the group in Tokyo, when contacted by telephone on Thursday.
The systems employed by the Japanese group don't appear as sophisticated. Only a handful of still images from the ship have been released by the group to the media, and they are a relatively low VGA (640 pixels by 480 pixels) resolution. No video has been made available.
The satellite communications technology being employed by the two ships is increasingly being used by media, governmental and relief organizations in remote areas. Earlier this month, Cable News Network (CNN) won a Technology and Engineering Emmy Award for its satellite news gathering system based on Inmarsat's BGAN broadband system. The BGAN system offers a standard IP (Internet Protocol) connection as fast as 492k bps and is small enough that it can be built into a backpack.
To solve their problems, both sides take advantage of digital video and photo technology to get the footage, then look to the skies and tap into the global satellite communications network run by London-based Inmarsat. The company specializes in providing voice and data services to maritime vessels and other users at sea, or in remote areas that traditional telecommunications networks don't reach.
On Tuesday, as the protestors approached the Japanese whaling vessel "Yushin Maru 2," a digital video camera was rolling onboard the small inflatable craft sent from the Sea Shepard Conservation Society's ship, "Steve Irwin." The camera caught the moment when two of the conservationists jumped aboard, and within seconds the video was speeding back toward the Steve Irwin on the inflatable.
Once back onboard, the video was fed into a Macbook Pro laptop and edited into a 13M-byte MPEG2 clip that was just 12 seconds long, said Jonny Vasic, a spokesman for the society.
"One of our big tools in these whale wars is these video and digital still cameras. They really help us expose the bad guys," said Vasic.
The clip was then sent via satellite to the society's FTP server and made available to the world's media.
The ship's satellite communications system is a US$35,000 "Sailor Fleet 77" unit that was donated to the society last year by Australia's Bluetongue Brewery. It supports up to 256k bps (bits per second) transmission, although actually getting that speed depends on several factors. In calm seas, a gyro-based mount keeps the antenna pointed at the satellite, but in heavy seas, maintaining a reliable signal can be a problem. Keeping the link gets increasingly difficult as the ship goes further south because the satellite appears very low on the horizon.
"It's about 90 percent reliable," said Vasic.
Crew onboard the "Steve Irwin" are also using the satellite link to attempt to send e-mail to the Japanese ship, in addition to marine-band radio calls, in an attempt to secure the release of their two members, who remain aboard the "Yushin Maru 2."
The Institute of Cetacean Research, the Tokyo-based organization that operates the "Yushin Maru 2," declined to comment on the technology at its disposal, citing security reasons.
"I'm sorry to say, you might be Greenpeace posing as a journalist," said Gabriel Gomez, a spokesman for the group in Tokyo, when contacted by telephone on Thursday.
The systems employed by the Japanese group don't appear as sophisticated. Only a handful of still images from the ship have been released by the group to the media, and they are a relatively low VGA (640 pixels by 480 pixels) resolution. No video has been made available.
The satellite communications technology being employed by the two ships is increasingly being used by media, governmental and relief organizations in remote areas. Earlier this month, Cable News Network (CNN) won a Technology and Engineering Emmy Award for its satellite news gathering system based on Inmarsat's BGAN broadband system. The BGAN system offers a standard IP (Internet Protocol) connection as fast as 492k bps and is small enough that it can be built into a backpack.
Intel's Classmate PC goes on sale to consumers in India
Intel's Classmate PC isn't just for students anymore. HCL Infosystems plans to sell a version of the Classmate PC to consumers and businesses in India who want a rugged, low-cost laptop.
Priced at 13,990 rupees (US$356), HCL's MiLeap X laptop uses the same beefy case as the Classmate PC. But HCL -- which signed an agreement with Intel last year to produce the Classmate PC -- insists there is very little in common between the two computers.
"It is a totally different product," said George Paul, executive vice president at HCL Infosystems.
The specifications of the MiLeap X suggest otherwise. Both computers have a 7-inch LCD (liquid crystal display) screen with 800-pixel by 480-pixel resolution, a 900MHz Celeron M processor, Wi-Fi, and 2G bytes of flash memory for storage instead of a hard drive. They also use the same chipset, Intel's 915GMS.
The main difference between the MiLeap X and the Classmate PC appears to be a minor aesthetic change: The MiLeap X's vinyl cover more closely resembles a business folio than the blue covers typically found on the Classmate PC. The MiLeap X also comes with HCL's logo emblazoned below the display.
Paul acknowledged the MiLeap X can be considered a "derivative" of the Classmate PC since both computers use similar technologies, but said significant differences exist between the two products. He did not specify what those differences are.
Nor Badron, an Intel spokesman, confirmed the MiLeap X is based on the Classmate PC.
The basic Classmate PC systems are supplied by Intel and manufacturers such as HCL configure the computers and install software to meet the needs of their customers, Badron said, adding that Intel was "extremely supportive" of HCL's plans to develop a Classmate PC version for consumers and business users.
The MiLeap X gives HCL a start in the low-cost laptop segment, where most computer makers have yet to release products. "It's a quick and easy way of getting into that market," said Bryan Ma, director of personal systems research at IDC Asia-Pacific.
The MiLeap X, which runs a version of the Linux operating system, will go on sale in India on Jan. 26.
Developed in response to the One Laptop Per Child Project's low-cost laptop efforts, Classmate PC was designed for schools in developing countries. The computers were not originally meant to be sold to the general public, largely over fears within Intel that the low-cost laptops would cut into the company's gross margin.
Last year, Taiwan's Asustek was the first to crack open the door for wider Classmate PC sales with the introduction of its Eee PC, which uses many of the same components. Intel expected Asustek to announce a version of the Classmate PC for education customers, but the Taiwanese hardware maker instead declared the Eee PC, which uses the same processor and components as the Classmate PC, would be sold to consumers.
Intel has since embraced low-cost laptops as a product segment, despite continued resistance from some executives inside the company. The company's focus on that market will intensify later this year with the release of Silverthorne, a low-cost, energy efficient processor that will appear in a number of low-cost laptops currently under development.
(John Ribeiro, in Bangalore, contributed to this report.)
Priced at 13,990 rupees (US$356), HCL's MiLeap X laptop uses the same beefy case as the Classmate PC. But HCL -- which signed an agreement with Intel last year to produce the Classmate PC -- insists there is very little in common between the two computers.
"It is a totally different product," said George Paul, executive vice president at HCL Infosystems.
The specifications of the MiLeap X suggest otherwise. Both computers have a 7-inch LCD (liquid crystal display) screen with 800-pixel by 480-pixel resolution, a 900MHz Celeron M processor, Wi-Fi, and 2G bytes of flash memory for storage instead of a hard drive. They also use the same chipset, Intel's 915GMS.
The main difference between the MiLeap X and the Classmate PC appears to be a minor aesthetic change: The MiLeap X's vinyl cover more closely resembles a business folio than the blue covers typically found on the Classmate PC. The MiLeap X also comes with HCL's logo emblazoned below the display.
Paul acknowledged the MiLeap X can be considered a "derivative" of the Classmate PC since both computers use similar technologies, but said significant differences exist between the two products. He did not specify what those differences are.
Nor Badron, an Intel spokesman, confirmed the MiLeap X is based on the Classmate PC.
The basic Classmate PC systems are supplied by Intel and manufacturers such as HCL configure the computers and install software to meet the needs of their customers, Badron said, adding that Intel was "extremely supportive" of HCL's plans to develop a Classmate PC version for consumers and business users.
The MiLeap X gives HCL a start in the low-cost laptop segment, where most computer makers have yet to release products. "It's a quick and easy way of getting into that market," said Bryan Ma, director of personal systems research at IDC Asia-Pacific.
The MiLeap X, which runs a version of the Linux operating system, will go on sale in India on Jan. 26.
Developed in response to the One Laptop Per Child Project's low-cost laptop efforts, Classmate PC was designed for schools in developing countries. The computers were not originally meant to be sold to the general public, largely over fears within Intel that the low-cost laptops would cut into the company's gross margin.
Last year, Taiwan's Asustek was the first to crack open the door for wider Classmate PC sales with the introduction of its Eee PC, which uses many of the same components. Intel expected Asustek to announce a version of the Classmate PC for education customers, but the Taiwanese hardware maker instead declared the Eee PC, which uses the same processor and components as the Classmate PC, would be sold to consumers.
Intel has since embraced low-cost laptops as a product segment, despite continued resistance from some executives inside the company. The company's focus on that market will intensify later this year with the release of Silverthorne, a low-cost, energy efficient processor that will appear in a number of low-cost laptops currently under development.
(John Ribeiro, in Bangalore, contributed to this report.)
Mac users: MacBook Air lacks features
Steve Jobs wowed the Macworld audience when he unveiled the slim, ultraportable MacBook Air notebook, but users and analysts say its lack of some important features may make it unattractive to buyers.
The ultraportable notebook, launched at the conference and expo on Tuesday, has a 13.3-inch wide-screen display and a full-size back-lit keyboard. It uses a 1.8-inch hard drive, also found in the iPod and a smaller version of Intel's Core 2 Duo processor.
Apple has also developed a program called Remote Disk, with which users can download software from the optical drive of a nearby computer using built-in 802.11n wireless networking. At 3 pounds (1.3 kilograms), Jobs called it the lightest and thinnest notebook on the planet.
Scott Armstrong, a Mac user, was watching the Web for news from the show as Jobs unveiled the notebook, which is .076 inches at its thinnest part and from 0.8 inches to 1.2 inches high, by removing it from a business-size manila envelope. For all its impressive features, it does not meet the needs of Apple's traditional multimedia audience, said Armstrong, who is also president of the Macintosh Users Group in Kennewick, Washington.
One omission is a FireWire communications port, which is necessary to transfer big multimedia files, Armstrong said. Apple has led the effort to promote FireWire, so it's surprising it wasn't included in MacBook Air, Armstrong said. One USB (Universal Serial Bus) port isn't enough, he said.
The machine lacks storage capacity and, at 4,200 revolutions per minute, the hard drive is really slow, Armstrong said. "Most people would like to have features in their laptops. This product is for people who won't need stuff or hook stuff up," Armstrong said.
It may be targeted at students, who could sacrifice features for portability, Armstrong said. "They haven't discontinued the MacBook and MacBook Pro notebook models, so they are doing it for a niche market," Armstrong said.
The Air's novelty value could attract buyers, but the $1,799 starting price tag is too heavy for a machine lacking features.
"They won't stay with this for long, they'll come out with something more innovative with Air," Armstrong said.
The MacBook Air is a mismatch with Apple's price-sensitive customers, such as educators and those who do creative work and require significant storage for music, photos and video, Citigroup said in a research note on Wednesday. Moreover, ultraportable-laptop users are generally Windows-based PC users, not Mac users, Citigroup said.
While the product could be a long-term success, Apple will produce the laptop in small volumes until more features are added, Citigroup said.
Unlike Asus' Eee PC, the MacBook Air may sell slowly because of its high price point and overlapping functionality with the existing MacBook and MacBook Pro lines, said Shaw Wu, an analyst with American Technology Research, in a research note. However, Apple is adept with product placement, as shown by the iPhone and iPod, where there has been minimal cannibalization despite overlapping functionality, Wu said.
The MacBook Air may be niche, but Apple could be pioneering the adoption of future technologies like wireless communication between devices, said Jim Ritz, a Mac user and member of the Apple Pi user group in Rockville, Maryland.
Users were concerned when Apple got rid of the floppy drive, and now Apple is now betting that the time for wireless networking has come by removing the Ethernet port and including wireless storage, Ritz said.
Adding more wireless features establishes Apple's intent to change the way users look at ultraportable laptops, Ritz said. "I'm curious to see what the notebook looks like a year from now."
Ritz has a plan that will help him afford to buy a MacBook Air, which he wants to try out -- he says he's going to offer to sell his recently purchased MacBook to his wife.
"It's a costly little puppy no doubt, but all new things are expensive," Ritz said of the MacBook Air.
Apple officials could not be reached for comment regarding concerns with the MacBook Air that were raised by Mac enthusiasts and analysts.
The ultraportable notebook, launched at the conference and expo on Tuesday, has a 13.3-inch wide-screen display and a full-size back-lit keyboard. It uses a 1.8-inch hard drive, also found in the iPod and a smaller version of Intel's Core 2 Duo processor.
Apple has also developed a program called Remote Disk, with which users can download software from the optical drive of a nearby computer using built-in 802.11n wireless networking. At 3 pounds (1.3 kilograms), Jobs called it the lightest and thinnest notebook on the planet.
Scott Armstrong, a Mac user, was watching the Web for news from the show as Jobs unveiled the notebook, which is .076 inches at its thinnest part and from 0.8 inches to 1.2 inches high, by removing it from a business-size manila envelope. For all its impressive features, it does not meet the needs of Apple's traditional multimedia audience, said Armstrong, who is also president of the Macintosh Users Group in Kennewick, Washington.
One omission is a FireWire communications port, which is necessary to transfer big multimedia files, Armstrong said. Apple has led the effort to promote FireWire, so it's surprising it wasn't included in MacBook Air, Armstrong said. One USB (Universal Serial Bus) port isn't enough, he said.
The machine lacks storage capacity and, at 4,200 revolutions per minute, the hard drive is really slow, Armstrong said. "Most people would like to have features in their laptops. This product is for people who won't need stuff or hook stuff up," Armstrong said.
It may be targeted at students, who could sacrifice features for portability, Armstrong said. "They haven't discontinued the MacBook and MacBook Pro notebook models, so they are doing it for a niche market," Armstrong said.
The Air's novelty value could attract buyers, but the $1,799 starting price tag is too heavy for a machine lacking features.
"They won't stay with this for long, they'll come out with something more innovative with Air," Armstrong said.
The MacBook Air is a mismatch with Apple's price-sensitive customers, such as educators and those who do creative work and require significant storage for music, photos and video, Citigroup said in a research note on Wednesday. Moreover, ultraportable-laptop users are generally Windows-based PC users, not Mac users, Citigroup said.
While the product could be a long-term success, Apple will produce the laptop in small volumes until more features are added, Citigroup said.
Unlike Asus' Eee PC, the MacBook Air may sell slowly because of its high price point and overlapping functionality with the existing MacBook and MacBook Pro lines, said Shaw Wu, an analyst with American Technology Research, in a research note. However, Apple is adept with product placement, as shown by the iPhone and iPod, where there has been minimal cannibalization despite overlapping functionality, Wu said.
The MacBook Air may be niche, but Apple could be pioneering the adoption of future technologies like wireless communication between devices, said Jim Ritz, a Mac user and member of the Apple Pi user group in Rockville, Maryland.
Users were concerned when Apple got rid of the floppy drive, and now Apple is now betting that the time for wireless networking has come by removing the Ethernet port and including wireless storage, Ritz said.
Adding more wireless features establishes Apple's intent to change the way users look at ultraportable laptops, Ritz said. "I'm curious to see what the notebook looks like a year from now."
Ritz has a plan that will help him afford to buy a MacBook Air, which he wants to try out -- he says he's going to offer to sell his recently purchased MacBook to his wife.
"It's a costly little puppy no doubt, but all new things are expensive," Ritz said of the MacBook Air.
Apple officials could not be reached for comment regarding concerns with the MacBook Air that were raised by Mac enthusiasts and analysts.
US OMB pushes for software as a service
A top official with the U.S. White House's Office of Management and Budget (OMB) gave her strongest endorsement yet to software as a service, saying Wednesday it can help federal agencies cut development costs.
A speech on Wednesday at the SaaS/Gov conference in Washington, D.C., wasn't the first time Karen Evans, administrator of the OMB's Office of Electronic Government and Information Technology, endorsed software as a service. Despite Evans' continuing advocacy of the concept, adoption has been slow among government agencies, according to one vendor.
Asked whether the OMB should more strongly promote software as a service, Evans said U.S. agencies need to weigh cost, security and other factors. But the U.S. government needs to move to a more service-oriented software model, she said.
"Our track record is clear -- we are not very good at delivering our own software in the time frame set," Evans said at the conference. "We're also not very good at managing large projects."
Some agencies haven't embraced the service approach, often because they want hands-on control of software development, Evans said. But government agencies can't afford to keep developing their own software without sharing with other agencies, she said.
"We can't continue to maintain all of the things we have," she added. "We have to start shutting down some of our legacy systems. We really have to move to a ... service-oriented market."
Although there's been no prohibition against U.S. agencies using software-as-a-service models, many agencies have been reluctant to move to a service-based approach, partly because of concerns about the security of Web-based services, said Dan Burton, senior vice president of global public policy for Salesforce.com.
Evans' speech on Wednesday could create a "tipping point" for the use of software-as-a-service models in the U.S. government, Burton said. Many agencies seem to believe that they don't have the authority to take a chance on the new model, he said.
One step that service-based software vendors can take is to seek security certifications and map out how their services meet Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) requirements, Evans said. Some agencies are reluctant to move to software as a service without certifications, she said.
However, some agencies are already using software as a service to cut down development times. Rezaur Rahman, enterprise architect and Web services manager for the U.S. Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, said his agency began using Salesforce.com offerings in its information management systems in recent months. Budget constraints helped push the agency toward software as a service, he said.
The agency is using services to take care of many functions it would have had to write its own code for in the past, including reading and writing to databases, Rahman said. The agency can often make tweaks to its information management systems in a day or less, he added.
A speech on Wednesday at the SaaS/Gov conference in Washington, D.C., wasn't the first time Karen Evans, administrator of the OMB's Office of Electronic Government and Information Technology, endorsed software as a service. Despite Evans' continuing advocacy of the concept, adoption has been slow among government agencies, according to one vendor.
Asked whether the OMB should more strongly promote software as a service, Evans said U.S. agencies need to weigh cost, security and other factors. But the U.S. government needs to move to a more service-oriented software model, she said.
"Our track record is clear -- we are not very good at delivering our own software in the time frame set," Evans said at the conference. "We're also not very good at managing large projects."
Some agencies haven't embraced the service approach, often because they want hands-on control of software development, Evans said. But government agencies can't afford to keep developing their own software without sharing with other agencies, she said.
"We can't continue to maintain all of the things we have," she added. "We have to start shutting down some of our legacy systems. We really have to move to a ... service-oriented market."
Although there's been no prohibition against U.S. agencies using software-as-a-service models, many agencies have been reluctant to move to a service-based approach, partly because of concerns about the security of Web-based services, said Dan Burton, senior vice president of global public policy for Salesforce.com.
Evans' speech on Wednesday could create a "tipping point" for the use of software-as-a-service models in the U.S. government, Burton said. Many agencies seem to believe that they don't have the authority to take a chance on the new model, he said.
One step that service-based software vendors can take is to seek security certifications and map out how their services meet Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) requirements, Evans said. Some agencies are reluctant to move to software as a service without certifications, she said.
However, some agencies are already using software as a service to cut down development times. Rezaur Rahman, enterprise architect and Web services manager for the U.S. Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, said his agency began using Salesforce.com offerings in its information management systems in recent months. Budget constraints helped push the agency toward software as a service, he said.
The agency is using services to take care of many functions it would have had to write its own code for in the past, including reading and writing to databases, Rahman said. The agency can often make tweaks to its information management systems in a day or less, he added.
MacBook Air -- the day after
Steve Jobs introduced the MacBook Air during his keynote address at the Macworld Expo on Tuesday morning. And one day later the first-blush opinions are in...
Apple's MacBook Air ultra-thin could spawn improved PC
By Joel Shore, ITworld
The envelope, please. No, it's not just an awards-show phrase, it's precisely how Steve Jobs unveiled Apple's latest masterwork, the ultrathin MacBook Air computer at Macworld earlier this week. Just 0.16 inches at its thinnest point, Jobs pulled the computer from a standard-size manila interoffice envelope. I'm no Mac maven, but like the crowd packed into the Macworld keynote address, I'm duly impressed. ...continue readig 'Apple's MacBook Air ultra-thin could spawn improved PC'
Apple's MacBook Air: evolution, not revolution
Scott Bradner, Network World
There was a, for Apple, reasonable level of hype leading up to Steve Jobs' keynote at Macworld 2008. Not like last year when everyone knew that the iPhone was coming (even if they did not know what an iPhone was). Most of the buzz this time was about a possible 'ultra portable. Finally, an hour into the talk, Steve introduced the MacBook Air - the 'world's thinnest notebook.' It's not my dream machine but it's very nice - more of an incremental improvement than something that creates a whole new mold-breaking concept. ...continue reading 'Apple's MacBook Air: evolution, not revolution'
MacBook Air: How incomplete is it?
Harry McCracken, PC World
Steve Jobs is, among many other things, the great denier. But I'm not sure if he's ever denied Apple customers as many features as he will with the MacBook Air. In introducing the Air, Jobs said that manufacturers of other thin-and-light laptops made too many compromises to make their machines sleek, like using small keyboards and screens and wimpy CPUs. But nobody else in the industry would dream of making some of the compromises that the Air makes. ...continue reading 'MacBook Air: How incomplete is it?'
Ultraportable challengers to the MacBook Air
PC World Staff
The MacBook Air is Apple's first foray into a crowded ultraportable market that has seen its share of very light, very capable products from companies including Sony, Lenovo, and Fujitsu, among others. Here's a fast look at how they stack up. ...continue reading 'Ultraportable challengers to the MacBook Air'
Big '08 for Apple with MacBook Air, iTunes
Jim Dalrymple, Macworld.com
After announcing the availability of movie rentals through iTunes, Jobs ended his 101-minute Macworld keynote by taking the wraps off the MacBook Air. It would be hard to gauge from the cheers during the keynote which of the two new announcement made the bigger impression. As for which product will be bigger for Apple in the weeks and months following the keynote, that all depends on who you ask. ...continue reading 'Big '08 for Apple with MacBook Air, iTunes'
Apple's MacBook Air ultra-thin could spawn improved PC
By Joel Shore, ITworld
The envelope, please. No, it's not just an awards-show phrase, it's precisely how Steve Jobs unveiled Apple's latest masterwork, the ultrathin MacBook Air computer at Macworld earlier this week. Just 0.16 inches at its thinnest point, Jobs pulled the computer from a standard-size manila interoffice envelope. I'm no Mac maven, but like the crowd packed into the Macworld keynote address, I'm duly impressed. ...continue readig 'Apple's MacBook Air ultra-thin could spawn improved PC'
Apple's MacBook Air: evolution, not revolution
Scott Bradner, Network World
There was a, for Apple, reasonable level of hype leading up to Steve Jobs' keynote at Macworld 2008. Not like last year when everyone knew that the iPhone was coming (even if they did not know what an iPhone was). Most of the buzz this time was about a possible 'ultra portable. Finally, an hour into the talk, Steve introduced the MacBook Air - the 'world's thinnest notebook.' It's not my dream machine but it's very nice - more of an incremental improvement than something that creates a whole new mold-breaking concept. ...continue reading 'Apple's MacBook Air: evolution, not revolution'
MacBook Air: How incomplete is it?
Harry McCracken, PC World
Steve Jobs is, among many other things, the great denier. But I'm not sure if he's ever denied Apple customers as many features as he will with the MacBook Air. In introducing the Air, Jobs said that manufacturers of other thin-and-light laptops made too many compromises to make their machines sleek, like using small keyboards and screens and wimpy CPUs. But nobody else in the industry would dream of making some of the compromises that the Air makes. ...continue reading 'MacBook Air: How incomplete is it?'
Ultraportable challengers to the MacBook Air
PC World Staff
The MacBook Air is Apple's first foray into a crowded ultraportable market that has seen its share of very light, very capable products from companies including Sony, Lenovo, and Fujitsu, among others. Here's a fast look at how they stack up. ...continue reading 'Ultraportable challengers to the MacBook Air'
Big '08 for Apple with MacBook Air, iTunes
Jim Dalrymple, Macworld.com
After announcing the availability of movie rentals through iTunes, Jobs ended his 101-minute Macworld keynote by taking the wraps off the MacBook Air. It would be hard to gauge from the cheers during the keynote which of the two new announcement made the bigger impression. As for which product will be bigger for Apple in the weeks and months following the keynote, that all depends on who you ask. ...continue reading 'Big '08 for Apple with MacBook Air, iTunes'
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