Dorkage – n. A physical object that holds the attention and affection of a dork (see also geek). Often used collectively.

Ah, a little cleaning over the weekend unearthed the slide rule I used all through high school physics (this was PC – pre-calculators).

The damn thing is, I still remembered how to do a few (very few) things on it: Multipication, division, square roots, some trig.

Dorkage is oddly personal, but fun…

Steve Outing has a good, yet short, article about communication services (think Net access, cable TV, Dish TV, cell phones).

Obstensively, the article talks about how newspapers may get the short straw in the rush to get other communication/data subscriptions: News has become a commodity – so newspapers may well be cancelled in favor of, for example, NetFlix or whatever for those without unlimited budgets.

Newspapers have already become aware of this – slowly, but they are adopting and adapting (see Dan Gillmor’s blog on any given day for more on this). Large newspaper companies are starting to experiment with free newspapers for commuters and other city dwellers, betting the ad revenue for this non-subscription product will be great, as the target audience’s appeal to advertisers – younger, professional, conspicuous consumers – will feed the coffers.

Papers have also begun to embrace the blog mentality – that’s content that IS unique to a Web site. When Gillmor was at the San Jose Mercury – blogging daily for their Silicon Valley property – I’d read him daily. And there’s those ad impressions….

But the article also touched on the idea of “bundling” services (as Comcast has done with their Triple Play – VoIP, TV and Internet), but didn’t explore it much.

Bears more thought, methinks.

What are some of those thoughts? Consider the following:

• For the average consumers, a package is usually easier to consume than hand-picking parts to make a custom package. And there are far more average consumers than the opposite.
• Packages usually keep costs down. A Triple Play type package is usually cheaper than three subscriptions from different companies. That said, such packages often make people purchase what they don’t really need (“Gee, I don’t need high-speed internet, but for only $5 extra a month…”).
• So – as consumers – we need to make sure that unbundling – or lack of bundling – is supported. Who wants to go through a Microsoft-type lockin for communications/data subscriptions? Not me, that’s for sure.
• Related the the previous point: Bundling can be a good thing, but it can lead to monopolies, or – at least – a handful of large companies. There are upsides and downsides to such consolidation, but it bears watching. The rapid consolidation of the telco industry in the recent past (seems like there’s a $XX billion merger every other day) is both troubling (lack of choice) and welcome (telcos are so f’d up, some consolidation is welcomed).
• Outing is really talking – to a degree – about the end to traditional print media as we have known it. While print won’t disappear, it will be marginalized. Looks at the precedent of networkTV news dominance: CNN was scoffed at, but now is the first place the White House turns (OK, maybe FOX News first…). Talk radio came out of nowhere to be a right-wing staple, getting the message out. Then this thingee called the internet…with online news, blogs… To quote Bobby Zimmerman, the times (including the New York Times) they are a changin’.
• I’m a big reader, yet I’m also a huge computer dork. And I now subscribe to less magazines than at any post-high school point of my life, and that includes times when I really didn’t have a lot of money to spend on non-essentials. There’s little need for them for news – be it computer or world news. By the time it’s in print, I’ve read about it extensively online.
• I still subscribe to a newspaper, but I read it less and less. And I know very few (if any) younger co-workers who even subscribe.
• The explosion of data/delivery systems is great in that there is a lot of [whatever] out there. That doesn’t mean there is a whole lot of good stuff out (by any measure).

What this all means today, tomorrow or next decade I can’t say.

But it’s all a way different way of looking at a lot of things – data, content, delivery and distribution systems – than were not really even on the radar a decade ago.

A quarter-million downloads a day. Wow.

Go Firefox Go….

And – suddenly! – there is the pronouncement that Microsoft is backpedaling, and will offer a stand-alone IE update before Longhorn.

Remarkable coincidence…

I was driving home from work the other day (last week?) listening to NPR.

They were talking about some experimental (for lack of a better word on my part) newpapers. Basically, some metropolitan newspapers are experimenting with free, “lite” newspapers (news snippets, entertainment news) to hand out to commuters.

This is an effort to gain readers in the age bracket that traditional newspapers just don’t have a foothold – the young, but professional, crowd.

I’m really not certain what the target of this effort is – it could be to keep spooling out the free papers that are supported by ads (to an age group coveted by advertisers). Hence the OSN title of this post.

Or it could be an effort by the traditional papers to try to gradually get these folks hooked on papers, so they convert to the paying version.

Or a little of both. Whatever.

My point is this: This NPR report talked to some wanker professor at some well-known college who basically dissed the whole concept, trash talking the whole snippet concept of the newspapers blah blah…you’ve heard it before.

But it made me think. What’s about the most common intellectual/non-fluff newspaper out there consumed by professionals? Uh, The Wall Street Journal maybe?

What’s on its front page? SNIPPETS – with [hard-copy] links to the details. But you can peruse the top page and “be informed.” A fairly recent addition is color, and the color coding helps the, uh, non-newspaperish reader.

The WSJ. Stooping to OSN tactics.

Take that Professor Wanker.

And goodbye Mapquest/Yahoo Maps and so on.

Beta only, sketchy Mac support (Netscape/Mozilla) at this time…still kicks butt.

I saw this and kept pestering people throughout the day at work, showing it to them like I invented the damn thing.

Sweet….

Wired Magazine has a sorta brilliant, far-reaching article on the creator of BitTorrent, Bram Cohen.

It’s sorta brilliant because it’s the normal groveling Wired interview, but there are about four or five choice quotations that anyone working in any area of content creation/distribution/consumption[?] should at least read.

And Bram Cohen does not have an agenda, just tech smarts. Others will do the same or worse/better (depending on your politics).

Choice bits:

THIS is why the BitTorrent effect matters. Because it is a glitch in the Matrix, a disturbance in the Force.

What BitTorrent began will be continued/forked by others and so on.

Again, like Napster, the genie is out of the bottle.

Business models have changed. Get over it/get on with it.

Why BitTorrent is effective – and a protocol that I could not write in a zillion years – it’s claim to fame is that it allow faster downloads of stuff. To MPAA etc, that means faster pirating.

OK.

But as Cohen himself admits in the interview, the overall capability of folks to get access to stuff and store it is increasing at an astonishing rate. BitTorrent may be a good protocol, but when everyone has a 1 terabyte hard drive and a DS3 coming into the home, is the efficiency of BitTorrent necessary?

THAT’s why BitTorrent really doesn’t matter (in the LONG run).

Short run, it’s the [promise of]/[evil bastard] of Napster for large honkin’ files, which include films.

Long run – We’ll all be able to do this good/nasty stuff easily – much like a browser enable the delivery (and possible [gasp!!] storage/redelivery of same). BitTorrent shows us the potential of the future; it is not the future.

As Dylan sang, the times they are a changin’…

I mentioned in my prognostications for 2005 that I had, for the last few years, predicted the decline/demise of Sun and Apple Computer. And I still do.

However, in light of the pretty damn good year Apple had last year, it made me think again.

However, I still stand by my statement(s). But allow me to clarify.

When I wrote (above) “Apple Computers” this was very intentional. I’m talking about Apple as a computer manufacturer. And the outlook for the company in that respect is still pretty bleak. MS still has a stranglehold on desktops (especially in the business environment, which is woefully undercounted in many surveys), and any inroads made against MS is by Linux, not Apple. Speaking from personal experience, the places I’ve worked have mainly broken down to some art/graphics folks having Macs, some portion of the hard-core techies running Linux desktops (on machines which had Windoze pre-loaded: Dell units; IBM ThinkPads and so on) and everyone else running Windoze.

Apple’s success recently is not in computers but in their foray into becoming an entertainment company: Itunes; Ipod and so on. Some of this may – at some point – translate to more Mac sales, but – right now – we’re just not seeing it. No halo effect.

So – to me – Apple is, at best, stagnant as a computer company.

Sun is a little more straight-forward and interesting.

All the pundits seem to paint MS as the next IBM, referring to the decline of IBM after they refused to acknowledge that their heavy-iron mainframes were becoming dinosaurs. (IBM bounced back by embracing the PC and – later – Linux.)

There is a certain amount of validity to that argument, but – to me – Sun is really the next IBM.

Sun is still pushing the same hardware (SPARC) and software (Solaris) that they were a decade ago. Yes, they’ve added Java to their software portfolio, but I’d wager that MS has made more profit off the Java-clone C# in the last couple years than Sun ever has off Java.

Sun reported a meager profit lately, but this was in large part due to an large injection of capital – in the form of litigation avoidance – from … [drumroll]… Microsoft.

While there still is a need for Enterprise 10000 servers put out by Sun, the demand is going way down. Less than a decade ago I worked for a small company that ran an old DEC mainframe. An expensive piece of hardware to own/maintain – but that’s what was needed. Today, you could throw that out, get a couple of blade units running Linux and have way less maintenance, greater speed and higher redundancy at a fraction of the cost.

Take Google for an example: They have huge farms of Linux/x86 servers. Know what they do when one of the units has problems?

Nothing.

If you have 10,000 servers, if one goes down, you still have 99.99% of your units running.

Have a cluster of five Enterprise 10000 servers and one goes down, you’ve lost 20 percent of your units.

To its credit, Sun keeps surviving, but I don’t know how long this can last. I have nothing against Sun; I learned (sorta) Unix on Solaris. But it’s a tough technical row to hoe with 10-year old tactics.

Know what I mean?

Well, last weekend I was a total sofa spud, and – over the course of the weekend – watched the entire first season of The West Wing.

Yeah, 15 hours of staring at that screen instead of a computer screen. Sue me.

I’ve long been a fan of the show, even though the last couple of seasons it’s fallen off a bit for me.

I never saw the first season – maybe a show or two in reruns – but it was amazing to watch the first season (especially without commercials!). Great acting, great writing, intelligent topics (for a prime-time drama) without much pandering. Just amazingly refreshing after sampling some the recent TV dreck.

So I purchased seasons two and three, and that’ll keep me occupied for some time.

Really, really quality prime-time TV. Amazing.

A week ago, 10+ inches of wet, frozen snow.

Two days ago, mid-50s weather: Fog throughout the day as the snowdrifts dwindle.

Yesterday, small ice storm. Had to chisel my way into the car.

Today and through the weekend, highs(!) of low teens, with wind chills well below zero.

Remind me again why I live in Chicago?

Ah yes, it’s that time of the year again: Time to flaunt your ignorance by proudly proclaiming to divine future events.

Hell, it’s just fun to do, and – as are most lists – fun to read.

Without further ado, my 2005 Prognositications:

• Theme of the year: Security – Hate to start off with a bummer, but that’s the big picture for 2005: Security from trojans, viruses, worms and other exploits. The winners of this derby will be the vendors (think Symantec) and ISPs (think Earthlink/AOL) who can seamlessly deliver this protection (“Mom, what ports does your firewall allow access to?” – there’s a conversation that’ll never happen…). The big loser will be Microsoft: large installed base, large target; OS and software built on pre-pervasive Net code, more brittle. At the same time, I expect MS to spend more $$ on security than any other single company next year.
• Google will have another remarkable year – I don’t mean this in the financial sense (though I don’t expect their value [currently ~192/share] to tumble in an appreciable way). I think they will continue to innovate and have at least two major impacts next year. This year I count three: Gmail, their IPO and the bookscanning project. The latter has received the least press; in many ways, it will have the largest long-term impact.
• Google will do something remarkable with Blogger – Google has really goosed up Blogger since the acquistion, but more flash (better tools, JS widgets and so on) than substance. Don’t get me wrong, they’ve taken Blogger to a whole new level, but I think they can do some really interesting things with it if they want to. I think the general dearth of significant improvements (such as those embodied for years in SixApart’s tools) signals that the big upgrade is coming.
• Six Apart will struggle – As one of the most remarkable Net stories out there, Ben and Mena have a good sense for what users want and so on. However, the generally brittle nature of MoveableType (don’t flame; it’s just hard to upgrade etc for NON-geeks) will become all too apparent this year as blogging becomes mainstream. Look for a buy out.
• Blogging becomes mainstream: – Bolstered by the divisive nature of the election, blogging actually became mainstream in 2004. Dean was an internet candidate; all candidates had blogs; bloggers brought down CBS/Dan Rather in a manner that would have been inconceiveable a year ago. All this made blogging acceptable; so look for corporate and media blogging efforts in 2005 to become as *yawn* as “..or visit or site at www.companyname.com” is today for just about any TV/radio ad. Simply put, in 2005 your mom will have heard of blogs.
• Industry consolidation a-go-go – Expect to see more mega-mergers along the lines of Oracle/PeopleSoft & Compaq/HP. Expect some rancor to accompany the big mergers, as the two previously mentioned. One possible target is Gateway: If so, it will be by an off-shore company – not Dell or IBM.
• Demise/decline of Apple and or Sun – I predict this each year to some degree, sometimes not doom and gloom, but never with expectations of progress. I see this year to be the same. Both companies will endure, gain a lot of press but not gain any market share; Apple will innovate more than Sun; Sun still won’t figure out how to make money off of Java.
• A serious Linux virus/Trojan will surface – As marketshare increases, so does the size of the target. I hope not, but PHP just got hit with one; Apache 2.x was vulnerable about a year or so ago…it’ll happen.
• This will be the year of broadband – Half of the US is now connected via broadband, but it’s been a long, painful process to get there. This is the year the incumbent telcos will pull their heads out of their asses and realize they can make money on DSL. SBC finally did this by working with Yahoo!; Verizon is starting to roll out DSL in an aggressive manner. While I love my cable modem, DSL is the answer to the broadband question: Delivered over the copper that’s already installed in just about every home. Yes, there are limitations (old lines, distance from central office etc), but it beats fiber (too costly), wireless (too flakey) and cable (not ubiquitous) in most cases. It’s the 80/20 solution that will make remarkable inroads this year. This always-on connection will help feed the security issue; instead of being online 3 hours a days, you’re connected 24×7. A port-scanner’s delight!
• Outsourcing – Will keep increasing for manufacturing/development (why not?), but will decrease/not increase appreaciably for customer service. With computers becoming commodities, service is a point of differentiation. Dell has learned this the hard way.
• Upstart Start-Up – Some new company is going to come on the radar this year and just blow us away (think Netscape/Google/Blogger). And it will probably be just a really well done job of something that – once you see it – is “duh! that’s so obvious!”
• RIAA & MPAA will again duck and miss getting hit with the clue stick – Let’s settle back and enjoy(?) another year of mindless litigation, chasing after the wrong targets by these two entrenched institutions. The current political climate makes these antics more possible than a regulatory/judicial administration that accepts that the rules have changed/don’t apply to this or that area, but that’s just gravy: The big issue is these organizations have dug in their heels and won’t budge a bit. No, the internet/DVD/VHS revolution doesn’t make us rethink our business models; it makes us want to sue people who are leveraging (uh, stealing with[?]) these tools. Disney is still doing the “lock the items in the vault for seven years” thing. Why? When theaters were the only outlet, this made some sense. Today, someone who’s kid wants to see Toy Story will (if locked away) borrow a friend’s, rent from library, burn a DVD from somewhere, buy on eBay or whatever not because they want to do these (in some cases, illegal) things, but because they can’t buy it. Rather than sue Mrs. Mom for copying Toy Story, why not make it available for sale? In seven years, her kid’s going to be X years old and won’t want to see it anymore. Or has seen it so many times over at the Johnson’s house on their old VHS that there’s no way the kid’s going to beg the parents for it.