SkypeMania: VOIP rulez

There are some smart people in this world. People who understand the Age of Information (or the age of IT?).

So they gave us things like Kazza, Google, the torrents, mp3's ... and now we got Skype!

A couple of months ago (or was it even earlyer? - in modern times, everything's running so fast!) I heard news about this great tool. My curiosity was hungry as a mad wolf in cold Siberia - so I downloaded it - to check it out. It didn't have many users back then ("just" a couple of million I guess). Since none of my friends had it, and I'm not realy the person who's sending out those "get this tool" e-mails, I forgot about it.

Up untill recently, when I was chatting with my brother on MSN and my trackpoint somehow lead to that voice chat button. As we're both quite crazy about all this stuff, we tryed to connect ... once, twice, ... and it didn't work. I thought it's probably becouse of slow connection - as I'm using VPN over dial-up at home (YES, there are still people with dial up ... especialy those who have fast LAN's at work and don't realy need constant connection at home!).

The idea of talking using the web somehow stayed in my mind and during work, I remembered this skype-thing again. Download, install, send instructions to Bro ... connect in the evening. -Surprise, surprise - it works perfectly fine!

I couldn't believe it - when conn. started, it was a bit weird and I noticed that it wasn't fast as it should be. Couple of moments later, it seemed as it just got optimised to my slow dial-up (45kbps) - it was just like talking over fixed line. With one BIG DIFFERENCE - IT WAS FREE - although I was calling to another country!

So we joined the 22 million+ community of Skypers. I'd recommend it to everyone who wants to talk to others for free.

VOIP rulez.


If you ever tryed one of those IM's, it's gonna be a piece of free cake. And if you haven't ... well,- it's still a child's play. ;-)

Check out the screenshot:

Get it at www.skype.com

Nice comment on Skype and VOIP at BW Tech Beat:
Tech Beat: Technology Blog on BusinessWeek Online

May good Lord provide us with more stuff like this.

Let our connections be fast,

servers always on (and IBM :-) ),

and may cute holly penguins keep those blue screens away.

@men!

:-)

Way to go, Apple!

Jobs with Mac Mini

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/qtv/mwsf05/

http://www.apple.com/macmini/

Steve Jobs is THE KING. Nobody can deny that. For me, he represents the most charismatic figure in whole computer industry. A legend. Pioneer. Icon of innovation.

I like Apple products. They are simply cool. Pure beauty. Every time when there's a new fruit announced, I'm wondering, what do their designers eat - or were they born to produce perfection??? :-)

Some may say I'm over-reacting, but I can't help it. When I visit Apple store or see one of their babies, I get that itchy feeling that says "just grab this stuff and run away with it!". :-))

Recently, on MacWorld, Steve announced Mac Mini. As usually, I was impatient to watch video of his Keynote ... and when I saw Mac Mini, I couldn't believe it. It's just so ... well, it's tough to use this word for a computer, but anyway: it so sexy! :-)

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this little box will be the breaking point for people considering switching. After all, it has a "buyer-friendly price" - quite unusual for Apple (up until now). I'm going to buy one myself. It's going to be a great company to my ThinkPad T41! ;-)

What stayed in my memory the most is when Steve says, that "Mac Mini is BYODKM (Bring Your Own Display, Keyboard and Mouse)". -Yeah, man: just pull stuff out of your bugged windoze PC and plug them into your brand new shiny Mackie!

Ofcourse the story hit the news instantly (even before actual announcement, which lead to some lawsuit threats by Apple!), but there's other side of the story: it opened a discussion about small form factor PCs (SFF) as well. They can be very useful for certain types of businesses (such as bank branches).

I'll get to this subject in one of future posts ... but check out IBM ThinkCentre S50 SFF and USFF - it measures just 4 (tennis) balls x 4 balls! :-)

http://www-132.ibm.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/CategoryDisplay?categoryId=2580519&storeId=1&catalogId=-840&langId=-1

Jonathan's open letter to SJP

Jonathan's Blog

http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan

On Friday, January 21st, Jonathan Schwartz (pardon me for giving him a blog-nickname Schwarzy) of Sun has published an open letter to IBM (http://blogs.sun.com/roller/page/jonathan/20050121#an_open_letter_to_sam1) - urging it to port some of it's SW to Solaris 10 for x86 ...

... it's funny, that Schwarzy has to use a blog to beg IBM what to do. Actually, I just think he tried to persuade some people that Big Blue is getting back to its proprietary roots. -That's bullshit, JS - and you know it.

I like the fact, that he admitted, what a lot of people already know - it was a great sunny day, but now the sunset is coming. :-)

I'm wondering, why there was no customer response - at least I haven't seen any - with these same claims?

Maybe you should go to your customers more often and listen to them - you'll spend your working hours better that way. Instead of blogging funny jokes on the web ... :-)

However, I think you did a hell of a good job with that hot coffee, man! Java rocks.

Another personal remark: Sun seems that it just stayed a technology company. Hardware, Software. Mega, giga - bytes, -Hertz and benchmarks. Check the customer side sometimes - the value they get out of it, the problems they can solve and how this can drive their business. There are some great listening courses offered by IBM Learning Services! Don't worry, you'll get a discount ... :-)


Good comment on the story at The Register: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/01/25/sun_IBM_blog/

"In addition, Solaris 10 isn't even shipping yet - on Sun's own servers! Sure companies such as BEA and Oracle have pledged to support the OS when it arrives, but can you really chastise one of Sun's biggest competitors for not rallying behind an OS that's not on the market"

... and...

"Sun's PR staffers, however, have been hounding reporters for weeks to talk about IBM specifically giving Solaris x86 the cold shoulder. They say at least 20 members of the Fortune 500 have asked IBM to port its middleware to Solaris x86. Sun, of course, won't call out these customers by name."

Carly's fail is getting pretty obvious

Poor Carly ;-)

Ever since The Merger, HP has been under the spotlight. Investors, analysts, clients, competitors ... and most of them who know what's going on at HP wouldn't like to be in Carly's shoes. Even if she doesn't wear high heels ... :-)

It's going down, that's for sure. But, unlike most think, we can't blame it all on merger with Compaq. Half we could. It was simply clash of two different worlds. -Can you imagine merging IBM and Dell? -Yeah, I thought so! It's simply unnatural. Sure, you can merge stocks, capital, maybe even products (although HP wasn't quite successful at this either), but you can't simply merge people's philosophy. The way they work. Their business-slang. All the 3-letter acronyms. Impossible.

Going further, I myself would compare this as merging USA and USSR. Get real. But it's comparable. Not by size, but by the way they live their workdays. We can just wait (and read) while things are getting worse - slowly, but certainly.

BUT! They still have time to change the pace. Before they collapse. But there is a big decission to be made. Sometimes, HP seems like that Polly girl from Along Came Polly - indecisive and uncertain. And that's VERY bad for corporation of HP's size. They have to decide, whether they'll go "Dell way or IBM way". Position themselves. Currently they're just trying to fight both fronts. And they're weak on both corners. They have to regroup and fight one front. I'd reccomend to Carly some Sun Tzu reading.

Dell winning from commodity side (PC's, printers, PDA's ...) and IBM winning on the other side (servers, consulting, software). They need a fast change in the way they operate and target groups, otherwise they're gonna collapse like a house of cards. I'm witnessing it every day.


IBM & Lenovo

I admit. IBM's deal with Lenovo was "punch under the belt" to HP. It doesn't represent just business, but also a fundamental change. There were a lot of emotions in us, when it was announced. Especialy in PC Division. But we quickly understood this is good. It's the best for all of us. And there was this sweet feeling that came with it: there wasn't so much panic around it (also tnx to great IBM execution and communication!) - the concerned public focus was mostly on HP - what will they do now. Hehe, we're good and SJP is God. TJ's would be proud of you, Sam! ;-)