The Continuous End-to-End Missed Opportunity of Desktop Linux

A recent PC World post asked, if Desktop Linux has missed its opportunity. Oh, boy. Did it ever.

Understand that I've been using Linux more years than I've been using Macs, and I'm sold at how solid Linux is. I rely on Linux everyday to run my back-end stuff and my network. Apple fan boy that I am, know that this isn't any religious bias when I say, Desktop Linux sucks. Let me tell you why.

The kernel aspect of it--- the schedulers, the memory management they're all good as it is. This underlying technology can handle Desktop Linux no doubt.

For years, Desktop Linux--- Gnome or KDE has had the look and feel of Windows. And it sucked. Have you seen the standard Ubuntu color?

Linux for years has offered little to differentiate itself from the market. In fact, a few years ago, no decent distro would install mp3 support natively. None. nada. You'd have to hack it to get decent mp3 playback. And the slow support by Intel, NVidia, and ATI for their graphics cards have long been an issue too (which has changed considerably in the last two years or so)! Hell, Flash Player couldn't run properly on a 64-bit Linux machine up until quite recently. Then there is the eye-candy of Compiz and Fusion are only now being integrated into the whole shebang. With technologies like XMBC Media Center, and with projects like Gnome 3.0, things are getting better right?

When Red Hat ($RHT) walked away from the consumer market, it was a punch in the stomach for Desktop Linux. No one wanted to buy it. And for good reason, you can't even play games that your friends were playing on it. And like I said, you were still expected to hack most of the media stuff yourself. Yes there were games like Tux Racer, but haven't you been a kid before? People were using windows because they liked to play PC Games too. With their friends. Wine for all its power took too long to get to market.

It wasn't so much as a developer problem writing linux native windows drivers, because TransGaming has succeeded in that. Have you seen Cider? You can run spore today on Macs and Windows using cider technology, which is based on wine. Yes, it is imperfect for hard core gamers but the casual gamer wouldn't be arguing that much, right?

So the question is, why haven't Dell ($DELL) or HP ($HPQ) jumped into integrating Linux more into their machines? Think about it: an Ubuntu base, with a customized Dell User Interface and User Experience with properly licensed mp3, dvd playback technologies that can run native windows applications like Photoshop, Office suites, Chrome, Halo, Left4Dead, and Fallout 3, why hasn't anybody done it?

Is it because they'd have to answer to Microsoft's wrath?

All this world needs is one huge PC manufacturer that has the clout to integrate Transgaming technologies, an innovative User Interface and decent User Experience and a Linux foundation and you have not just serious competition to Windows, but Desktop Linux. The real deal.

How much did Apple ($APPL) spend to initially develop OS X? Surely, Dell or a similar company can do it. Surely, other material that are not open sourced can be licensed.

If you look at Apple's success even during this recession, it is a shout in the bow that PCs and, specifically Windows--- sucks. People are tired of viruses and trojans and reboots. And while Windows 7 addresses most of the issues of Vista, have you seen how it arranges Control Panel? Seriously, the damn thing is so complicated, it takes a rocket scientist just to decipher what it all means, much less to get it to work right.

The problem of Desktop Linux has been too many cooks. Desktop Linux suffers from the Windows mentality of mediocrity. There is no focus. It looks and feels like Frankenstein on top, when in fact under the hood, the kernel and the infrastructure around it is ready. Avahi technology on linux is like Apple's bonjour for instance and it works right out of the box.

The other truth is, the best unix desktop for the consumer right now is Apple's Mac OS X and boy, it could have been Linux. Still could really. No one just has the balls to try to do it right.

Don't get me wrong, the building blocks to making a true and ultimate desktop linux experience that challenges the status quo of Microsoft's dominance is here or getting here and like Lego bricks, someone just needs to put it all together and polish it. The continuous missed opportunity is that Linux distos are following the Microsoft formula of we're software only. No one dares enough to combine in one single polished product both the PC and Linux in an end-to-end solution and tell the customer, yes, we're responsible for all of it. In the words of Alan Kay, "people who are really serious about software should make their own hardware". It's also true isn't it that people who are serious about hardware should write software as awesome as their hardware.

Microsoft Buys Transgaming, will move Windows to Open Source

In a startling announcement, Microsoft's Steve Balmer announced that the Redmond company has purchased Transgaming Inc., for an undisclosed amount. Microsoft also announced that it will be moving its basic code base to Darwin, shocking the global computer industry.

"Today marks a new era for Windows. We have purchased Transgaming Inc., and will use their Cidar technology to power legacy and future Windows applications as we migrate to an Open Source code base for Windows. This code base will be shared across everything from Windows Mobile to Windows 8 and Windows Servers." Mr. Balmer said.

Mr. Balmer when asked why the sudden change, "Frankly, this has nothing to do with the Internet Reboot scheduled for today as some of you have speculated. I'm tried of being compared Apples to Oranges with our friends from Cupertino. For Windows 8, we will be moving our basic code base to Darwin, which is open source and which coincidently is the foundation for OS X. Make no mistake that the entire User Interface and User Experience stack will be familiar to Windows users everywhere."

Michael Dell when asked how this will affect Dell Computers, simply said, "We asked Apple once before if they will licensed OS X to us. Now, Microsoft has anted up. Windows 8 will look great on future Adamo notebooks!"

Industry pundits point out that this too is a shot across the bow for Linux. Now that the world has gone Unix, industry insiders said that it will be an interesting few years.

Apple declined to comment. Microsoft stock rose 5% in after hours trading on news of this purchase.

Lauren is a PC

Macs are not for the price conscious. Macs are for people who look beyond the price and see the value what they're buying. I mean, how much are you going to spend on viruses and system crashes vis-a-vis getting a Mac? How much is the price of headaches when things don't work on the PC?

Apple prices the Mac at a certain price point for a reason. It helps built the Elite feeling, that Cult of the Mac brand. Microsoft needs to understand that it should build better software to entice users and to build a better user experience. Less geek on Windows and more simplicity.

Is Sun worth US$6 Billion?

With IBM ($IBM) in talks to buy Sun ($JAVA), can the latter finally find a place to rest? The market has been disappointed with Sun. It has failed to invigorate itself. It has failed to capitalize on its amazing potential and awesome technology pedigree. And it seems that this once mighty enterprise is but a shadow of its former self.

The times of course have changed. Competition in server space is tighter than ever and choice is just as aggressive. It may be this is where once and former giants come to rest--- on the graveyard of Mergers and Acquisitions.

Several months back, I wrote a post "Sun Looses 17B, Time for Apple-Sun merger?" The technology that is with Sun ($JAVA) isn't so bad. Its open source stable of technologies: mysql, zfs, just to name two are worth a lot of money. ZFS could in fact be the answer to a future media server or could compliment Apple's Final Cut Studio. But the fact that ZFS is licensed under CDDL effectively means no one needs to own the company that started it. The same goes with mysql.

Since Apple isn't at all interested in higher order enterprise business--- its focus on pro-consumer/consumer space is laser focus makes little sense for them to get to buy Sun. Well, little sense to be willing to pay a hundred percent premium.

Also the threats facing ZFS on the technology horizon is increasing. An alternative to ZFS called Btrfs ("Butter FS") has emerge on Linux space and is under heavy development. And Btrfs is in fact more friendly to Linux because it runs off GPL. This licensing disagreement has, in my humble opinion been most detrimental in getting ZFS technology to become prevalent everywhere.

The marriage of IBM and Sun is perhaps the best fit in the technology business. Sun closed on March 19 with a market cap of US$6.43 Billion. Is Sun worth that much money?

Sun looses 1.7B, Time for Apple-Sun merger?

The merger of Apple ($AAPL) and Sun ($JAVA) has been rumored for 20 years now. It is an Apple ($AAPL) fan boys' wet dream! The arguments for and against it has long been many. Both are Hardware-Software companies. Both have been in competition. Ok, somewhat in competition since NeXT (another Steve Jobs company that was merged with Apple during his Second Coming) was the one really in direct competition with Sun. Heck, a long time ago, even everyone's favorite cranky geek John C. Dvorak had asked the question, Is Schmidt the set-up pitcher for an Apple-Sun merger.

The New York Times reported Sun lost 1.7 Billion dollars and is leaking. The Street thinks it is a problem child that has a lot of potential but little in execution. Sun developed and licensed Java--- the software that runs most mobile phones and other embedded technologies. It owns Solaris--- an operating system for Server space and part of that technology stack is an awesome, advanced 128-bit file system called ZFS, coveted by everyone from Apple to Linux fan boys.

Sun also owns MySQL--- an open source database company that markets the open source database with the same name and which is used by nearly every geek, and blogger in the world and not to mention enterprises small to large.

We've not even begun to look into their hardware stuff. Sun is also a player in the high computing business, specifically the high performance computing genre.

Sun's market cap is at nearly 4 Billion. Awesome hardware and software assets. Some of the smartest engineers in the world. Apple taking control of ZFS, taking a footstep into enterprise and that engineering talent--- paying 6 Billion for it would be a steal.

ZFS could be a boon for Apple's XServes and media file clustering offering.

The argument against such an acquisition are as myriad and compelling as the arguments against it. Buying it means taking a bit of that cash out of the bank and investing it in a company that, well hasn't performed as well. It isn't even in Apple's long term interest to focus on enterprise software in such deep fashion and could throw a monkey wrench on immediate business. Apple is a huge company that operates efficiently because it thinks like a small business and is focused on the pro-consumer market.

The higher-end enterprise business is just an after thought for Apple.

Before the Second Coming of Steve Jobs, it was Sun, rumored to buy Apple. A merger may or may not be in the works. IBM and Microsoft could very well profit too by buying Sun. IBM isn't in this kind of buying business and Microsoft acquiring Sun would be like them acquiring Yahoo. Google too could do it--- but Sun's business isn't really their own even if Schmidt migrated from Sun.

As Dvorak pointed out so long ago, Schmidt does sit on both Apple and Google boards and could be the point man for merger talks between Apple and Sun. Furthermore, Dvorak wrote and is still applicable today:

And the big change in Steve Jobs has to be noted. In doing the deal to merge Pixar with Disney (DIS:

25.33, +1.36, +5.7%) , thus making him the top Disney shareholder, Jobs may have gotten the M&A itch. Could he do a big deal again? Is he now thinking he could become a dealmaker?

He has to feel good about that last deal, right? He'd feel even better doing this one so close to home.

The risk--- considerable and the rewards could be great. Buying Sun could be just as important as acquiring NeXT or could be the knife that strikes Apple deep. Is Apple interested in an alliance with Sun, given current market conditions and given their talent for focusing on one thing at a time that has served Apple so well in the last 10 years?

The Philosophy of Computing Platforms (part 6)

The Way the World Is

I was asked "Why is the Mac immune to criticism on Application Integration at the Operating System Level?" this question over at twitter by @digitalfilipino in response to my posting this link by thebetaguy.com on Windows 7 development. Which led me to ask myself this question: Is the fundamental difference between platforms all about philosophy and human nature?

We took a journey down memory lane, into part of the past 30 years of our technological era. We began with a small company called Apple in 1976 that was started by two guys named Steve. We saw the rise of a pure software company, called Microsoft that was Bill Gates' and Paul Allen's and through events that favored them, became the sole provider of an Operating System for IBM's Personal Computer. And as they say, that was that.

Fast forward to 2007, Steve Jobs is one of the most admired, if not the most admired CEO in the world. Bill Gates is ending his tour of duty at Microsoft and is one of the richest in the world. We talk about the Philosophy of Computing Platform and when we look back at the last 30 years, it was shaped by these two men. 

Jobs' sense of perfection, his nature as a charmer, his salesmanship, his taking technology to an art-form, his driving belief of minimalism and simplicity and his role as the patron of the arts for our technological epoch drives Apple. His vision of a universe of integrated hardware and software whose marriage forms art is Apple's soul. 

In the same way, Gates is the vision, the pure geek energy, laser focused, calculating towards software that drives any computer in everyone's home is the source of philosophy ingrained on PC and by extension every Microsoft product the world over. 

Similarly, this Gates philosophy extends to Linux because if there is something similar to how Windows and Linux do things is that they are reflections of geek-engineering culture. Such culture, such philosophy is this technology savant imprint, a kind of rough around the edges, almost brute-force-like feel that calls for every user to be familiar with technology.

The scorn and hatred Microsoft got at the end of the 1990s haunts them to this day. It is this mistrust, this sense that Microsoft can do evil is the very fuel, the very thing that blocks them from furthering their vision of the future. It is this wall that forms criticism around everything Microsoft does. Which isn't really fair to Microsoft but is the price of being found guilty. 

At the same moment, the very nature of the PC, an Open Architecture on the hardware side is in direct conflict with a proprietary platform such as Windows. The PC world is a world where everyone can and must interact. And Windows as gatekeeper of this dynamic, Frankenstein-ish world plays a balancing act to keep legacy and future applications running. Perhaps, one day it will collapse under the weight of its own complexity or perhaps, one day it will allow itself to be transformed.

How ironic that it is quite the opposite for the Mac. The Mac is built on the same commodity parts that PCs use but engineered by Apple. Its software is based on Open technology: BSD Unix. Yet what Apple has done, it has taken this pedestrian technology and made it extraordinary (something that Linux can learn from). 

The Integration, the marriage of Hardware and Software is at the very heart, the very philosophy of Apple and in everything they do. Mac loyalists are willing to let Apple be the gatekeeper of their machines because it is no long just a mere computer, it is a consumer electronics device, sensual to the touch.

The differences between PC and Mac is the very Philosophy of their creators and their nature. PC needs to be open, needs to be a platform where anything goes (even transformed into a beauty like Mac) and accessible to everyone. In short, it fulfills the do-it-yourself mantra of hackers everywhere. Mac on the other hand is like a piece of art like that Ferrari or like a thoroughbred, gorgeous, perfection and powerful. The fundamental nature of computing platforms is the philosophy and nature and ultimately whatever the end-game of their individual creators.

The Philosophy of Computing Platforms (part 5)

Return of the Jobs

Is the fundamental difference between platforms all about philosophy and human nature?

After years of poorly executed plans, high cost of production, and failed opportunities, Apple Computer was facing death. Discounted, ridiculed and a market share as bad as OS/2 had, Apple was written off. But Apple would not go without a fight. In search for a New Operating System to jump start the company, Apple shopped around. Long story short, Apple bought NeXT--- Steve Jobs' company and in MacWorld 1997, Jobs stepped back on stage.

MacWorld 1997

When Steve Jobs returned, he brought with him Bill Gates' multimillion dollar no stock investment to Apple (think: loan) and Microsoft Office. This would prove significant. It wasn't the money. It was the deal that Microsoft would make Microsoft Office for the Mac. Jobs knew then that interoperability would be a key factor in reviving Mac shares. How could it not be? The world had standardized on Office. Everyone needed Microsoft's word processor if they were to pass documents to and from associates and business partners.

So began an Apple renaissance.

The seeds of what Mac OS X is today began after Jobs had exited Apple in 1985. The NeXT platform was Unix-based. It also had tools like Objective-C, a subset of the C language but was Object Oriented. These among others would prove to lay the foundation for the future.

The startling difference between Apple's then future OS X and Windows was its design. Clearly, OS X from the get go, was built around tools that painted a specific goal. It favored the creative mind-set of its core constituency certainly, but more than that, appeals direct to the non-hacker-non-technology-savant. The underlying layers of OS X--- Unix, Core Foundation--- Core Audio, Core Image/Core Video and now Core Animation (1997/1998) continued to serve as abstractions to the Geek dominated world of zeroes and ones.

The genius of Apple is that it uses technology and brings it to the level of art.

Take the iMac--- iconic desktop of Apple. Unlike its rivals, the iMac is an integrated platform. There are no CPU boxes, and there are three cables that go to and from the machine: a power supply, a keyboard and mouse (a fourth could be a Harman/Kardon speaker set). Heck, if you were really adventurous, you could simply run it with a wireless keyboard and mouse. The design is elegant. The machine is finely crafted. The Operating System that goes with it makes you work from the get go. Phones connect via bluetooth just like that. other devices can simply be plugged in and chances are they would just talk.

Macworld 2000

The beauty of OS X is its simplicity and well thought of design--- from simple buttons to how the computer interacts with the users in intuitive ways. Take installing software. In the windows world it would require you to answer series of questions just to install an Application. Often, this requires the user to be quite knowledgeable about technology. But with OS X, most Applications come in a disk image. It "mounts" like loading a CD on your system. And how do you install? simply just drag the App to your Applications folder (or any local folder for that matter) and you are done. Application is installed. just double click on the transferred app and you're working. No hassle. No need to think about complex stuff. Want to uninstall? just drag the App from your application folder into the trash and empty it. The power of this simplicity is that Macs don't require you to be a technology savant. It doesn't impose a barrier for the lowest most ignorant user. It makes these things abstract letting most people just use the machine. This beauty comes from a well thought of integrated foundation.

Elegance in everything is the simple nature, simple beauty of Apple.

This is the same simplicity, same elegance that Apple incorporated into the iPod and iTunes when it entered the Music business in 2001:

Apple's 1st Music Event, 2001, The First iPod

Beyond the Macs, and the iPod, what makes Apple different is its cult-like following. It is arguably the largest subculture in computing, perhaps even more so than Linux and Open Source. Leander Kahney author of (and who writes a blog of similar name), The Cult of Mac (legally free download via Bittorrent) wrote:

Mac users can be extremely cool. It's a lifestyle thing. Mac users tend to be liberal, free-thinking, counterculture. They dress well, look good, have discerning taste (in New York, anyway). Take a Mac out in public and people want to look at it. Mac users have a sense of humor. They also help eath other. Myriad Web sites help you find solutions to problems, pointers to the best deals, and great freeware or shareware.

Mac users are creative. What else would you expect from all the musicians, artists, designers, and filmmakers who make up Apple's core constituency? It's not unreasonable to say that a lot of the world's mass media--- books, magazines, movies, music, Web sites--- is made on Macs. A lot of highly creative people fire up their Macs every day to shape our culture.

This difference in culture is the predominant distinction between the design philosophy of PCs whether it is Windows-based or Linux-based.

The Philosophy of Computing Platforms (part 4)

The End of the Beginning

Is the fundamental difference between platforms all about philosophy and human nature?

In the Mid-1990s, a company called Netscape drew its bread and butter from selling a Web Browser and Communications (Email, HTML editor and Browser) suite at a price. When Internet Explorer became freely available on Windows and came with every copy of Microsoft's world dominant operating system, and with technologies like "Channels"--- push (similar idea to what RSS is to us now) data from the Internet to your Windows desktops became a feature of Windows 98, Netscape was losing the war.

So in the process of adding value and growing their business, Microsoft not only stepped on the toes of others already in the game developing emerging web and multimedia technologies but was figuratively shoving it down their throats.

Naturally, those emerging companies cried foul.

And this arrogance, this hubris would taint Microsoft to this day. Gone was Chancellor Palpatine who everyone respected for his ability to be politically adept. When Microsoft won the war, it had become Emperor. Well-earned nomenclature or not, the world saw them the Dark Side.

Microsoft crushed Netscape when they made Internet Explorer free and part of Windows. With every PC that came out a manufacturer's door, Microsoft's Internet Explorer was right there. Ordinary people who needed to use the nascent Web naturally would use IE. It was the first thing they saw. For Netscape, a company that sold browsers, who made a living by selling a web browser and suite, how do you fight against the very attractive price of US$0.00 and which came along with your computer, no downloads, no additional install needed?

The seeds of AntiTrust, anti-monopoly, anti-Microsoft revolution begun.

Companies started to fear Microsoft's control and it became evident. They wanted the same freedom to build applications on the Windows platform as the PC but when Microsoft started making the same applications, naturally the upstarts would die.

Everyone had to dance to Microsoft tune. And when people start to feel less free, the seeds of dissent were sowed. Revolutionaries were poised to come out of the shadows and fight a guerilla campaign openly.

Eric S. Raymond wrote a paper called "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" and published it online. This paper was more about software development. It was about the fundamental difference between writing software where everyone could see it and writing software behind closed ivory towers (Microsoft's way). In many ways, this paper helped legitimize and bring to mainstream an Open Architecture philosophy to software development in the same way that the IBM PC had opened up the commodity hardware business. The Cathedral and the Bazaar would be the geek version of a Declaration of Independence.

But dissent wasn't just with the geeks.

In the boardroom and the backdoors of silicon valley power--- companies who relied on the Openness of the PC were also revolting. Microsoft held a firm iron grip on them. Microsoft was slowing down innovation by the very nature of the "closeness". But no hardware manufacturer in their right mind would have dumped Microsoft. They'd have no business. It was a symbiotic relationship. The world had standardized on Windows as much as it had standardized on the PC. To dismantle more than 15 years of Microsoft rule would be like throwing stones at a rushing Jumbo Jet.

Much had change by 1998. The wheel was once more poised to turn. The Internet revolution had brought the network to early adapters and it was fast becoming mainstream. In accelerated the development and adaption of Linux, the world over. In Mountain View, Google was born. And Netscape, after reading Raymond's paper had announced it was opening up its browser and giving it away for free. The Open Source revolution went mainstream.

In Red Hat co-founder Robert Young's "Under the Radar" book about the rise of Red Hat, he wrote this about Intel:

Executives at the highest levels at the company had long recognized that proprietary operating system manufacturers were not moving their operating systems forward as quickly as Intel was advancing microprocessor technology. That is, Intel was being held hostage by those that controled the operating system. If it had new technology available at the processor level that would allow computer users to do new things, it had to wait until the Operating System supplier decided it was willing to build support for these features into the system.

With an open source operating system, Intel could enhance the operating system itself if to s desired, to support its new chip technology. It then could contribute the enhanced software back to everyone who was using Linux, for example. This represented the first time that operating system development might e able to keep up with the new hardware that Intel was brining to market.

Moreover, the though that it could itself begin to tune an operating system to take immediate advantage of any new chip technology it pleased was a very attractive one to Intel, which had been in lockstep with Microsoft for more than a decade.

In the latter half of the 19990s, arbitration began and Microsoft would be subject to Anti-trust hearings the world over.

Civil War was on. Companies disgruntled with the Microsoft Empire had revolted.

Young wrote further:

...the evidence showed that Microsoft was in a position to call all the shots, often bullying its supposed business partners to limit themselves to Microsoft-owned technology. Microsoft appeared to have gone so far as to dictate how fast other companies could bring out new products--- or if they could bring them out at all, for that matter.

Young continued:

...Intel vice president Steven McGeady would testify that Microsoft threatened to withhold critical technical support from intel if the chipmaker did not stop developing software that Microsoft believed competed with its own product strategies.

But Intel's eagerness to participate in the open source business had nothing to do with any animosity the chip giant had toward its partner Microsoft. Instead, Intel was about to embark on a strategic partnership that had everything to do with smart business.

If during the late 1990s, Linux's rebel hackers and companies like Intel were fighting to unshackle themselves from a Microsoft Empire, another unlikely Revolution was creeping from a different front. An old friend of Microsoft from the 1980s had returned to the company he founded. And boy, was he back with a vengeance.

The Philosophy of Computing Platforms (part 3)

One Windows to Rule Them All

Is the fundamental difference between platforms all about philosophy and human nature?

Bill Gates' dream that his software would run on every Computer in the world had come true. Windows in every PC made Gates and Paul Allen, two of the richest men in the world. The mid-1990s saw Windows reach the pinnacle of its success, a resounding commercial success. Perhaps, it is something about seeing someone successful that we want to pull them backdown to Earth. Perhaps, it is just the nature of all things that eventually something better comes along. However it was, after 1995, Microsoft would be perceived differently.

Unmistakably, Microsoft had taken the crown from IBM. If before the PC era, anybody who needed to buy right, all bought IBM. In the 1990s, you could never be wrong if you bought a Microsoft product. It of course was also helped that at the time, IBM was in the midst of a transformation themselves. And Apple Computer was in similar position as IBM, if not worst.

The world had changed in the 15 or so years since IBM launched the PC. It could be argued that the PC was the fundamental engine driving that change but something was already replacing the PC as the center of rapid growth. It was the maturing Network. The hardware was fast becoming ubiquitous. No longer were humans locked away as discrete islands. Humans and by extension Computers and the Data we keep, and manipulate in them, they needed to interact.

The Web was on the rise. Bill Gates had dismissed the web as the next big thing. But by 1995, even as Windows 95 was one of the most successful releases of the Operating System, clearly the Network was going to become huge. But this wasn't the vision of the future that Microsoft held. It was a time when Bill Gates didn't see the Internet as the next big thing. So Microsoft stayed away from the action, while others were building software to meet this emerging world order.

By the nature of its design and ecosystem, Windows was not a natural playmate of the network. I argue this reflects the geek attitude of Microsoft. The Windows heritage grew from islands of computers. But Windows and the PC that it ran on was the dominant platform ever. Every country, every person in the world relied on data being processed on desktop computers running Windows.

In the dark corners of the Internet, rebel hackers were sowing the seeds of dissent. Linux was born in 1991, and by 1994, the scientific community (particularly NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory) gave birth to the Beowulf Project which in simplest terms was "Commodity Clustering". It was the idea of networking ordinary PCs to do the job of once expensive and proprietary Supercomputers. And it ran, a then largely unknown Operating System called Linux.

And while Windows was being cheered, adored and welcomed, Linux was being adapted across technical circles. It was the new Unix.

1995 was a landmark year. Red Hat Linux was born with the goal of packaging and selling the free operating system Linux. In the same year, Caldera was likewise founded. And the Apache Group build its version of its popular Webserver, Apache based on the National Center for Supercomputing Applications' HTTPd 1.3 series. And who could forget the birth of Yahoo! that same year?

A company called Netscape was an upstart that was poised to become the new Microsoft and by the time of the late 1990s--- Microsoft saw that it had to take on Netscape or else lose dominance. Microsoft of course got its Windows to play nice. Microsoft started to build web technologies and multimedia technologies with Windows. It was obvious. Maybe it was because of hubris--- Microsoft was the biggest baddest fish in the sea. They needed to expand Windows, add value for the customer base.

It was getting pretty clear by then that Microsoft was embracing the new world networked paradigm. Problem was, companies the world over were already taking advantage of it before Microsoft did. Companies like Netscape sold web browsers for example. It was their bread and butter. Nobody could ever doubt that at Redmond, the Killer Instinct was alive and well, so what happened next was also quite natural.

Netscape and Microsoft fought the First Browser War. IE versus Netscape, winner takes the Internet.

The Philosophy of Computing Platforms (part 2)

World Dominance, Winner Take All

Is the fundamental difference between platforms all about philosophy and human nature?

It was the early 1990s. The world was changing. No one knew how much it would change in such a few short years. Beyond the political--- the First Gulf War (1990-1991), the fall of the Soviet Union (1991) and the Comeback Kid Bill Clinton (1993) taking office, the nascent Internet was rising, a new operating system was humbly being born, all the while a global war for desktop computer dominance was reaching its pinnacle and would make Bill Gates and Paul Allen the richest men in the world.

Unknown to most people, the following year would be a landmark. Even while Windows was poised to become the One Operating System to Rule Them All, in 1991, a geek called Linus Torvalds from Helsinki with the aid of an Internet trying to grow, let loose Linux Kernel 0.1 and begun an underground revolution that would change the shape of the world. The emerging platform of the Internet also saw the birth of Mosaic, a web browser that would father Netscape (which would father Mozilla) and eventually bring to mainstream, a whole new network paradigm.

Let us rewind a bit to 1990. Windows 3.0 came into the fray and coupled with cheap hardware that PCs were notoriously known for, was on the road to global dominance. It was eroding Apple's market share. More people were buying PCs. It was commodity hardware that allowed everyone to have a PC. Who cared if it looked like Frankenstein? The market needed gear that worked and worked cheaply.

On Apple's corner, the momentum of Macintosh five years early was ebbing. High cost of the machine, lack of interoperability with the rest of the world proved to be a bane. Windows was slowly alienating their competitor in the broader war. Brute force won over elegance. Who needed Beauty when Frankenstein could do the same things Beauty did?

In December 1992, development for NCSA Mosaic begun and in a few months found its way to Macs and Windows PCs. That browser called Mosaic would eventually become Netscape Navigator.

And where was IBM?

If the late 80s and early 90s was a golden age for Apple and the beginnings of a World Ruled by One Windows, by 1993, it was a dark time for IBM. Big Blue was entrenched with difficulties at home. In fact, IBM was dying and dying quickly. The gigantic Elephant that was IBM was hemorrhaging money. IBM Boss at the time, Louis V. Gerstner, Jr., recounted in his book, "Who Says Elephants Can't Dance," April 1993:

At the end of May, I saw April's results, and they were sobering. Profit had declined another $400 Million, for a total decline of US$800 million for the first four months. Mainframe sales had dropped 43 percent during the same four months. Other large IBM businesses--- software, maintenance, and financing--- were all dependent, for the most part, on mainframe sales and thus, were declining as well. The only part of the company that was growing was services, but it was a relatively small segment and not very profitable. Head count had declined slightly, from 302,000 at the beginning of the year to 298,000 at the end of April. Several business unites, including application-specific software and our semiconductor businesses, were struggling.

It was clear that in 1993 the First Desktop and Operating System War was over. The Windows Flag flew proudly. IBM was dying and even Gerstner acknowledged IBM's defeat, with 5% to 6% OS/2 market share, IBM exited the PC Operating System business. And Apple? By the time Windows 95 rolled out, Apple was lost, searching for a way to recapture the glory days of Macintosh.

Windows wasn't the technically superior of either OS/2 or Mac OS (well at least in those early days of the 1990s). Windows had copied Mac OS' Graphical User Interface and gave PC users a semblance of the easy of use of the Mac. Windows PCs continued on the legacy of the 1980s. Windows ran a very open, PC architecture.

If you think about it, the quick and dirty Frankenstein approach was the very philosophy of the PC. It was what made it successful. Like the pioneers of early flight, who cared how it looked, just as long as it flew. Who cared if it had seat belts or cup holders or soft leather seats? For the longest time, it was the same with the PC.

And of course they needed an Operating System to run it and Microsoft was the only one who sold it. By the time Windows 95 came out, it was pretty much a certainty that everyone who had heard of computers, all pointed to Microsoft Windows' Start button to begin their day.

In the same way that the PC was a geek project, Windows in many ways reflected the worst of being geek. Its interface reflected the enthusiasts' idea of interface. Never mind, if everybody else had to learn it. It was for a lack of a better term, crude. But it worked. And people put up with it.

So the world had standardized on PCs. The world standardized on the philosophy of Frankenstein, after all it got the job done. People would put up with the endless reboots and crashes. If you were writing a paper and the machine crashed and you forgot to save, tough man. People would put up with blue screens of death, of viruses, of worms and trojans that had become such a part of life in a Windows PC world. It was a device everybody could buy and build and build to meet their own need so people bought into the Frankenstein Philosophy.

Could Microsoft had fixed it? perhaps. perhaps not. Why fix a well oiled machine when nobody was going to beat you? It was perhaps the price of a monopoly that continued to hunt Microsoft. Perhaps, it may not even be that but the inherent Frankensteinsim of the PC itself with its myriad combinations and legacy devices and applications that Windows had got to support. Windows needed to keep the past going. Perhaps, we can lay blame on the hubris of the victor and for sitting on their laurels for lack of technical vision for what the future held and we can even blame the nascent technology.

If you've lived in those days, it would have been evident that the dust had settled. Game over. Little would everyone know that the next chapter wasn't about to begin, it had already begun in 1989 with the birth of the Web.

The wheel was once more poised to turn.

The Philosophy of Computing Platforms (Part 1)

The Beauty and The Beast: the Age of Commodity Computing

"Why is the Mac immune to criticism on Application Integration at the Operating System Level?" I was asked this question over at twitter by @digitalfilipino in response to my posting this link by thebetaguy.com on Windows 7 development. What follows is my train of thought on the matter.

Is the fundamental difference between platforms all about philosophy and human nature?

The story began, a long time ago, in a time, far, far away. There were two Steves, a Paul and a Bill. The age of the minicomputer was on. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak started a small business upstart called Apple that sold computers. Bill Gates and Paul Allen on the other hand began a software company called Microsoft, founded to sell BASIC interpreters.

Even back then, the startling differences in their corporate philosophies was evident and those differences would shape not just their companies, the information technology industry but society at large. Apple was always an integrated company, shaped by the vision and natural salesmanship and personality of Steve Jobs and driven by the engineering genius of Woz. Apple since its inception has been a synergy of those great things. And Microsoft? Its relentless software focus, and core geek philosophy of its founders would take shape in the very operating system which they would use to dominate the world.

PCs for everyone was the dream but it wasn't until the early 1980s that computers started to become commodities and enter the mainstream. Enter the IBM PC.

Before the InterWeb, PCs were islands onto themselves. No one bothered with wires, Lans and Wifis. Want data passed between computers? Someone hands you a disk. You used those archaic devices called "Floppy disks". Call 'em the precursors of the CD, the usb flash drive. The PC as was the Apple before it, was birthed by the Philosophy of the age: do it yourself computers. The difference was, the PC was an Open Architecture meaning anybody could simply design hardware that could work with the PC.

By creating an Open Architecture, IBM had created what we call today, a "community". People would come in, design a hardware that would work for the PC because the standard was freely available to everyone and no matter who manufactured the PC, that device was guaranteed to work. The appeal was that anybody could build a PC from scratch to do what they want it to do.

A computer without software is like a human without a soul, without a consciousness thus, merely a pile of wires, silicon and plastic.

Operating Systems are the consciousness and unconsciousness in humans. Part of it directs everything we humans want the computer to do. Operating Systems know where to write a piece of data into the drive. It tells the DVD-ROM the instructions to spin when we humans want to watch a movie. It knows that the keyboard is a keyboard and not a mouse. It translates our keyboard and mouse interaction into what the computer could do.

So IBM at the dawn of the PC era, needed an Operating System to run the computer. In a bit of luck or faith for one Redmond company, the Operating System was subcontracted by IBM to Microsoft. This Operating System wasn't an Open Architecture as the PC was. Nobody cared back in the day about that. People were perfectly happy that Microsoft kept the OS growing. It didn't even talk to other computers as our computers do today. The network was farther off into the future.

The explosion of the PC hardware because it was an Open Architecture sent entrepreneurs building their own version of the PC. Businesses sprung like mushrooms building devices for the PC. There were video cards, and sound cards and hard drives were soon mainstream. It was like a sprawling bazaar where people could mix and match hardware. This Openness helped create business. By seeding the world with PC hardware, IBM had made possible the commodification of computers. But all of this hardware had to talk to the computer. Microsoft's Operating System needed to know all of those diverse devices. Want your sound card to play on every PC in the world? You had to write a device driver for Microsoft's Operating System.

And where was the nascent Internet of the time? It was silently cooking the back rooms of Universities, through copper wires and phone lines, through Electronic Bulletin Boards, ARPANET and USENET what would eventually become the web remained in the providence of hackers and university researchers.

In 1984, Apple launched the Macintosh. It was a tiny box that was revolutionary. And Apple's iconic 1984 advertising for that event also started the trend of Superbowl ads. It was a well made computer. It was a computer in a box--- it wasn't just a commodity, it was an appliance like a Television is. Needless to say this vision of the future foreshadows where the IT industry is now head towards. Like many things Apple, it was ahead of its time. One might argue that sometimes, Apple is too ahead and quite often, such out of the box thinking is not appreciated by the market, at least not initially.

It wasn't to say nobody did. The amazing Apple platform, dazzled many. It opened up the Graphical User interface and introduced the mouse and we've all pointed and clicked away towards interacting with the Computer. Apple pioneered the Laser printer and ushered in the Desktop Publishing business. It revolutionized fonts and how we display information on the computer. And Five Years later, the innovation, if not the platform the Macintosh began would be the standard the world over.

And in all this Apple was true to its calling of building a package that ran well, that looked good, that was revolutionary, that worked.

But by 1985, a civil war had broken out at Apple. And Steve Jobs found himself kicked out of the very company he founded. Exiled, Steve Jobs may have found himself, young, bright and talented, he would find himself very much a serial entrepreneur founding two companies during his post Apple days. One company was called NeXT and the other Pixar. The first company ran on Unix with futuristic designs and Pixar would later create the world's first animated feature presentation. His story is far from over.

With Jobs gone from the picture, Apple still continued to rise, fueled by the revolution that was Macintosh. "A golden age," wiki quotes MacAddict was the time between 1989 and 1991.

The Operating System War of the late 1980s and early 1990s was much about platform as it was about philosophy. The Mac had pioneered the Graphical User Interface, but Windows brought the same technology to the PC side. A competition arose between the two philosophies. One based on open hardware and combined with Windows created a machine that could only be characterized as a Beast: Frankenstein. The other, elegant, graceful and was simply Beauty.

The momentum the PC was on since the early 80s fueled the tide into Microsoft's and the PCs' favor. Commodity hardware was what the market needed and wanted. Sure, grace and elegance mattered but it was a young industry. It needed to be cheap enough, rough around the edges didn't matter. What mattered was to be adapted the world over and grace and elegance did not come cheap. Quite naturally, Market forces dictated that people love Frankenstein.

The First Desktop and Operating System wasn't just between Windows and Mac OS. IBM was losing control of the business that they had founded. After making a device that was Open, virtually every company in the world would be making their own PC. Companies other than IBM were growing and winning over the PC and IBM was just lost on the hardware business. When IBM looked at the software side, they came to realize what what they had done with Microsoft, so started the war between Windows and OS/2.

Do you remember Jobs' NeXt Computer? Well, in March 1989 saw the birth of the World Wide Web by Timothy Berners-Lee, Robert Cailliau and the staff at CERN and a NeXTcube was used by Berners-Lee as the world's first Web server and was also used to write the first web browser.

And so the 1980s ended with Microsoft fighting a War against IBM on the Operating System at the PC front while battling it out with Apple on the broader market. The prize was the only prize worth fighting for: World Dominance, winner take all.

Anyone? Creative Suite Market Poaching Season

Is there a cold war going on between Adobe and Apple? Recent skirmishes seem to be heating up an already rocky relationship. First that whole, "Flash isn't good enough for iPhone" bit from The Great Jobs, which no one has really independently and technically disputed (at least not that I know of). Then we have a huge shot across the bow from Adobe that their next Creative Suite will not be going 64-bit on the Mac, but will be 64-bit on 64-bit Windows (which has a miniscule market share), at least not until CS5 (latest version is CS3). Can you spell out performance penalty?

Talk about wasting all that Mac Pro Octa Power.

John Siracusa's Rhapsody and Blues takes us all through the historical and technical detail. Apple has for years made public that Cocoa is the future of software on the Mac, and perhaps because of financial reasons, Adobe has kept their software on Carbon.

Dirty minds of course will have to raise the question that this maybe some kind of bargaining, and negotiating ploy by Adobe. And ultimately posturing between these two companies. Apple for one rides its high-end hopes with its stable of creative users. Adobe on the other, full of pride knows this and would like better treatment. "No flash on iPhone? We won't give you 64-bit Photoshop on Mac."

John Siracusa pointed out that porting of Photoshop to Cocoa will be the largest port ever. Which, ultimately translates to dollars spent on developers. No company wants to do that, not when you can keep on working out using the same old technology. Makes business sense for the bean counters over at Adobe. But wait! Doesn't Adobe charge such premium fees for their software suite and has actually mimicked Microsoft's very confusing product line, which isn't really differentiated?

Adobe is setting its sights on webapps, especially with these moves like Adobe Air and Photoshop Express, which is online image editing. Perhaps it doesn't really see any substantial growth in the Creative Suite department. Call me "old fashioned" but there are somethings that WebApps aren't good enough to do. Not yet anyway. Maybe in 10 years, we can really see some amazing webapps that can give desktop apps a run for their money.

The choice that Adobe has made by procrastinating on delivering 64-bit on Mac could be a bargaining ploy, a negotiating tactic. Or it could very well be a shortsighted business maneuver by bean counters. It would take a lot of resources to do that port.

Over the years, Adobe has grown into this huge global enterprise. It is the Microsoft of the creative suite business. Who comes remotely close to Adobe? None. No one. Books to creative professionals have made businesses around Adobe software. It wasn't like Mac users haven't been paying Adobe in the recent years not just in dollar sense but in free advertising.

It will be pointless though to raise the idea that Apple should put Adobe out of their misery, considering how poorly Adobe is executing of late. It just wouldn't be good business sense to splurge Apple's WarChest on such an endeavor. It would be far simpler and far easier for Apple to simply break the glass on its use-only-when-Adobe-goes-too-far plan. Even if Apple doesn't have some silent blacker-than-black-ops photoshop-killer-software around, throwing a few million dollars from the War Chest to make one wouldn't be too big a deal, would it? Come on Mr. Oppenheimer, please crunch the numbers and tell Steve, "yes oh, Great One we can make this happen, money is not a problem".

Cult of Mac on the other hand is speculating that Apple could buy Corel. On a closer note, Corel is cheap but their suite of Applications already collides with Apple's existing product line: iWork. Apple has nothing to gain with buying into Corel. Heck, it could probably gain more by buying Pixelmator, which is already a good basic photoshop replacement. And with the right investment, that little photo-editor that could, could be an excellent foundation to build a new professional photo-editor replacement for photoshop.

I argue, throwing money to write software from scratch will probably serve Apple better going forward. Apple already has iPhoto, Aperture. It already has the basic building blocks not only in experience building the said products but in technology found on OS X.

The entire Creative Suite marketplace not just on Macs but on Windows and Linux as well is ripe for the taking.

Apple will still be selling Macs and iPhones and iPods even if Adobe brings out less than ideal software. Apple's business isn't tied directly to Adobe. This disaster by Adobe to deliver less performance on an already substantial investment doesn't screw Apple, it screws the loyal users of Adobe software who have helped build the creative suite business that Adobe is currently enjoying a substantial market share. Even if Apple doesn't enter the creative suite business, this space is ripe for an assault. If only to give Adobe a run for their money. They've been complacent and arrogant in their market position. However it goes-- Apple or a third party like Pixelmator must rise to compete!

There is an Apple in your Windows Future: OS X Apps to Run Native in Windows

In a bold and surprising move, escaped developers sources from Cupertino Redmond have revealed an insidious plan from within the super-secret enclave of The Great Jobs. It is nefarious. It is so viral that it shatters all preconceived paradigm.

Remember that hat trick Jobs did when Apple switched to Intel? That OS X had, for years been secretly running on Intel machines? Well, Steve Jobs, Lord of All Things Apple is expected to announce a new secret sauce in Apple's ever expanding WarMachine, code-named, "Orange".

Think of Orange as "Rosetta for Windows".

This little backdoor program will allow all native OS X applications to run natively on Windows machines. Developers had been pushed to work like slaves the lavishly paid folks that they are, 24/7 for the past year to get this baby out the backdoor.

This probably isn't any surprise to Cranky Geek John C. Dvorak who back in 2006, wrote a piece, "Will Apple Adopt Windows?". He saw what no one thought possible.

What does this mean to the whole Apple-Windows universe?! Migration plans to move AppleScript to .Net is reported to have been completed as of MacWorld. XCode will replace Visual Studio as Developer's coding environment and will be using a freely available Intel C/C++ compiler. Spotlight will take over all search on Windows machines. XGrid--- that Apple magic formula to cluster all your machines ubiquitously is reportedly a welcome addition to the Windows Family of Native Apps. The Dock will be retired in favor of Windows Button and Taskbar. And Sudo will be the one command to rule all your Applications.

This is like a merger, not of two companies, which will never stand regulatory scrutiny but a merging of minds. It will be a merging of two of the world's most recognized Platforms. Gates and Jobs have been seen with wide grins on their faces, spending hours upon hours taking Photobooth snaps and iChat sessions. Even Steve Ballmer and Phil Schiller have been reported as uncharacteristically friendly towards one another, both giddy like schoolgirls. They've all seen Peter Oppenheimer's projections on this little project. Both companies are expected to gain billions and billions of dollars from massive and perpetual licensing and royalty agreements.

Sadly, a downside of all this is the reported whipping verbal reprimanding of escaped developers sources from Apple's and Microsoft's ultra-secret concentration camps, better hidden than CIA detention centers comfortable campuses.

Folks, this isn't like 1984. This is bigger than that! If this new world redefining paradigm isn't enough, as Bill Gates is set to step out of Microsoft's campus, he is reportedly handing over Strategic Planning to his long time friend, Steve Jobs. Steve B., will run day to day, Steve J. will take over Strategy. As today, April 1st is Apple's Anniversary, expect the world to go crazy once Bill Gates and Steve Jobs announce this New World Order later in the day as part of Apple's Anniversary surprise.

Updated: Happy April Fools!

If Apple is an Evil Genius, is Evil the New Good?

A few days ago (which, oddly enough seem like a lifetime ago), Wired posted How Apple Got Everything Right By Doing Everything Wrong. It got me thinking, is, Apple really Evil or is Evil the new Good?

I'll skip the whole part that Apple is an Evil Genius. I think Wired covered that part. Truth be told, if I were Apple, I'd think that as compliment. Apple's the smartest kid on the block and that success is entirely attributed to Steve Jobs' brand of genius.

But there are a lot of misconceptions about Apple.

People think of Apple as the new Microsoft because they think Apple is proprietary. But that's not the case is it? Apple isn't entirely closed. The very underlying technology of Apple's OS X is Open Source. And I think people are missing the whole point that Apple is what Red Hat, Suse and all the other great Open Source Linux houses should be!

BSD. Unix. GCC. Apache. PHP. Perl. Ruby. SQLite. MySQL. PostgreSQL. Some of the big names in the Open Sauce business and all successfully running on OS X. In fact, BSD, GCC are very important parts in the whole wheel that is OS X! GCC is the "complier" that comes free with every Mac and BSD is Unix that forms the foundation of OS X. From iPods to iPhones to Macs to XServers, Apple's built this gorgeous piece of operating system marvel on top of Open Source technology.

Is OS X perfect? That would really depend on what you'd want it to do. I love my OS X but having Linux running along side my Mac, compliments each other rather than competing. And what of Windows? I can't speak for the next guy, but I've outgrown Windows' limitations. Would I get a Windows Machine in the near future? Only perhaps to play games (which i hardly do anyway) but at the rate consoles are becoming the gaming platform, there maybe no windows in my future.

You'd think there wasn't any reseed between Apple and Open Source. Bonjour for example may not be the standard picked by the Open Source community but the idea of zeroconf networking is certainly taking flight on Linux so much so that there is a standard around which open source is rallying behind. Bonjour is this idea of zero network configuration like having two iTunes on two separate machines "see" each other and "talk" to each other without the user (who more likely will know anything about computer networking) telling any, "hey, you can find another iTunes at this internet protocol address". How can that not be a good for the community?

Strip out all the religiousness of Open Source and its whole premise is a level playing field. The starting line is equal whether you're a kid in a garage or a multinational corporation. You get the same set of basic rules to play with. The difference is how creative you can get. It is up to you to decide what creative avenues you'd like to take this recipe to.

Put it in another way, it's like saying everyone gets the basic recipe for Spaghetti. But hardly two people will cook it identically thus, each batch will taste differently. Most people will cook spaghetti with beef. Apple would cook spaghetti with tuna.

People will note, Apple has this "proprietary user interface". So what? I'd rather have a stable, gorgeous proprietary user interface running on top of a stable open source operating system than run an open source operating system and an open source interface that feels like it was put together by paste. What do I care about writing a new operating system every single time? I'd love to play with it on my spare time or for a specific project but not all the time. And most people couldn't even get past the whole internet address on their browser or email for that matter to care about whether the machine is open sauce or not.

What most users (who are undoubtedly are Not Geeks) want, is a machine that works. Apple has, for the most part done that with less headache for the user than say Windows and to some extent Linux distros. Believe me, when a non-geek asks you about antiviruses and networking, it's tough having to explain all that to them, step by step. Why make it hard on non-geeks? Apple's success rate on delivering quality products more than makes up for some of their "perceived inefficiencies" on being "completely open".

Like BMW or Mercedes Benz building value on top of the basic notion of a car, Apple is doing just that. Computers and Operating Systems are one and they are becoming more like cars. It's a game of spot the difference between a Honda, a Toyota, a Kia, a BMW, a Porche and depending on your price range, you'll fit into one category.

Apple as it is today has taken the whole notion of open source and built value on top of it. This is where open source should be. Take a piece of standards, or standards compliant, or open technology and build something creative, something of value on top of it. Is Apple really Evil? Then Evil is the New Good.

*I found the villain image via wiki.

Remember, Remember March 6: when the world fundamentally changed

You wouldn't think the world fundamentally changed. But last Thursday, it did. Much the same way in 1984 when Apple introduced the Macintosh and the mouse, similar to the birth of Windows 3.0 in the early 1990s, and the iPod, it was done with little fanfare, so quiet neither the plebs plebis nor the technology elite have completely digested its significance. 

Not yet anyway.

Personally, I haven't fully wrapped my mind around this whole iPhone Software Development Kit. Not completely. As I've written in "Apple goes after Blackberry's lunch", This changes the game across so much of the technology industry.  When the dust settles, we'd need a rewrite of the map. This opens the door you see to make iPhone the next platform that 5 years from now, most people will not only be wanting but getting.

de facto standard. the benchmark. the one device to rule them all. It is the device that like the lightsaber is an extension of the Jedi, iPhone is the extension of the personal you, much more than the cellphone is or the PC is today.

iPhone is poised to be the Personal Computer. iPhone is going to do for our early 21st Century, what the PC did for the world during the last two decades of the 20th.

"Awesome," isn't enough to describe how this is changing the world and the only thing that could ruin it is if Apple drops the ball.

iPhone is no longer just a phone--- or an iPod, it is more than that. It is the platform! This opening to develop applications for the iPhone platform is that game changing. It is that revolutionary. It is that paradigm shifting. It is a seismic shift the kind that transforms industries and the way we live, work, interact and be creative.

Apple is going after Blackberry's Lunch

(Updated, -1) There is blood in the water: Microsoft's, Sony's, Nintendo's and Research in Motion's blood. If there is any doubt that Apple is a shark and is about to eat and have Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo and Research in Motion for lunch--- the Apple March 6 Event launching iPhone's Software Development Kit is that proof.

Let's start with the most obvious. Apple's crosshairs has locked on Research in Motion. With Apple licensing ActiveSync thereby giving it access to Microsoft Exchange servers, iPhone and sister iPod Touch just laid down any doubt that they are players on the Enterprise.

Has Microsoft realized what it has done?

Enterprises don't need a third party to push their services. iPhone just cut that middle man (RIMM) off. iPhone can have direct access to Exchange servers. Enterprises, and email addicts will now ask, why should they pay for Blackberry service when they can provide it all in house, with cheaper infrastructure and less complexity?

And as more and more people come to become addicted and married to their Blackberry iPhone, enter the second coming of the Halo Effect. Apple's push to eat Microsoft's lunch is far more insidious, far more subtle than its attack on RIMM. iPhone is positively viral.

Giving Apple access to ActiveSync and Exchange servers maybe the nail that signs Microsoft dominance on the Enterprise. Coupled with growing discontent with Windows by businesses everywhere, this push towards the Enterprise by Apple via iPhone will increase adaptability of the rest of Apple's more consumer oriented line.

Who was it who said Apple isn't interested on the Enterprise?

What Apple is doing against Microsoft, this is guerilla warfare at its finest. Apple is trying to get inside the Enterprise through the backdoor. They want to get people addicted first to this one device.

What Apple is doing is turing iPhone into spice like Dune spice. Just like any drug for that matter. First they give you a taste, and you find you can't live without it. You'll say, "This is great. I want more. then you go, more, more".

If it's that good, could it be evil?

Pretty soon employees will be banging demanding like a rabid mob in front of the IT department's door: we want Macs.

Insidious.

Okay, maybe not that crazy, but you get the picture.

The other set Apple is out to get is Sony and Nintendo. With Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch displaying such advanced game play as was demoed in their March 6 event, the PSP and the DS are definite targets.

Heck, iPhone can run Spore-- positively one of the most awaited game of the year. (Update-1) Whether or not EA launches Spore on the iPhone platform is of course another issue but beside the point. Macworld confirmed that EA is launching Spore, other games on iPhone. The advanced features of iPhone like the accelerometer gives game play a different interface. Just look at the Wii. Rock, roll--- or whatever the game designers can come up with.

Wonder if LucasArts will have The Force Unleashed on this baby?

iPhone is a game changer, more than I thought it was. iPhone is the one device that lets you work and play. It is a convergence and general purpose device so much like the PC.

When iPhone was launched, I first thought this was going to be the beginning of the UMPC era... that iPhone would be the grandfather of the UMPC, let me be the first to correct myself: this is UltraMobile Computing, right here, right now. This is what Bill Gates has been lusting about with his Tablet PC craze. iPhone is what every person should have.

Forget any other device that fits right in between the iPhone and a Macbook. iPhone is that device. iPhone is that platform. If there is anymore doubt as to the authenticity of this claim, just point your browser to iFund where KPCP is looking for market and game changing ideas on the iPhone platform to fund. This to me is the most important aspect of the March 6 Event that solidifies this platform as the device we are looking for.

I don't mean to be a backseat driver but the only thing Apple can do wrong now is that if it lets iPhone be married to a single carrier. Forget negotiating with a carrier: set iPhone free in the markets you haven't entered just yet. Don't worry if it eats iPod's lunch. Let it spread across different frontiers and with this device on every continent it will take the world by storm. It already is happening, underground. The developers will come from across the planet and the revenue you lose by being married to a carrier will be taken over by the App Tax you get on every download. iPhone is viral.

Okay, maybe it isn't that simple. There are complicated arrangements with every country on frequency and such and their local laws and communications commissions. Can we collectively shout out, "damn, bureaucracy!"

For Apple, they've come full circle with iPhone. Without a doubt, Apple has learned the lesson of the Machintosh and is applying it to this new revolution. iPhone is the new Cellphone. iPhone is the new iPod. iPhone is the new Macintosh. iPhone is the PC of the 21st Century. iPhone is truly a personalized computing experience. iPhone is a game changer.

Updated: Don't believe me? Fake Steve gives a clear point: Happy now, bitches?

Steve Jobs: The Master Speaks

Fortune has a 15 web page, 200 word piece on the Master, "Steve Jobs Speaks Out".

highlights:

On dealing with roadblocks

"At Pixar when we were making Toy Story, there came a time when we were forced to admit that the story wasn't great. It just wasn't great. We stopped production for five months.... We paid them all to twiddle their thumbs while the team perfected the story into what became Toy Story. And if they hadn't had the courage to stop, there would have never been a Toy Story the way it is, and there probably would have never been a Pixar.

"We called that the 'story crisis,' and we never expected to have another one. But you know what? There's been one on every film. We don't stop production for five months. We've gotten a little smarter about it. But there always seems to come a moment where it's just not working, and it's so easy to fool yourself - to convince yourself that it is when you know in your heart that it isn't.

"Well, you know what? It's been that way with [almost] every major project at Apple, too.... Take the iPhone. We had a different enclosure design for this iPhone until way too close to the introduction to ever change it. And I came in one Monday morning, I said, 'I just don't love this. I can't convince myself to fall in love with this. And this is the most important product we've ever done.'

"And we pushed the reset button. We went through all of the zillions of models we'd made and ideas we'd had. And we ended up creating what you see here as the iPhone, which is dramatically better. It was hell because we had to go to the team and say, 'All this work you've [done] for the last year, we're going to have to throw it away and start over, and we're going to have to work twice as hard now because we don't have enough time.' And you know what everybody said? 'Sign us up.'

"That happens more than you think, because this is not just engineering and science. There is art, too. Sometimes when you're in the middle of one of these crises, you're not sure you're going to make it to the other end. But we've always made it, and so we have a certain degree of confidence, although sometimes you wonder. I think the key thing is that we're not all terrified at the same time. I mean, we do put our heart and soul into these things."

On catching tech's next wave

"Things happen fairly slowly, you know. They do. These waves of technology, you can see them way before they happen, and you just have to choose wisely which ones you're going to surf. If you choose unwisely, then you can waste a lot of energy, but if you choose wisely it actually unfolds fairly slowly. It takes years.

"One of our biggest insights [years ago] was that we didn't want to get into any business where we didn't own or control the primary technology because you'll get your head handed to you.

"We realized that almost all - maybe all - of future consumer electronics, the primary technology was going to be software. And we were pretty good at software. We could do the operating system software. We could write applications on the Mac or even PC, like iTunes. We could write the software in the device, like you might put in an iPod or an iPhone or something. And we could write the back-end software that runs on a cloud, like iTunes.

"So we could write all these different kinds of software and make it work seamlessly. And you ask yourself, What other companies can do that? It's a pretty short list. The reason that we were very excited about the phone, beyond that fact that we all hated our phones, was that we didn't see anyone else who could make that kind of contribution. None of the handset manufacturers really are strong in software."

my favorite is this because it is so true (italics below is my emphasis):

On Apple's focus

"Apple is a $30 billion company, yet we've got less than 30 major products. I don't know if that's ever been done before. Certainly the great consumer electronics companies of the past had thousands of products. We tend to focus much more. People think focus means saying yes to the thing you've got to focus on. But that's not what it means at all. It means saying no to the hundred other good ideas that there are. You have to pick carefully.

"I'm actually as proud of many of the things we haven't done as the things we have done. The clearest example was when we were pressured for years to do a PDA, and I realized one day that 90% of the people who use a PDA only take information out of it on the road. They don't put information into it. Pretty soon cellphones are going to do that, so the PDA market's going to get reduced to a fraction of its current size, and it won't really be sustainable. So we decided not to get into it. If we had gotten into it, we wouldn't have had the resources to do the iPod. We probably wouldn't have seen it coming."

There is No Sentiment, Only Profit

John Murrell of Good Morning Silicon Valley had this to say about Apple (AAPL) and VMWare (VMW) in from toast of the market to toast: 

  

the same crowd of nervous investors who pummeled Apple after its great quarter (see "Market takes knife to Apple, determined to find worm") thought 50 percent growth sounded like too quick a drop-off from 70-80 percent rate VMware had been posting. Executives' explanations that the growth rate is slowing because the company is much larger now went unheeded, and by the time the last knife was put away, investors had cut the share price by almost 34 percent, to $28 -- right back where it debuted. There went $10 billion in shareholder wealth. And there was collateral damage. EMC, the company that spun off VMware and remains its largest stakeholder, saw its shares drop 6 percent despite reporting a strong quarter itself. At least The Motley Fool is accentuating the positive: "Here's your buy-in discount. Enjoy it while you can. It took 10 weeks for VMware's stock to go from a 52-week low of $51.50 per share to the high-water mark at $125.25. It can happen again, so don't get caught flat-footed." 

Why am I thinking "excesses of the market"?   One would think that in an environment where indicators are showing growth is slowing down, you'd at least stick to companies though not showing "super-stellar" growth you'd dream of, have at least proven they do deliver growth and shareholder value and are at least making their companies grow and delivering excellent products and services and have sensible executives at the helm to guide them through the storm. But hey--- i could never understand the fickleness of the market. One thing I'm sure of, sentiment has no place in the market.

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Honeymoon's Over?

Is there something wrong when a company ships 2.3 million of its products, earning 47% revenue growth from the previous year, equalling to a Net Quarterly profit of US$1 Billion dollars, which is earning each share, US$1.14 and a Cash Balance of US$18.4 Billion?  One would think, nothing's wrong and everything is all right, correct? One might even conclude that those running the company are doing a good job, would you think? Wall Street disagreed and Apple stock fell after it announced it had stellar performance in its First Quarter results: 

“Apple’s revenue grew 35 percent year-over-year to $9.6 billion, an increase of almost $2.5 billion over the previous December quarter’s record-breaking results,” said Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s CFO. “Our strong results produced cash flow from operations of over $2.7 billion during the quarter, yielding an ending cash balance of over $18.4 billion. Looking ahead to the second quarter of fiscal 2008, we expect revenue of about $6.8 billion and earnings per diluted share of about $.94.”

Is Apple doing something wrong?  In a bearish market, guess the honeymoon's over.