Tech Recap Week Ending 5/13 - a new Clash

It was a busy week in Tech and May is usually that way, spanning back all the way to May of 1990,  when Microsoft introduced Windows 3.0 to the world. Things changed.

This week Microsoft was at it again and they announced that they were buying Skype, which at 8.5 Billion is a steep price to pay to get your Mojo back. See my take on the deal here.

Of course Google was at it too and the shot that hasn't yet been heard around the world is their new Chromebook. A nifty way to shift people from buying to renting a PC (prices are roughly US $20-28 per device/month) and more importantly some clever security and a new way of isolating of apps from the OS to stop intrusion attacks. Google still needs to show that it is committed to this approach with its partners, but this week it certainly showed it is dedicated to Chrome. The progress Google showed with Chrome in just twelve months is impressive and it also shows that Google's development teams are maturing.

The last item probably would have never showed up at all had it not been for a smart reporter that wasn't about to be duped and it has to do with the whisper campaign Facebook tried to launch against Google. While this has been widely reported and widely tweeted about, what is interesting is that this represents an epic shift of the clash of the titans.

I used to discuss Microsoft vs IBM as the big titan clashes. Now that the battle is in the cloud, it is Google facing off against Facebook. This time it is really all about Ad revenue. Google has it and now Facebook does too. I'll certainly be talking about Facebook in the future, but suffice to say, Facebook is pretty vulnerable to the same type of PR attack it launched on Google. Even more worrisome, Facebook is also an effective tool to use as part of a cyber-attack on an enterprise (see As Facebook Grows, so does Cyber Warfare).

So a busy week in tech and it doesn't show any sign of slowing down.

Will Microsoft Get its Mojo Back with $8.5B Skype Purchase?

Microsoft needs a shot of Mojo and Skype could be part of the answer. In an Internet era where Facebook, Android, iOS, iPhone, iPad and Skype are uttered hundreds of thousands of times a day on Twitter and the blogosphere, getting a brand called Skype certainly should help Microsoft's brand recognition in the consumer space.

Of course, that assumes this deal goes down as reported in the online edition of the Wall Street Journal.  Assuming it does, Microsoft gets a hot consumer brand that it should be able to leverage its Bing Search engine against (advertising revenue).

For enterprises, the question could quickly become: Should I (pay for) Lync or should I Skype. Clearly the spin will say you can do both, but for many Skype is an attractive easy to use alternative to a Microsoft Lync, whether it be Lync on-premise or Lync Online.

Of course, the problem with acquisitions these days at Microsoft is that resistance is futile. The big divisions at Microsoft don't take kindly to threats to their dominance, so the question is, what happens to Skype after the deal goes down? Does Skype remain somewhat independent or will they be absorbed.

Either way, this deal will give some pricing leverage to enterprises on the Unified Communications and Collaboration (UCC) front. Skype is good enough on many fronts so that Lync doesn't have to be licensed for all users in the enterprise and that could mean a big savings for both the CIO and Business Unit GMs. Just as in Content Management, it is time for enterprises to start segmenting users and their UCC needs vs a one size fits all approach.

So overall, this deal will be viewed as more of a  Microsoft tries to get their (Internet) Mojo back than anything else. Microsoft needed to do something in UCC and this deal is far cheaper what they were looking at paying for purchasing Yahoo as recently as 2008. Whether Microsoft really leverages this Sykpe acquisition with the rest of its products remains to be seen.

The Tablet as your new all-in-one

Tablet devices like the Apple iPad, Samsung Galaxy Tab  and Motorola XOOM are changing our world in ways that people are now just beginning to realize. The rise of the tablet and the apps that run on them is causing a shift to occur that will affect the things people buy and how they access content.  Products that had unique hardware for enabling common tasks or conveying information are about to be replaced.

Applications (called Apps), running on a tablet computer, are going to become the defacto way to access content  (news, tv, movies) and to control devices (TVs, PCs, game consoles and more). The Cable service that used to give you a remote control, will now give way to an app that runs on a tablet. Xfinity, Time Warner Cable and others are leading the charge here with their respective cable tv apps. With these apps,  and others from Slingbox, and Netflix, the remote is built-in. The Tablet just became your new all-in-one and it will go much further than just controlling your TV.

Regarding content (news, tv, games and movies), the publishing industry is still figuring out the eBook/eMagazine business model and distribution strategy (see prior Ebooks post). Clearly, tablets will play a huge role in how we consume news. News Corp is jumping at the opportunity with The Daily, a paid application that gives you daily news for $39.99 for a two year subscription.

It doesn't stop there. Last week, I used my iPhone to advance a PowerPoint presentation on my PC, more as a way to demonstrate how change is occurring than anything else. Car companies like Hyundai Motors are now offering the owners manual for their Hyundai Equus car in a digital format - they provide an iPad as the actual owners manual.

Look for much more than just owners manuals, magazines, movies and remote controls going forward.  Tablet apps are going to explode and the demise of consumer electronics dedicated hardware has begun. Look for more and more games to be tailored for tablets. How much money will game controller firms throw at hardware in the future?

So in a way, the tablet and their affiliated Apps becomes the new All-in-One. Going forward, it will be less about the tablet itself, and more about the Apps that run on the tablet that becomes the consumer selection criteria. The race for tablet App development has already started, but it is about to explode.

An Operating System that changed the World

The seeds were planted years ago, soon after the Apple iPod came out. However, Apple never disclosed its multi-device OS strategy until their momentum in the market was well established. Today, Apple's Operating Systems are powering phones, tablets and Macs. That has created a fair degree of market envy, but Apple now has a few generations of users that know their products work and pretty much keep working.

The high tech industry, which from 2007 until early 2009 failed to take Apple seriously, is now reeling from the continuous product hits coming out of Apple. In fact, one could argue that the PC industry has been permanently changed. Netbooks have given way to Tablets and Smart Phones without apps are just not highly desired, since data, not calls, are powering Carrier growth. Mobility, Applications and ease of use are the watch words.

Google recognized the trend early, put together a great team and now Android has become the OS of choice for most handset and tablet manufacturers. Other providers failed to act and now are scrambling to catch up.

The OS is not the only part of this success story, Apple made it easy for developers to monetize their work and that unleashed a wave of application innovation like we haven't seen in decades. The others that are in the game, with the minor exception of Google, don't have the same application portability across phones and tablets.

I was in the battles of the Desktop Operating Systems in the early days of a GUI based OS (I was at Xerox in Palo Alto) and in those days the desktop OS was looked at in one dimension (Workstations/PCs).  What is fascinating to me is how many large vendors have continued to look at the OS in a single dimension. Apple and Google get As, they did their homework, monetized their designs and are now reaping the rewards.

The question though is what lessons the other vendors (Microsoft, Dell, HP, Nokia, RIM, Sony) will learn from this. For many, a multi-dimensional OS was never viewed as strategic. For a few, it is fast becoming a matter of survival. Mergers and acquisitions will be the things to watch this year.

A sidebar about IBM. IBM certainly knows about Operating Systems, but they of stepped back from the desktop OS fray when they exited the PC business. Given all that is going on, this may be a time that they evaluate their strategy, since they have the core competence to scale an OS up and down.

The result of all this is that that it will no longer be a one OS fits all approach. Users will pick the apps they want, run them on the devices they want and access secure corporate portals that serve up the right content, data and analytics.

Global Travel, Blackberrys and the iPhone

So the iPhone is going to launch on Verizon's network. Cool, many people will be happy. That said, for many business executives who travel, the issue is having a phone and wireless carrier that they can use on a worldwide basis.

For many years, Blackberry RIM devices were THE standard and today for many, they still are. It is a great device for email and phone calls. I used mine all over the place, but about a year ago, I switched to the iPhone. On a recent trip around the world, the only device I took was the iPhone. It worked - flawlessly.

I used it for calls, for email, SMS texting and Web Conferencing. One of my products - Saba Centra Web Conferencing runs on the iPhone. I had to join a meeting right after landing in Amsterdam, and joined it via iPhone. I was in the meeting, watching the slides and talking via VoIP. Try that with other products.

So, anyway, my transition from Blackberry to iPhone has been a positive one. I'm much better at touch typing than I used to be. I'll also note that in Silicon Valley, I have very few dropped calls, but I'm not in San Francisco.

Is Harassment via Twitter the Same as Email?

People communicate in different ways and for many, communicating via email has had its set of issues.  Over the years, people started to use email as a way to harass others. It got so bad that many states passed laws that  made it a misdemeanor to send e-mail "with the intent to harass".  Normally, the line gets crossed when multiple emails (or tweets) are involved that are intentionally abusive.

Sometimes, a twitter chat can turn unexpectedly ugly.  If you get harassed on Twitter and the person persists in their abusive behavior, the best thing to do is not to respond. If it is an associate you work with, you can report it to your HR department. If it is someone you don't work with, you can block the user and report them to Twitter via this link. If it involves real threats, call your local police department.

It is clear that the day is coming when states will update their legislation to make harassment via Twitter the same as email.

2010 in Review: As Facebook Grows, so does Cyber Warfare

If the growth of Facebook and the emergence of the Apple iPad were the most widely reported tech stories in 2010, the emergence of Cyber Warfare that targets governments and enterprises is the most under reported one, with far greater consequences.  In fact 2010, could be viewed as the year that Cyber Warfare emerged as a true weapon. Below I outline six steps to take to protect your enterprise.

It is now very clear that certain governments are using Cyber warfare to attack adversaries, including private/public companies. Some key things that occurred in 2010:

1. Facebook and other consumer social sites played a role in the Great Hack of Google and 34 other firms. However, it is worse than that. Thousands of firms may have been breached according to Kevin Mandia, CEO of security firm Mandiant.
2. Redirection of US Internet Traffic by China on April 8, 2010 and the attack of at least 5 other firms.
3. Confirmation by the US Federal Government that attacks against Google and other enterprises were ordered by Chinese Government officials (via CNBC).

A key conclusion from an earlier post: these new modes of attack, known as Advanced Persistent Threats, are far too sophisticated to stop with software and firewalls.  The best known method to protect your corporate assets (source code and intellectual property) is to isolate key corporate systems from the normal corporate network. In other words, you need two networks.

What does all of this really mean? Well, for starters, it is a new era of electronic warfare and this time it is information that is the currency that is being fought over. There stakes are very high: the future of countries and the future economic well being of both the country and the companies that operate in those countries.

Why? Well, the military and technology firms are linked together in interesting ways, as this article (based on research by Rand Corp) demonstrates. Companies have become fronts for governments and military organizations. Some may say that this is not new, but the scale of what is going on now has not been seen in the past.

For enterprises, all of the investment in products that represent the future could be wasted if those secrets are stolen. Cisco learned this a few years back when some of its code was stolen by Huawei Technologies Inc. The lawyer who represented Cisco, G. Hopkins Guy, won an injunction against Huawei and was widely recognized for his ground breaking work that resulted in a worldwide injunction against Huawei.
What does this all mean to you and your enterprise? For starters consider doing this:
1. . Develop a comprehensive strategy to combat cyber warfare and make sure it includes a training program (cyber war gaming) for executives, not just IT staff. 
2. Take the steps to isolate your corporate systems. No matter what you hear from major analyst firms or anyone else, physical separation of information on computers (e.g. a separate network) is the only sure way to stop intrusion right now. Look at models that the military has used (classified vs unclassified systems). This also has major implications for desktop/pc access.
3. Shield key data centers/systems from wireless access and wireless monitoring. For those with remote sites (e.g. retail branches), don't over look these sites as methods of access. If you have any doubts about this action, you need to read The Great Cyber Heist (courtesy of the NY Times).
4. Re-evaluate all browser and operating system security at an architectural level. Evaluate roadmaps from all providers and make the tough, but correct decisions on what platforms you will invest in going forward. Blindly following the incumbent provider may not be the answer that solves your issues.
5. Intrusion from the inside is also a growing issue. Compartmentalizing information so that no one person has access to everything is key, as is a practice of not keeping all source code in one location or on one physical server.
6. Block Facebook. As popular as it is, Facebook isn't secure and it isn't good for your corporate security. Run Facebook in conjunction with certain web browsers and you have the perfect system for intrusion. Many governments and enterprises block access to Facebook and now you know why. This won't be a popular decision, but it is the right one.


So, in 2011, expect to keep hearing more about Facebook and its growing valuation.  2011 may also be called the year of the Tablet (the rise of Android based Tablets). That is all well and good, but the number one issue your enterprise or government needs to prepare for is cyber warfare. 2011 is the time to get prepared for the attacks that are yet to come.....Happy New Year.