Category: Book Related

Privacy, Gmail, and Unintended Consequences

The email below comes to me via Dave Farber's IP list. I quote it in full with permission of the author, I think the story he tells is quite interesting as it relates to our communications and intentions moving from the ephemeral to the eternal (the title of a chapter…

The email below comes to me via Dave Farber’s IP list. I quote it in full with permission of the author, I think the story he tells is quite interesting as it relates to our communications and intentions moving from the ephemeral to the eternal (the title of a chapter in my book). This email was written by JA Terranson, who is on Dave’s IP list, in response to this article by Declan McCullagh on issues of privacy and GMail.

Subject: Opposing view of Gmail issues (Cypherpunk tie in)

Good Afternoon Declan,

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Microsoft: Built From Scratch, The Interface Migrates to the Web

Three things struck me as I reflect back on my trip to Microsoft Tuesday. One, it's not wise to dismiss the company as being "at the first grade level" or "behind" the rest of the pack. Second, the fact that Microsoft came late to the search game just might be…

msft_118x35Three things struck me as I reflect back on my trip to Microsoft Tuesday. One, it’s not wise to dismiss the company as being “at the first grade level” or “behind” the rest of the pack. Second, the fact that Microsoft came late to the search game just might be an advantage. And third, I need to get some face time with the Windows team, because I went into the day wondering if MSN isn’t becoming MSFT’s future interface/platform play, with Windows relegated to a supporting role (as DOS was to Windows) and, well, nothing I heard convinced me otherwise. And that certainly can’t be right. Or can it?

cole-1I met first with David Cole, who runs MSN and has a long history at the company, in particular with Windows and web technology. Much of what we discussed I need to save for my column, but suffice to say we covered a broad range of topics, including Longhorn integration (yes, MSN and search are being built with an eye toward that eventuality), the Web OS meme (while not dismissive of the idea, Cole thought it was just one of many approaches to solving computing and information service problems), and of course, competition with Google and the rest of the field. Cole began by outlining how MSN has shifted to its current strategy, based on building scaled software services that break into two major buckets: communications services (MSN Messenger, Hotmail, etc) and information services (search, content, etc.). Yusuf Mehdi, who I met with next, runs information services, and we had a pretty detailed chat about the present and future of search. That conversation was for the book alone, due to timing issues. I can report, however, that Yusuf was pretty charged up about what they are building.

So why did I leave thinking that MSFT’s late start in search could be an advantage? Well, think about it. The company has massive resources, and the folks in charge are pretty smart. So they get to tackle the search problem with no legacy issues and no presumptions with regard to approach. There are any number of hurdles in search – starting with how to scale your infrastructure and moving into how to integrate results with personalized data – and many of these might best be tackled by starting fresh. Plus, on the talent side, MSFT is really the only viable player that can offer engineers unlimited resources and the chance to start from scratch. I know, the Valley mill says MSFT is having a hell of a time hiring, but when I asked that question up in Redmond, I got quite the opposite answer.

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Taking the Day Off, Headed to MSFT

Going to MSFT today (well, early on the 20th) to meet with David Cole, who runs .net and MSN, and Yusuf Mehdi, who runs search and most of MSN for David. Should be darn interesting. Scoble, you around? If so, email me jbat at batellemedia.com. Anyone care to suggest questions…

Going to MSFT today (well, early on the 20th) to meet with David Cole, who runs .net and MSN, and Yusuf Mehdi, who runs search and most of MSN for David. Should be darn interesting. Scoble, you around? If so, email me jbat at batellemedia.com.

Anyone care to suggest questions for these two gentlemen? Post away on comments or email me….thanks!

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Grokking Furl: Storage, Search, and the PersonalWeb

Today I finally got to talk with Mike Giles, the fellow behind Furl. He's based near Amherst, Mass, but used to work out in California, most recently at Vitria, a businessprocessenterpriseapplicationsoftware (ie, BigBoringButImportant) company. He started there when it had 20 employees, rode it out as it went to 1200…

furlToday I finally got to talk with Mike Giles, the fellow behind Furl. He’s based near Amherst, Mass, but used to work out in California, most recently at Vitria, a businessprocessenterpriseapplicationsoftware (ie, BigBoringButImportant) company. He started there when it had 20 employees, rode it out as it went to 1200 and went public, then bailed (it’s now at about 300 or so). Before Vitria he founded a startup, then, closed it. In other words, he’s one of us – he’s been through the roller coaster, and he’s wiser for it.

Something tells me he’s pretty happy in his current gig. He’s the only full time employee, but works with a small cadre of contractors and friends. He’s got between 5-10K users since announcing the beta in January.

Mike started Furl about a year ago to solve a problem he – and a lot of us – had with bookmarks. Namely, bookmarking is a lame, half-assed, unsearchable, flat, linkrotten approach to recalling that which you’ve seen and care to recall on the web. Now, a lot of folks have made stabs at solving this particular problem, but Mike’s got a lot of very cool features built into his beta, and more on the way.

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Bill Joy Moves In

Bill Joy is comfortably into his new role of not having a role, to judge from our meeting last Friday morning. We met at the Depot, a Mill Valley cafe which pretty much defines Marin casual. Bill is in the middle of what he termed a "three year move" -…

joyBill Joy is comfortably into his new role of not having a role, to judge from our meeting last Friday morning. We met at the Depot, a Mill Valley cafe which pretty much defines Marin casual. Bill is in the middle of what he termed a “three year move” – moving out of his Sun offices, which contained more than 20 years of research, notes, and assorted papers – moving as well from his Russian Hill home in San Francisco, and into new digs in Mill Valley as well as his ranch in Aspen. In essence, transition has been Joy’s job for the past few years, and he seems content in it.

Our talked ranged over a pretty open space, and touched on his talks with Google (he confirmed them, but they are not ongoing), his sense of where Sun is going (tough road ahead but he wishes them well), his continuing thinking along the lines of his now legendary Wired article (still figuring if he has a book in him on the topic, and if so, when), and his thoughts on better search solutions (we touched on the work of David Gerlernter more than once). In fact, I have an interview scheduled with David Gerlernter this Thursday morning, stay tuned for that.

As to what he might be doing next, he seemed happily indeterminate. A fine place to be, it seems to me.

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IBM v Google, The Chart

For readers of my earlier (and overly long) post on Webfountain, this chart makes a first attempt at outlining some key distinctions between IBM and Google's approach….

For readers of my earlier (and overly long) post on Webfountain, this chart makes a first attempt at outlining some key distinctions between IBM and Google’s approach.

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WebFountain, the Long Version

(nb: long post, subject to revision…) To quote Dylan, it’s been buckets of rain for the past few months around here. On my way down to IBM’s Almaden research campus a week ago this past Friday, I crossed the San Rafael bridge and tacked South into yet another storm. The…

(nb: long post, subject to revision…)
To quote Dylan, it’s been buckets of rain for the past few months around here. On my way down to IBM’s Almaden research campus a week ago this past Friday, I crossed the San Rafael bridge and tacked South into yet another storm. The guy on the radio joked that we should all stay calm if a bearded fellow shows up leading animals two by two onto an oversized boat. But not ten minutes later, as I passed Berkeley, the rain relented. I have no doubt it will be back, but on that fine morning, the sun took a walk around the Bay area hills, peeking between retreating thunderheads and lending an air of Spring to the drive.

So I was in just about the right mood to accept the rather surreal juxtaposition of Almaden with its surroundings. The center is sculpted into what must be at least a thousand acres of pristine Bay area hillside; to get there, you must navigate three miles of uninhabited parkland. It’s an escape from the strip-mall infested Valley, land of soulless architecture where community is defined by employee ID badges, up a two-lane road winding to an unmanned and entirely unimposing gate. For all its context, it may as well be Norman Juster’s Phantom Tollbooth (fittingly, at that). Nearby, Hollywood set-piece cows chew Hollywood set-piece cuds.

The gate opens and you drive a quarter mile to a four-story slate-gray building, which looks rather like a Nakamichi preamp, only with windows (and landscaping). Inside are 600 or so pure and applied researchers who are …well, mostly thinking about about NP-hard problems. And this center is just one of eight that IBM supports around the globe, in Haifa, Switzerland, Japan, China, and India, to name just five. It’s quite impressive, and reminds you that while the media can get carried away with one company at one moment in time, some firms have been hiring PhDs and putting their brains to good use for longer than most of us have been around.

I met with a couple of these scary smart guys, Daniel Gruhl (at left) and Andrew Tomkins, the lead architecht and chief scientist, respectively, of IBM’s WebFountain project. I’ve heard a lot about WebFountain, and what I gathered sounded promising – it’s been called an “analytics engine” by none other than the IEEE, which honored it in a recent issue of IEEE Spectrum. I wanted to see what it was all about up close.

(more from link below)

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Research Asst.

I'm in need of a research assistant for my book. Lots of reporting, organizing, mind melding, and probably some dull work too. I'm interviewing grad students from UCB, where I work, but I thought I'd hang it out here as well, given what an interesting group this readership has…

I’m in need of a research assistant for my book. Lots of reporting, organizing, mind melding, and probably some dull work too. I’m interviewing grad students from UCB, where I work, but I thought I’d hang it out here as well, given what an interesting group this readership has proven to be. Some of you might know someone who’d be perfect, or, some of you lurkers out there might be perfect yourself. Ideally the right person is based in the Bay Area, practically, it’s someone who is looking for experience, rather than a huge paycheck. Send recommendations my way at jbat at battellemedia.com. Thanks!

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WebFountain, Technorati Visits

Spent the day talking to two very interesting companies, one huge with massive scale, the other tiny, with massive scale. I'll post a report on both soon, watch this space….

Spent the day talking to two very interesting companies, one huge with massive scale, the other tiny, with massive scale. I’ll post a report on both soon, watch this space.

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