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Steve Jobs – Santa Claus 2.0??!

As of late, emails being addressed to Apple CEO Steve Jobs have actually been getting what seem to be curt responses that actually seem to be FROM Steve.   You would think that the CEO of a major corporation wouldn’t bother to address the unwashed masses, but that’s exactly what seems to have been happening.

And it looks like today Steve (or whoever is playing him), has taken the next step from being adored Tech magician, to… Santa Claus?

Apparently a High School student who wanted desperately to learn Final Cut Pro, but couldn’t afford the exorbitant price for it,  asked Steve if he could be made eligible for the student discount.   The reply he recieved from an Apple exec warms the cockles of my geeky heart.

Courtesy of Gizmodo:

And this is the reply:

Hmm..  I wonder,  if I write to Steve will he send me that 24″ iMac I’ve been dying to own?… Nah.

Why the “Big 3″ Automakers may not DESERVE survival

Today, I’ve heard one EXTREMELY stupid thing.  People in the US Government are calling for a bailout of GM and the other “Big 3″ US automakers, due to the fact that they are very near bankruptcy.   I have to say only one thing:

ARE YOU FREAKIN’ INSANE!?  WHY!?

Now I’m of course aware of the 2 million jobs that are held currently by employees of these car-makers,   and their losing there jobs would indeed be not only a tragedy, but a large strain on our government, and our morale as a country.  I’m also aware of the brand-identity that GM, Ford, and Chrysler carry.  They are names like US Steel.  Things that were at one time rock solid, the foundation of the US Economy.  Things that could NEVER possibly go out of business.

The problem is,  that is exactly what’s happening.  And it’s their own fault.

Continue on after the jump:

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Jerry Yang to Step Down – Don’t let the door hit you on the way out!

Now like I said last week,  I don’t have any ill will against Jerry Yang.  He founded a giant of the Web 1.0 era.  If Google had never shown up,  Yahoo would likely be the biggest web company around.  That being said,  Yang is NOT a great businessman,  and despite his promises upon his return that he would turn Yahoo around, he has only driven it farther into the ground.  Today after a lot of speculation (including mine) that he would/should step down,  it appears as though he has.  Here is a copy of Yang’s memo to his fellow Yahoos earlier today courtesy of BoomTown:

To: all yahoos
Fr: Jerry
Subject: update

yahoos -

i wanted to address all of you on the news we’ve just announced. the board of directors and I have agreed to initiate a succession process for the ceo role of yahoo!. roy bostock, our chairman of the board, is leading the effort to identify and assess potential candidates for consideration by the full board. the board will be evaluating and considering both internal and external candidates and has retained heidrick and struggles to help in this effort.

i will be participating in the search for my successor, and i will continue as ceo until the board selects a new ceo. once a successor is named, i will return to my previous role as chief yahoo and continue to serve as a director on the board.

last june, i accepted the board’s request that i assume the ceo role to restructure and reposition the company as a whole in order to more effectively meet the fast-changing needs of both users and partners. since taking on the ceo role, i have had an ongoing dialogue with the board about succession timing. thanks in large measure to your tireless efforts, we have created a more open, competitive yahoo! and we believe the time is now right to transition to a new ceo who can take the company to the next level.

despite the external environment we face, the fact remains that yahoo! is now a significantly different company that is stronger in many ways than it was just 18 months ago. this only makes it all the more essential that we manage this opportunity to leverage the progress up to this point as effectively as possible. i strongly believe that having transformed our platform and better aligned costs and revenues, we have a unique window for the right ceo to take ownership over the next wave of mission-critical decisions facing the company.

all of you know that I have always, and will always bleed purple. i will always do what I think is right for this great company. while this step will be an adjustment for all of us, i know it’s the right one. i look forward to updating you on this process as soon as the board has developments to share, and will continue to do everything i can to make yahoo! fulfill its full potential.

thank you,
jerry

I wish Jerry Yang all the best of luck in whatever he chooses to do.  And I wish whomever takes his place EVEN MORE luck.  He or She is going to need it.

New Star Trek Trailer now available in HD!

It’s the new full trailer for Star Trek!  Just click the screenshot and go look.  You know you want to.

OpenOffice five times more popular than Google Docs? Makes sense to me.

I just read a very interesting article on InfoWorld about the fact that Google Docs has been lagging compared to other free competition like OpenOffice.  Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.  Here’s some text from the article:

 

OpenOffice.org was used by 5 percent of people, versus Google Docs’ 1 percent, according to the survey of 2,400 users on their home PCs conducted between May and November of this year. OpenOffice.org was also found to be used more often, 8.7 days, versus 1.5 days; and longer, an average of 9.3 minutes, versus 3.4 minutes for Google Docs, according to ClickStream’s panel, which was two-thirds comprised of women.

During a keynote speech at a Gartner conference last month , Ballmer said: “We have better competition today than Google Docs and Spreadsheets. We get more competition from OpenOffice and StarOffice , frankly.”

 

Now of course, one study doesn’t mean anything in the real world, but these numbers don’t surprise me in the least.  As far as the whole cloud computing movement goes,  I don’t think the majority of people see much reason to move a word processor to the cloud.  When there are free cross-platform native alternatives like OpenOffice,  why would you?   OpenOffice runs perfectly well on Windows, Macs, and even the most miniscule of Linux netbooks.   Besides the fact that it’s free,  I think people are interested in having a word processor that’s available even if the internet is not.   Of course there are solutions like Google Gears that bring Web based apps offline, but I have a feeling that people that aren’t extremely tech savvy just aren’t getting that yet.  Besides that, I think that many published writers, especially novelists, would be hesitant about moving to a cloud based word processor for fear that someone could hack in and steal a copy of a manuscript in progress, much in the same way that a lot of professional photographers fear putting photos online because of the high level of intellectual property theft.

Besides,  unless you’re in a collaborative work environment, or work frequently on the same project from multiple computers,  why would a cloud based solution even be remotely interesting to the general public?  Unlike pictures and video which are shared frequently among friends and family, documents rarely are.  Writing for many people is a private endeavor, except for the obvious example of Blogging, which is almost always edited and written independently of a word processor anyway.  

Still, the argument is moot because for the foreseeable future, Microsoft Word will continue to dominate the space.  It is fully featured,  used by everyone, and a heck of a lot faster than OpenOffice.   Then again, for the multiple hundreds of dollars you’ll spend on it,  it better be fully featured, standardized, and fast!   Though if you don’t have a word processor on your system, or you’re running linux,  I can’t recommend OpenOffice highly enough.  It’s absolutely a production quality office suite, and something that I think will be far more of a threat to Microsoft in coming years, vs anything that Google puts out.

AppleTV – Turning a Hobby into a Business.

Since the release of AppleTV, Apple CEO Steve Jobs has maintained that it isn’t yet a serious business venture for Apple, but more of a “hobby”.   For some this is simply a way of explaining away a less-than-successful product, but I think Jobs is being more honest about it than we think.

It IS a hobby to them, but I think it’s likely that you’ll see the AppleTV going from a hobby to a business soon.  Very soon.

Jason Calacanis recently talked about how Apple is going to go into the Television business,  making flat panel TVs.  While I’m sure they have a few Apple flat panels in the lab, there is no freakin’ way they’re ever going to get themselves into such a commoditized business.   They would have to compete with EVERY television maker out there, and there just is no way for them to grab enough marketshare to make it worth it.  In a world where $700 Vizio HDTVs are King,  there is no way for Apple to add enough value to make a $2000+ TV worth it to most people, which is likely where they would want to place it in the price structure.  I still think the set-top box is the way for them to go.

Why?  Find out after the jump.

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