* Posts by Matt Asay

22 publicly visible posts • joined 26 Sep 2008

Big Data in creepy hook-up with big-game whales

Matt Asay

Might be even worse than that

Does it make it worse that it was while listening to a podcast about how developers use my company's own technology that it really hit home? Because they were using my tech to do exactly what I'm deploring here. Yes, it was a wake up call, as I tended to think in high-minded terms like "optimizing for the user" and such. I was blinkered, definitely.

Matt Asay

Re: Capture & 'one more click' reward mechanisms

Reading now....Thanks!

Matt Asay

Re: Maybe I'm missing something here.....

I don't think we can. AT&T doesn't offer any means to do it, since we're on a family plan. The problem is that I want to trust him, and he wants to heed our advice but...he's up against something that he's struggling to overcome. I don't want to lay the blame at someone else's feet, as I feel like we're able to make our own decisions and live up to them. But he's 13 and isn't strong enough (it seems) to overcome the "best minds of our generation."

Man City drags Big Data into Big Football

Matt Asay

Re: Asay is a Gooner

It's why I'm so angry at the world. :-)

Matt Asay

Why bag on Theo?

I mean, it's hard to carp on someone who rides the bench. :-)

Let's just say that I dearly wish I could have been writing about all the data my Arsenal has been crunching to spend pennies and get pounds-worth of playing. But we always seem to come up a bit short these days. I'm hopeful this year will be different....

What happens when Facebook follows MySpace?

Matt Asay

Re: Why not just...

So, we've done that, but photos actually don't last forever, or even very long (particularly if you store them the way we do :-). I really want everything digital so it's searchable, but....

Tech biz today is WORSE than dot-com bubble days

Matt Asay

Re: Very sensible article

As Emerson would say, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds." :-)

No, actually, I agree with both articles (I should, since I wrote them both :-), but they accentuate different data known at different times. My earlier article focused on the companies still focused on *revenue,* but what I had overlooked earlier (because I didn't have enough data) was a focus on *profitability.* It's clear that companies are more interested in revenue than before...and that they're not nearly focused enough on marrying revenue with profitability.

An oversight in the first article? Probably. But those data simply weren't available to me then. Or, rather, I should say: "easily available." I could have gone out and dug up the information, but I didn't. That's my fault. But I appreciate you calling out the apparent (real?) discrepancy.

Facebook's viral activism is really good... for admen

Matt Asay
Happy

I knew it! You really *are* "against them"!

:-) I spent the first few hours totally annoyed that I couldn't weed the Stop Kony! posts out of my news stream fast enough. But it was only later that I realized what a powerful lesson it was in how to coordinate a social media campaign.

Which isn't to say that these are any more likable, even if effective.

I personally feel that the way to do social media is through nuanced conversation, not hitting people over the head with a blunt message. But maybe that's why I'm not the one with millions of Stop Kony! views....

Enterprise IT's power shift threatens server-huggers

Matt Asay

Space suit...purchased!

I had it made in the cloud. :-)

Matt Asay

Of course we'll still need IT

It's just that the nature of it will change. That's one of the things I was trying to communicate (clearly not very well). Thanks for reading and commenting.

Red Hat's sales architect exits on Linux high

Matt Asay

Delayed post...!%!%!%

I originally wrote this post before the news broke that Alex joined Acronis. So...please disregard the speculation about Zmanda. The rest is true, however: Alex was phenomenal for Red Hat, though he broke a few backs in the process, probably including his own. :-)

However, in talking with Red Hat insiders, one other thing comes through: Alex, while a tough taskmaster, is also a very ethical, above-board guy. He didn't cut corners to get sales done, which is very refreshing, and very much in keeping with the Red Hat ethos.

Android, Steve Jobs, and Apple's '90%' tablet share

Matt Asay

Bang for buck

I think this is true...for now. But make no mistake: Apple set the iPad price at a rate that gives is a big profit margin. I'm watching the Samsung Galaxy 10.1 and 8.9's. They start to drive price downward while delivering equal or better hardware than the iPad.

Matt Asay

Totally agree

But that's kind of my point: the media went wild ridiculing Xoom's paltry 100K opening, which shows a distinct lack of appreciation for history. Apple doesn't care about owning all of the market. It can't. Its high-margin approach almost demands that it give up the mass-market to instead win the mass-margin.

Matt Asay

Good point, but...

I think you're right to point out the different economics driving tablets. Also, it's a much higher price point, regardless of subsidies from the carriers, so the turnover on devices will be slower. So, I think it will take longer for the iPad to fall behind. But I still hold that the iPad necessarily will give way to "lesser" rivals.

Matt Asay

Don't forget what is driving Google here....

...Advertising. Google can afford to subsidize the cost of Android because it makes its money elsewhere, in advertising. That's what makes it such a difficult competitor for Apple (just as Linux is a tough competitor to Microsoft Windows and Unix systems: IBM can afford to dump a lot of innovation into Linux, knowing that it's going to make it back on services and hardware sales). It's what makes the tech market so interesting these days: different businesses are competing on very different value propositions.

Canonical's Dell and Lenovo love lets Ubuntu down

Matt Asay

Great point

I actually have argued before that "Ubuntu" could come to mean much more than an OS, and instead describe an open computing experience. This would let Canonical focus on building interoperability between disparate clouds, desktop environments, etc. Actually, its Online Services business unit already is doing this. I'm just not sure there's enough of a desire to move beyond the OS.

App Store not invited to web's date with destiny

Matt Asay

Maybe not

I suggest you take a look at Sports Illustrated's newest app and try to find any - any - HTML5 ugliness in it. You won't. Why? Because where a native look/feel is needed, they used native. But 90%+ is HTML5 (which is very easy to code if you use a good framework).

Matt Asay

Great points

Great points, all, but there's a very binary theme running through them: that something is either web or native. That's a false choice. It's very easy to integrate the two (particularly with a rich framework like SproutCore. /infomercial). I think the pendulum swung way too far toward all-native apps but I'm not arguing for discarding native altogether. More like a 90 (HTML5) / 10 (native) split.

Open source Drupal takes Gardens path to big business

Matt Asay

Templates AND code geekery

I think Drupal needs both. Your point that it's great because you can dig deep and get your hands dirty is absolutely one of the benefits of Drupal...and will remain such, even if Drupal also adds a template-driven experience through Gardens. It's an additional choice, not the removal of one. For many, Drupal needs to be easier to use. Gardens gives them this, without taking away your ability to futz with code. That's a good thing, no?

Matt Asay

Wasn't overlooking Joomla...

Joomla is an awesome web CMS...but it wasn't the point of this article. I mentioned WordPress because the focus was on commercialization of Drupal, and WordPress offers a good counterpoint as to how another open-source project stands in its way in that area. Joomla does not because it is not directly monetized.

The focus of this article was Drupal and its efforts to turn "a whole lot of free" into "a whole lot of cash"...while not sacrificing the freedom. As such, there are some great technologies - like Joomla - that I simply didn't cover, but your point is a good one.

Memo to Microsoft: don't bet against Amazon

Matt Asay

Not really cloud hype...

I guess it looks a bit like Amazon cheerleading, but that's not the intent. The intent is to look at what scale is doing to the industry, and (at least initially) it clearly favors those, like Amazon and Rackspace, who understand how to scale. Google, too. I don't count out Microsoft (despite the title given to the piece), but I think it has a long way to go to learn how to think beyond isolated computing units (desktops, servers) and instead grok the potential power behind Azure, rather than just the basic operations.

At any rate, I also should have talked more about Rackspace, which now has a significant asset - OpenStack - that could be of significant benefit in its counterargument to Amazon. But I had to stop writing at some point. :-)

'I can see dinosaurs from my back porch'

Matt Asay

This article started biased, then became balanced

Was the object to bring people in with a silly headline, follow it with a highly biased and emotionally charged (as well as demonstrably false) opening paragraph, and then get down to reporting a moderately balanced story? If you, you succeeded!

Palin's record is very different from the caricature that you paint for her. I'm not a creationism sort of guy, though I am very religious and believe that more than mere evolution when into creating the earth. I just don't see the need to teach any particular religious or scientific theory as dogma/doctrine in public schools. My kids learn that at home and at church, and if someone wants to present evolution as the best scientific theory we have today, even despite its flaws, have at it.

But that is not far off from Palin's record, either, so please don't try to score cheap points on an allegedly technology-focused web news site by falsely deprecating a strawman representation of Palin's beliefs and record of upholding those beliefs.