Mac@Work : The Ultimate Business Machine

The
Ultimate
Business Machine

Technology, business
and innovation.

And, not least, about
the Mac.

Weblog • Archive • Cutedge

by: Bernard Teo

Thu 19 Jun 2003

Fairport

Category : Technology/fairport.txt

I got a NetGear wireless PC card for our Dell laptop today. It's a snap getting it to work. It recognises our Airport Extreme Base Station and (whoosh!) we're surfing the net on the Dell, no strings attached.

It's interesting what the guy at the PC shop said when I asked if the card's known to work with the Airport Base Station. He said, "Yes, but the PC can only surf out; it can't talk to the Mac and vice versa." I asked him what makes him so sure. He admitted he's never used a Mac. So I told him that, if it can surf out, it'll talk to the Mac. Now it's me who's sure.

In fact, that's what happened. Share a folder on the Mac and the PC can see it. Share a directory on the PC and the Mac can see it. It's the magic of OS X, which gets better and better all the time.

Posted at 4:00PM UTC | permalink

Tue 17 Jun 2003

The Parable of the Talents

Category : Commentary/parabletalents.txt

When I was small, I puzzled over The Parable of the Talents. For one thing, it seemed to contradict another thing I was taught - the concept of stewardship. When you're given something to look after, you guard it with your life and hope to return it all in one piece.

So I was indignant the last servant in the parable (the one who was thrown out to the darkness, with all the weeping and gnashing of teeth) had done nothing wrong, returning to his Master the single talent he was given to keep. After all, he hadn't lost it. I often wondered what The Good Lord would have said, had the first two guys reported a next loss with their speculative investments.

Nowadays, I am content to believe the parable was an exhortation to do more with whatever talent you had the luck to start off with. If you don't, even the little that you have will be taken away from you.

So somehow this morning, when You Meng made a reply to my request to see more of his work, my mind jumped back to The Parable of the Talents.

This is what I was hoping for - that people would respond to using this platform to show-case some of their work. Especially, since I'm the host and I'm saying it's OK. Otherwise, it would be like the third servant, digging a hole for his talent and hiding it. If you don't show it, nobody will know you can do it. And if you do, the worst that can happen is to be accused of flaunting it. But, what if your example serves as an inspiration for others and spur them to push the state of the art. That, in my opinion, would be a very good thing. And well worth the trouble. For it's the same with me, too. I've got a platform I can use to do some good. If I don't, well, I would lose it.

Posted at 7:13AM UTC | permalink

Mon 16 Jun 2003

As Dull as Dell

Category : Commentary/dullasdell.txt

I was at the Sakae Sushi joint next to the AppleCentre at Wheelock. My favourite table is where I can just look across at the action.

It was the iPod Live launch. And I'm thinking of the comment by Richard Lim ("Got Singapore") on Sunday that these hand-held devices are going to get ever more powerful and the next natural progression we're going to see is video.

Now what does it take to do that? Even higher capacity drives. A little bigger screen. In colour, definitely, with very fine pixels and sharp picture quality. A litte bigger form factor, but not too much. Needs to be still slim. And still weigh not more than two CDs. And FireWire 2 or 3 or its equivalent, to keep the data transfer times short. And tight software integration with the mother ship, the personal computer that was used to create or edit all the video.

Now who's going to be able to build that? Not the kids at Sim Lim Square snapping up their own PCs, looking for the cheapest deal. Not even Dell.

I believe that the future favours makers of integrated products. Products that show a tight integration between hardware and software. In all the dark years of Apple's troubles, I still believed they were right. They were criticised for not licensing out their operating system, leaving the field open for Bill Gates and Windows. But what if, having known all that, Apple would still have done what they did. It's in their DNA to build the hardware with the software, as one indivisible whole.

Now back again to Dell. Just what have they done? They've not made the pie any bigger. Instead, they've just grabbed more and more slices to themselves, bleeding the competition dry in a painful price war. What the PC user loses is the innovation that Andy Grove talked about that would have made more out of the processor.

Let's say Dell succeeds in totally annihilating the rest of the PC makers (and they may because, for PCs, I've also only bought Dells lately). They're the only ones left standing. Now what do they do with all that power? Will they suddenly know how to innovate and build great products. Not if they haven't spent all of their lives trying to do that in the first place.

Posted at 1:31PM UTC | permalink

Co-opetition

Category : Commentary/coopetition.txt

In "Co-opetition" by Brandenburger and Nalebuff, Intel's Andy Grove made a rather surprising comment about the other half of the Wintel duopoly, "Microsoft doesn't share the same sense of urgency [to come up with an improved PC]. The typical PC doesn't push the limits of our processors ... It's simply not as good as it should be, and that's not good for our customers."

But we all know who's always been pushing at the limits of technology. Perhaps it should not be surprising if, one fine day, Mac users are going to be using Intel chips. After all, by several accounts including Andy Grove's, he and Steve Jobs have kept up a rather friendly dialogue all these years. When the migration to OS X is complete, soon, things may get even more interesting.

While on the subject of Co-opetition - which means helping to grow the pie so big even your own slice gets to be a healthy portion - that's basically what I'm trying to do with the "Bulletin Board as Ultimate Business Machine" idea. Without an ecosystem that will allow the Mac-using community to connect with each other and create new value out of the associations, there's no pie to begin with. Or whatever it is, is meagre and small. Let's not fight for the crumbs. Let's grow the pie, instead.

Posted at 5:31AM UTC | permalink

Sat 14 Jun 2003

Holland Village

Category : Commentary/hollandv.txt

It's been a long time since I've been to Holland Village, this little leafy oasis at the Holland/Buona Vista junction. But it still feels good.

I've spent a lot of time wondering what makes Holland V work. It has always been my favourite place in the whole of Singapore. I practically camped there in my student days. Tonight, I can see my kid enjoying it. It's so much easier stuffing food into him when, perched on the railing on top of Deli-France, he's going, "Look Mummy, Porsche, BMW, Morgan".

Morgan. He's 3 years old and he recognises a Morgan. But not simple words like Apple. There's a book that I read a called "Branded - The Buying and Selling of Teenagers" that discusses this phenomena among the kids.

And, there's that distinctive rumble of the Harley-Davidson. So Holland V is a smart place - a good second-hand bookshop, antiques, smart restaurants, banks, supermart, chic cafes, fashionable clothes.

It's an expatriate enclave. But before it gets too snooty, it's overrun by the slippered brigade pouring out from the HDB heartland of Queenstown. Then there's the University/Poly students. Arty, crafty, MBA types. And the sarong party girls. All mingling in perfect harmony.

A thriving community, united in commerce. You can feel the churn. Just what we need to drive us out of the recession.

What does it take to build a community like Holland V in cyberspace? To build it from out of nothing. That will make me believe in magic.

Posted at 5:19PM UTC | permalink

Fri 13 Jun 2003

IP is for Intellectual Property

Category : Technology/ip.txt

Yezdi from Mean (and MUGS) pointed out that The Open Group is suing Apple for trademark violation - for using the term Unix in conjunction with its Mac OS X operating system without a license.

This follows in the wake of a couple of other Unix-related law suits. "SCO and Novell are sparring over the extent of SCO's ownership of Unix, while SCO and IBM are embroiled in a trade-secrets lawsuit," reports Silicon.com.

While we're wondering just what SCO and The Open Group have done for Unix lately (they both claim ownership of Unix but just what do they own?), Microsoft is sneaking into cable TV, hoping to create a "standard" for Interactive TV that will choke off access points for everyone else.

Some questions. Why is Unix so hot all of a sudden? What are they fighting about? And why? Anyone can see that only one party outside the fray will benefit when the dust settles, if it ever?

Something's afoot. The issues are complex. This is a portent of things to come. If you're in any way connected with information technology, you must read Lawrence Lessig's "The Future of Ideas. It's a serious book because it deals with serious things. Lessig believes that the spirit of cooperation that gave rise to the amazing richness of the Internet is coming under threat as the incumbent powers start to fight back - by grabbing control of the "standards" through legislation - and they're able to do it because the issues are too complex for the legislators to follow.

Thus he's written the book to map out the issues, starting from a historical perspective to remind the reader of the assumptions made when copyright law was first being framed. From there, he picks his way through the ensuing developments, highlighting the subtleties in the arguments made in our latter day. He believes that it is important to be educated about the issues because the efforts made by incumbent stakeholders to control the initiative could stifle the innovation that made the Internet so rich in the first place.

If you don't believe that, try imagining Apple's Avie Tevanian submitting OS X through The Open Group (who are they anyway?)'s certification process. "You've got to take Rendezvous out because there is no such thing as Rendezvous in Unix". If you've ever gone through a corporate ISO 9000 certification exercise, you'll have a better frame of reference. Try imagining how enthused the Apple guys are going to be. If you can do that, you must be dreaming.

Click on the Creative Commons logo on the left sidebar and you'll be able to reach Lawrence Lessig's weblog with just two more clicks. Quiz: what is the connection? Do the exercise to find out.

Posted at 7:02AM UTC | permalink

Wed 11 Jun 2003

Switchers' Heaven

Category : Technology/PCFriendly.txt

We've just got a couple of PCs back from a client. They've been out as loaners. I've finally taken a good look at this weblog page from a PC and realised the buttons on the left side-bar have stretched the page out of alignment. That's easy to correct.

We have now the perfect compatibility lab. If you've ever got the time, come on over and see how well the Macs work with the PCs - Oracle, file sharing, cross platform development, MS Office document exchange - you'll see Macs work like you've never seen them before. This is Switchers' Heaven. Now why can't Apple do this?

Posted at 6:05AM UTC | permalink

Tue 10 Jun 2003

The Grass Grows Taller When It's Grazed On

Category : Commentary/grass.txt

In "The Future of Ideas - The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World" (by Lawrence Lessig), there's a remark by Eric Raymond ("The Cathedral and the Bazaar") about Open Source, "[It creates an inverse commons. Grazing does not reduce the code that is available. Instead], in this inverse commons, the grass grows taller when it's grazed on."

That's pertinent to the bulletin board I had set up. What I have to hope for is that it becomes an inverse commons. If more people come to graze, the collected wisdom (the grass) will grow taller, which in turn attracts ever more people to come over. And that process feeds on itself in a virtuous circle.

Then you can do more with it. Discuss. Know who you can connect to. And then create - to bring something back to the community.

Will it work? I don't know. But why bother? Well, as a developer, I've felt the lack of a Mac-based ecosystem like a mountaineer out of oxygen. Nothing in all the current discussion groups convinces me that this has changed. It's Apple selling to the distributors selling to the hobbyists. The money flows one way. But at some point, you've got to make money out of the platform to justify the costs you've sunk into it. Unless the Mac is integral to commerce, it's just an incidental purchase, easily swept away in the next platform-standardisation pogrom.

The irony is that the Mac is (potentially) the "Ultimate Business Machine". At least more so than the PC. But how do you demonstrate that? That is the question.

Posted at 9:00AM UTC | permalink

Fri 06 Jun 2003

Send TUBMac to a Friend

Category : Commentary/emailfriend.txt

I've got a new feature on the left side-bar. If you feel there's something interesting on the weblog that you would like somebody else to read, you can send over the page via e-mail.

My friend, Hai Hwee, contributed the PHP code that does this. She originally did this in Java. But I thought it'll be great to include this in the weblog package you can download from the right side-bar. That's all PHP, so she obliged with the conversion. Talk about asking for an inch.

The links will all work in the e-mail page. Ironically, it looks best in Outlook in Windows. OS X's Mail.app has a problem with handling style-sheets. It just ignores them (as far as I know, monitoring other discussions on the web), so the page gets messed up in OS X Mail.

But just imagine another application of the technology. You're the owner of a company and you're looking at your Balance Sheet in a browser. You decide to send the page, via e-mail, to your accountant with a query. It arrives and, since the links all still work, the accountant can click on a link and (after suitable authorisation) drill down to work out how best to answer your query. [See, I can speak the language.]

Posted at 1:49PM UTC | permalink

Thu 05 Jun 2003

The Blind Spot

Category : Commentary/blindspot.txt

As my friend observed, the Chinese in China have focused, almost exclusively, on Intel or AMD-based PCs running Windows. Macs and even Open Source software have rarely figured on their radar.

But I believe they may be missing something big here.

If you look at OS X, you will see that most of the best and biggest things happening here are Open Source software. Apple didn't create Apache, Java, Sendmail, PHP, Perl, Samba, OpenSSL, etc. which are the mainstays of the operating environment. Even the operating system, Darwin, is Open Source.

What Apple did was to glue everything together, including creating the crucial pieces that transformed the system from geek-toy to something even your grandmother could use. Apple's genius is in hardware design, building wonderfully integrated systems that are a joy to use. It is telling that, while most PC users look upon their PC as just a utility tool, most Mac users love their Macs.

I believe the future will favour integrated tools. It's a natural progression. Just look at cars. In the beginning, you needed to be a mechanic to drive a car. Now, who wants to be bothered having to peer inside the hood each time you drive a car. The best cars need zero maintenance.

Same with video cameras. In fact, any consumer product. While people used to bang up their own PCs, how many people actually build their own laptop or notebook computers? Portable computer sales have overtaken desktop computer sales. Computers are morphing into consumer products and the best ones work like a Sony or an iBook - sleek, small, powerful, quiet and mobile.

The point I am getting at is that the Chinese can learn more from Apple than from Microsoft. Learn how to take things legally open in the public domain, and re-configure them to things of greater value, which you will get paid for, rather than simply lifting stuff you haven't paid for.

Use Open Source tools because they're legally free. Use the chance to learn how other people write databases, network layers, web servers, because the source code is open. Study Lindows. Couple it with their own emerging capability to build hardware cheaply.

I think the Internet is like a public road. Vendors like Apple make cars like BMWs. The Chinese could start by making a Skoda, which can get successively refined, like today's Octavia or Fabia. One day it'll morph into Lexus. But the point is that we need not be simply users, letting Redmond suck in all the profits, but also be creators, to suck it all back. One day. At least there's hope.

I believe Microsoft's current domination is an aberration. The world has learnt from it. Nobody now is foolish enough to let another vendor create a proprietary de-facto platform and thereby squeezing the future profits out of everybody else. Everybody is going to insist that standards are open, non-proprietary, and neutral. More like a public road. It'll be great to see innovation return in the form of a variety of well-integrated computing machines - so you choose whether you want to drive the Porsche or the Yugo. Apple has shown that this alternative model of computing is quite possibly profitable.

Posted at 3:52AM UTC | permalink

A View from Chengdu

Category : Commentary/chengdu.txt

I've got permission from my friend in Chengdu to reproduce a part of what he wrote me, in the context of a discussion we had on the merits of the Mac vs the PC. But that's not what I want to focus on. What we have here is the view, from another pair of eyes, of the relation between Chinese University kids and their computers.

And that's why we read, right? We can't be everywhere. We read to leaven our experiences with other people's observations. The truth is usually somewhere in-between.

"Walking round the computer shops here... tell you what I see... you know people here are poor, not all university kids can afford new computers (or even computers at all). Sometimes 4 kids combine to buy parts for a PC in their hostel (sleeping 8 students to a room), or 1 kid would skimp together enough money to buy 2nd or 3rd hand parts for a machine.

"In the 2nd hand computer shops, Intel and AMD cpu's are piled in trays like chocolate chip cookies, old motherboards stacked up like magazines. The parts are generally dusty, scratched, dented, but they (in general) work. It's a beat up universe, and very democratic somehow. The idea that a Chinese farm kid in his dirty hostel room, has a dusty little box, with its side open, wires sticking out, staring at his little 15 inch screen; and this little box probably has more computing power than that giant Intergraph we had when we were at NUS in the 80's. The idea of that is beautiful, more than any nice packaging or slick OS look and feel... I ask them if they'd ever considered MACS and I get loud laughter. 'Who can afford it?', they reply."

Posted at 2:12AM UTC | permalink

Mon 02 Jun 2003

Why am I writing this weblog, anyway?

Category : Commentary/welly.txt

Welly posed a question, which got me thinking, which got me closer to understanding what I really wanted to achieve by writing this weblog. I wrote a reply that's a "stream-of-consciousness" way of putting it. I really need to distill it further. But I'd hate this weblog to be merely self-indulgent. It would be a waste of time if it were so.

Posted at 4:15PM UTC | permalink