I'm sooo jealous of everyone going to PDC 2005.
I'm looking forward to watching some of the sessions this week, but don't know how on Earth I'm going to make time. There are hundreds of hours of presentations. In other words, if I spend 10 hours per day watching PDC sessions it would take me well over 25 days to see them all -- that's mindblowing.
Flickr users are starting to post pictures. Gotta love the Vista stairs - hehe!
Grrr. So jealous!
[10/30/2005 - Updated link to PDC 2005 content]
Sunday, September 11, 2005
Google gets letters
This is amazing. Can you imagine how the Google mobile search engineers must feel when they receive letters like these? Wow.
Thursday, September 08, 2005
Damn you, Scoble!
Damn you, Scoble!
I'm laying in bed, about to slam shut the laptop and go to sleep. But no, that little red plus on the Bloglines notifier icon is too tempting. Work was busy, I didn't have the chance to read a single blog today, so I figure I'll peak and see what's new in the Blogosphere.
What do I find? Channel9 has 5 kick-ass videos up of interviews with Bill Gates, Marc McDonald, Scott Guthrie and ASP.NET, Jeff Barr from Amazon, and Jason Shellen from Google (the dude who created the site that powers this blog).
There goes another hour of my time watching cool Microsoft videos. Nevermind that I spent the last hour and a half of my workday watching internal videos of new Vista technologies. Now you're invading my bed! Gee, I wonder what I'll be dreaming about tonight.. (hint: Clear. Confident. Connected.) *sigh*
I'm laying in bed, about to slam shut the laptop and go to sleep. But no, that little red plus on the Bloglines notifier icon is too tempting. Work was busy, I didn't have the chance to read a single blog today, so I figure I'll peak and see what's new in the Blogosphere.
What do I find? Channel9 has 5 kick-ass videos up of interviews with Bill Gates, Marc McDonald, Scott Guthrie and ASP.NET, Jeff Barr from Amazon, and Jason Shellen from Google (the dude who created the site that powers this blog).
There goes another hour of my time watching cool Microsoft videos. Nevermind that I spent the last hour and a half of my workday watching internal videos of new Vista technologies. Now you're invading my bed! Gee, I wonder what I'll be dreaming about tonight.. (hint: Clear. Confident. Connected.) *sigh*
What's going through my head tonight?
Today something pretty random happened. I was sitting at an outdoor meeting, and all of a sudden we hear helicopters. Everyone turns around, and BillG's helicopters (yes, plural) plop down on the lawn next to our meeting. It was neat. This is Shanti before making a presentation at the meeting. She's my manager. I think she's cool. :-)
I can't wait until my product is announced. I've found so many cool random product blogs at work... my coworker Ben and I are just waiting to jump on the work blog bandwagon. Tic tok tic tok...
So, here's some neat stuff:
GPS-Photo Link - Your camera has photo and time data. Your gps device has time and gps data. This app links the photo and gps data based on the shared time attribute. Pretty neat idea.
Geominder - Attach reminders to physical locations. This is a really neat idea. It's too bad you need to go to the location to set the reminder. I'd love to see notifications of this type that are dynamic -- show me information that's useful to me when I enter a physical location (like where free parking spots are when I drive into a parking lot).
Ah, still so much potential in location based services. I can't wait for people to start building platforms around this type of stuff. It's an area waiting to explode. If I didn't have a job that requires 100% dedication, I'd be building this in my garage right now. Oh well.
The other day my friend Mike and I took a picture of this bus with a "FREE WiFi service on this bus" ad on it. A day later, Mike found this local news article: Transit services adding Wi-Fi to buses. They're using the Junxion Box. So cool. :-)
Oh oh oh, and I read another book the other night: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni. GO READ THIS BOOK NOW (and no, I'm not taking a commission on that link to Amazon). My Director of Program Management swears by it, so I picked it up a couple months ago, but hadn't had the chance to read it. The other night I was too tired to be productive, but it was too early to go to sleep, so I picked it up off the shelf and started reading. Wow. I read the whole thing in one sitting. It's 200 pages, but very very easy reading and definitely a page turner.
In short, the book tells the story of a leader who transforms an incredibly screwed up team at a fictional company into being functional. It talks a lot about establishing trust as the foundation for a healthy team. The key concept is that absence of trust leads to fear of conflict which leads to lack of commitment which leads to avoidance of accountability which leads to inattention to results. I know.. it sounds like a mouthful of psychobabble.. but it actually rings true.
Anyway, it's a great read. Check it out if you wanna kill a couple hours reading a great book on a peaceful Sunday afternoon or somethin'.
Goodnight!
I can't wait until my product is announced. I've found so many cool random product blogs at work... my coworker Ben and I are just waiting to jump on the work blog bandwagon. Tic tok tic tok...
So, here's some neat stuff:
GPS-Photo Link - Your camera has photo and time data. Your gps device has time and gps data. This app links the photo and gps data based on the shared time attribute. Pretty neat idea.
Geominder - Attach reminders to physical locations. This is a really neat idea. It's too bad you need to go to the location to set the reminder. I'd love to see notifications of this type that are dynamic -- show me information that's useful to me when I enter a physical location (like where free parking spots are when I drive into a parking lot).
Ah, still so much potential in location based services. I can't wait for people to start building platforms around this type of stuff. It's an area waiting to explode. If I didn't have a job that requires 100% dedication, I'd be building this in my garage right now. Oh well.
The other day my friend Mike and I took a picture of this bus with a "FREE WiFi service on this bus" ad on it. A day later, Mike found this local news article: Transit services adding Wi-Fi to buses. They're using the Junxion Box. So cool. :-)
Oh oh oh, and I read another book the other night: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni. GO READ THIS BOOK NOW (and no, I'm not taking a commission on that link to Amazon). My Director of Program Management swears by it, so I picked it up a couple months ago, but hadn't had the chance to read it. The other night I was too tired to be productive, but it was too early to go to sleep, so I picked it up off the shelf and started reading. Wow. I read the whole thing in one sitting. It's 200 pages, but very very easy reading and definitely a page turner.
In short, the book tells the story of a leader who transforms an incredibly screwed up team at a fictional company into being functional. It talks a lot about establishing trust as the foundation for a healthy team. The key concept is that absence of trust leads to fear of conflict which leads to lack of commitment which leads to avoidance of accountability which leads to inattention to results. I know.. it sounds like a mouthful of psychobabble.. but it actually rings true.
Anyway, it's a great read. Check it out if you wanna kill a couple hours reading a great book on a peaceful Sunday afternoon or somethin'.
Goodnight!
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
Linux > Windows Mobile ?
Russell Beattie is "betting that the future of mobility will be Linux, and not Symbian, Windows or anything else".
I disagree.
I don't really feel like spending an hour of my time writing a big pro-Microsoft anti-Linux diatribe on the subject (because it will come off as biased and I'm actually neither pro-Microsoft or anti-Linux), so suffice it to say that I disagree with Russell on quite a few of his claims and simply think he's as wrong about Linux as he was about Symbian.
He also claimed this article supports a statement that Linux has outshipped Windows Mobile devices, when in fact explicitly notes:
One slightly misleading factor is that Gartner apparently does not include Windows Mobile "Pocket PC Phones" in the smartphone data. Thus, relative market shares of Linux and Windows may actually be closer than the Gartner data suggest.
In other words, it doesn't include any of these Windows Mobile devices -- like the one in my pocket right now.
Oops. I'm letting myself get dragged into it. Stopping.
Time will tell.
;-)
I disagree.
I don't really feel like spending an hour of my time writing a big pro-Microsoft anti-Linux diatribe on the subject (because it will come off as biased and I'm actually neither pro-Microsoft or anti-Linux), so suffice it to say that I disagree with Russell on quite a few of his claims and simply think he's as wrong about Linux as he was about Symbian.
He also claimed this article supports a statement that Linux has outshipped Windows Mobile devices, when in fact explicitly notes:
One slightly misleading factor is that Gartner apparently does not include Windows Mobile "Pocket PC Phones" in the smartphone data. Thus, relative market shares of Linux and Windows may actually be closer than the Gartner data suggest.
In other words, it doesn't include any of these Windows Mobile devices -- like the one in my pocket right now.
Oops. I'm letting myself get dragged into it. Stopping.
Time will tell.
;-)
Because even Bill Gates doesn't have a college degree...
Jenna over at the JobsBlog just made an awesome post: Ivy League and Minimum Wage.
Jenna, you rock. It's colleagues like you who make me proud to work where I do today. Any of you talented and passionate readers who do not have a formal college degree and are interested in positions at Microsoft should check out Jenna's post. I hope she follows up with a success story or two.
For those of you who don't know, I dropped out of college at age 19 to work for a couple of years. It was one of the best decisions of my life. At the same time, I must say I'm kind of glad I didn't find Jenna then, or I might never have gone back to school (another one of the best decisions of my life -- luckily I was in a place where I could do it).
BTW, as a sidenote, the JobsBlog looks GREAT! I really need to start a work blog soon...
Jenna, you rock. It's colleagues like you who make me proud to work where I do today. Any of you talented and passionate readers who do not have a formal college degree and are interested in positions at Microsoft should check out Jenna's post. I hope she follows up with a success story or two.
For those of you who don't know, I dropped out of college at age 19 to work for a couple of years. It was one of the best decisions of my life. At the same time, I must say I'm kind of glad I didn't find Jenna then, or I might never have gone back to school (another one of the best decisions of my life -- luckily I was in a place where I could do it).
BTW, as a sidenote, the JobsBlog looks GREAT! I really need to start a work blog soon...
Monday, September 05, 2005
Good to Great
Finally had a chance to catch up on some reading over the weekend. It's sad, but the airplane is one of the few places I find myself that still lends itself to reading for long periods of time without distraction. I wonder if that'll change as WiFi proliferates into more flights (sidenote: Is "into" the correct preposition for "proliferates"?) and as mobile phones become usable and I find myself sitting between two chatty cathy soccer moms unable to focus -- and we wonder why kids these days prefer gameboys and require Ritalin to function... but alas.. I digress.
My most recent read was Good to Great, recommended by my father. There are 380 customer reviews on Amazon, so I'm not about to walk you through the ins and outs here and now, but I will say that I thoroughly enjoyed the read and highly recommend it.
Recently, I've read quite a few books that tell great stories and solidify much of what we already know, but don't provide much new substance. Good to Great did not fall into that category. In fact, I'd find it hard to believe that anyone could walk away from this book not feeling more knowledgeable than before reading it.
Based on a study of companies that consistently outperformed the market by an average of seven times in fifteen years, Jim Collins and his research team explore the distinguishing characteristics that cause 'good' companies to become 'great'. These 'great' companies are then contrasted point for point with a selection of comparison companies that failed to achieve the same level of greatness.
The findings are quite interesting -- so if you've got a mind for business books, do check it out. And if you've already read it and liked or disliked it, I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts too.
Woohoo. Down to only 30 more on the "must read" list of books recommended by friends and family (but still growing faster than I can keep up).
I heard a new catchy buzzword phrase over the weekend from a friend who is working down at Sun in the bay area -- to "double click" on something, as in, to drill into something deeper. Example: "That's an interesting thought... let's double click on that (and further explore the implications)..." Muaha. I'm going to infect work with my new cheesy saying tomorrow.
Hmm... I just added it to Urban Dictionary, and was told:
Your submission is under review by editors. This can take up to 21 days. Check back here to see the results of the review.
That's lame. Imagine if it took 21 days and editor review to update Wikipedia. Oh well.
My most recent read was Good to Great, recommended by my father. There are 380 customer reviews on Amazon, so I'm not about to walk you through the ins and outs here and now, but I will say that I thoroughly enjoyed the read and highly recommend it.
Recently, I've read quite a few books that tell great stories and solidify much of what we already know, but don't provide much new substance. Good to Great did not fall into that category. In fact, I'd find it hard to believe that anyone could walk away from this book not feeling more knowledgeable than before reading it.
Based on a study of companies that consistently outperformed the market by an average of seven times in fifteen years, Jim Collins and his research team explore the distinguishing characteristics that cause 'good' companies to become 'great'. These 'great' companies are then contrasted point for point with a selection of comparison companies that failed to achieve the same level of greatness.
The findings are quite interesting -- so if you've got a mind for business books, do check it out. And if you've already read it and liked or disliked it, I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts too.
Woohoo. Down to only 30 more on the "must read" list of books recommended by friends and family (but still growing faster than I can keep up).
I heard a new catchy buzzword phrase over the weekend from a friend who is working down at Sun in the bay area -- to "double click" on something, as in, to drill into something deeper. Example: "That's an interesting thought... let's double click on that (and further explore the implications)..." Muaha. I'm going to infect work with my new cheesy saying tomorrow.
Hmm... I just added it to Urban Dictionary, and was told:
Your submission is under review by editors. This can take up to 21 days. Check back here to see the results of the review.
That's lame. Imagine if it took 21 days and editor review to update Wikipedia. Oh well.
Google Earth on CNN
Upon arriving home from my visit to the San Francisco Bay Area, I walked into my living room to find my housemate watching CNN report on the hurricane disaster situation. On the CNN set were several large displays side by side. One showed live video footage from a news helicopter. The other, right alongside it, was a live instance of Google Earth.
"Whoah", I thought to myself. The news anchor was using a mouse on his desk to drive Google Earth, setting context for the live video footage from the helicopter and the story being covered. Seeing this was a mindblowing moment for me. After poking around the products section of the Google Earth site, I discovered CNN has also used Google Earth on the air during the Iraq war. Very cool.
I guess the reason I think this is so cool has something to do with challenging the way we traditionally think about building software (or other products, for that matter). When profit is the single most important goal, we become short-sighted. We start thinking about the 80% case. We start cutting features because the lowest common denominator of users doesn't have a powerful enough computer. We spend resources developing ways to monetize a product before it even launches when we should be spending those resources pushing the limits of the technology. We define a market then let our customers tell us what they want rather than realizing we might not know who our customers are and even if we do they might not know what they want.
Google (or in this case, originally Keyhole) built something cool that pushes the limits of technology. Now it's being used by everyone from hobbyists with GPS devices to a wide range of business and government industries. I have no doubt Google will have no problem monetizing this, not to mention the unbelievable free press you get when CNN decides to broadcast your product with your logo all over it to millions of viewers simply because they find it useful (and probably cool too).
Way to go, Google Earth team!
"Whoah", I thought to myself. The news anchor was using a mouse on his desk to drive Google Earth, setting context for the live video footage from the helicopter and the story being covered. Seeing this was a mindblowing moment for me. After poking around the products section of the Google Earth site, I discovered CNN has also used Google Earth on the air during the Iraq war. Very cool.
I guess the reason I think this is so cool has something to do with challenging the way we traditionally think about building software (or other products, for that matter). When profit is the single most important goal, we become short-sighted. We start thinking about the 80% case. We start cutting features because the lowest common denominator of users doesn't have a powerful enough computer. We spend resources developing ways to monetize a product before it even launches when we should be spending those resources pushing the limits of the technology. We define a market then let our customers tell us what they want rather than realizing we might not know who our customers are and even if we do they might not know what they want.
Google (or in this case, originally Keyhole) built something cool that pushes the limits of technology. Now it's being used by everyone from hobbyists with GPS devices to a wide range of business and government industries. I have no doubt Google will have no problem monetizing this, not to mention the unbelievable free press you get when CNN decides to broadcast your product with your logo all over it to millions of viewers simply because they find it useful (and probably cool too).
Way to go, Google Earth team!
Thursday, September 01, 2005
Yet another post entitled Work, work, work.
The last few days have been pretty intense. Things are chugging right along at work, and my team is pushing hard to get out of the planning phase of our new product. We're currently operating under Microsoft's "Product Cycle Model" software development methodology. I found this pretty damn informational powerpoint presentation on our download site -- it gives a pretty good overview of PCM. I also tried Googling for the site that links to this presentation, but couldn't find it. Hopefully the download link won't die anytime soon. Anyhow, there are lots of different software development methodologies in use at Microsoft -- groups still using PCM will likely move away into more iterative and agile methodologies over time. But for now, we're stuck chugging along trying to push our way out of planning.
So today I had my first feature area review with my group's product unit manager and the rest of our management team. I presented what I've been working on, and it went pretty well. He's a down to business kind of guy -- not much positive affirmation or warm fuzzy feedback. But yeah, all and all it went well, and got lots of useful feedback out of it. Now I've just got one more review to do tomorrow with the same group. We're a small team, so I've got 3 big feature areas... which is cool. Once the reviews are over and our deliverables are in, we're out of planning and into design, where I'll be spending the next month with my head down writing functional specifications on exactly how features in my feature areas will work.
So yeah, been spending lots of time at work... a few very long days. But it's been fun, and I'm taking a break this weekend and flying down to the Bay Area for labor day. I actually took a few years off of school after my first year, and spent some time living and working out there (for a software company called Xtime). I always love getting back there and seeing all of my friends and former coworkers.
Oh, on a somewhat random note.. I've started using Macromedia Fireworks at work to make UI mockups. It's amazing! It's like a cross between Photoshop and Visio. The frames feature is especially cool. Love it.
Okay, that's all for now. Need to stop rambling and go make some dinner and change laundry.
So today I had my first feature area review with my group's product unit manager and the rest of our management team. I presented what I've been working on, and it went pretty well. He's a down to business kind of guy -- not much positive affirmation or warm fuzzy feedback. But yeah, all and all it went well, and got lots of useful feedback out of it. Now I've just got one more review to do tomorrow with the same group. We're a small team, so I've got 3 big feature areas... which is cool. Once the reviews are over and our deliverables are in, we're out of planning and into design, where I'll be spending the next month with my head down writing functional specifications on exactly how features in my feature areas will work.
So yeah, been spending lots of time at work... a few very long days. But it's been fun, and I'm taking a break this weekend and flying down to the Bay Area for labor day. I actually took a few years off of school after my first year, and spent some time living and working out there (for a software company called Xtime). I always love getting back there and seeing all of my friends and former coworkers.
Oh, on a somewhat random note.. I've started using Macromedia Fireworks at work to make UI mockups. It's amazing! It's like a cross between Photoshop and Visio. The frames feature is especially cool. Love it.
Okay, that's all for now. Need to stop rambling and go make some dinner and change laundry.
Friday, August 26, 2005
Funny videos
I saw some funny videos made at work this week:
A few summer interns decided to say goodbye by creating a music video (the waterfall and rock garden are right outside my building too!). I hope they code better than they sing. ;-)
The Virtual Earth team made a funny film on the creation of Virtual Earth. Corny, but fun to watch in a room full of hundreds of geeks chowing down on Krispy Kremes and coffee.
There was also a third video on punishing our developers for their bugs by driving sharp metal objects into their ***es, but I don't think it's been posted publicly yet and some group like legal or PR would probably have a field day with it. ;-)
A few summer interns decided to say goodbye by creating a music video (the waterfall and rock garden are right outside my building too!). I hope they code better than they sing. ;-)
The Virtual Earth team made a funny film on the creation of Virtual Earth. Corny, but fun to watch in a room full of hundreds of geeks chowing down on Krispy Kremes and coffee.
There was also a third video on punishing our developers for their bugs by driving sharp metal objects into their ***es, but I don't think it's been posted publicly yet and some group like legal or PR would probably have a field day with it. ;-)
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Google on my mind...
I finally took the bus to work! Yes, it took me having to get my car serviced before I'd get off my lazy butt and try it out -- but still, I did it! Where I'm from (Los Angeles), public transportation sucks. It's impossible and takes forever to get anywhere without a car. But out here, it's a breeze, and you beat all the traffic by traveling in the handy dandy carpool lanes.
On the ride home, I happened to sit next to a Microsoftie I met last week at the location aware software discussion. It was pretty cool chatting with him a bit more about this that and the other. It looks like he has a blog too where he's written some cool stuff about his mobile projects at MSN and some funny bus stories. I'd have to say that before today, I've never been on a jam-packed public bus where every other person has open a laptop or tablet. Probably would've been worth a picture.
In other news... Google launched Google Talk. I installed it to check it out. True to Google's form, it's very clean and simple. You can chat, and you can talk. With other Gmail users. Period. I'll be watching with interest to see whether or not this succeeds in its current form. It's definitely lacking features I would've expected, but perhaps the simplicity of it all (+ the Google brand) will be enough to make it a hit. Should be interesting.
If there's one thing I love about Google, it's that they're incredibly disruptive. What's the number one topic of conversation at Microsoft? Unequivically without a doubt: Google. And I'm not just talking about their products. We talk about their food, how much better their T-shirts fit, how they commute to and from work, and just about every other facet of work and life at Google vs. Microsoft. I have received about 200 emails related to Google in the last 3 days. At lunch, we talked about Google. In my office, Google comes up at least once an hour (thats ~10 times per day) -- not including # of times it comes up in my web browser. ;-)
So, in honor of Google's disruptiveness, I wore my Google shirt to work today. My manager came into my office and confessed that she too had a Google shirt, but was too afraid to be seen in it. I don't blame her, it definitely drew more than a few comments and stares.
Okay, my buddy Ayush just IM'd me on Google Talk, and I clicked "Call" to check it out. Oh my god. Soooo cool. I wasn't even sure whether it would work, but apparently my Thinkpad has a microphone built in and Ayush says it is crystal clear (I'm at home on wifi+comcast). I think it's pretty damn cool that you can install an app in <5 seconds, without any setup, and be seamlessly talking to people so easily online. I think the reviews are gonna lay the smack down on Google for lack of features, but this might be one case where they did 1-2 things really really well and made them incredibly easy and accessible to the world. We'll see. Whatever happens, we need more companies like Google challenging assumptions and causing disruptions. Word.
On the ride home, I happened to sit next to a Microsoftie I met last week at the location aware software discussion. It was pretty cool chatting with him a bit more about this that and the other. It looks like he has a blog too where he's written some cool stuff about his mobile projects at MSN and some funny bus stories. I'd have to say that before today, I've never been on a jam-packed public bus where every other person has open a laptop or tablet. Probably would've been worth a picture.
In other news... Google launched Google Talk. I installed it to check it out. True to Google's form, it's very clean and simple. You can chat, and you can talk. With other Gmail users. Period. I'll be watching with interest to see whether or not this succeeds in its current form. It's definitely lacking features I would've expected, but perhaps the simplicity of it all (+ the Google brand) will be enough to make it a hit. Should be interesting.
If there's one thing I love about Google, it's that they're incredibly disruptive. What's the number one topic of conversation at Microsoft? Unequivically without a doubt: Google. And I'm not just talking about their products. We talk about their food, how much better their T-shirts fit, how they commute to and from work, and just about every other facet of work and life at Google vs. Microsoft. I have received about 200 emails related to Google in the last 3 days. At lunch, we talked about Google. In my office, Google comes up at least once an hour (thats ~10 times per day) -- not including # of times it comes up in my web browser. ;-)
So, in honor of Google's disruptiveness, I wore my Google shirt to work today. My manager came into my office and confessed that she too had a Google shirt, but was too afraid to be seen in it. I don't blame her, it definitely drew more than a few comments and stares.
Okay, my buddy Ayush just IM'd me on Google Talk, and I clicked "Call" to check it out. Oh my god. Soooo cool. I wasn't even sure whether it would work, but apparently my Thinkpad has a microphone built in and Ayush says it is crystal clear (I'm at home on wifi+comcast). I think it's pretty damn cool that you can install an app in <5 seconds, without any setup, and be seamlessly talking to people so easily online. I think the reviews are gonna lay the smack down on Google for lack of features, but this might be one case where they did 1-2 things really really well and made them incredibly easy and accessible to the world. We'll see. Whatever happens, we need more companies like Google challenging assumptions and causing disruptions. Word.
Sunday, August 21, 2005
No subject
This past week has been a particularly engaging one at work... so much so, that all I've been able to think about at home... is work... and don't get me wrong... I'm totally cool with that... some of my most brilliant realizations come to me in the shower... and in the car... and I write them down and take them back with me to work... but lately... I've even started to think about work in my dreams... the last 3 nights, in fact, I've dreamt about work... and it's really beginning to get to me... because nothing productive comes from the dreams... and don't I think about work enough as it is? without it invading my dreams... the last sacred place... and I begin to wonder (don't you know that it's really making me crazy)... so I searched the web and found this Harvard study where they subjected people to hours of Tetris... and what do you know they dreamt about Tetris... I remembered hearing something about controlling dreams on the Diggnation podcast last week... so I searched some more and found this really weird site... and since their message board is so popoular it must be true... but I don't have time to try it because I'm too busy trying to learn Chinese... and thinking about work... geez... I'm starting to blog like Rory... who rocks by the way... yet another Microsoftie I wouldn't mind meeting sometime... whoah it's 1am... time to go to sleep again... sorry for the ellipses... you shouldn't be reading this anyway.
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
America is just another country
Congratulations, patriotic Americans! You've won! Foreign workers will not be able to apply for any more H-1B visas until April 2006.
Instead of bringing their brilliant talent to our great country, paying taxes to our great government, driving to Vegas on the weekends and recirculating their wages into our great economy, foreign workers will be relegated to the wide array of job opportunities in their own countries.
America will be forever stronger now! You've saved our jobs!
Instead of bringing their brilliant talent to our great country, paying taxes to our great government, driving to Vegas on the weekends and recirculating their wages into our great economy, foreign workers will be relegated to the wide array of job opportunities in their own countries.
America will be forever stronger now! You've saved our jobs!
Software, volleyball, and blogging
Yeah, it's been a week since I've blogged, and even longer since I've blogged anything substantive. Here goes.
Google's rumored acquisition of Meetro, their actual acquisition of Android, and a bunch of other buzz in the world of location-based services and location and mobility in general really rekindled my interest in the area.
Ayush, one of my collaborators on the mates project is interning at Microsoft for the summer (he's working on the IE7 search experience!). So, we decided to ping a few people we knew and float an email to a distribution list in order to organize a meeting on the subject of "location aware software".
We got quite the response, and worked our butts off Monday and Tuesday night throwing together some slides and a brief presentation for the discussion today. We had a good turnout with representatives from a wide range of product groups and research teams, and had some great discussion and ideas.
I don't know of many companies where it's completely normal for an intern and a kid straight out of college to lead an initiative among a group of people who've been at the company for 10+ years. It was certainly a humbling, yet positive experience. (Now we're faced with a new challenge: turning talk and ideas into results!)
My division had a company off-site today at a park on a lake 10 minutes from work. I generally consider manufactured bonding experiences (like off-sites and retreats) to be lame, but decides to tag along with some coworkers at the last minute - just for an hour to get some free lunch. It ended up being really cool! There were all sorts of toys -- even jet skis. I got a game of volleyball together with some of my coworkers, and ended up staying for closer to 2 hours. :-)
Robert Scoble took a trip to Google. It was interesting hearing from him about the differences he noticed between the way Google and Microsoft operate. Google is a fierce competitor, and everyone at Microsoft knows and is constantly thinking about it (a good thing).
On a related note, copies of Scoble's book are available for pre-order. I'll probably pick one up sooner or later (I wonder how quickly they'll arrive at the MS library!). Lately, I've wondered a bit about what would happen in Scoble left Microsoft for a competitor (and took his non-MS hosted blog with him). Is this a liability he covers in his book on business blogging? ;-)
Ah well, that's all I've got for now. Blogging has become rough ever since I graduated and started working full-time. I spend 90% of my time at work or thinking about work, and can blog about very little of it. It's also tough to remain unbiased and know when to bite my tongue on some of my more critical opinions of my company and my competitors -- and since we/they make up quite a huge portion of all things technology, it leaves little fair game for the blog.
*sigh* I'll think of something.
Google's rumored acquisition of Meetro, their actual acquisition of Android, and a bunch of other buzz in the world of location-based services and location and mobility in general really rekindled my interest in the area.
Ayush, one of my collaborators on the mates project is interning at Microsoft for the summer (he's working on the IE7 search experience!). So, we decided to ping a few people we knew and float an email to a distribution list in order to organize a meeting on the subject of "location aware software".
We got quite the response, and worked our butts off Monday and Tuesday night throwing together some slides and a brief presentation for the discussion today. We had a good turnout with representatives from a wide range of product groups and research teams, and had some great discussion and ideas.
I don't know of many companies where it's completely normal for an intern and a kid straight out of college to lead an initiative among a group of people who've been at the company for 10+ years. It was certainly a humbling, yet positive experience. (Now we're faced with a new challenge: turning talk and ideas into results!)
My division had a company off-site today at a park on a lake 10 minutes from work. I generally consider manufactured bonding experiences (like off-sites and retreats) to be lame, but decides to tag along with some coworkers at the last minute - just for an hour to get some free lunch. It ended up being really cool! There were all sorts of toys -- even jet skis. I got a game of volleyball together with some of my coworkers, and ended up staying for closer to 2 hours. :-)
Robert Scoble took a trip to Google. It was interesting hearing from him about the differences he noticed between the way Google and Microsoft operate. Google is a fierce competitor, and everyone at Microsoft knows and is constantly thinking about it (a good thing).
On a related note, copies of Scoble's book are available for pre-order. I'll probably pick one up sooner or later (I wonder how quickly they'll arrive at the MS library!). Lately, I've wondered a bit about what would happen in Scoble left Microsoft for a competitor (and took his non-MS hosted blog with him). Is this a liability he covers in his book on business blogging? ;-)
Ah well, that's all I've got for now. Blogging has become rough ever since I graduated and started working full-time. I spend 90% of my time at work or thinking about work, and can blog about very little of it. It's also tough to remain unbiased and know when to bite my tongue on some of my more critical opinions of my company and my competitors -- and since we/they make up quite a huge portion of all things technology, it leaves little fair game for the blog.
*sigh* I'll think of something.
Friday, August 05, 2005
Zonked.
It's been a crazy week. I decided to take 2 days off to take a mini-vacation back to Ann Arbor last weekend and had an awesome time visiting the college friends, but came back to a boatload of work.
Here's a really great description of what I do all day (or, there's always the HR version). I'd venture a guess that unless you've been a PM in a fast-paced environment, you can't imagine how much I relate to this part:
Some years ago I realized that as a PM, my definition of vacation was not just going somewhere to have fun (work is quite fun most of the time). Vacation means getting to an environment where no decisions have to be made. I used to drive my friends nuts, since I would go visit them, and they'd say "what do you want to do?", or "where do you want to go?", and I would simply say "you decide".
When I come home from work, all I want to do is curl up on the couch and watch a good movie. No discussion, no decisions -- just dim the lights, put on some tea, and relax.
Here's a really great description of what I do all day (or, there's always the HR version). I'd venture a guess that unless you've been a PM in a fast-paced environment, you can't imagine how much I relate to this part:
Some years ago I realized that as a PM, my definition of vacation was not just going somewhere to have fun (work is quite fun most of the time). Vacation means getting to an environment where no decisions have to be made. I used to drive my friends nuts, since I would go visit them, and they'd say "what do you want to do?", or "where do you want to go?", and I would simply say "you decide".
When I come home from work, all I want to do is curl up on the couch and watch a good movie. No discussion, no decisions -- just dim the lights, put on some tea, and relax.
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