For some time now one of the companies I’ve been working with has been designing a product for software defined networking. With the advent of cloud computing and highly distributed services based computing models, the whole area of networking is enjoying somewhat of a technological renaissance. As you can imagine, we delve into some pretty interesting areas of networking topology, connectivity, latency and other geeky subjects. My good friend Harry Quackenboss, who is CEO of the company, is probably one of the most knowledgeable people in the area of network design. Having been CEO at a couple of networking and server companies before joining LAYERZngn, Harry is no stranger to dealing with some pretty technical issues. Read more…
Innovation, Technology cloud computing, data center, fiber optics
How many times lately have we seen this scenario: Big company “X” decides to change a policy or implement a new fee for something. Then a few days later they do a complete “180”, stating that they are being sensitive to the desires and wants of their customers. All in the spirit of promoting the highest levels of customer satisfaction…
Let’s take a look at a few real world examples. Bank of America implements a $5 per month fee for debit card use. After a vitriolic public outcry, BofA reverses its decision, stating “Our customers’ voices are most important to us. As a result, we are not currently charging the fee and will not be moving forward with any additional plans to do so.” GoDaddy.com publicly announces support for the Stop Online Piracy Act, and suffers a huge backlash, with well-organized “boycott GoDaddy” campaigns on communities such as Reddit. Read more…
Business brand, groundswell, marketing
The IT world is changing around us as we speak. While the global economy may be stalled, innovation in information technology continues at a healthy clip. Along with this change comes the challenge of understanding not only how all the new moving parts fit together, but also how the economics associated with traditional IT architectures and service delivery models are being reshaped.
I’ve penned a few thoughts over at SummaLogic on some of the key factors that are driving changes in the economic model of the technologies that make up the underpinnings of the next generation data centers and cloud computing services. Read my thoughts on this subject here…
Business, Technology cloud computing, economics, information technology, Innovation
OK… maybe I’m beating a dead horse here… I’ve already written numerous articles and essays on the subject of social networking and social media “influence.” So why am I yet again spending time putting more words to screen?
A couple of events lately prompted me to revisit this topic. First, Robert Scoble recorded an interesting treatise on Klout over at his blog. In a nutshell, he basically reinforces my position that Klout scores are fundamentally flawed when it comes to measuring “influence.” Like me, he does see some relevance to “participation” in the social networking world. But as far as a meaningful measure of the influence a person has in the digital/social world… it has been and continues to be a seriously flawed indicator. Read more…
Business influence, klout, social media, social networking
Jon Stokes recently penned an interesting article on cloud computing innovation over at Wired Cloudline. In his article Mr. Stoke posits that the current tech bubble is stifling innovation – primarily from the perspective that the skills required to implement cloud computing models are in short demand, exacerbated by the rapid change in technology induced by Moore’s Law and the free flow of “go go funding” from the VC community, which creates an environment where it’s easy for the really smart people to go work on the latest whiz-bang startup idea. This in turn draws down the talent pool which is needed to enable cloud adoption and innovation. While there are several interesting points in Mr. Stokes’ article, I believe that if cloud innovation is being stifled, it’s not because of the current tech bubble.
Read more…
Business, Technology cloud computing, Innovation, Moore's Law
