Family Learning Center

Posts Tagged ‘Openness’

MySpace Stream Architect Monica Keller Jumps To Facebook

Monica Keller, a MySpace Group Architect who has played a key role in advancing MySpace’s initiatives in activity streams and openness, is leaving the company to join Facebook. Keller announced the news in a blog post this evening. She will be joining Facebook as an Open Source and Web Standards Program Manager, where she’ll be joining a team that includes David Recordon and Luke Shepard. MySpace confirmed that Keller had left the company but declined to comment further.

Keller played a key role in launching MySpace’s Real-Time Stream API, helping to design the Real Time Stream using PuSH and architecting the network’s Twitter Sync Ingest.  Keller was involved with the technical aspects of the Stream, and was also involved with the design of MySpace’s developer platform. She’s also represented MySpace on numerous conference panels.

While Keller has some nice things to say about the struggling company in her post, she clearly wasn’t pleased with the way some things were handled at MySpace:

But I have chosen to leave. While I was able to have some temporary creative freedom this is not the norm or part of what other engineers enjoy and I do not feel there is one cohesive push to deliver the best we can deliver anymore.

To my friends and colleagues at MySpace, some parting advice:

It is imperative that MySpace puts in place strong technical leadership who can attract good technical talent and make well-informed decisions. It is important that they stay connected to rest of the world and work on interoperable standards and solid products which benefit the end user. Many of my fellow engineers have fantastic ideas and a plan for phased delivery.

This is a loss for MySpace, but it certainly isn’t the end of their real-time and open initiatives (which have been more progressive than Facebook’s).  We hear that these are still being spearheaded by recently promoted MySpace co-president Mike Jones, and that Christina Wodtke, who recently joined the company after running the activity stream product at LinkedIn, is involved in running the team’s day-to-day operations.

Image by Adam Tinworth.

Read the whole story…

WebOS homebrew MyTether app updated, brings WiFi hotspots to Verizon Palms w/o the extra subscription

Since the last time we mentioned it, the MyTether app for WebOS phones has gone up in price from a requested $10 donation to $14.95, but that’s still considerably cheaper than Verizon’s $40 per month Mobile Hotspot plan. We’re still leery about what usage/overusage could mean for your contract & bill, but a new beta version has been posted that officially supports the Pre Plus and according to the developer “makes use of the API calls behind MHS” to let it work more smoothly. Even with the Pre’s openness to hackery we had some issues getting the beta installer to operate on our Windows 7 machine but once it was installed it worked as promised, giving comparable speeds to a dedicated EV-DO card on the same network. Other new features include automatic tracking of data usage and the ability to manage connected devices directly on the app. Other than some compatibility issues with WebOS updates there hasn’t seemed to be any blowback from Sprint or Palm on this app so far, we’ll see if Verizon has any issues with its premium priced turf being encroached upon.

WebOS homebrew MyTether app updated, brings WiFi hotspots to Verizon Palms w/o the extra subscription originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 03 Feb 2010 23:08:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  Pre-Hacks  | Email this | Comments
Read the whole story…

Some Pros and Cons of a Google Tablet with a Chrome OS

The Chrome OS is a bit different than most operating systems. Scheduled to be unveiled late this year, the Chrome OS is entirely cloud-based.

It’s still speculative to say if Google is really working on a tablet computer. But let’s assume for a minute that Google is developing such a device with a Chrome OS.

Sponsor

I guess that’s not too hard to do considering this concept video Google created.

The Chrome OS opens some interesting opportunities for Google. A cloud-based operating system would make a tablet unique compared to the iPad. No data would be stored on the device at all. A lost tablet would not mean lost data. The information would be retrieved simply by going online.

But the absence of actual data on a device is also an inherent weakness. There are some things you always want to have on your device. For instance, client-based software. You can’t do that with an operating system that’s all in the cloud.

Further, since the Chrome OS is not coming out until late next year, it does face some challenges. First off, Windows Mobile 7 will most likely be unveiled before Google launches the Chrome OS, giving Microsoft a head start in the market. The iPad OS is more mature. Apple has more experience with UX development in this regard.

Speed

In the tech press, we get caught up with issues such as openness. Do customers really care that much? We think they prefer open systems because of the options that come with.

What they really want, though, is speed. A goal for Google with the Chrome OS is to make it very fast. But the iPad is lightning quick. By developing its own processor for the iPad, Apple is realizing a customer desire. Would a Google Tablet with a Chrome OS be as fast as the iPad?

Security

The Chrome OS is a browser-based operating system which inherently raises issues about its security. Browsers are widely acknowledged as prime targets for malware. Remember, Google suffered a cyber attack through an employee’s compromised browser (Internet Explorer).

But are the criticisms founded? The Chrome OS is an open environment. It’s not an air-tight vault. Google knows it has bugs. So, they have gone out to the community, like good developers do, and challenged people to find the flaws. We like what Threat Expert has to say about the matter:

“By openly discussing the security challenges and suggested approaches to circumvent them the Chrome guys talk to us this way:

‘Look, in our bank there is a vault with so much gold in it. The system is secure, but we’re not sure about that air con duct – we think it’s a weak point and the intruders may potentially crawl through it.’

Given the source code is open, the potential intruders will get access to the internal scheme immediately. But the moment they start studying it, the highly qualified white-hat professionals will start doing that as well. The idea is that any bugs, flaws or weaknesses will be revealed and fixed instantly, without leaving the intruders any chance to plan an attack.

Compare it with an alternative approach: ‘Look, in our bank there is a vault with so much gold in it. The system is secure.’ After the robbery: ‘The system is secure.’ After another one: ‘Ok, we fixed it, the system is secure’, and so on.”

It is smart. But that is what we expect from Google. A smart approach. Here’s Google’s take on how it approaches the security issue with Chrome OS:

Conclusion

A Chrome OS makes sense on a device like a tablet computer. Google’s focus is on cloud computing. Perhaps the most valid criticism is Google’s broad approach and lack of experience in the hardware market.

Google is learning and they have some clear advantages. The iPad does not support multi-tasking. The Chrome OS makes it easy to manage multiple applications. Lacking features means Apple won’t dominate with the iPad. But the Chrome OS is a first-time operating system that is unprecedented in its approach.

That’s not always a recipe for market domination.

Discuss

Read the whole story…

Former Current TV strategist Sloan jumps to Twitter

Robin Sloan, a former strategist and executive at Current TV, is joining Twitter to handle media partnerships. He says he’ll help “producers, reporters, developers and strategists at media orga­nizations that want to do cool, transformative things with tweets.”

He was recruited by a former colleague Chloe Sladden, who experimented with one of the earliest of uses of Twitter against a live broadcast. During the first presidential debate of the 2008 campaign, Sloan built an application that would overlay curated tweets over the bottom of the screen (see the video below).

He didn’t give any specifics as to how he sees Twitter working with media organizations. Instead, he pointed to how quickly the company’s ecosystem has evolved.

He wrote on his blog:

“I feel like I’m constantly learning and re-​​learning how to use Twitter. And I think that’s because, paired with this odd constraint, you’ve got this crazy openness—this refusal to specify exactly what you’re supposed to do with the service, or how, or even why. So those determinations fall to us, and as a result, the whole thing seems to be convulsing and transforming, like, every six months.”

Sloan was auspiciously also the author of Twitter’s five billionth tweet.

Read the whole story…

Android dual-boot could make Nokia N900 jack of two trades

Maemo’s already pretty open as open platforms go, but what’s better than a single open platform on your open phone? Two open platforms, of course, creating a vortex of pure, unadulterated openness the likes of which the world has never seen. Hacking is par for the course with Nokia’s N900, so it comes as no surprise to see that a motivated individual has managed to get his unit set up in a trick dual-boot configuration with Maemo on internal storage and Android on a separate partition loaded from the microSD card. He says it’s “proof of concept” for the moment — but to steal his words, “its [sic] real and it could be spectacular.” We couldn’t agree more, and as much as Nokia loves its own code, we can’t help but think this precisely the sort of tinkering the N900 was made for. Check video of the magical boot after the break.

Continue reading Android dual-boot could make Nokia N900 jack of two trades

Android dual-boot could make Nokia N900 jack of two trades originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 23 Jan 2010 18:34:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink SlashGear  |  Brandon’s Posterous  | Email this | Comments
Read the whole story…

For Google, The Meaning Of Open Is When It’s Convenient For Them

Yesterday, Google published a long manifesto on the “meaning of open” in the form of an email to all employees republished as a blog post. In it, senior VP of product management Jonathan Rosenberg, makes an eloquent argument for why open systems always win and urges Google’s employees to always strive to be open when designing products. An open Internet spurs innovation and brings more consumers on board, which ultimately means more searches and increased use of Web applications.

The gist of his argument is that a bigger, better Internet is good for Google. He writes that Google employees should resist the impulse to create closed products and systems, and even makes a swipe at Apple for doing so (bold added for emphasis):

. . . open systems win. This is counter-intuitive to the traditionally trained MBA who is taught to generate a sustainable competitive advantage by creating a closed system, making it popular, then milking it through the product life cycle. The conventional wisdom goes that companies should lock in customers to lock out competitors. . . . a well-managed closed system can deliver plenty of profits. They can also deliver well-designed products in the short run — the iPod and iPhone being the obvious examples — but eventually innovation in a closed system tends towards being incremental at best (is a four blade razor really that much better than a three blade one?) because the whole point is to preserve the status quo. Complacency is the hallmark of any closed system. If you don’t have to work that hard to keep your customers, you won’t.

It all sounds great and Google certainly is a champion of open systems with Android and Chrome and countless other projects. Google is making a very public effort to claim the mantle of openness. But the battle for this mantle has been going on for a long time. Two years ago, I wrote a post titled “Who Is The Opennest Of Them All?”. What I noted then bears repeating:

But don’t be fooled. Companies are very selective about the areas where they choose to be open, and they very rarely open up their core source of profits voluntarily. . . . So the next time a company touts how open it is, ask yourself how that will help it make more money. Don’t confuse openness with altruism.

Google is only open when it is convenient for them. Google will never open up the source code to its search algorithms or its advertising system, or share the core data which gives it a competitive advantage in those areas because that is where it makes all of its money. Again, I pointed this out in that post two years ago:

Just because industry pressures and increased interconnectedness are forcing companies to embrace open technologies, don’t confuse openness with profitability. Open standards tend to be good for spurring the adoption of new technologies, but not so good for generating profits directly. That is why companies choose to be open along axes where they don’t compete. Google, for instance, is a big proponent of open standards in social networking, mobile networks, Web applications, and practically everywhere —except the one place it makes money. Its advertising system is a black box. You also never hear any talk coming out of Google about opening up the search algorithms that drive all of those advertising revenues. In contrast, Google has no problem championing open standards in industries that it is hoping to disrupt (by commoditizing existing business models with open standards, and making money with advertising instead).

Rosenberg realizes there is an incongruity between what he is saying and what Google is doing. He takes a stab at rationalizing this huge exception to Google’s embrace of everything open:

While we are committed to opening the code for our developer tools, not all Google products are open source. Our goal is to keep the Internet open, which promotes choice and competition and keeps users and developers from getting locked in. In many cases, most notably our search and ads products, opening up the code would not contribute to these goals and would actually hurt users.

Maybe, but it is more likely it would hurt Google. The company has good reasons for keeping those things closed tight. Opening up those black boxes would make it easier to spam search and game AdWords and give competitors valuable data to make their own search engines and advertising systems better. If it opened all of that stuff up, it would have to work harder to keep its customers.

And really nobody should begrudge them the right to keep products they’ve spent a lot of time, energy, and money building to themselves. But don’t give us this song and dance about how everything should be open and how Google is the opennest company in the world. Google has nothing to lose if operating systems, mobile phones, browsers, books, news, and every other industry becomes open and free, as long it can make money from search and advertising. That is exactly why Google is so disruptive. It can offer products for free that other industries charge for, as long as those products result in more searches or other advertising opportunities.

There is nothing wrong with this strategy. The fact that Google is pushing openness in so many industries is generally a good thing for startups and consumers alike. But Google should just be honest and say that they think everything should be open—except for search and advertising.

(Image via j/f/photos).

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

Read the whole story…

Shocker: Ars, Hollywood agree on need for ACTA openness

MPAA head Dan Glickman sent a letter yesterday to both Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and to US Trade Representative Ron Kirk in which he called for a serious US push to pass the secretive Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. That’s certainly expected—ACTA contains a host of goodies for Hollywood and the recording industry—but what came as a surprise was Glickman’s irritation at various ACTA “protests” which create “apprehension over the Agreement’s substance.”

He’s referring to online outlets that have hoisted the anti-ACTA flag over the last year, accusing the treaty of being a pretext for ramming “three strikes” laws through without Congressional oversight or empowering Customs agents to check the contents of your iPod. Based on our reporting, neither of these items appears to be in the draft text, but the secretive nature of the negotiations and the bland, impenetrable public statements about ACTA have fueled plenty of suspicion.

Read the whole story…

Palm: Free Apps For The Web, Free Development For Open Source, And Free Phones!

I’m here in San Francisco for a meeting Palm has called to give its newest employees, Ben Galbraith and Dion Almaer, who both came over from Mozilla, a chance to talk a bit about the state of the webOS platform.

The two, along with Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein and some other executives spoke at length about the hardware, the platform, and the plan going forward. The message was pretty clear: Web development is the future, and openness is the way. They also made a few big announcements.

The first is that they’re allowing developers to fully distribute their apps via the web. What this means is that developers can simply submit their apps to Palm, and Palm will return to them a URL that they can then blog, tweet, do whatever they want to share it. When a person then clicks on that URL they can easily install the app, bypassing any kind of store. And while Palm is providing the URL, it is not going to be reviewing the apps in any way — a clear dig at Apple’s approval process.

Palm did note that they will still offer their App Catalog (their app store) for developers who want that too. Presumably, any app developer who wants to charge for their app will still have to go through the store. And for those developers, Palm will charge $50 for the apps to go into the Catalog.

The next announcement is that Palm is waiving the $99 yearly fee it normally charges to developers to make webOS apps if those apps are going to be open source. Galbraith and Almaer with their Mozilla backgrounds are big proponents of open source, as are many that were in the audience tonight, so this move drew cheers.

On top of that, Palm is opening up all of its analytical data to any developer who wants to access it. Again, this is different from Apple which keeps much of the analytical data for itself, and shares little.

And finally, in an effort to spur development for the platform, Palm announced that it is giving to every developer in the audience a free Pre, and its new wireless charger. On top of these, everyone will get a month free of Sprint service to use the device and tinker with developing for it. “Just hack on it,” Galbraith said.

So now Palm has had its “Oprah moment,” just as Google did a few months ago at Google I/O where they gave a G2 to everyone in the audience. That was a much bigger audience, but the gesture is still a good one from Palm. Here’s the takeaway from tonight: Galbraith and Almaer are the new sheriffs in town and they want to open things up an get you developing for webOS.

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

Read the whole story…