IMRAN: In My Humble Opinion Podcast
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Imran Anwar brings his sharp analytical skills, understanding of geopolitical matters and bold opinions to bear on current affairs. Short, sharp and sure to "enlighten, educate and entertain." He discusses current affairs, global matters, social issues & how they impact our lives. Tongue in cheek commentaries on everything from Paris Hilton to John Bolton, the land of Moses to Bush burning the world. Click and listen, you'll love it!
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Transitioning From Guesswork To Analysis In Predicting Apple Product Transitions
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Sat, Aug 02, 2008
There has been some discussion going on about the direction of Apple next new models. Speculation became rampant when the Apple CFO referred to some product transition coming up, which may squeeze profit margins.
People are trying to guess if it means a switch from Intel to AMD, some new chipset from Semi, the company that Apple acquired, some new video chipset, etc. I can see that they can be called 'trasitions' - but then, so is changing the way a power adaptor connects to the laptop. I do not see any of these as having significant enough impact to warrant the CFO warning of some lower profit margins.
My prediction is that Apple may decide to let Mac OS X run on non-Apple 'Windows/Wintel' machines (which would lower margins and be a product 'transition' at the same time).
To keep pace with, while not really price-matching the low quality fares of HP and Dell, they would also reduce their own hardware prices somewhat, but still command a premium for additional things like Semi related chips, perhaps GPS and a WWAN capability built in.
And, finally, perhaps it is time for the granddaddy of the old and defunct Apple Newton, bring in a TouchMac. A tablet style MacBook Pro with touchscreen, iPhone like functionality, and 3D display capability.
It would be cute to call them TouchBooks, but Panasonic may object based on their Toughbook trademarks. That would be tough to book as a trademark!
What do you think?
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MADitorial: Banking On Bad Headline Writing Skills & Helping Thieves
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Wed, Jul 30, 2008
English is my third language, but even now I recall teachers at St. Paul's High School in Karachi, Pakistan, teaching us to be careful in stringing words together. One of my favorite songs, Stairway To Heaven says something about how "sometimes words have two meanings". But, sentence structure can have even more impact.
But, all too often, we see news stories, especially headlines, that can mean the opposite of what the writer intended. And, most often, they are not deliberate puns. I am sure I am guilty of such errors too.
Today's daily email from the Palm Beach Post in my Inbox is amusing.
It states:
Armored-car worker shot at bank near West Palm
Attempted robbery happened this morning Wachovia Bank on Okeechobee Boulevard.
View map of bank | More crime news
First of all, the way it is written, the text suggests that the armored car worker, an armed guard usually, is the one who shot at the bank building or something related to the bank.
Secondly, the sub-heading does not continue logically from the headline itself. For example, it could have conveyed the same information, but tied to the headline by saying something like this, "Shot by bandits during morning robbery at Okeechobee Wachovia Bank" - even using terse verbiage for space-saving reasons.
But, what I find amusing about this reporting is how conveniently the "More crime news" link is placed right next to "View map of the bank"... the better to help the next set of bank robbers plan their getaway perhaps!
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Three Blind Mice Or One Boring Politician?
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Sat, Jul 19, 2008
A FaceBook friend of mine, Amanda Bateman, posted a comment on her profile page with an interesting premise - that the three leading anchors on regular TV, Katie Couric, Brian Williams and Charles Gibson (plus, one assumes, their networks) are biased against poor Senator John McCain.
Her brief posting, cutely titled, "Three Blind Mice", simply stated, "And the biased media continues...should we be surprised? Probably not."
That was followed by the following three URLs.
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/kyle-drennen/2008/07/17/network-anchors-join-obama-world-tour-little-coverage-mccain-travel
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2008/07/if_a_network_anchor_falls_in_t.html
http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/entertainment&id=6274320
Not that the media does NOT have a bias. Of course it does. It always appears biased in favor of whoever you oppose! But I was amused to read the first link. So, I posted a follow up note to Ms. Bateman'sc comment.
I acknowledged that she did make a valid point. But I went on to say that it was amusing to read the first link and have a real pro-Republican blogger quote the... (gulp)... New York Times for an objective comment. :-)
I did not check that blog's previous postings to see what they may have to say about some opinions that Fox News Channel simply is a Republican Party propaganda machine.
This is not to defend the anchors Amanda criticized above, or their myopic lemming-like networks. But, let's not forget that, media bias not withstanding, the media reports things based on interestingness from the public's perspective.
So, Britney Spears' sister having a baby gets on the cover of People magazine but not, say, the Sudanese leader possibly being charged with genocide.
Is that particular choice a show of "bias" against black politicians or world leaders? Of course not - though I am sure some will want to think so. No. We have to look at other possible angles also.
Even my Republican friends, and objective conservative media professionals all admit, McCain has just not been a very interesting candidate or politician in a very long while. He is NOT good at thinking on his feet when an unfamiliar question is posed to him.
(See this video online of him totally lost and clueless http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/mccain_respect_contraception/ ).
He seems uncomfortable with his position. All he can do is appear "resolute" in sticking to the failed policy of the war in Iraq.
People immediately "accuse" me that I must be some extreme liberal, or Democrat, if I dare criticize anything about Republicans. But, in fact, I am a thorough independent.
Ironically, I had been a loud supporter of John McCain for President in 2000 and fully believe we would have been far better off as a nation having him, despite his somewhat loose-cannon personality, as President than the joke of the millennium George W. Bush that fate, and the Supreme Court, foisted on us.
(2004's re-election of George Bush is something Republicans and his voters have to take the blame for and know that history will judge their actions as the most destructive single influence starting America's decline in the world at a time it should have been getting far more loved, respected and emulated worldwide).
So, much that I supported McCain over Bush in 2000, and much that I respected him for being a war hero (as opposed to a war Zero like Bush), I cannot bring myself to support him for President of the United States in 2008. He has served his country ably, well, sincerely, and should be commended and respected for that. That alone is not reason to elect him President.
Does that mean, somehow, that Obama is the perfect candidate. Surely not. Obama can make mistakes, Hillary can still cause trouble enough for the Democracks -- sorry - Democrats to lose the election.
That means McCain can obviously not give up. But, just being a candidate does not a campaign make. He needs to smarten up. He has no momentum at present. He has no great ideas. He is sticking to bad ideas on Iraq. He is not exciting to the populace. Even worse, especially from the media perspective, he is just not interesting anymore.
That is what his campaign in disarray has to focus on. Try to make him be more exciting, interesting, and, yes, more creative and original than he is at present. Can it be done?
What do you think?
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Economy, Russia, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan - Bad News All Around
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Fri, Jul 11, 2008
Everywhere, on every news site, it seems there is nothing but conflict and bad news. The good news is... hold on, I am looking. Nope, I did not find any.
Just the top stories in "MyYahoo" is a litany of bad news, followed by worse.
It appears that the economic crisis we are facing today, with bank stocks melting (don't even ask how much I lost on Citibank alone), hundreds of thousands facing foreclosure, credit cards and others squeezing customers, oil trying to hit $200, is not going to get better any time soon.
Item one, at least on my view of "Top News from Reuters", is a report saying the government is mulling taking over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. What that means is that despite recent claims by their management, and top Bush economic officials, that the organizations have enough money, they in fact are preparing for a bailout. What that means for the rest of the economy, and for the American tax-payer, remains to be seen.
The second item shows that the Russians, still following the policies of Mr. Putin (whose eyes and soul apparently Mr. Bush seems to know intimately well), are actually using the recent Iranian missile tests as a reason for the USA NOT to deploy a missile shield. I am not quite sure I understand the "logic" of the Russians. I can understand them not wanting the US to deploy weapons systems that negate Russian military power, but using the (fairly) successful Iranian missile tests as a reason against that defies logic.
Wait, there is good news. The new iPhone is being snapped up by customers around the world. Great news. But, much that I love Apple and the iPhone, in the grand scheme of things, and in the serious issues we face, it is kind of silly for that news item to be displayed at par with the economic meltdown in America, the Russian military grumbling and the roar of Iranian rockets and potentially soon, Israeli jets.
The next item has me scratching my head. The Mexican government, which does not want to take back its 12 million illegal immigrants (including the many criminals and gang members they sent over), nor wants us to build a fence to keep these illegal hoards out of America, is taking us to court! And, not even our courts, but the 'World Court', where they are fighting to save five Mexican criminals from execution for deadly crimes committed in the USA! So, not only are we supposed to welcome their illegal riff-raff with open arms (doing which both Obama and McCain are falling over each other to show love for illegals), we are also supposed to welcome, and allow to roam free, those among them who commit murder or heinous crimes. Amazing.
For a second, my attention was caught by the next item - which could qualify as good news. Lebanon may be able to form a unity government. Whether that is good news or bad depends on which side of their internal strife you are on.
But, before I could dwell on that item, the last news item in that list of six top stories was just more bad news on several fronts.
Things in Afghanistan, the place where Bin Laden and his henchmen hid and planned their attacks on America, are getting worse. The Taliban are resurgent in Afghanistan, and we are losing soldiers in Iraq. The Afghan government is getting weaker and Bin Laden is nowhere to be found, and we are preparing for an attack on Iran.
And, what did we just manage to do? Our mistaken bombing just killed 47 civilians there, including women and children. Surely not a sign of success in winning hearts and minds. Bad, very bad, news.
With Bin Laden still out there, the Taliban attacking us and our allies more and more, Iraq still a morass, our economy in meltdown, and oil aiming for $200, what is a President to do... why, start a new war of course! Hello, Iran. Hello, $300 oil. Hello, total economic meltdown.
What do you think?
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MADvertising: Old Stereotype Underlies Sports Authority Under Armor New Prototype
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Tue, Jul 08, 2008
Generally, I am not a big fan of people or organizations that see, or cry, racism, or sexism, or something-ism or the other, in almost anything, even if none was implied.
However, I also strongly believe that, regardless of the (low) merits of political correctness, it is imperative for businesses, especially those in communications or consumer industries, to be cognizant of how their work(s) may be perceived. Sometimes, a racist, or bigoted, or sexist, person may deliberately create advertising, or TV characters, or movie situations that play up stereotypes. Other times it is sheer cluelessness that leads to the same results.
The latest example of such, most likely clueless, MADvertising came into my Inbox just now. It is a Sports Authority electronic promotion for Under Armor brand sportswear.
What amazes me about this image is the deliberate or inadvertent combination of racism, sexism, stereotyping as a big, strong, and apparently determined Black male is seen running after (or behind) an obviously weaker (single?) white female. Even worse, look at the expression on her face. She is not out running in a determined manner of an athlete. There is almost an expression as if she is concerned and stressed, and looking for shadows on the ground to see if someone is coming after her.
Yes, I can be accused to seeing imagery that is not there and imagining these issues where none were implied. But, that is the whole reason I call it MADvertising. Smart communicators and marketers avoid such potential pitfalls to the best of their abilities. This particular ad surely could have been done a lot better.
What do you think?
===
PS. This comment generated a lot of comments, as you can see below. I am quite amazed, and amused, by some of them, but displaying them regardless of the personal attacks. As can be seen, everyone's comments have been posted.... even the ones from the same 'anonymous' using the same computer a few minutes apart. :-)
It is also interesting to see many people completely miss my referring to this as most likely an example of clueless advertising (the world is full of more examples than just this) or MADvertising.
I think people also miss that I am personally sick of political correctness (or of pandering to particular races that a lot advertising is now doing). I am also sick of having to squint my eyes to read English instructions on product packaging because half of the space has been given up to Spanish. I detest having to choose between English and Spanish when I call banks or other companies' phone numbers. This is America. We speak English. I feel if an organization has so many customers of a particular language or ethnic group then they should set up a separate 800 number for them instead of making their (most likely) 90%+ of English speaking customers to have to select what language to speak in their own country.
But, that does not mean I can claim there is no racism here. (I will be accused of being racist for the above comment, while being accused below of seeing racism where it does not exist!)
I do raise eyebrows when I see particular ads where, for example, the likelihood of seeing Black models tends to be higher if the ad depicts some sort of stupid behavior. Again, it is not only Blacks shown doing stupid things. There are plenty of ads showing stupidity (in the name of humor) with models who are white males, females or even groups of people. (I will post something about those separately later).
But, everyone's comments are appreciated and posted here. Thanks!
Imran
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In Defense Of Self Defense & Supreme Court Shooting Down DC Gun Laws
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Thu, Jun 26, 2008
It was a split decision, but at last and at least the Supreme Court of the United States has taken a stand on the American Constitution.
Sadly, it has not had much to say on violations of the Constitution carried out by the Bush regime, nor taken any stand on the daily decline in our constitutionally protected rights.
More important to them than the Constitution being torn to shreds were Washington, DC (District of Columbia) gun laws that ban legal ownership of guns by DC citizens.
Mind you, DC, among other cities, has often vied for the Murder Capital of the World title. So, I can see the local law enforcement's logic in trying to ban guns (for the last 32 years). But, both as someone born in Pakistan and having been taught to handle my father's favorite Webley & Scott revolver, and now as an American with an affinity for Smith & Wesson/Walther devices, I fully support the right of Americans to bear arms.
Of course, the NRA, of which I should be a member but am not, would probably disagree with my contention that there do have to be some limits on the types, and possibly even number, of guns we can or should be allowed to own.
I support the right to bear arms for several reasons.
My interest in owning weapons includes having them for target shooting, self-defence and all that the Constitution intended as good reasons to bear arms.
However, I also do not think we, or any non-law-enforcement citizen, need some sort of 3000 rounds per minute assault rifle or machine gun to do all of the things above.
We live in unsafe times. Security of the homeland means protecting ourselves not just from would be suicide-bombers but also from armed home invaders, drug dealers, road-rage-warriors, thugs, muggers, petty criminals, gang members, and so many other types of vile scum that can easily snuff out our lives for a few Dollars, or on a whim.
So, I do support the Supreme Court decision shooting down the DC gun laws, but I also hope for two more things.
The Supreme Court, and American courts in general, should also not hobble American law-enforcement from coming down hard on hard core criminals who often brazenly conduct their business better armed than our Police officers.
Of course, it would also be nice if the Supreme Court actually did something more to protect the whole Constitution itself from our increasingly fascist dictatorial executive branch and lame, crippled Congress, and spineless Senate, and not just try to address one particular aspect of the Constitution. What do you think?
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2 Centences Worth: America's Worst Airline Not Growing So Fast!
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Mon, Jun 02, 2008
Not that any domestic American airline is worth loving, but few are as despised and despicable as the customer-endangering, deserving of bankruptcy, AirTran, which can try to grow as there are enough new suckers available to fall for its supposedly cheap fare offerings. What a delight to read that this flying disaster-in-waiting, customer-screwing, airline offering cheap fares at the cost of safety and service is feeling the pinch and had to defer orders for 18 Boeing 737 aircraft for four years.
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Pssst, Want To Make Money Monetizing Social Networking Instead Of Time-Wasting Social NOT Working?
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Tue, Apr 29, 2008
FaceBook, MySpace, linkedin, and so many other social networking sites offer great ways to connect with people - and lose touch with reality (and time spent on a computer). That is even before location-aware GPS and RFID devices, married to addictive platforms like FaceBook, Twitter and MySpaceTime.net (more on that later) make social networking mean even more being social and not working even during working hours.
It is so ironic that just about 16 years I wrote a piece contradicting people's then assertion that computers and the Internet were going to make us all anti-social.
Having started probably one of the first online matrimonial sites, I dared to disagree.
I felt that though we may spend more time on our computers, the Internet would actually help us find that one in a million connection from places around the world we could never have gone or known or met that person.
Little did I know how social networking would grow.
Of course, as is my forte, I have a knack for starting new things. But, in the past I also had a "rebel without a cause" habit of not sticking around in such businesses long enough to become a millionaire off them. Usually, I sat back and a few years later watched someone else do the same thing, with funding instead of personal funds, and grow rich/er. I saw the same thing as online dating grow into a huge business with the likes of match.com and others.
When I started/founded Internet email for my native country of Pakistan, I also became co-owner and co-founder of the .PK top level domain. Besides the kick of being called "father of the Internet" (at least in Pakistan), I even gave people free email addresses to promote email. But, never could I have imagined that sticking around giving something for free I could later have sold it to a giant corporation as hotmail did a few years later. Oh, well, live and learn.
When I started writing an online journal and political opinions (Occasionally Obnoxious, Obviously Outspoken Opinions) at http://imran.com in 1995-96, little did I know that I could have built some sort of "blogging" empire on that.
In 1995 I became a heavy GPS user in boating and later in aviation. In 1998-2000 I became CEO of EverTrac, among the first out the gate pitching RFID and GPS based solutions. Alas, as usual, like Panasonic's slogan, I was just slightly ahead of my time.
But, this current new momentum of GPS based devices we are seeing will prove I was on the right.... umm.. EverTrac?
Hopefully, this time, with my current projects, covering GPS, social networking and mobile-monetization - I'll actually make some real money if I can sell something to a Google or Yahoo or, some even smarter business!
If that does not happen, I guess the pattern (or call it the Corporate Culture of an Entrepreneur) here is that I love to start new things, just before their time, that others make billions off later.
So, feel free to call me about what I an doing now. Surely I can help you become a Web 2.0 multi-millionaire doing whatever I am too lazy to make money from!
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Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Beats Bush Rice Pudding For World Peace
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Sun, Apr 27, 2008
My sweet tooth (more like sweet teeth!) mean there are few desserts, and hardly any ice-creams, that I do not like. But, among my favorites are Ben & Jerry's flavors, along with Hagen Daz and many others.
I have been a fan of B&J's ice-creams from before they showed the courage to take the challenge of exposing our government's, especially the Bush administration's, follies and foolish policies.
Obviously I just consume massive quantities of Chunky Monkey, Chubby Hubby, Stephen Colbert's Americone Dreams, Half Baked, and many other flavors just to support Ben and Jerry be great corporate citizens. Fine, don't believe me!
Anyway, when I saw a link to it, I was happy to become a fan of their "fan page" on FaceBook. I saw that they have actually created several flavors and brands in support of world peace.
During the same Facebook session, I clicked on the page of a very interesting person in Israel, who had connected to me. On his page, in a section called The Wall, which is standard on most FaceBook profiles, it was very heartening to see Palestinian and Israeli members, writing literally side-by-side, for world and middle-east peace.
It was just a coincidence. But one that reminded me again that individuals, like Yaakov Ort and Ben & Jerry (as people and as a business), can, do and will achieve far more for world peace with simple web pages, than President Bush ever could, even if he had thought about actually trying.
Even just by naming some flavors for World Peace, Ben and Jerry has/have done more for peace around the world, than President Bush did in 8 years. Even with his FaceBook profile, people like Yaakov, do more than Rice can do inviting world leaders for photo-ops.
Of course, Bush still has a SO many weekends left to solve the Mid-East problem, Darfur, and other issues. Many effective techniques are at his disposal. He can have the conflicting parties come and solve it all in day --- perhaps by having some (kosher/halal, one hopes) hamburger cookoffs at his ranch.
I am not sure what dessert they serve at the Bush ranch. Surely it is not Ben and Jerry's ice-cream...
Perhaps the dessert is Rice pudding -- served on a water-board?
As I wrote in a comment on one of the profiles on FaceBook... Peace, with Dignity, and Equal Justice, to All.
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Can "Atom" Bomb? Imran's Law of Expectations
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Wed, Apr 23, 2008
Sharon Gaudlin's article in ComputerWorld April 3, 2008 begins: "With Intel Corp. betting so heavily on the mobile Internet device market exploding in the next several years, industry analysts are wondering if the fledgling business can live up to the expectations."
Intel has named the technology/chips in question ATOM. So, I guess, the question is, will Atom bomb in the marketplace?
I think some of the comments from analysts like Charles King suggest that might be the case. "For a market now in its infancy to grow that fast in just five to 10 years would be an enormous growth curve - one that may not be realistic, especially with so many people satisfied with today's iPhones and other smart phones, said Charles King, an analyst at Pund-IT Inc. in Hayward, Calif."
I think King's comments are an example of Imran's Law of Expectations: "Any technology can be sufficiently overhyped to be perceived as failing to meet expectations, even if it is commercially successful in the market."
Yes, Intel (and others) will overhype this chip, this technology and this market demand. But the market 5 years from now will be far different from current form factors, so using those as benchmarks is surely a silly way to analyze the potential for this technology. The market may be smaller than Intel's hype, it may be bigger than analysts guesses, but it will be BIG. Big enough to be commercially successful.
Five years ago people using handheld PDAs could not have foreseen millions of iPhones in people's pockets today. As Apple readies its iPhone 2 device for release shortly, with even more functionality, it will be even more likely to hit its target of number of units sold.
I can only imagine what general magic Apple, and its many copy-cat product designers will do when Intel's Atom and others' even more exciting technologies become available to them to design the next generation of cool new products.
(Update: April 23, 2008: As I was writing these lines, Steve Jobs was busy negotiating the purchase of PA Semi, a StrongARM design-based chip-designer firm. It will mean far more incredible machines from Apple. Will it be a blow to intel's Atom? Yes. Will Atom bomb? Probably not, as there will be plenty of Apple-copycats out there needing chips.)
What do you think?
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Snooping On Big Brother Snoops So Easy
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Mon, Apr 14, 2008
I am a frequent reader of ComputerWorld for many years. It often offers good news and analysis on technology as well as technology related issues. One of the areas that is of interest to almost everyone with a job that requires using a computer (isn't that everyone these days?) is employers needing to or choosing to monitor on (or spy on?) the PC and net activities of employees. Jaikumar Vijayan has written an interesting article in the April 7, 2008 issue of ComputerWorld, titled "IT 'Big Brothers' trying to keep internal users under control".
One thing most of my readers know quite clearly, is that I am a big proponent of personal liberty, freedom of speech and privacy - citizen rights that the Bush administration has worked hard to destroy for the last eight years. However, on the topic of employers' rights to monitor to employees' use of the computer and network, I fully support employers. A PC is given to employees to do work for the business, not as a personal tool.
Sure, most, if not all of us, have had to use the office computer to login to a bank's web site to pay a credit card bill, or to send a quick email from hotmail or mac.com Mail. However, that is quite clearly not abuse and I know of few employers who would target such use as abuse. (I am sure if the email being sent was sexually explicit or otherwise inappropriate, employers could find that objectionable).
But, such one-off "urgent issue" type personal use does not mean an employee has the right to be sitting writing personal emails, trading stocks, watching online videos, visiting porn sites or chatting with buddies during the hours he or she is being paid to do work.
That means more and more companies are using automated and semi-automated tools and policies to monitor use of their IT resources. ComputerWorld's article (currently available at this link) makes some great points and talks about some products. It starts off by speaking about a technology manager named Tom Scocca at some big company that he did not want identified.
But even before reading the complete article I had to laugh at the silliness of stating "Scocca, (who) asked that his employer not be named."
Don't these "Big Brother" snoops know that anyone with a PC can be snooping on them as easily. Suppose one of the people mentioned in this story was really protecting something seriously important. It is laughable to think that a person seriously targeting him or his company can not reverse snoop on him.
Tom Scocca is most likely the same person who can easily be found on the Internet as being the Senior Security Manager at Applied Materials. Since it can established that this person worked at Cisco, and may have attended Santa Clara University.
We can easily see the company proudly tell us that: Applied Materials, Inc. designs, manufactures, and sells semiconductor fabrication equipment worldwide. It operates in four segments: Silicon, Fab Solutions, Display, and Adjacent Technologies. The Silicon segment provides a range of manufacturing equipment used to fabricate semiconductor chips or integrated circuits.
Even without us feeling like being in a Mission Impossible type movie, an attacker could even speculate or analyze what Tom's attitudes or exposure to technology or even technology philosophy is by doing further research on his past job and even the courses he may have taken in the past. I think the biggest problem is that our IT managers today may be so focused on targeting small fish, they may not even know they are in the bite-path of hungry data sharks themselves.
Food for thought.
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Intel Back With A Vengeance, Apple Back To High End Drawing Board
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Tue, Mar 18, 2008
ComputerWorld (and others) have reported some interesting news items out of Intel, the erstwhile computer chipmaker.
During the last several years, it was interesting to see how Intel faced competition and where it's greatest threats came from. Instead of Intel getting beaten by PowerPC chips, that were made originally by the giants IBM, Motorola and Apple, Intel had a far rougher time competing with the brash and bold people of AMD. Now, however, the tide seems to have turned.
I have to say that intel has come back with quite a lot of steam, thunder and vengeance, or, add your own cliche' here.
I do find it amazing that Microsoft is still so far behind in helping applications and users take advantage of even the dual-core chips available today in most computers being sold today. Application makers are also not off the hook in that regard.
As usual, people are buying computers that can do far more than they can do. What I mean by that circular sentence is that the capabilities of the chips in most cases are outstripping the capabilities of the software to benefit from them.
Sure, most software products, especially image processing, speech recognition, video compression, etc. push computer CPU chips to the limit in terms of their clock speed. But, to use a bad example, that is somewhat like driving a Ferrari mostly with just one of the rear wheels, while the engine RPM nears redline.
One hopes that better use of these multi-core chips is at hand soon, before people realize that the multi-cores are not worth upgrading for.
As a MacUser I am looking forward to the Q4 release of smaller quad-core Intel chips, with QuickPath. I suspect that may be when my beloved 2003 vintage PowerBook G4 17" (whose design is still used on MacBook Pro laptops) will finally get a new shape and design.
That may also be just in time for some new battery technologies, as well as laptop sized Blue-Ray drives to become available.
That surely would be a nice toy, I mean, tool, to get in the New Year 2009.
What do you think?
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"King Of Spam" To Be "Queen Of Slam" In Prison Showers
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Mon, Mar 17, 2008
I was delighted, and highly amused, by news that the so-called "King Of Spam", Robert Soloway, has pleaded guilty to fraud and other crimes. He may face 26 years in prison.
There are several ironies here.
One, just like Al Capone, he is not going to prison for his actual crimes (shamelessly sending spam and explicitly inappropriate content, without caring if children were the recipients, costing users and ISPs millions or more in extra costs and time/effort wastage) but for tax fraud. Al Capone must be turning in his grave.
Two, it would be such sweet poetic justice, and irony, when he finds himself the new "Queen of Slam" or 'bitch' of some hard core prisoners in the prison cells and showers.
Triple the irony, if his new "Daddy Bubba" and buddies are criminals who had actually ordered and used penis enlargement pills AND Viagra that Robert Soloway may have at one time emailed them about.
Quadruple the irony, if those pills actually had worked... poor Robert Soloway. It's going to be a long, long, long, hard, hard, hard 26 years in prison.
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NY Governor Spitzer In Bed With Prostitution Ring, Literally
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Mon, Mar 10, 2008
It appears that Elliot Spitzer, NY's holier-than-thou(sands) crime-busting, Governor has given one final opportunity to NY to Spit Out Spitzer. I had created those domain names and web sites to express my disgust with his decision to give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants (which they could then use to gain other documentation, and learn to fly planes if they wanted).
Most people remembered (and I respected) him for his going after white collar crime. It seems it was more than Wall Street crooks that Spitzer was doing things to/with. The NY Times reports he is admitting to being involved with a prostitution ring. So, selling out American interests by giving driver licenses to illegal immigrants was not as big a problem, but having sex may have him thrown out of office. What do you think?
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Is Indian Outsourcing Industry Losing Out To Other Sources?
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Wed, Mar 05, 2008
Someone posted an interesting question on LinkedIn, that I have also seen being asked in other places, whether India was not the top outsourcing destination and why?
From discussions I have had with various people, and my own observations, I think that, yes, India's value as an outsourced services provider has increased in volume but is now less of a cost advantage to client companies. Quality has suffered, and many American companies in particular have pulled back from Indian operations.
While it will take some time for India to fall off its perch as the main focus of IT and even other professional services outsourcing, IT is beginning to show some changes.
Several factors are at play. In the past Pakistan, etc. could not really come close to what Indian companies could offer in a scalable manner. Such countries are getting better, though India still has far more momentum.
A major problem, besides India's poor infrastructure, is the fact that GOOD Indian engineers can now command salaries not a small but a significant fraction of salaries for similar positions in the USA.
Additionally, the quality of resources being churned out, almost mass-produced, by the professional/educational system there is not at par with what Indians have previously built a great reputation on. So some clients are starting to see significant declines in quality and significant increases in the amount of hand-holding or reiterations needed to get things right.
That still does not mean it is a slam dunk for Pakistan, Bangla Desh, etc. to steal India's thunder. India still offers far greater stability than, say, Pakistan can - so a US businessman is not going to worry too much about being beheaded during a trip to India.
So, yes, India is vulnerable to good competition on cost with good quality work. But, it is not on the way out.
Certainly many Pakistani and other countries' companies are leveraging that. But, I do not see Pakistan's built-in tendency to self-destruct any great opportunity going away anytime soon. Having been born in Pakistan, I have been an entrepreneur in Pakistan in the 80s. I know how tough it was then - even before suicide bombings became a problem. Now, suicide bombings targeting Pakistanis are a DAILY occurrence. I can only imagine how difficult it would be for a Pakistani company to convince Americans or any foreign clients to visit and freely move about the country.
I surely respect those that are trying to do it in the even worse situation of law and order they face. Their job is not going to be easy to even catch up to India, much less get ahead. But, time, effort and rising Indian costs can give them a better foot in the door than ever in the past.
In the meantime, Indians being far more strategic and better business-minded thinkers, are doing a great job not just moving up the "food chain" in services they provide, but are also leveraging global capital markets to turn the tables and buy American and European companies.
I do not see Pakistan's biggest business, industry and media tycoons thinking or being far sighted beyond the lengths of their own noses.
What do you think?
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If Bill Gates Had Gone Into The Food Business
noreply@blogger.com (Imran Anwar)
Tue, Mar 04, 2008
A magazine I otherwise respect, CIO, did a piece recently asking:
What If Bill Gates had Become a Restaurateur Instead of Making Software?
Imagine if Bill Gates had studied food science instead of computer science. A world without the Empire That DOS Built would be a very different world...
On these blog pages I have written plenty about Bill Gates supposed contribution to computing. (e.g. http://www.imran.com/media/blog/2005/05/stolen-content-from-bill-gates-new.html )
Most people with knowledge of computing will agree that Bill's 'vision' usually consists of speeches about technologies available on Apple 2-3 years prior, or already commercially known. His biggest "visions" have been that people do not need more than 640KB of memory on their PCs, the Internet is a fad, etc.
Quite frankly, if Bill Gates had gone into the food business, most people buying his food would have diarrhea or food poisoning most of the time - and they would just get used to it.
Gates would still get rich, by selling repackaged versions of the same food based on promises of less diarrhea and less pain.
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