On Friday afternoon I'm going to be presenting at the 2013 Silicon Beach event. Unless I have a massive change of heart between now and then, the following is roughly what I'm going to be saying. If you're attending the event, really, really, this is what I'm going to be saying so don't read the … Continue reading seven stories – Silicon Beach 2013
Category: Themes
So within a fortnight of my own departure, things appear to be entering a really interesting phase at Microsoft with Steve Ballmer's announced retirement "within the next 12 months". It's generated a flurry of press coverage, a significant uplift in the stock price and one paradox that is being frequently mentioned is that on his … Continue reading The next CEO
A few weeks ago I was chatting with an acquaintance who works for a trade body in the marketing industry, organising events for them. These events take sponsors, and the sponsors they were working with were exclusively technology service providers. Marketers buy marketing agency services, advertising space, novelty pencils and the occasional cuddly toy, right? … Continue reading The “2017 Meme”
Here's a question - what's more ecologically sustainable... a physical telephone directory, or a phone book smartphone app? At base level, the "death to paper" technologist will say the printed telephone directory claiming dead trees and non-biodegradable plastic packaging. In retort, the telephone directory publisher will respond that (somewhat incredulously) that a smart phone uses … Continue reading Infinitely measured
A couple of years ago I wrote a blog article that was unusually well read. As a colleague at the time put it, "don't think its because of anything other than your employer", which cut my literary aspirations down to size in a second. But the article - What motivates developers? broke all of the bandwidth … Continue reading What motivates developers – two years on
There was an article published on the Stratechery blog last week about the failings of BlackBerry (and Nokia) that put in mind a piece written a few years ago by The Partners' Jim Prior (and part of his book Preserved Thoughts). Ben Thompson's piece on the mobile industry noted that, in the relatively short history of personal computer … Continue reading The power of two
As the TV-licensing fee paying father of two toddlers, one of the most consumed parts of the wealth of the BBC's output in our household is CBeebies - the channel aimed at pre-schoolers. Although I use the term channel, content is probably a better description because having been born into the iPlayer age, our two … Continue reading The public service remit
About a year and a half ago I wrote about the competitive battleground that was the living room. Eighteen months later I feel I might have been missing the point; by the look of the numbers from Ofcom's Communications Market report this year, the battle for the living room has been won, by TV content. … Continue reading The living room battle is over
Every once in a while, an old colleague of mine Francis requests a theme for a blog article. A few days ago he asked me why, when we shared an office, I'd seem to pick up every sales telephone call I received. He wondered why... The mechanics of it are simple, I guess. I'm easily … Continue reading Answering the phone
Twenty or so years ago an old friend of mine set up a "knowledge-based" business and needed a loan of a couple of hundred thousand pounds to get up and running with the infrastructure required to establish a company - an office, furniture, kit, staff and so on. Five years ago I heard a chap … Continue reading Thoughts on starting up
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