Nokia adds 14 patents to complaint, citing Jobs' 'Great artists steal' comment
Responding to Apple's vehement countersuit against Nokia, in which it leveled 13 patent infringement allegations against Nokia's 10, last December 29, Nokia added 14 more to the mix, including for concepts that may perhaps be as integral to the construction of modern telephones as power-conserving voltage-controlled oscillators, and a sensor that de-activates touchscreens while the phone is held against the ear.
The assertion made in Nokia's latest amended complaint is that Apple based the design of the iPhone around Nokia concepts, implying that Apple may have actively reverse-engineered Nokia's phones to do so -- rather than stumbling upon the same concepts accidentally in its own research. Upholding the notion that Apple would rather steal than innovate, Nokia cites a 1996 statement made by Apple's then-former-CEO Steve Jobs, in a PBS documentary by Robert X. Cringely entitled "Triumph of the Nerds."
5 things I know to be true about the Apple tablet
If you're looking for leaked Apple tablet product specs and photos, this post isn't for you. But if you're interested in a hearty (and discussion disrupting) list describing what the product's impact already is (and will be, if released), please read on.
1. It's mythical. Like the sasquatch, unicorns or alien invaders (yeah, yeah, the truth is out there), the Apple tablet doesn't exist until someone finds one. Sure there are rumors and unconfirmed sightings. But no one outside Apple or its NDA-bound partners/developers really knows what it is, or if it really exists. The government may have successfully guarded its Area 51 secrets (downed alien aircraft or U.S. test plane?), but the G-Men are in many respects no match for Apple. No one protects super secret projects like Apple. Much of the information out there is likely false.
The world does need a tablet, but not the one you're thinking
The problem with a manufacturer creating a new market is that it must demonstrate a latent need among a sizable plurality of potential consumers, for a product they don't know they need. No one ever needed an iPhone...until round about January 2007.
The current debate about the probable Apple tablet, or tablet-like, product, whose formal announcement is slated for January 26 in San Francisco, is really about whether another latent, iPhone-like need actually exists, or whether Apple may be tapping for oil where there is no oil -- something the company has done in its history, more than once. The debate was joined last week by our Betanews contributors: independent analyst Carmi Levy, who argued in favor of breaking through the smokescreen of hype and reassessing our priorities with respect to personal and business needs and wants; and former Jupiter analyst Joe Wilcox, who argued that Apple has not demonstrated a market need for the type of device that most reasonable speculation and analysis projects an Apple tablet device to be.
What you want from an Apple tablet
Yesterday's request for Betanews readers to answer "What would you use an Apple tablet, or any other, for?" has brought plenty of answers, perhaps because the post -- "The world doesn't need an Apple tablet, or any other" -- was so provocative. I wrote that post to bring some sanity to the outrageously loud Apple tablet hype. Instead, the post stirred up geek emotions and several, pointed rebuttal blogs (Marc Flores, Robert Scoble and MG Siegler, among others). I won't defend yesterday's post here. It stands or falls on its merits.
But I do want to call out some readers' responses about what they would do with an Apple tablet. As I write, there are 119 comments, which is enough for some of the best ones to get lost. I want to thank you all for sharing your enthusiasm about the mythical Apple tablet and what you would do with it. Some of the best comments were simply too long to present here; my apologies for omitting them. They could have been separate posts, and maybe they should be. The comments collected here are presented randomly.
The world doesn't need an Apple tablet, or any other
Apple's rumored tablet computer cannot live up to the hype, which has reached almost ridiculous levels of rumor, speculation and anticipation. The rumored tablet will fall short of expectations, because they are simply too unrealistic. What surprises me most about the excitement and early analyst sales projections: No one is talking about addressable market.
So I'll assert what should be obvious to anyone thinking rationally and not emotionally: Tablet is a nowhere category. For all the hype about an Apple tablet , it is at best a niche product. The world doesn't need an Apple tablet, no matter what the hype about rumored features or regardless of what actually releases (if anything).
LG finally brings mobile digital TV hardware to the States
Mobile Digital TV is still about a year away from mainstream adoption, but major strides were made in 2009. Now on the last day of the year, consumer electronics company LG has announced it will finally be showing off Mobile DTV products at the Consumer Electronics Show.
The mobile DTV concept has been developing for more than three years, but only began to seriously take off in the last four months, after the Advanced Television Systems Committee approved the A/53 ATSC Mobile DTV standard.
AT&T: The end of the wireline telephone is in sight
In an historic public response to the US Federal Communications Commission's request for comments regarding its forthcoming National Broadband Plan, due before Congress on February 17, AT&T acknowledged not the forthcoming obsolescence, but the current obsolescence of the wireline telephone system. Without shame, it even applied the once-degrading acronym "POTS" (Plain Old Telephone System), interchangeably with "PSTN" (Public Switched Telephone Network), to refer to the one-time marvel of technology that defined its predecessor, the Bell System, in the 20th century.
But the new AT&T went a huge step further than to denigrate its stepchild. In its filing dated December 21 and released Tuesday (PDF available here), the company called upon the Commission to begin consideration of a formal deadline for the transition of all wireline customers to a wireless system comprising broadband and IP-based connectivity -- refraining from referring to 3G or 4G services in a cellular context. AT&T's reasoning: Carriers can no longer afford to maintain the old network while simultaneously building out the new one.
Hype this! Apple's marketing puppet show continues
We segue into 2010 with rumors swirling around the biggest mega product announcement since the iPhone. If Apple's mythical tablet device -- the "iSlate," if insiders and analysts are to be believed -- is in fact announced sometime in January, Apple fans will once again dance in the streets before lining up in the middle of the night, wallets in hand, ready to buy into the latest must-have doodad from Cupertino.
Not that I'm one to make resolutions. They are, after all, pointless promises that are inevitably broken before the last bit of confetti has been swept out of the gutters in Times Square. But if I ever had to make one, it would be to ban the Apple hype machine permanently from our midst. The noise from all this speculation is hurting my head, and I just want it to stop.
Ten resolutions Microsoft should make for 2010
Each year, I offer a list of things Microsoft should do in the coming year, in lieu of making predictions. It's a bit arrogant to tell Microsoft what to do, but I've got a good track record of giving advice that is right. The year ahead will be challenging for Microsoft, as the company struggles against weak global economies and to successfully launch cloud services.
Ten resolutions aren't enough. I had to ignore so many others, such as keeping CEO Steve Ballmer (don't fire him!) or uniting Xbox and Zune (something already underway). The list is in order of importance, from least to most, from 10 to 1.
2000-2009: Microsoft's decade of shattered dreams
This will be the toughest commentary I likely will ever write about Microsoft. It is toughest for me to compose because I see what Microsoft could have been in 2009 from where it started in 2000. It is toughest on Microsoft, more than anything I may ever write again about the company.
I dedicate this seemingly harsh post to all the Microsoft employees that privately have complained about management problems -- not because they were mad or resentful but because they desperately wanted to fix the problems. They spoke to me in confidence out of their love for Microsoft. I apologize for not speaking up for them before. I do so today, as reflection on the past to shed light on future actions. The decade 2010 could be better if Microsoft learns from its mistakes.
Live poll: Is the cloud your business' next killer app?
0(online surveys)
The hosting of software and services in leased, private clouds is already a reality for many businesses worldwide. But the synchronization of confidential data is the next big step, and while technologists declare "the cloud" as something that is happening, like climate change, CIOs aren't always ready to take the plunge.
But services such as Microsoft Exchange synchronization are already among us. Is that a cloud app? Recently, Microsoft has been saying yes, as it rolls out its own leased Exchange hosting services to many classes of business, including SMBs. The difference between hosted Exchange and Exchange Server is that it's Microsoft that's doing the hosting. And in synchronization services such as those being constructed by Google and others, employees' data could follow them wherever they go, from their PCs to their Android phones and on the road. Almost like Eeyore, users wouldn't be able to escape the cloud over their heads.
Russinovich: A possible cure for exploitable heap corruption in Windows 7
The key to a huge plurality, if not a majority, of exploits that have plagued Microsoft Windows over the past two decades has been tricking the system into executing data as though it were code. A malicious process can place data into its own heap -- the pile of memory reserved for its use -- that bears the pattern of executable instructions. Then once that process intentionally crashes, it can leave behind a state where the data in that heap is pointed to and then executed, usually without privilege attached.
Yet it doesn't take a malicious user to craft a heap corruption. Multithreaded applications that make use of collective heaps become like multiple users of a single, distributed database. Without intensive methodologies to maintain vigilance, making sure one thread doesn't corrupt an application's heap for all the other threads, the app collapses into something more closely resembling the more colloquial meaning of the metaphor "heap." Microsoft would like to present its development environments and runtime frameworks as providing these vigilance services on behalf of the developer, so she can concentrate on her application. But in recent years, what developers don't know about what's going on under the hood, has come back to bite them.
The case for the government-based private cloud
[The author of this article is Bob Flores, the former Chief Technology Officer for the US Central Intelligence Agency. Currently he's a private government technology consultant with Applicology Inc., and a member of the board of directors of St. Louis-based cloud computing software maker Appistry.]
Hope was a slogan and a sentiment that played a major role in the US presidential election of 2008, and hope continues to be the mindset of technology advocates pushing for cloud computing in the public sector. As a former government employee with a long history in the intelligence field, I can easily see how cloud computing can contribute to the country's security and prosperity.
Lessons learned by IT in 2009 #2: Microsoft sheds its 'Dr. Evil' costume
The personification of evil in the modern world: Dr. Heinz Doofenschmirtz, from Disney Channel's "Phineas and Ferb."
The problem with characterizing any kind of business, including information technology, as "war" is that it immediately polarizes the opinions not only of the war's practitioners but also of its observers. Once an enemy is formally declared, the concept of "If you're not with us, you're against us" becomes self-fulfilling.
Inevitably, since everyone's hands emerge equally bloodied, the original, unifying sense of polarity that marked the outset of the war, becomes lost. Any ethic or principal or qualitative substance that characterized one side from the other(s), is usually compromised. Before long, people forget what it was they were fighting for, or fighting against. And often, the war gets cancelled for lack of funds.
10 reasons why Microsoft must buy Palm now
The new year is time for reflection and planning. I've got a New Year's resolution for Microsoft: Buy Palm and use the hardware and software to jumpstart your mobile strategy. Palm the company is struggling and may not survive past 2010. But its technology is worthwhile. WebOS is a modern, mobile operating system. So what if it's based on Linux? What operating system did Hotmail run when Microsoft bought it more than a decade ago? You know the answer. Linux is better than nothing.
My list is in no order of importance, because all the reasons are important and they are interrelated.
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