Posted 9:11 AM (0) comments

Which is the Real scumware?

Windows Media Player has been the point of contention in lawsuits and is often pointed out as evidence of Microsoft's evil intentions. But Spyware's look at Real Player goes a long way towards determining who the real scumware vendor is. (Thanks to Adam Gaffin's Compendium!)

Posted 5:56 PM (0) comments

Almost Linux = Almost pregnant?

According to this story in Toronto's Globe and Mail, a group of students at the University of Western Ontario are building their own Linux distribution, albeit one with a twist. Ignalum Linux will run standard Windows applications (Word, Excel, etc.) alongside standard Linux apps.

For organizations wishing a slow transition of their desktops from Windows to Linux, this certainly deserves consideration. Its in the final stages of beta testing right now, but should be freely downloadable in late May.

Posted 10:02 AM (0) comments

Scapegoats and fallguys

Frank Quattrone is sleazy, probably unethical and certainly a poster boy for the excesses of the dot-com bubble. But only because the judge and the Prosecutor Played Fast and Loose with the truth and the law was he convicted of obstruction of justice.

Quattrone did not violate any law when he forwarded an email to those working with and for him. While he may not be "innocent" in the colloquial sense, he certainly is in the legal sense and the quicker an appeals court hears this case the better off we will all be.

Some will compare this to the Martha Stewart trial and wonder why I feel she's guilty and he isn't. The difference is that Stewart broke a law which she should have known about (she was on the Board of Directors of the NYSE after all) while Quattrone did not break any law. Simple as that. Motives, emotions, sexual politics, blah, blah, blah - all irrelevant.

Posted 4:15 PM (0) comments

Stick it to them, Google!

In one of the more bizarre pieces about the upcoming Google IPO, an unnamed writer at quicken.com claims that Big Funds Could Pressure Google for Better IPO Prices. Why Google should give a rat's tail for the preference of big institutional investor, though, leaves the writer grasping at straws - "Some fear that distributing the shares to an unusually large number of individual shareholders could increase Google's costs for communicating with investors and might even hurt the stock's performance."

The institutions are able to bid alongside everyone else in the auction and neither deserve nor warrant any special consideration. There's nothing they can do for Google that's positive, and a lot they can do that's negative - such as focusing on short-term issues.

Google's better off ignoring these bozos and letting them fend for themselves on the open market. It might do the fund managers some good to actually have to work for a profit rather than have companies give them one on a silver platter balanced on the backs of small investors.