Scripting News for 6/20/2006

BloggerCon party: Thurs at 6:45PM, Jillian’s, 4th & Howard.  

BloggerCon update. Thursday night party. Lunches. Parking. Giants. A’s. Gay Pride. Dr John. What’s the song?? 

BloggerCon webcast page.  

A question for Windows podcast pros. We’ve got Simplecast running on my Sony Vaio, works great, even saves a WMA file as an archive, but I’d like to be able to include a Skype caller. The Simplecast software only runs on Windows so running it on a Mac is not an option. Any ideas on how we can get me on a mike (locally) and Steve calling in on Skype to go out over Simplecast? If you have an idea, please post a comment on the WordPress annex. 

Slate rates Apple ads: “If you’re a PC user, these ads are more likely to irritate you than convert you.” 

Foo Camp 2006 wiki. You’re (probably) not invited.  

Tim O’Reilly: “If you didn’t get invited, it doesn’t mean you’re not a ‘Friend of O’Reilly.'” In my case, I think it does. 

Steve Rubel notes that CNN has an OPML of its podcast feeds. 

Jakob Nielsen in the WSJ on blogs, RSS, feeds. 

Engadget: USB teddy bear holds data, scares children. 

Jon Udell received a takedown notice from PRI (which is related to National Public Radio, here in the US, a subtle distinction). 

Google is having serious amnesia problems tonight. 

New header graphic, New York’s Broadway, looking south from Houston St. 

Why did Bill Gates step down? 

When the top executive of a major company steps down, even gradually, we are too easily distracted by the emotional arguments, and Microsoft plays this sleight of hand better than almost anyone, but come on, do you think Bill would be stepping aside if the graph were inverted?

Why do they need two guys to take Bill’s place? Even he admits the “software architect” thing was bogus. The only new architecture to take hold at Microsoft during Gates’s tenure was RSS, and we all know where that architecture came from.

How effective has Microsoft’s capital expenditures on software R&D been over the last decade? Doesn’t all the revenue still come from R&D that was done in the early 90s? How can Microsoft justify employing all those programmers? What exactly are they doing?

And will Brad Silverberg be vindicated now that Firefox is forcing Microsoft to make their sites work with another browser? How do they like dancing to someone else’s tune? After they bet the company on Bill Gates’s aggressive vision for the net, and then let the investment rot in a mess of malware, now where is the company?

Why doesn’t Gates leave now, so that the new management can start fresh and make the adjustments that are needed to reverse the slide? And who’s going to take Ballmer’s place when they realize they need more than a sales guy who can lead a pep rally to run the company? Ballmer understands the software business in the same way that Gil Amelio did, in a very last generation way. He lacks the confidence in himself, rightly so, to make agile bets on behalf of Microsoft’s share holders.

Microsoft has been expending huge resources for over a decade in an effort to remain in place. Clearly now the giant must change some of its basic philosophy about who it is and what it does, and stop trying to stay in place, a place that barely exists now, and won’t exist at all in a few more years.

I guess the question is why is Gates taking so long to get out of the way?