Category Archives: Articles

Facebook’s Global Telco Dream

Maybe there’s more to the Facebook acquisition of WhatsApp than just the centralised consolidation of users and user information that Simon denounced in his previous InfoWorld article. Perhaps this particular addition to their portfolio is Facebook’s move towards becoming the first truly global telco!

The idea makes a lot of sense; not only is the world already familiar with the technology, WhatsApp has the same phone numbers that legacy telcos use, without the need to pay for connection fees across the world’s analog phone network. It’s almost amazing it hasn’t happened already, but conditions for a global telco have only recently become so ideal. Smart phones and globally available internet connections mean the moment has come and the big question remaining is, who’ll get there first?

Read Simons take on the potential for a global telco in his InfoWorld article.

Hope in Federations

Facebook’s acquisition of WhatsApp gains them almost half a billion users worth of telephone data. We can fully expect them to share their user information once joined, adding a wealth of phone data to Facebook and fleshing out WhatsApp with both Facebook’s data and the results of Facebook’s powerful semantic search. This sort of centralisation avoids giving users control of their own data.

To create a more positive environment in which users retain control of their data, what’s needed are more federated projects. Projects which offer the ability for suitably capable users to run their own service that can federate as a full peer, extending the service without surrendering full control. Diaspora and WordPress are two high profile examples of what federated services can look like, but there are many more available. All are open to user control in addition to service provider hosting.

If we are to maintain control of our own data in the future, federated services offer us much more hope than the route Facebook and WhatsApp are going down. Read more in this weeks InfoWorld article.

Stand Up For ODF In The UK

Showing that no issue is actually sorted until the end of the process is reached, Microsoft is trying to get its partner network to speak up for OOXML as a document format for government interaction. In a posting to ComputerWorldUK, Simon explains that this would defeat the objective explained by Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude, who said

“The software we use in government is still supplied by just a few large companies. A tiny oligopoly dominates the marketplace. I want to see a greater range of software used, so civil servants have access to the information they need and can get their work done without having to buy a particular brand of software.”

So ODF Advocates once again need to speak up for openness and diversity – there are links in the article.

Making the most with Open Source

What opportunities does Open Source provide if you’re really looking to go big? Aiming to become “the next Red Hat” is an idea flawed from the start, as former XenSource CEO Peter Levine explains in his recent TechCrunch article. So what’s left if business models focussing on selling support and services all have a relatively low limit to their growth?

Those who are making the most money out of Open Source today are in fact not those who try to monetize a specific Open Source project, but those who innovate and build businesses that sit on top of a backbone of Open Source projects. Twitter, Square, Google and Facebook could all be given as examples of this sort of innovation. Importantly, the Open Source communities these companies engage with are likely to stay active and healthy as other community members also execute on their business model, gaining benefit from the project as well as making their own contributions (if they are smart).

For more, take a look at Simon’s InfoWorld article.

Does Nominet Hate Charities?

Simon’s blog post about the bias the UK’s domain authority is showing against charities obviously struck a nerve with them as they responded to him. Sadly, the response was not a reply; rather, it sought to focus on issues away from the main point while using logical fallacies to attempt to discredit his complaint. Since there was no reply, Simon has posted a more focussed restatement of the issue and is now awaiting a reasoned reply (rather than the further logical fallacies a domain salesman has posted so far).

UK Domain Mismanagement

Alerted by a Twitter conversation, Simon checked Nominet’s rules concerning the new .UK domain and found they have a distressing bias against UK charities. It’s bad enough that UK web sites have to waste money on more domain names to protect their brand; these rules actually prevent charities from doing so. Read his article for more.

Net Neutrality – Act, Don’t Mourn

Alexandra posted to ComputerWorldUK last Friday with news of the worsening situation with net neutrality. It’s not just the push-back to the FCC that’s concerning; there are also real challenges posed as vendors corrode the principle. Read her posting to learn more and see what she suggests instead.

Patent trolls set sights on cloud computing

The trolls are coming. It’s inevitable. As the success of cloud computing continues, grows and evolves and the size of the associated deals increases, the eyes of scavenging trolls eager to make a quick parasitic buck are drawn more and more to the opportunities awaiting them in that field.

They can pick up the relevant patents from a number of different sources, notably from failed start ups and from university research facilities keen to get quick pay back for their work. For large corporations for whom trolling is only one of many lines of income, large portfolios of patents will have been created already in the course of their cloud computing business units regular operations.

Knowing that the attacks are coming, that the trolls are poised for battle, what defences can we prepare?  This is a situation that OIN speaks directly into. Among the many new updates to their anti-troll arsenal there is an intentional development towards protection of cloud services. This includes the addition of the packages from OpenStack to the new (March 6th) Linux definition, which given the OIN membership of IBM and Red Hat, both heavily invested in OpenStack, means the cloud infrastructure project has serious protection.

If your business relies on open source software, joining the Open Invention Network is an effective defence, worthy of your serious consideration. For more detail on OIN’s move towards defending the cloud, check out Simon’s InfoWorld article.

Bitcoin coming into its own

Bitcoin has been in the news a lot over the last few weeks. It’s astronomical rise, then the crash after the Peoples Bank of China took cautionary moves to avoid it destabilising the Chinese domestic currency and finally the recovery of Bitcoin’s price over last few days.

The attention that Bitcoin and other virtual currencies are getting should come as no surprise. The internet is creating a meshed society in which each of us is able to start businesses, trade goods, conduct relationships, publish, editorialise, and conduct politics, all without needing an intermediary to empower us. An alternative currency that is managed not by a bank but by the consensus of its users, becomes increasingly necessary as this meshed society matures.

For more detail and commentary check out this weeks InfoWorld article from Meshed Insight’s Simon Phipps.

Oracle fighting innovation on mobile Java

Perhaps you thought that the matter of whether or not API’s can be copyrighted was already closed, after Judge Alsup’s May 2012 decision in favour of Google. Google had been innovating in mobile device programming by building on the dying remains of Java ME. Alsup’s verdict concluded the trial that started out to determine whether Oracle’s patents relating to Android had been infringed and ended on instead on the fundamental matter of the copyrightability of APIs. Unfortunately, the story didn’t end there. Of course Oracle appealed the decision and it seems that Oracles arguments are finding traction with the federal circuit judges panel looking at the case.

Despite the fact that British and European courts have recently confirmed their position against copyrighting API’s in favour of innovation and competitive markets, the American judges appear to be moving in the opposite direction. A decision in favour of Oracle could well give the innovation advantage to European companies at the expense of their American counterparts. No doubt Google would in that scenario continue the fight with an appeal of their own, but the threat this case poses to programmers everywhere is still very real.

To read more about the case and its implications, check out Simon’s InfoWorld column.