Tech-bits June 19
It has been a rocky week for Internet and related technologies. I spotted five points tat prompted me to read.
1 ) PowerPoint turns 20
Snappy presenters who wow their audience with jazzy slideshows may not realise it. PowerPoint is 20 years old!
And, perhaps, not many realise that when Robert Gaskins and Dennis Austin invented PowerPoint 1.0 in 1987, they meant it for for Macs. Frankly, I only came to know about it when I read it on WSJ supplied to my hotel room.
However, it took three more years users got to see the Windows version of PowerPoint. Back then, graphics-oriented computers were still early days, and even venture capitalists insisted that text-based DOS machines would never go away.
Gaskin, however, foresaw that there was a huge but invisible market for business slides with GUI-centric computers. His PowerPoint was bought over -- lock, stock, barrel -- by Microsoft in late 1987 for US$14 million. But PC users had had to wait until 1990 when Microsoft finally released a Windows version of PowerPoint.
Both Gaskin and Austin left Microsoft in the 1990s to pursue personal projects. Ironically, they are less famous than the product they both created.
Read this article, and tell us if PowerPoint will ever become less important for you when you hold the rostrum next.
2 ) France government bans Blackberry
It's the leakage of economic and sovereign intelligence, not the technology.
France president Nicolas Sarkozy is a gadget-friendly politician. He was oftem seen with a mobile phone clamped to his ear, engrossed in calls, for much of his election day victory parade in Paris recently.
Somehow, he has to give in to Alain Juillet, the civil servant in charge of economic intelligence, that members of his new cabinet must stop using Blackberry. The keywords used were: "Data security problem". They fear the US, and third parties, could intercept state secrets.
The ban was prompted by SGDN, the state agency responsible for national security, which expressed concerns that the Blackberry system is based on servers located in the US and the UK, and that highly sensitive strategic information being passed between French ministers could fall into foreign hands.
Hooked onto the digital age, some cabinet members blamed SGDN for not givingthem alternative options to access real time information.
Interestingly, the private sector in France seemed to adopt the same approach towards Blackberry. Oil company, Total, has also banned Blackberry among its employees for "security reasons", Financial Times reported June 20. "There are plenty of other perfectly good PDAs," Total said.
According to the FT, US bankers would prove their bona fides in meetings by first p;acing their Blackberries on the table and removing the batteries.
Do take note, you journalists and 4th Floor Boys!
3 ) YouTube thwarting copy-cats
Apparently, YouTube realised it had to do something quick to protect its turf as it now draws more than half of its audience from outside the US. Copy-cats will eat its lunch if it didn't.
June 19, YouTube, now owned by Google, announced that it was launching nine foreign-language sites globally.
The international strategy is intended eventually to make it a local mainstay in dozens of countries and fend off local copy-cats that have sprung up in recent months, Financial Times reported.
The news cames within days after Flickr.com, now owned by Yahoo, took steps to live up to its claims of being "the eyes of the world" by launching in seven new languages.
Are we seeing the re-emergence of single global database in each genre of content?
4 ) Yahoo losing grips on Web2.0?
Yahoo chose the sidelines of CommunicAsia 2007 to officially launch oneSearch -- its search service on mobile devices. I have blogged about this in Lemak Lemang (CNet Asia, May 15).
Six major mobile operators from Asia have signed a partnership deal with Yahoo to extend the distribution of its mobile search service in the region, namely Globe Telecom in the Philippines, India's Idea Cellular, LG Telecom from South Korea, Maxis Communications in Malaysia, Indonesia's Telkomsel and Taiwan Mobile.
The six mobile operators have a combined subscriber base totaling almost 100 million.
Before this, Yahoo oneSearch was already available in other Asian markets -- Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
5 ) Yahoo changes CEO
June 19, Yahoo also announced a top management shakeup that saw the departure of CEO Terry Semel, who is replaced by Yahoo poster boy and co-founder aka Chief Yahoo! -- Jerry Yang.
Former Chief Financial Officer Sue Decker will take over as President. And the search for a new CTO is still on.
Semel, who joined Yahoo in 2001 and engineered a remarkable turnaround at the company, has presided over a two-year period of non-performance. But he'll continue to work at the company as non-executive chairman. CNBC said Semel personally pocketed more than US$600 million during his 6-year tenure.
CNBC also reported that the Board decided to show Semel the door, especially after last week's shareholder meeting where he kept driving home the point that Yahoo's new search monetization software called "Panama" was performing admirably and that investors would see the fruits of that labor when the company reports earnings the second week of July.
Meanwhile, Google seemed to have delivered the full Web2.0 impact that made Yahoo look jaded.
On the other hand, many feel Yang does not equate to a Steve Jobs who returned to revitalise Apple when two CEOs had failed.
The jury's still out on Michael Dell, remember?
5 ) Large file senders
Two options I have read:
1 ) www.pando.com
2 ) www.yousendit.com
Comments
Back in the old days where Windows 3.1 wasn't that popular besides for Solitaire and WordStar was the popular word processor, I recall that Harvard Graphics was the first presentation software I've used that worked in MS-DOS...
wonder what happened to the company
Posted by: auyongtc![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.my/nav-commenters.gif)
|
June 22, 2007 04:14 PM
Harvard Graphics 3.0, yes! I still have a copy of that in the achieves of my computer, I think it still works. Used it before Powerpoint became popular, and even after, as I have an adversion to MS products, if a viable alternative is available.
Posted by: limeuu![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.jeffooi.my/nav-commenters.gif)
|
June 25, 2007 12:06 AM