Technology, Philosophy, and Art

Here is another one of my paintings. Enjoy.

I recently read an article by Adrian Kingsley-Hughes about Ubuntu application replacements for folks thinking about making the switch from Windows. The title of the article unfortunately used the word “Linux” although the article was specifically about Ubuntu. Of course, this immediately got Linux users upset. In fact, a large number of the article comments centered around why Linux does not equal Ubuntu and why dozens of other distributions are better.

Being somewhat OS-agnostic myself (I dual boot Vista and Ubuntu, but I really like OSX), I see both sides of the “Linux doesn’t equal Ubuntu” argument. I don’t, however, understand the zealotry and jealousy demonstrated by the Linux users who don’t use Ubuntu. True, Ubuntu gets all the press, but that’s largely because they have focused a lot of effort on simplifying and smoothing out the entire end user experience for folks considering a move from another OS. Plus, when all is said and done, it is still Linux. In the words of Rodney King, “Why can’t we all just get along?”

The truth is, for the majority of people Linux does equal Ubuntu. It is fairly safe to say that Ubuntu is the most heavily-publicized version of Linux in history. Ubuntu is the “media darling” of the Linux world. More non-Linux users know about Ubuntu than any other Linux distribution. They only know about Linux because they know about Ubuntu. In their minds, Linux and Ubuntu are interchangeable terms. 

In my opinion, we should just let them think Linux equals Ubuntu. Perhaps we should even encourage it. Before I get any angry comments laced with zealotry, let me explain why I say that.

The masses want simplicity. Distributions add a level of complexity they don’t like. The masses don’t want to keep track of 100 different distributions to figure out whether a specific program runs on a specific distribution (or specific window manager). Even now, average users don’t say, “I use Windows Vista SP1″ or “Windows XP SP3.” They say, “I use Windows.” They want that same level of simplicity when referring to any OS they consider as a replacement for Windows.

To oversimplify, think about it this way. People say they are “Xeroxing” something even when they use other brands of copiers. “Xerox” has become a generic term for photocopying and everyone understands that it doesn’t necessarily mean they are using a Xerox copier. When they go to buy accessories for the copier, the salesman may be able to extract more specific details about which brand, but the users really don’t care if it is Sharp, Xerox, or Canon. They just call it the “Xerox machine.”

Similarly, if the general public uses “Linux” as a generic term when they mean “Ubuntu,” we should all just agree to let them do it, because it will benefit us in the long run for one major reason. If we can get lots more folks using Ubuntu, our future chances of getting Linux drivers included in the box with any new hardware purchase will increase dramatically. Getting better drivers quicker is a benefit to all distributions of Linux.

On the other hand, if you push all of those masses away from Linux, the new hardware driver problem will continue forever. If we don’t create a much larger installed user base, manufacturers will always develop hardware drivers for Linux as an afterthought (if they develop them at all). I don’t think any Linux user wants that to happen, no matter what distribution they prefer.

Let’s be honest here. The way the Linux community is currently divided, a seemingly simple statement like “I know a great Linux application” incites a lecture about stating which precise distribution you mean. That lecture is usually followed with a dozen different people arguing about why your distribution isn’t as good as the one they use. Another dozen start arguing about why one windowing system is better than another. Eventually no relevant information is being shared at all. It becomes nothing but opinion warfare.

Passionate division like that drives many potential users away. They have too much confrontation in their lives already to use an OS that provokes confrontation from others using a different flavor of the same OS. We should also realize that making fun of people for saying “Linux” when they mean “Ubuntu” drives them away even quicker than bickering amongst ourselves. Who wants to join a group that makes fun of you?

All of which leads me to restate my main point. I believe we should all just agree to let the masses think Linux equals Ubuntu. Call Ubuntu “Linux for the masses” and let them be happy. We should do it for the benefit of all of us. The users get their simplicity. All of us get our quick driver releases. In fact, the only folks who really lose anything will be those who live for anal-retentive semantics.

Another one of my paintings…

As soon as Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer publicly demonstrated some UI concepts for the upcoming Windows 7, I saw comments all over the Internet about how Microsoft had copied the Mac OSX 3D dock. It proved to me, once again, that there are a vast number of victims of the “Jobs Reality Distortion Field” running around on this planet. I like Apple, but come on people. Stop giving them more credit than they have earned. Let’s take a look at reality.

Apple didn’t invent the 3D dock in OSX Leopard. It is a copy of the 3D Sun Looking Glass dock, which was created earlier than the UI for OSX Leopard. Looking Glass wasn’t viewed by the public until 2003, but remember that the pretty 3D dock finally appeared in Leopard in 2007. A Sun programmer (Hideya Kawahara) developed Looking Glass in his spare time. When Sun executives saw the first version, they gave him the full-time job of developing it further. They showed it to the public in 2003, and made it Open Source in 2004. It seemed to fizzle out in 2006. 

Giving Apple credit for inventing the 3D dock shown in the Windows 7 demo is just like believing Apple invented the windowed, mouse-driven OS, which was created by Xerox PARC labs years before Apple copied it in their Mac. If Microsoft did anything, they copied Sun (and Xerox), just like Apple did.

While Apple definitely uses innovative technology in products they create, they rarely invent it. It amazes me when people even forget that portable MP3 players existed for a while before the iPod ever came out. What made the iPod so popular was iTunes. I keep wondering what psychological trickery is involved that keeps making Apple’s otherwise intelligent users think Apple invented all of this stuff. Apple innovates by using cool technology invented by others.

Here’s another reality that gets overlooked. Microsoft’s early work for some of the 3D desktop features of both Vista and Windows 7 was done many years ago. Microsoft has been working on various 3D desktops for almost a decade. For example, “The TaskGallery” was a project they did back in 1999. It allowed users to display normal Windows programs running in “paintings” hanging on the walls of a 3D virtual office environment.

For more reading, head to “Project Looking Glass” and look at the screen shots. Overall, it makes our current UI’s look bad. Taken as a whole, it is much more advanced than Windows or even OSX. Actually, you may think you are looking at OSX Leopard on some of the screen shots. It’s a shame Looking Glass never took off. Back when I first saw it (2003), I hoped Microsoft would purchase the rights and make it the new Windows standard UI. As usual, Apple beat them to the punch by folding some of the concepts into Leopard. Seeing the demo of Windows 7 with a Looking Glass dock gives me hope that Microsoft may be headed that same direction.

I’ve made no secret of my opinions on our current recording industry. I feel the existing record companies have litigated and legislated themselves into being the focus of widespread consumer hatred. They are involved in the most self-destructive activities of any business segment in history. They are dying of self-inflicted wounds and most folks will be happy to see them gone. Everyone hates them.

More importantly, nobody really needs the set of services they provide anymore. The business models they cling to make no sense in the digital age when individual artists can record and distribute their own music nearly as easily as the big companies can and with more control. Times have changed and the record companies haven’t.

The only question left unanswered is, “What’s next for these failing companies?”

There are some great suggestions floating around the web for taking the recording industry in a new direction, but none I’ve seen were as workable as the ideas outlined in an open letter posted by Ian Rogers, the former General Manager of Yahoo Music. He wrote this letter to Guy Hands, the boss at EMI. Guy Hands is one of the more forward-looking executives in the music industry, so he is likely to be more open to innovative ideas for his company’s future.

In this letter, Mr. Rogers talks about the services recording companies once provided for artists. He then talks about why those services are no longer as valuable as they once were. Finally, he outlines a new set of services the recording companies could provide in order to make themselves relevant again. Let’s explore some of his ideas, intermingled with my own of course.

In the “old days,” recording companies provided the startup capital needed to make a master recording. Studios were scarce and studio time cost a fortune. The equipment was cost prohibitive and it took very specialized skills to create professional sounding recordings.

In those days, recording companies also provided the cash for duplication and packaging. They paid for the large scale reproduction of the studio recordings, the album artwork, the printing, the packaging, and everything else associated with creating a retail package to put on store shelves.

Recording companies also provided distribution. Back then, shipping cases of heavy vinyl records to stores all over the country became quite expensive and logistically difficult. Although the media became lighter when moving to CDs, the shipping expenses were still huge and it was no easier to coordinate. That was the era of big record store chains and obtaining shelf space for their artists was a major service the record companies provided.

Finally, they did a lot of marketing. In those days, marketing meant getting albums played on the radio. It meant paying for premium placement in retail outlets. It meant creating “point of purchase” displays in the big chain stores. Later, it meant getting the album played on MTV.

All of this was both useful to the artist and very expensive. All of it was necessary. All of it was worth signing a contract turning over most of the income from the album sales to the companies in exchange for the services. It was simply the way things were done back then.

Things are quite different now. In the digital age, professional quality recordings can be done by the artists at home using modern computers and software, all at very low cost. File servers and the Internet make “infinite duplication” as easy as customers clicking “download” on a web page. Album packaging means “tagging” the digital audio file with album artwork. Most of the labor and cost-intensive portions of making an album have been replaced by cheap digital solutions. Even getting the word out is fairly easy in our socially-networked world.

So why do we need the recording companies? Good question.

Really, out of all the services once provided by recording companies, the only one that is still debatably valuable to artists is marketing. Viral word-of-mouth on the Internet makes getting the word out about new releases nearly trivial, but the recording companies can still help the artists in the areas the artists don’t want to deal with.

For example, they could provide new types of marketing services that are good for both the artist and the consumer. Create “groups” of artists with similar sounds, styles, or influences. Ian Rogers suggests that these groups be handled as “affinity labels.” These are small niche labels that only handle a certain style of music. I personally think this is a brilliant idea.

One way to think of this process is “matchmaking.” There is so much music available now that customers need a way to narrow down the selection. In this case, knowing you like one artist at a given affinity label means you can assume you will probably like other artists at the same label. The service provided by the record companies would help customers select music they are almost certain to like. They would be matching artists to consumers, which would help artists sell their music.

In my mind, the affinity label could even be “virtual” and still serve the same purpose. For example, you might call all of your dark, brooding artists, “Onyx” artists. In reality, “Onyx” may only exist as a marketing “tag” you use on web sites. The simple act of tagging an artist as an “Onyx” artist would tell the consumer what to expect and boost the sales of that artist to all “Onyx-loving” consumers.

The recording companies could also provide management services to the artists. Most artists have no desire to do the detailed management associated with multiple income streams from a wide variety of digital distribution sources. Perhaps the companies could provide web-based tools and services for artists to manage their various income streams.

The recording companies could also make it simple for artists to select highly-targeted marketing services or purchase premium placement on music web sites. Put all of these services in one secured location online and make it easy for them to use. The level of automation involved in these services will make it cheap to operate them. If it makes their lives easier, artists will be happy to pony up a percentage of their sales.

The retail and manufacturing aspects of this industry are quickly fading away. It is becoming a pure digital service industry. If the recording companies focus on providing the types of services that are both valuable to artists and helpful to customers, they will reinvent themselves in a way that allows them to persist far into the current century. They will also make good money at it.

In contrast, litigating grandmothers, parents, and children until hundreds of thousands of people are telling everyone they know to stop buying your products is stupid. Treating all of your customers like criminals is a bad idea. Using restrictive DRM only encourages your customers to download illegal DRM-free media instead. Lobbying to restrict Fair Use rights only makes customers hate you for making it illegal to use what they already bought. It’s common sense.

This is not the way to do business and certainly not the way to survive. If you spend all of your time doing your best to incite hatred in those who feed you, don’t expect them to feel sorry for you when somebody pirates your products. When you make it difficult or impossible to use the products they purchase from you, customers don’t want to give you any more of their money and they don’t care a bit when you go out of business.

The one common thread in every article I read about the RIAA these days is the belief that a major change is critical for their survival. The RIAA member companies need to pursue an entirely new direction and business model. They need to become service companies instead of product companies. They need to focus on serving the needs of both the artists and the consumers. Only then, do they have any hope of surviving.

Does a tower case with a quad core CPU, 4GB of RAM, and an NVIDIA 8800 cost more if you buy it from Apple instead of Gateway? Absolutely. BUT only if you are just talking about buying the hardware. We all know there is more to a computer purchase than that. When you consider the complete OS, the included software, and the level of service, the price evens out quite a bit.

First of all, Apple includes the complete OS. Adding Vista Ultimate to a PC costs extra, pumping up the price significantly. Apple includes word processing, simple spreadsheet, and a number of other useful applications. Adding this same level of capabilities to a Vista PC will require additional software purchases. Add these costs to the price of the hardware and suddenly the price gap is a lot narrower than it seems at first glance.

Just a couple more observations: I’ve used both Vista and OSX. I’ve used identical applications available on both. Both were running on hardware “certified as compatible” and I had zero crashes on either. I also had zero mal-ware infections on either. Both were very stable and easy to use. Both have brain-dead easy installation routines that worked perfectly with supported hardware. Both started up with tutorials for new users. They both just worked for me with no trouble at all.

What about performance though? I’m mostly a Vista user these days, because there is a lot of software not available on Macs. BUT I want to tell everyone OSX just beats the heck out of Vista in one key area: resource footprint. By this, I mean RAM, GPU, and CPU usage. OSX is simply leaner and meaner. With the same CPU, RAM, and GPU in both machines, I saw less RAM and CPU being used in nearly every task I tried and despite using less resources, the OSX system felt more responsive.

I’m guessing this is why an Apple machine can often get away with using less hardware for the same tasks. This is one important difference that nobody ever seems to address for some reason. Instead the groupies say easier, more stable, more secure, etc. None of which is really true in my own experience. For a user like myself, Vista and OSX provide virtually identical levels of stability, security, and ease of use. But, OSX wins hands down on resource usage. You get more bang out of your hardware.

The standard 64 bit address space is another big difference I liked. Using 8 GB of RAM on your motherboard is no problem at all in OSX. Think about that. It needs less RAM but it is able to address more. That’s a nice combination if you work with large images and video. More RAM is available for your data.

So what more could you possibly want? I’m glad you asked. 

In a word, software. The Mac needs more off-the-shelf software. If you could walk into Best Buy and have the same software choices available for Macs that are available for Windows, it would become impossible for Vista to compete in any identical hardware comparison. OSX would just eat it alive. For now, though, most of us are stuck with Windows because we need that software selection. After all, it is the software that actually lets us do things, not the OS.

The bottom line? Macs may cost more initially if you only look at identical hardware, but including the full OS, and useful basic software levels the playing field on cost. Add in the more efficient use of hardware resources and you end up with an arguably quicker system with more usable RAM. The efficiencies of OSX mean identical hardware isn’t truly identical. The Mac gives you more punch on the same hardware. So you are getting more bang for those extra bucks. But this isn’t enough for a win. Why not?

The one glaring blemish for the Mac is software availability. If there were more software available, the Mac would win hands-down. As it is, the lack of software ruins any hope of a clean victory for the Mac. If Apple can somehow address this, the Mac will become a clear winner.

Here is a question: If there was a way to evaluate Mac OSX on your current Windows machine for under $150, would you jump at it?

I think for many of us, the answer to that question is a resounding “yes.” Could this be a way for Apple to pump up their profits? I honestly think it could. That’s why I think Apple should release a boxed version of OSX that runs as a client on Virtual PC SP1.

While I’ve used OSX for a short duration, I’ve never had the opportunity to evaluate it as a long-term solution. It seemed promising, but I’m not willing to change out all of the PC’s I use daily just because an OS looks “promising.” I think many feel the same. On the other hand, running a test copy of an OS in a controlled virtual environment is a safe way to dip our toes in the water. There is no risk or interruption to our daily workflow.

If Apple were to release a “client” version of OSX that ran under Microsoft’s Virtual PC for under $150, I’d be one of the first to buy and install it. This would allow those of us with investments in PC’s and Windows to take a good long look at OSX to evaluate whether it is a viable replacement over the long term.

Even if many of us who try OSX decide to stay with Windows, Apple will have made easy money off of us and their current users weren’t hurt in the process. On the other hand, I think a large number of the folks who try it, may like it enough to switch completely at some point. Either way, this influx of new users could drastically grow Apple’s market share and stimulate future development efforts for the platform.

I really think a virtual PC-friendly version of OSX would take minimal resources to implement, since their OS would be running in the controlled environment of a virtual PC. It would also allow Apple to sell its own OS onto the desktops of a lot of Windows users, closing the apparent gap in market share significantly and potentially converting a lot of users in the process.

At this point, Microsoft sells copies of its OS to both Windows AND Mac users via BootCamp, Parallels, etc. This increases Microsoft’s market share and further dwarves Apple’s share. Putting OSX on Windows could level the playing field and push the market share numbers closer together. It would also make Apple a lot of money.

Are you listening Apple?

As I continue setting up the Eee PC 900 that I received this morning, I caught wind of a new version that may be coming in the very near future. The new model is rumored to be the Eee PC 901 and will be a re-work of an Eee PC 900 using the Intel Atom processor. Other differences between the two units will be mostly cosmetic. They include shifting the power, battery, hard drive, and wireless indicator LED’s toward the touch pad. The laptop locking mechanism has been moved to the left side and the power adapter socket has been moved to the right. A pair of microphones has been added below the display to replace the single microphone mounted above the display on the 900.

I poked around a little and discovered photos of the new model on a French web site. Check them out below.

Rumored specifications on the new system:

Intel Atom processor @ 1.1 GHz (Diamondville Z510)
1 GB DDR2 SODIMM RAM
20 GB SSD drive storage (4 GB built-in + 16 GB flash)
Windows XP Home Pre-installed (A Linux version may appear later.)
8.9 inch display running at 1024 x 600 native
1.3 Megapixel Camera
3 USB 2.0 ports
1 RJ-45 10/100 Mbps network port
1 MMC-SD-SDHC port
1 Stereo Microphone port
1 Stereo Headphone/Audio Out port
1 D-Sub 15 pin VGA display port
1 Kensington Security port lock
Built-in 802.11b/g wireless (still no N support?)
FingerGlide track pad
Built-in bottom-mounted stereo speakers

Speculation centers around a late June release for this unit. Rumor is that the retail price may be around $650. Of course, all prices and specifications are purely speculation until it actually hits store shelves.

Today is the long-awaited arrival of the Eee PC 900 in the USA! I have followed  the news of this machine with interest over the past few months figuring I would grab one as soon as they became available. They seem to fit a need for folks like me who spend weeks traveling and need something easy to transport in order to do their writing. About a week ago, I saw news that 900 was arriving today (May 12). So, over this past weekend, I decided to take a look around the Internet to see if anyone had posted them early.

The major retailers had nothing on their web sites. Next, I looked at major online stores like NewEgg. Again, I found only the older Eee PCs offered. Finally, I checked eBay. To my surprise, a number of Asus dealers already had them listed for sale. I searched for a company with a high user rating and placed an order for the XP model to be shipped second day air. Their item post said they had 24 on hand. The order immediately went through.

Earlier today, I received a tracking number in my email with a notice that the machine had shipped. Assuming the box is not full of air, this obviously means that Eee PC 900’s are in the USA and shipping to consumers this week. This is great news to the quickly-increasing fan club of the diminutive Eee PC line. Many users have been flooding the Internet with virtual drool over the pre-release details of the 900 for many months.

In case you have been living under a rock, take a quick look at the official Eee 900 web page on Asus’ web site. It lists some of the new features we will find on this tiny notebook computer. The highlights are an 8.9 inch 1024 x 600 screen, FingerGlide (multi-finger gestures on a touch pad), an improved 1.3 M. pixel web cam, bigger solid state drives, more RAM, and two operating system choices (XP and Linux).

On the down side, I’ve seen rumors that the shipping battery is actually smaller capacity than the battery included with the previous generation of the machine and also smaller capacity than the one Asus sent out in review units. According to these rumors, there is a massive shortage of lithium ion batteries and Asus had to use the few batteries they had available.

If this rumor is true, the reduced battery capacity of shipping units is horrible news for purchasers because the battery life was already a problem with this little PC. A smaller battery will be much worse. Let’s hope Asus steps up and does something to make it up to the early adopters. Punishing this vocal group can come back to bite you later in bitter online reviews, rants, and negative blogs. Perhaps they will ship a larger battery to early buyers at a future date?

In order to check the battery shortage theory, I popped on eBay and looked for batteries for these machines. There were batteries in a wide range of capacities up to 10,400mAH. I ordered a big 10,400mAH battery and it went through without a hitch. Granted, the supplies needed by a manufacturer are quite different than for stores selling to end users, but given the variety of after market batteries I saw online I’m not sure how hard Asus tried.

At any rate, I am looking forward to receiving this machine in a couple of days and putting it through its paces. I will post updates on my impressions as a real world user soon afterward. People who followed my iPhone blogs last year on MySpace know I don’t pull punches about shortcomings in technologies, so be sure to check back frequently for the real world scoop on these tiny PCs.

Here comes the future! As reported in Ars Technica, the independent music labels are gaining some power with an organization they created last year called “Merlin.” This new “virtual music label” has only been accepting applicants for about a month and they have already signed 12,000 labels! Perhaps they will become the blueprint of future music labels for the digital age.

It is a fact that the combined releases from independent labels outnumber the combined releases from the four major labels by 4 to 1. In the past, however, they haven’t been able to wield the power to push those releases through sales channels as well as the “big four” labels because there are too many companies to deal with. So, despite accounting for 80 percent of all new releases, the independent labels presently only account for under 28 percent of total sales. With Merlin, that could soon change.

As mentioned earlier, Merlin has signed up over 12,000 independent labels in the past month or so, giving music distributors and services a single source for negotiating deals or music distribution licenses. This combined size will allow Merlin to negotiate the same sorts of deals only the major labels could get before now. This will be a boon to independent labels and their artists.

This will also make it much easier for places like iTunes and MySpace Music to carry a vast selection of music from independent labels. In fact, Merlin is already working out deals with many of the biggest players in the online music scene. Look for a steady stream of announcements to start appearing over the coming months.

In the past, there has always been discrimination against independents in the royalty amounts they could negotiate. They were second class citizens in a sense, while the “Big Four” labels carried more clout and got the sweetest deals. Hopefully, this will change now that Merlin carries the clout of nearly 28% of the total market share.

While I see this as a great step toward the music industry of the future, there are still some troubling issues. For example, some of the Merlin member companies (like Concord or Rough Trade) are also RIAA reporting companies. Granted they aren’t the Big Four companies running and financing the RIAA, but they are still affiliated, however loosely. This makes me nervous about their future intentions and direction.

The ideal situation in my mind would be if Merlin maintained its distance from the RIAA and its consumer-hating activities. I would like to see them set themselves up as the new music label for “the rest of us.” I’d love to see them treat their artists, labels, and consumers with respect rather than extreme suspicion and disdain. This means no DRM and no litigious primary focus.

I’ll be watching how Merlin develops as a music company and you can expect to see further updates on their activities as their intentions become more clear. For now, I’m hopeful that this is the beginning of a new era for music lovers everywhere.