tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-42660968903160675092009-06-06T12:46:57.129-07:00Take a look (if you dare) into the twisted mental melee that is Bob Cusick...Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.comBlogger300125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-42705327112972525242009-05-21T08:12:00.000-07:002009-05-21T08:34:00.347-07:00

I don't know how many of you follow American Idol - but last night (in case you were living under a rock) - was the grand finale of the season - where the winner was announced.The show was in a 2 hour slot. TWO HOURS to announce one winner in less than 30 seconds? Ugh.I was prepared for it to be like the Academy Awards or Emmies - where it just drags and drags for so long that I just want to poke

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-48500893249989807652009-04-28T08:58:00.000-07:002009-04-28T10:21:10.259-07:00

In order to celebrate my 300th blog entry - I decided to revert to one of my favorite topics: slamming Microsoft... and predicting the demise of this (truly) evil empire.In what is just the latest in a long history of time-sucking, headache-inducing, blood-pressure-raising events - I stupidly set the auto-update of my parent's aging Dell (XP Professional) to on.When it decided to do an SP3 update

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-38865044108617038572009-04-20T10:35:00.000-07:002009-04-20T10:52:31.378-07:00

Oh man... Larry Ellison just bought Sun.Zoinks!Well, if it's one thing Oracle knows how to do - that's monetize their software assets. He gets to kill off MySQL and "own" Java all in one fell swoop - for about the price that's a steal - $5.9 billion.What will happen to MySQL and Java and Solaris and JavaFX and all the other Intellectual Property of Sun? Only Larry knows for sure... but I bet

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-71006581297014712502009-04-07T15:52:00.000-07:002009-04-07T16:18:26.844-07:00

Dear ___________ (fill in assh*** credit company or bank here),I have had an account with you for the past ___ years. I've made 99.9% of my payments on time, and have paid at least double the minimum amounts - even when times were tough. In many cases, I have paid off the balances in full three or four times - and you've increased my credit line on 6 different occasions - in response to my '

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-27212816167098965802009-04-03T10:17:00.000-07:002009-04-03T10:41:00.572-07:00

Well, it's not a totally "done deal", but IBM is still looking to acquire Sun. If they do - it'll be interesting to see what happens to Sun's operating system: Solaris.My guess = c ya! IBM already controls 37% of the high-end Unix market. Guess who is #2? Yep, Sun - with 28%.Hmmmm.... nice. Buy 'em, kill Solaris... and nearly double your Unix marketshare overnight. Sweet!Sun's shares were in the

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-76264589323244633002009-04-02T13:55:00.000-07:002009-04-02T14:21:27.234-07:00

Since HP announced that it was "thinking about" using Android as the operating system for its new netbooks, and since both Asus and Freescale have also announced plans to do so - I got to thinking about Linux on the desktop.It's been the "holy grail" of Linux to find a home on the desktop as a real, viable alternative to Windows. However it's taken many, many years and there is still a lot of "

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-14851584523437398242009-03-30T10:10:00.000-07:002009-03-30T10:30:26.123-07:00

First of all - many thanks to all of you who have emailed and called and IM'd and social media'd me about the fact that you miss the regular updates to Bob's World! It's nice to know that people actually read this thing. :-)And, I do apologize for being a total slacker for the last couple of weeks... BUT - since I've restarted Clickware I've been switching hats so often that I'm getting tennis

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-31994426156739461802009-03-13T06:52:00.001-07:002009-03-13T07:28:23.774-07:00

After taking this week "off" from my social media commitments - I jumped back (literally) into the "stream" of the social collective this morning.Now, those of you who know me know that I'm not the most "social" person out there - and that at the beginning of this wave of social media - I was skeptical (at best). But after being "out of the loop" for a week - I found that I actually missed the

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-7134211383312760242009-03-06T06:28:00.000-08:002009-03-06T07:15:58.398-08:00

Conventional wisdom would suggest that and economic depression (we're way beyond recession here, folks) is the worst time to start a business.I, for one, would strongly disagree. And so would FedEx. And Burger King. And IBM. And about two dozen more "household names" that were all founded during economic downturns. I think that now is a terrific time to start a business (or expand the one you

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-44949754704704593182009-03-05T23:01:00.000-08:002009-03-06T06:26:55.502-08:00

Well - as seen on numerous blogs around the world today - it's finally come out that Facebook really DID try to buy Twitter last fall. There had been rumors all over the place that Mark and team was vying to snap up the microblogging site - and roll it into their own offering.So after the negotiations had come to an unfruitful end (from Facebook's perspective) - they took a play out of the Gates

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-88537700781297352052009-03-02T16:44:00.000-08:002009-03-02T17:13:15.313-08:00

Ok, ok, so as much as I (and everyone else) bitches about Microsoft - I think they've had another "Ah, the Internet!" moment.I was reading Mary-Jo Foley's EXCELLENT blog entry on Microsoft's "Cloud OS" (code name: Red Dog) and at the same time read in ComputerWorld about how Microsoft was bringing the (almost) full "power" of SQL Server to the cloud... when all of a sudden it hit me like a ton of

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-21080836385155390182009-02-27T08:20:00.000-08:002009-02-27T08:43:18.950-08:00

As I was trying to think up something witty and poignant for today's entry - I came across an old story from 1997 that pitted Microsoft against the now-up-sh*ts-creek-without-a-paddle - GM.Back in the heady days of the late 90's the computer industry was bragging about how far the technology had come in comparison to the automotive industry. That spawned a single 3 line joke with a cool punchline

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-81366022653571745862009-02-26T11:53:00.000-08:002009-02-26T12:01:39.109-08:00

Nothing in the world works 100% of the time. That's a fact of life.Why is it then when Gmail goes down for two hours - or the Twitter "fail whale" comes up - people go crazy? Hey - people - do YOU ever do anything 100% of the time - every day, all day, every day of the year?Neither do I.Why, then do most people just expect all software, hardware and Internet connections to be up 100% of the time?

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-61977403948547932962009-02-24T12:35:00.000-08:002009-02-24T12:35:00.887-08:00

The level of panic in companies is getting almost palpable. They are cutting, cutting, cutting - and a lot of the time not THINKING about the ramifications of those cuts.Some companies are cutting valuable IT staff, killing business-enabling (and enhancing) projects, and doing other stupid things like cutting benefits, reducing work hours and making the overworked people who are "fortunate"

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-24852460364523023932009-02-24T08:16:00.001-08:002009-02-24T08:24:35.686-08:00

It seems that Microsoft does have a heart after all (or just a really, really, big aversion to bad PR)...After laying off 1,400 workers - it accidentally overpaid some of them by $4,000 to $5,000. Once HR realized the error - the laid off workers were promptly written an letter that demanded they give the money BACK to Microsoft.Nice!In an abrupt about-face, Microsoft has now said that the people

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-41244399876042593132009-02-19T12:42:00.000-08:002009-02-19T13:04:36.886-08:00

This whole bailout "thing" has got me a bit pissed off. Never mind the fact that the presses are working overtime to print money we don't have to give it to companies that have such inept (and greedy) management that they "managed" their companies into the ground and took the economy with it... no, the real thing that gets my goat is the fact that NO ONE seems to know where this money is going.A

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-55318303665158289252009-02-18T23:39:00.000-08:002009-02-19T04:16:51.516-08:00

I had my iPhone cranked up listening to my "favorites" channel and just let my mind wonder.... and in one of my rare moments of clarity - I was thinking about the future of computing. I come to the decision that the future of computing will not be about hardware, or operating systems, or which applications are "better" than others - it will all come down to a single thing: the screen.Yep, that's

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-23922175455695988432009-02-17T23:03:00.000-08:002009-02-18T00:13:07.470-08:00

So, I don't know about you - but I'm getting a little tired of the word "Beta" when it comes to commercial software and especially with Web 2.0 applications.Now, most people aren't in the technology field - but I am - and the word beta has a traditional meaning that's getting more and more obscured as time goes on. Traditionally, a piece of software was considered beta - when it was feature

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-68815538871015774472009-02-16T10:55:00.000-08:002009-02-16T10:55:00.549-08:00

I just came across a February 12th press release from Microsoft saying that they are going to open retail stores!What the??Seems they've tapped former Wal-Mart entertainment guy (and DreamWorks Animation SKG, where he was head of worldwide product distribution), David Porter to head up the efforts.Hey, what could go wrong with such a brilliant plan?I can just see it now - rather than having a "

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-55254207979995997622009-02-16T09:26:00.000-08:002009-02-16T10:11:35.001-08:00

Some of the biggest complaints about the new Google phone is its lack of multi-t0uch interface. You can thank Apple for that.Palm is trying now to figure out how to not have the bejezus sued out of itself for having multi-touch capabilities on their soon-to-be-shipped Pre phone. You can also thank Apple for that.It all stems from Patent No. 7,479,949 (originally filed in September 2007) that

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-52398208058859915842009-02-12T22:33:00.000-08:002009-02-13T08:30:11.739-08:00

Customer reviews suck. There. I said it. But, of course, there's a story behind the statement. Here it is:I was looking to buy an all-in-one printer/scanner. So, I scoured the usual sources: PCWorld, CNET, Amazon, etc. I was looking for the "best of" categories in each. Never mind that each of them had a totally different pick for the "best 10" in the category (hey, they only get so many free

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-87062898092281647482009-02-11T05:42:00.000-08:002009-02-11T06:01:04.437-08:00

A new company called Postbox has announced - wait for it - a new email desktop client. It seems that a few Mozilla engineers, including Scott MacGregor, one of two original engineers of Thunderbird before it got killed and moved into the Mozilla Messaging unit, think they have come up with a better mousetrap.The interesting thing about this tool is that it was built using Mozilla's Gecko browser

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-8699631148747289712009-02-10T23:26:00.000-08:002009-02-11T05:40:33.826-08:00

Well, the pie-in-the-sky One Laptop Per Child program has called it quits after a tumultuous 3 years. The OLPC was hailed as the "$100 laptop" and had the noble and grand vision of providing accessible, easy-to-use hardware to people in developing countries.There were a lot of great ideas - some of which actually came to pass. In fact, Nicholas Negroponte, founder of OLPC said at the TED

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-9502022206977943352009-02-06T11:51:00.000-08:002009-02-06T12:09:44.070-08:00

So the mighty behemoth released "Latitude" - a service that allows you to broadcast your current location to your friends (or the world). It works by using Wi-Fi access points, cell towers or GPS to figure out where you are.Now, I know the "Big Brother is coming!" paranoid among you have probably already written, called and emailed your Congressperson about what an affront to personal privacy

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4266096890316067509.post-76432431728535629692009-02-05T11:31:00.000-08:002009-02-05T11:48:06.482-08:00

Hey kids! Microsoft is about to screw the pooch again when it comes to the number of "editions" it's planning for Windows 7. I guess "screw the pooch" is maybe too strong - let me put it another way: if you LOVE the convoluted, screwed up, totally senseless way they rolled out Windows Vista - you'll LOVE the Windows 7 launch just as much.They are planning to focus only on two editions - Windows 7

Bob Cusickhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07412475563286992069noreply@blogger.com1