Category: business and economics

Things about management and business on a smaller scale, and economics on a larger one.

Mac Mini switches to Intel

It wasn’t more than a year ago when I wrote in my OSCON bio:

Terry Chay is the only Mac user at Plaxo, where he develops the web-based version of their product (they tolerate him because he stinks at CounterStrike).

A few weeks ago, IT purchased a couple of Mac Minis to ramp up Mac support now that Plaxo Mac Beta has been leaked. QA has decided to make support for Safari on peer with Firefox and Microsoft Internet Explorer 6+ for Windows in all future bug listings. Plaxo has gotten serious about the Mac and it looks like that part of the bio is now very, very false—well, at least the part about sucking at CounterStrike is still true.

Well when I heard they ordered it, I said, “Why not just wait until March, April at the latest, and get Intel Mac Minis? They’ll come out just after the MacBook (iBook replacement) gets announced at the end of February.”

Looks like I was wrong. Apple introduced the Mac mini replacement using the Core Solo and Core Duo.
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Posted on by tychay 11

You can be sure if it’s Slashdot…it’s wrong

Westinghouse logo

I read this article today about Toshiba buying out Westinghouse Electric.

I shouldn’t be surprised that Slashdot gets it wrong again. Really wrong.

First of all, Westinghouse hasn’t made blenders since around the time I was born. They sold off the appliances division to a separate company, White, which renamed itself White-Westinghouse. The confusion arises because White-Westinghouse used the same W logo, but any Pittsburgher can tell you they aren’t the same. The same holds true for other “Westinghouse” brands like Westinghouse Digital Electronics, the makers of the LCD panels referred to in the article. They have nothing to do with Westinghouse or Westinghouse Electric. The brand name was licensed to them recently when the CBS/Viacom media empire realized they had a merchandisable brand name they weren’t using.

[ore theorizing after the jump]Continue reading →

Posted on by tychay 0

WMV on Mac OS X

After I read that Microsoft quietly discontinued support for Windows Media on Mac OS X, I didn’t know what to make of it. Just another free app for the Mac that Microsoft is discontinuing—guess MSN Messenger is next on the chopping block.

Flip4Mac WMV logo

As a consunmer, it reminded me that I needed to install a Windows Media Player solution on my computer again, as it begins its arduous recovery from a drive failure. At work, many people zip around video and given the platform predelictions here, many times that video is something in Windows Media. Well, I guess that leaves out Windows Media Player X 9.0.

Now normally I would download the latest MPlayer or VideoLAN Client to do this, but that always seemed a kludge. Oh, they have their uses, but I mostly I’m talking about a one-trick WMV playback-pony. Luckily, the article pointed out a solution I had bookmarked and forgotten about: Flip4Mac WMV.Continue reading →

Posted on by tychay 1

HP under new management

The business section of the Merc today has two articles on the front page about HP’s nascent recovery under interim CEO Mark Hurd.

So many people base their measure of a person on what they heard about them than the evidence staring them in the face of incompetence of their actions—people’s high opinion of ex-CEO Carly Fiorina is an example of that.

What I found so interest was not the articles themselves but in the inset graphics. One part of one inset was fascinating:

Where HP intends to grow

  • Distributed Computing: Companies increasingly are moving data off mainframes and onto distributed servers in multiple locations. HP sells servers and storage technology and services to help companies manage big computing tasks. It is also developing ways to automate data centers.
  • Mobile Computing: HP already develops mobile technology such as notebook and handheld computers. Security features and its management software will becoming increasingly important
  • Digital Printing: HP sells a wide range of printers for consumers and businesses, including pritners for digital cameras. It entered the commercial and industrial digital printing arena with acquisitions like Indico and Scitex and is also developing multifunction copiers/printers.

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Posted on by tychay 0

Saturn sets…

What an amazing article in the Times today about the closing of part of a signature Saturn plant.

Anyone in the U.S. in the 90’s remembers the quirky Saturn commercials featuring this Spring Hill plant; how Covey’s book had a ringing endorsement from Skip LeFauve, President of Saturn; how Saturn was representative of the new team-based thinking coupled with a revolution in worker-management relations.

What happened?

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Posted on by tychay 0

Interesting new scam

Caitlin points out a new scam job. The idea is to scrape various classified sites for services (like Craigslist) and then offer them money in return for a check (a la Nigerian 419 scam). The new ideas here are the fact that it is specifically targeting an interest (in this case, wedding photographers and videographers) and that I think the scam may operate along a variant of check fraud where one uses the routing number off of your check in order to drain the account.

These scams are getting increasingly more sophisticated. No wonder one person claims that internet crime may be more lucrative than drugs.

I was surprised that the two people I mentioned this to at work were unaware of how the check system works in regards to the magnetic ink at the bottom of their checks.

I’m curious how this stuff can be reported. I don’t think individual action, besides being a complete waste of time, would be of any use here—any initial funds provided by them for the con are probably funneled through previously compromised bank accounts. Any suggestions for her?

Posted on by tychay 0