HP Donation to increase High-tech grads

HP donates 2.8M to increase High-Tech Graduates. They are giving the money to universities. I'm all for HP donating money to schools, but in this case intentions are mis-guided. I don't think that donating money to Universities increases High-Tech grads, unless it allows for more students to join. Universities since the down turn are all running under capacity, ie more seats available than taken. This money will likely familiarize students who already have made a decision to go in high-tech to HP brand, which is fine by me. If this money was really about increasing high-tech grads we should donate it to high schools where the students are about to make a decision about their future. I'm involved in the talent pool initiative in Ottawa, and our effort are about understanding what is going on the heads of our teens and why is it that science is not a priority to them and that the computer went from being fun to do things with, to a tool to chat.

my personal rant - about web apps like Google Docs and Spreadsheets

Google Docs and Spreadsheets Interview from Read Write Web in this interview they say they are not trying to copy desktop apps. there is one thing good about desktop apps - i got used to work with them and i learned how to be very efficient with them. I think the web apps of today have to learn more about that aspect from their desktop cousins, not yet ancestors. the interactivity and fluidity of an app requires more than little/or a lot of ajax.

R/WW Trend Watch: User-generated Sites Define This Era of the Web

Mucho good post about web trends. It's interesting to see from the data how much generated content is the new black on the web. It just floors me on much pent up content there is in each and every one of the web users out there. Just like someone said in an article on wired - I post therfore I am!

The price of offshore attrition

Big attrition is not a good thing in any kind of job. In knowledge worker jobs attrition is very significant in the total cost of doing business. Most of the time though we can't really put a dollar figure on it. Let's say 1 out of 4 employee leave a team through out the year, and the ramp up for a job to get to the avg level of the team is 6months(50% of productivity of avg team member, so 3months of non productivity), on a team of 8 people. So conservatively for one person leaving 1.5month since less productive, replace the person (most likely a ghost - no time wasted), 3months no real consistent output, mentor time over the next 6months, 1.5month through out. The ideal output of the team with no attrition is 8people * 12months = 96man/months, with an attrition of 25%, a team loose at a minimum 12man/months or 2 * (1.5+3+1.5). And there is also the fact that the overall knowledge, or avg of the team will be trending down. More junior staff is less depth in the understanding of the system, so less productivity. So next time it's time to calculate the cost of the offshore team don't forget to add your attrition figure for 25% attrition rate, it is a minimum of additional 12.5% to the hourly rate. The best is to get into turn key solutions (project outsourcing) or have good performance indicators to monitor closely to have good leverage with the vendors.

One thumb down, one left

A few weeks back while cooking at home, preparing dinner, I seriously cut the tip of my right hand thumb. There was much cleaning to do from shaking my hand up and down, not realizing I was bleeding everywhere. This also made me realize for the subsequent weeks how much thumbs are useful, and absolutely mandatory for BlackBerry and Treo type devices. Typing with anything else than thumbs is anything but practical. I tried everything - a band aid, but it would hurt when I pressed the keys and started bleeding again, - a band aid with cushion underneath, but then my thumb was too big, and I was making too many mistakes, -use a finger from my right hand, and holding the device in my left hand, not stable enough. Finally I had to resort to typing with one hand, while holding the device in the other hand, it wasn't anywhere optimal. We need two thumbs end of story!

R&D success?

R&D success is no slam dunk. This article makes a good case that more money doesn't necessarily mean more results. Process and methods to capture and use ideas leads to better results. One interesting fact though with Google where we may think that the 20% R&D time is great is the solution - just recently the big honchos at Google are saying people need to think of more features not necessarily product - in other words funnel the innovation on leveraging the existing products. Even Google has its own problems, but more $$ doesn't mean more innovation. understanding the user and, understanding the context in which our product is used, will allow for a better targeting of the innovation, a better use of the $$$ available.

Pointing the finger to the guy who isn't the room

This is a very good article on the perception of outsourcing and the natural tendency to point fingers. There are cultural differences at play, this makes for different perceptions and understanding of situations. Is it an elephant, not it's a sheep. The difference between hiring someone for a job requiring creativity while another is strictly technical smarts and the impact it can have. There is also the part where because India/elsewhere is cheaper than the US, people have the reflex they can add people to de-risk their project for the same price, while they are in fact increasing the complexity and their risks. To de-risk a project going offshore there is a big design up front required.

Money saving: Amazon S3

SmugBlog: Don MacAskill ? Blog Archive ? Amazon S3: Show me the money I read about this story in the latest business week. I didn't realize the savings a startup requiring lots of web infrastructure could make by going with S3. The story in Business week btw is very good.

Technorati + Bloglines

This is a great way to check things out on what is going on with watchlists in as and RSS feeds in Bloglines, so that I can watch it everywhere and whenever, but when it doesn't work - it's just like with anything - it's useless. Something weird is going on with either Technorati or bloglines. I suspect it's with my watchlist in Technorati. Any how for the last little while a few of my watchlists always have the same content day after day. I have to understand where the problem is coming from and why it has stopped working. In theory if it's the same content day after day, it could mean there is no new content, so why is bloglines thinking it's new content and displaying as new everyday. Lots of fun for me.

Good project managers

Mike-O-Matic » 6 Signs of Good Software Project Managers Very good piece on the qualities of a good project manager. At the end of the day it's a whole new set of abilities. Often in companies I find people respect a lot technical bravado and overlook customer facing abilities. In a way it's a sign of one practice and smaller companies, the customer facing person has to be the best expert there is to convey credibility. To run a project, especially multi practices projects, I think it's best to focus on nurturing strong practice leads, and strong project managers overseeing everything with the qualities found in the link above.

Overzeallous custom agent?

Paul Kedrosky's Infectious Greed: No Digital Pictures, Please. We're Canadian. A little story about a guy crossing the border with a laptop, and the laptop has pictures! Watch out my friend - have you been surfing anywhere illicit lately - flush your cash before crossing the border into Canada.

Xbox + movies

The Next Net: Xbox 360 to Offer Video Downloads: "The Xbox is already connected to owners' TVs, so it's a pretty obvious move. " The post goes on to say Verizon and AT&T could start distributing xbox to anyone who signs up for their IPTV services. There are still a few technical issues to resolve before this is becomes real. The one I can see at this time is the XBox can pull data from a media center but it can't push to it. I think it's important to push because the xbox doesn't have the hard disk space or the video capture to allow for an experience that would be comparable to the plain old PVR one can get nowadays. Thumbs down to this one for now.

Thank you for smoking

For those who haven't seen this movie, thank you for smoking is really worth it. It's funny  in a dark way!

six thinking hats

Speaking with a business acquaintance he mentioned the 6 thinking hats as a good way to nail a decision. After reading a little more about it, I think it provides a way to organize a brainstorm so that we get to have all the data and organize it. The hats are a way to look at the decision from different angle, and only one angle at a time, which focus the attention and allows for every thing to be said. A pattern is likely to emerge, through the tweaking hat (Green Hat) or from the fact there are so many negative things that it can't be considered a good thing to do. Have a read.

Scrybe Syncing Calendar Has Launched In Beta

Techcrunch - Scrybe Syncing Calendar Two things - First Scrybe by the demo video does in fact look pretty nice. Second I forget all the time the penetration of Flash, but it's high up there, and highly avaialble. It doesn't have a whole lot of hype, as much sexyness as Ajax or Java, still it's more pervasive - hats off to Adobe/Macromedia. Looking at the video the User Experience of the Scrybe app is very interactive, whether offline or online. I have never done Flash programming I don't know how complex it is, but I have to give it the credit it deserves, and stop looking at it from high above because I know Java or whatever technology, and thinking it's just for animations.