This story also ran some place on Slashdot.org, but I thought it really a gem that Senator Hatch's Web site runs pirated code. See the story at Wired News.
Ooooooooooooooh! Fry that server!
I've written elsewhere about the sea change that's come over the software industry, principally in a move en masse to "shrinkwrap" software for even enterprise scale applications. This benefits both customers and the software developers because the cost of developing and maintaining the software is amortized over N customers. If N is sufficiently large, in terms of immediate cost this is a clear win. Evidence is available that this is a much bigger factor causing the shrinking labor market for software developers than, say, competition from overseas developers or H1B folks. For one thing, even India is experiencing a slowdown. (This reference is available upon request. It was originally on Reuters.com, but they have since pulled the article and I am not aware of any Reuters archive.)
I understand entirely why businesses are doing this. In a nearly deflationary economy, with major sectors already experiencing deflation, the best financial option is to hold cash. It will be worth more tomorrow.
In information technology this deflation is aggravated by the continuing improvement in processor and memory performance per unit cost, meaning demand is down for everything from semiconductors to replacements for software that exploit higher performance hardware. But, like most things in life, we're learning there are other costs, less immediate but real nonetheless.
First, just like costs are 1/N of what they might otherwise be if a business wrote their own software, it's sensible that the vendor's sensitivity in terms of response to problems or requests for customization at a customer site is also 1/N of what it might otherwise be. Actually, it is probably less since the more a particular customer demands fixes or customizations without paying for these the less valuable that customer is to the vendor of the shrinkwrap. It is the most profitable customers, the ones who can use the software just as is, who are the most valuable.
Second, and more recently, centralization on a handful of shrinkwrap applications incurs legal and other risk. I am, of course, speaking of the PeopleSoft-J.D.Edwards-Oracle battle and of SCO-versus-the-world, notably IBM.
In the case of Oracle's predatory attempt to take over PeopleSoft, when the takeover was first announced, they loudly they would discontinue the PeopleSoft product line should they succeed. Worse, they said they'd fire PeopleSoft's employees. This message is actually being focussed upon PeopleSoft's customers. Mr Ellison must want to damage PeopleSoft's market position even if he does not acquire the company. PeopleSoft's customers must now feel they made a poor choice in going with PeopleSoft, but the same outcome might await them if they went with anyone's pre-packaged solutions, including Oracle's.
These clients now base their central business processes depend upon that solution. It is in danger of disappearing and, even under the best of circumstances, should Oracle succeed the client's own customers are likely to suffer poorer quality of service during the changeover.
One might blame Oracle for this situation, as the management of PeopleSoft and J.D.Edwards are clearly trying to do with their lawsuits, and it is odd that Oracle is essentially punishing customers for going with PeopleSoft, but actual responsibility also falls on the decision to use shrinkwrap for essential business capabilities. The forces which are driving companies to outsource are the same which are driving consolidation and acquisitions. Mr Ellison of Oracle might say this is inevitable with his pronouncements about the end of software as we know it. But despite his opinions, Oracle isn't immune from these tactics either.
In the other case, that of SCO going on a rampage to renege its licenses for everyone to use Unix, also poses a risk, however less likely the SCO suit is to succeed than Oracle is to buy PeopleSoft. The idea of IBM's AIX being suddenly unavailable to thousands of businesses must have their CIOs have waking nightmares. It is also a price of centralization. IBM may have pockets deep enough and legal talent strong enough that settlement is the most likely outcome, however far off in the future that settlement might be. But there will be costs in that case, and I cannot see IBM doing anything but somehow passing these onto users of AIX. There are, too, also many other licensees of Unix who may not be as robust as IBM and who really will be damaged along with their customers.
In summary then, there are some pretty ugly possibilities facing businesses who have consolidated their software functions in an ERP like PeopleSoft. If common sense has its way, the markets, the government, and the courts will see the harm which the Oracle predation and the SCO litigation frenzy would do if they succeeded. But, then, this is management trusting the future of their businesses to an outcome determined by greedy and fickle markets on the one hand and a justice's whim on the other.
No, I don't think I'd like to be a CIO right now, certainly not one managing an ERP solution. Imagine if someone tries to do something to Oracle?
That it is possible for someone to accumulate enough wealth to the damage the community of which they are a part is actually an old idea. That people don't realize this occurred to me when I was reading Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War during warmups at a gymnastics meet. (How Greek a place to do it.)
A guy noticed the book and asked why I was reading it, and something new I had learned from it. I told him about sumptuary laws. He opined it sounded communist. It is not, of course. It may be socialist, although that is an anachronism, and sumptuary laws were enforced as much by social custom as legislation.
At the time these notions arose in Western history, they weren't called that. The first true sumptuary laws came later, at the time of Greece's invasion by Macedonia. (See Note 1 below.) Well before then, at the time of Solon, one of the first archons, the idea of moderation was promoted as the key to wisdom and happiness. This applied not only to behavior, practices, and policies in individuals, but also to a commonwealth such as a Grecian city-state, like Athens. Much later, Aristotle wrote a good deal about this, regarding wealth and other things. Moderation or the golden mean was the keystone to Aristotle's system of ethics, which coincided with what Greeks liked to believe about themselves.
It is hard to imagine such an attitude about wealth in today's consumer- and consumption-oriented society, let alone justify it. To these ancients, a individual or family could not achieve wealth without the support, protection, and social services, however procured, of the commonwealth in which that individual and family grew. Craftsmen teaching trades and tutors may have been paid out of the family's pocket, but the availability of the tutor in that city-state or region arose in some measure because it was attractive for the tutor to come there. Whatever knowledge and skills the tutor or craftsman had arose because their community collectively created an environment for this to be possible.
Because of this, the degree of wealth held and displayed and how it was used became an important factor in politics and business. Merchants shunned ostentatious folk. As some vaguely specified limit of financial capability was approached, the commonwealth, the public, fellow businessmen, and political leaders had strong expectations about what such wealthy individuals and families should do. Otherwise the up-and-comers were deemed social boors.
For instance, it was expected these people would commission comedies, tragedies, and other public entertainments, free for public viewing. It was expected that these people would participate in helping underwrite public improvements, whether for defense or civil works. This was done in addition to what the treasury of the commonwealth provided. In particular, in case of attack or military campaigns conducted in the commonwealth's interest, it was expected that these individuals paid out-of-pocket for construction and maintenance of ships and wages for their crews. (See Note 2 below.) In short, it was acceptable to flaunt wealth if you will by doing public works but not by giving lavish parties or erecting huge houses.
The idea was that the wealthy had the most to lose if the commonwealth did not do well so they should support its policy beyond what a less well-heeled citizen would. The less wealthy citizen might otherwise decide to remain home because their needs were more immediate.
He doesn't specifically address this as a law, but you can see these values at work in a part of one of Pericle's famous speeches recorded by Thucydides:
I am of opinion that national greatness is more for the advantage of private citizens, than any individual well-being coupled with public humiliation. A man may be personally ever so well off, and yet if his country be ruined he must be ruined with it; whereas a flourishing commonwealth always affords chances of salvation to unfortunate individuals. Since then a state can support the misfortunes of private citizens, while they cannot support hers...
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Moreover, Thucydides himself writes of Pericles, illustrating his character with a tale:
While the Peloponnesians were still mustering at the Isthmus, or on the march before they invaded Attica, Pericles, son of Xanthippus, one of the ten generals of the Athenians, finding that the invasion was to take place, conceived the idea that Archidamus, who happened to be his friend, might possibly pass by his estate without ravaging it. This he might do, either from a personal wish to oblige him, or acting under instructions from Lacedaemon for the purpose of creating a prejudice against him, as had been before attempted in the demand for the expulsion of the accursed family. He accordingly took the precaution of announcing to the Athenians in the assembly that, although Archidamus was his friend, yet this friendship should not extend to the detriment of the state, and that in case the enemy should make his houses and lands an exception to the rest and not pillage them, he at once gave them up to be public property, so that they should not bring him into suspicion.
And Thucydides reports regarding Alcibiades, son of Clinias:
... [T]he position he held among the citizens led him to indulge his tastes beyond what his real means would bear, both in keeping horses and in the rest of his expenditure; and this later on had not a little to do with the ruin of the Athenian state. Alarmed at the greatness of his licence in his own life and habits, and of the ambition which he showed in all things soever that he undertook, the mass of the people set him down as a pretender to the tyranny, and became his enemies; and although publicly his conduct of the war was as good as could be desired, individually, his habits gave offence to every one, and caused them to commit affairs to other hands, and thus before long to ruin the city.
But it isn't as if moderation and sumptuary law were limited to the classical Greeks. The Romans had sumptuary laws, too, at least for a significant time. The Jewish Talmud, interpreting the Five Books of Moses, institutes its own sense of propriety and sumptuary law.
Not surprisingly, many of these notions extended to more modern times, including Scotland and colonial Massachusetts.
The idea of a consumption-based society is a new feature, arising with the collision of the industrial revolution with a vision of the United States as seen through the eyes of its nineteenth century pioneers and expansionists.
Even when Adam Smith in his Wealth of Nations criticizes sumptuary laws, he does it because he says they are imposed upon the great public by people of power, wealth, and influence, and they are exempt from them. He is saying sumptuary laws, as known, are hypocritical.
A full-blown revolt against non-capitalist and non-monetary values demands the thoughts and arguments of Ralph Waldo Emerson, among others. He writes about it in his essay on Wealth, originally written in 1860 and revised significantly in 1876. It is a true reflection of its times:
Success consists in close appliance to the laws of the world, and, since those laws are intellectual and moral, an intellectual and moral obedience. Political Economy is as good a book wherein to read the life of man, and the ascendency of laws over all private and hostile influences, as any Bible which has come down to us.
Money is representative, and follows the nature and fortunes of the owner. The coin is a delicate meter of civil, social, and moral changes. The farmer is covetous of his dollar, and with reason. It is no waif to him. He knows how many strokes of labor it represents. His bones ache with the day's work that earned it. He knows how much land it represents; -- how much rain, frost, and sunshine. He knows that, in the dollar, he gives you so much discretion and patience so much hoeing, and threshing. Try to lift his dollar; you must lift all that weight. In the city, where money follows the skit of a pen, or a lucky rise in exchange, it comes to be looked on as light. I wish the farmer held it dearer, and would spend it only for real bread; force for force.
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Wealth brings with it its own checks and balances. The basis of political economy is non-interference. The only safe rule is found in the self-adjusting meter of demand and supply. Do not legislate. Meddle, and you snap the sinews with your sumptuary laws. Give no bounties: make equal laws: secure life and property, and you need not give alms. Open the doors of opportunity to talent and virtue, and they will do themselves justice, and property will not be in bad hands. In a free and just commonwealth, property rushes from the idle and imbecile, to the industrious, brave, and persevering.
Today, using ideas from modern economics and applying modern sensibilities, it is possible to assign the appreciative value of a community to the increase in the price of unimproved land as its surround is developed, schools are built, and public services are added. To our way of thinking, it is already accounted for in that increase of value and, so, does not need to be accounted for again. But that assumes the only reservoir of value is money or its surrogates, and that in itself is unsound economics.
Notes
Y'know, there may be a method to George Bush's "madness" about the tax cut. There's agreement it is too small to stimulate the economy much. So there's a puzzle.
But the main problem facing the U.S. economy is deflation, a spectre that's haunting other world economies as well. After a point, central banks can't do too much about deflation. One way to handle it is create some inflation. Printing money is one not-so-good way of doing that. The other way is to have the government spend more than it has.
Maybe the Bush tax cut is a way to arrange that.
A Republican can't come out and argue for bigger government spending, even if it is a good idea. It gives their big spending Democrats too much to praise. And there are folks in his own party who would fight it -- the fiscal conservatives, the same folks who are balking but compromising on the tax cut. So, knowing the Congress can't resist overspending some -- the pork must flow, y'know -- how to arrange that? Take some of their money away.
So maybe a bigger tax cut would be better, for roundabout reasons.
In the category of more evidence for my increasing belief that the terms "liberal", "conservative", "right wing", "left wing" are meaningless, consider China's current edict concerning SARS.
I think that is something Michael Savage proposed in the early days of the epidemic.
It's another Michael Savage wannabe. More here.
Oh well. I finally discovered what the Slashdot foe-freaks system is for.
On the whole, Microsoft WinXP seems to be an okay system, if you forgive its shortcuts mania, occasional loss of communication with a LAN, and intolerance for certain PC games. [Hint, 'though: Definitely invest in copies of Karp, et al's Windows XP Annoyances and Windows XP in a Nutshell put out by O'Reilly Press.]
But Microsoft Word for WinXP is something else.
I have a resume: Nothing fancy, just a one page thing. If I edit it in WinXP's Word it balloons in size to 632K. If I take the exactly identical
Oh well, gives me a reason for keeping my Win95 system around, along with all the excellent software I've invested in and on it.
The UK Telegraph is reporting a definitive connection between Saddam and Bin Laden
A contemporary ad for a telecommunications company says, in major part,
Business is about relationships. Technology is the easy part.
I say, "Bullshit."
Such is a huge misrepresentation of the nature of enterprise, and of reality, for that matter. New technology does not grow on trees. New technology is not about wrappers or presentation. New technology is hard to get, hard to win. New technology does not come without patience and investment in time. New technology is based largely upon science, and both are in large measure dependent upon luck, however educated.
The idea that cashing technology in demands the placation of gatekeepers, the involvement and appeasement of many who sit between an idea and financial success does not empower them. To the contrary, it shows them for the leeches and worthless wall-dressers they are, and, to the extent our culture praises them, however implicitly, the degree of its perversion.
What happened to the admiration for the Wright brothers, or George Westinghouse, or Francois Marie Arouet de Voltaire, or Thomas Edison, however single-minded on financial success he was, or for the strange but admirable genius of a Nikola Tesla?
MIT's Technology Review features an interesting article about privacy and surveillance.
Don't prejudge Tech Review! They seldom write what or how you would expect.
I listened to Bill O'Reilly's RadioFactor show on the way to a client's site today and learned of this article by Gary Kamiya on Salon.com. I used to subscribe to Salon, even had a banner for them on my Web site. But I dumped them when they became virulently anti-war after the UN Security Council fiasco.
I guess some Republicans are more connected than others. I think the government might owe Dr Wen Ho Lee a real apology.
There's more in this article, and here.
Anyone know what's going on in the case of the Mike Hawash story?
I'm a member of the Software Contractors' Guild, as is Mr Hawash. I learned about the case from the Guild's founder, Dave Keeney, who I've known forever, ever since the Guild was founded.
The talking heads, pundits, and other commentators have begun the assessment of risks facing the U.S. and U.K. as an outcome of this war, anticipating the speedy dispatch of the rest of Saddam Hussein and his henchmen. Comparisons with the spectre of Vietnam are being drawn and, oddly, they are being done in a tone which acts as if the comparisons hadn't already been made.
In matter of fact, the Coalition is dispatching the Iraqi regime in a way which is far less bloody and brutal than was anticipated, even by the war plan's supporters, and with a loss in lives and dollars that's remarkable. There remains the dangers assigned to "the Arab street".
That whole scene is hard to understand. The Iraqi defense plan, whatever of it there was, seemed to have the consensus of this Arab general opinion, that Americans were too soft to be "real warriors" and that Americans could not stand to see their troops coming home in body bags. The conclusion was that if the fight were prolonged and made bloody enough, Americans would tire and eventually leave. In essence, the Iraqi leadership and, apparently, opinion-makers in the Muslim world felt that the United States never grew out of its Vietnam phobias and that the public now is the same as the public then.
To the Western world, that's clearly not the case, at least to anyone who has eyes. And that is particularly true of the American military.
In fact, now, it seems, the pundits, the Iraqi media, what little there remains of it, the talking heads, and "the Arab street" are now drawing large Iraqis as victims of American aggression. Somehow these U.S.-U.K. dough soft boys and could be so easily defeated are now conquering monsters crushing babies heads beneath their boots.
In matter of fact, what this war has shown is that sheer zealousness and dedication, even if religiously sourced, is no match in combat for training, knowledge, technology, machinery, as well as the determination that comes with key American values. Sure, if horrific bodily damage is inflicted upon a civilian population, they will recoil in their psyches and feel cowed, at least initially. But, unfortunately for the supporters of the al-Queda approach to world domination, their military heroes, the al-Queda, or the Iraqi leaders, studied America and Americans too little.
I think even the British don't understand us that well, and they, of anyone, probably understand Americans best. The French would deny understanding us even if they did. The Russians have too bruised egos to know quite what to do, having bet on a long-term alliance with the United States, but being unable to follow its courageous lead. And the Chinese know when to remain aloof.
The fact is, Americans have a violent past, a past that even Americans whitewash in their historical recounts of it. Americans are not, I believe, any more violent than anyone else, but if they are injured in a big way, the public can collectively lash out at a perceived enemy with terrible ferocity, and with a firm belief in their moral justification that convinces them it isn't mere revenge. I recall after September 11th how, when asked, even George W Bush was amazed at the anger Americans were expressing regarding the terrorist attack. He may have been amazed, but he understood the message.
Indeed, it may be that the only folk who will suffer long term from this war is "the Arab street" itself if they misunderstand what it means. American tanks were charged by true believers driving explosive-laden trucks, trying to attack the infidels and "burn them", and the true believers were cut into ribbons and little pieces. But, for America, it is possible the outcome will be much better than the pessimists are saying.
An upbeat prognosis is offered by The Economist , one of my favorite news periodicals. The Economist cannot be pigeonholed in any neat "liberal", "conservative", "green", "neoconservative", or "nationalist" category. Indeed, the best description of them is "rational" and--not surprisingly--"economic". I don't agree with them on everything and, in particular, I don't agree with their position on manned space exploration. But I agree with them on surprisingly many things, or I have been convinced by them.
In an April 3rd 2003 article titled "At the gates of Baghdad", they present their upbeat assessment of the possibilities for the United States. They have not yet addressed the post-war fallout for Europe, but I am sure they will, and I look forward to that. For now, they say:
In Vietnam the Americans fought for ten years. The Soviet army spent ten years in Afghanistan. This war entered its third week with the Americans battering through Iraq's Republican Guard divisions to the gates of Baghdad. At this rate, it will be a surprise if the Americans have to fight for ten weeks, let alone ten years. Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza has lasted for 36 years. If America has its way, its occupation of Iraq is more likely to last for fewer than 36 months. And there is no reason why America should not have its way: unlike Israel and the Palestinians, America and Iraq have no territorial quarrel. America's stated aim is to remove the regime and its mass-killing weapons, allow the Iraqis to replace their dictatorship with a representative government, and then depart.
By sticking to this plan and remembering to go home, the Americans should be able to reduce the damage their victory does to wider Arab pride. They and the British are already going to unusual lengths to bring some delicacy, even political correctness, to the battlefield. There is no tactless raising of the Stars and Stripes or the Union Jack over captured Iraqi positions. The civilian casualties, which even the Iraqis put at under 1,000, have so far been negligible by the standards of war.
When the war is over, especially if its ending emboldens Iraqis to say out loud that they abhorred the previous regime, Iraq will make an improbable Afghanistan. The Arabs who flocked to fight in Afghanistan had a superpower (America) on their side and a base (Pakistan) to fight from. They also had an idea: they were fighting for Islam against communist atheists. None of this applies in Iraq. Iran and Syria, already on George Bush's watch list, have good reasons not to pick a fight with America. Iraq's other neighbours--Jordan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait--are already America's friends. Some of these governments will no doubt seek spheres of influence inside the new Iraq. This is a danger. But none will risk making itself the base for an anti-American guerrilla war. However much they disapprove of this war, most Arab governments will stay on side. And those that do not stay on side will stay in line.
The prognosis is not starry-eyed. It does not speak from inexperience or from an insufficient appreciation for how things can go quickly wrong. But it is a hugely refreshing analysis compared to the endless murkiness and "analysis paralysis" wafting over the media as this war ends. And whatever the risk to the United State or to Britain, they point out that the risks to the Muslim world are greater and that only the Muslim world can really do anything about those:
... Arabs are having to fume helplessly while Israel's superpower patron knocks the stuffing out of the one Arab state that had set its heart on becoming a superpower itself. To judge by the rage in Cairo, Damascus and other capitals, it is more than many Arabs can bear.
Humiliation is a dangerous thing. What is worse is that there is not much the western powers can do to soothe the wounds. In Iraq, America and Britain believe correctly that they are acting in their own vital interest and that of the wider world by separating Mr Hussein from his mass-killing weapons. They can try harder to bring peace to Palestine---indeed, to create a Palestine---but this will be possible only if the Palestinians and other Arabs stop hoping that they can reverse what many still see as the humiliation of Israel's creation. They can try to create the conditions in which a post-Saddam Iraq can become an exemplary democracy. But what if Iraq cannot rise to the occasion? Ultimately, it is for the Arabs themselves to opt for the modernity and democracy that have eluded them. All this war can do is to make that possible. It cannot guarantee that it will happen.
If we don't provide consumers with our product in a timely manner, the pirates will.
With those words, Michael Eisner, CEO of the Walt Disney Company, announced an about face in their approach to digital programming and technologies, embracing it, and competing with pirates on their own turf.
The context was the 2003 convention of the National Association of Broadcasters in Las Vegas, NV. The most concrete example of Disney's new found faith was their announcement of Movie Beam, a new service that will allow consumers to receive on demand high-quality versions of motion pictures using a set-top box.
I say IT'S ABOUT TIME!
Perhaps this is a result of belated wisdom, or perhaps the threat of Pixar leaving the lucrative partnership with Disney was simply getting too much, but Eisner sure sounds like he got that ole Steve Jobs religion in contrast to his earlier bitter statements. If so, it would be a big come-down for Eisner, considering the recent bleak relationship between Disney and Pixar, and Mr Eisner's reputedly large and sensitive ego.
If Pixar doesn't leave the partnership, Disney, its stockholders and fans will, IMO, owe a big debt to Steve Jobs for turning this around and perhaps in the process teaching Mr Eisner that technology is crucial in both the future of entertainment and for the Walt Disney Company, a lesson which Disney should never have forgotten. Walter Elias Disney himself said new entertainment.technology, such as color television, never really replaced existing media, only provided additional ways of telling stories. Steve Jobs also might have taught Eisner some humility, something Jobs learned the hard way.
Here was part of my take on Eisner and Disney about a month ago as posted on a discussion board at the exquisite unofficial Disney site, laughingplace.com:
... I think the solutions have been widely proposed here and elsewhere: Invest more cash in the theme parks and on the entertainment Disney is supposed to be great at making rather than spending it on cute acquisitions.
I do not know the company's cash situation or flow, since that is closely guarded. Obviously, too, it's harder now to justify such spending during travel recession and when major companies are abandoning exhibits and pavilions left and right.
But the point was to forestall that by improving the parks and creating an environment where companies would either want to stay or where other companies in better financial shape would see a great opportunity in sponsoring exhibits.
As far as "knowing Eisner" goes, no, I do not know him. However, I fail to see how Mr Eisner's personality has any relevance with how a prospective investor evaluates him, apart from the hypothetical case where a CEO simply doesn't get along with their board of directors or other management because of it.
And, whether Mr Eisner likes it or not, digital technology is going to mow other kinds of entertainment down, not because it is inherently better or more entertaining, but because more can be done with it at less cost in people and fixtures. Mr Eisner should be courting Pixar, not letting them go off on their own. Steve Jobs should be asked to be on the Disney board, not implicitly criticized for managing companies which steal money from Disney.
Folks talk about the dot-com trend having bombed, but I don't see anything changing or slowing about digital technology. If anything, prices for it are plummetting, partly because of the dot-bomb phenomenon.
Maybe Disney was too early in the GO.com phenom, but that technology is beginning to pervade everything. What Disney needs is leadership in this area, not excuses or complaints.
An authority is a person who can tell you more about something than you really care to know.
