Archive: June, 2006

The Who is about to release their first new album in 24 years. (!) Called Wire & Glass, it’s dedicated to Vict Cerf. Now that’s cool.

I’m hoping to catch at least 1 show (in person, see below) on this tour. The Who put on the best concert I’ve ever seen.

Known as “The father of the Internet.” Vint Cerf the nickname as one of the co-authors of TCP/IP. Of course, this allowed ARPA to connect various independent networks together to form one large network of networks-the Internet.

It’s really quite appropriate; The Who are simulcasting their entire tour over the Internet. I believe all proceeds go to charity. That’s the first time any group has attempted anything quite so audacious. They’ve bought bandwidth for 100,000 users to watch every show they do. I look forward to watching dozens of Who shows this year!

Microsoft & Bill Gates have announced that he is starting a two-year transition out of daily activities at Microsoft, so that he can concentrate on the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

I think anyone who works hard, and sees the work become extremely successful in his lifetime is a fortunate person. More fortunate yet is the person who finds things in life which they are passionate about, and gets the opportunity to pursue them. Bill Gates is passionate about making the world a better place. Soon, he’ll get to spend all his time making it happen.

Congratulations, Mr. Gates!

I almost went with the title “they whose name shall not be mentioned is building something big in The Dalles, Oregon” but apart from being long, I had to admit that such a title was really, really bad. But not my worst one yet! :-)

The reality of the matter is that Washington and Oregon State enjoy lots of cheap electricity (thanks Canada!), and lots of Internet fibre. For that reason, two companies which can be named: Microsoft and Yahoo! are building massive datacenters in Wenatchee and Quincy, WA. That information is public. A third company has been reported in the press to be building a complex, as pictured below, in The Dalles, Oregon. That company forced city staff to sign confidentiality agreements prior to starting their project.

In spite of those agreements, the word’s out.

So these two buildings, and a third one that’s still to come will become Google’s latest, greatest Datacenter. Apparently each building is about the size of a football field. Those cooling units on the end must are massive. Each stack is large than our office! Thanks to the NY Times for the picture.

Some (too many) days I don’t get the chance to read Danny Sullivan’s postings. I probably only read a fraction of them, in hindsight, some I wished I had read sooner, just as additional background information to reference. Today I’m glad I did: the posting about Eric Schmidt from Google denying that Google is a media company was one of the better ones I’ve read lately.

He saved the best for last, and I quote;

Perhaps calling Google an advertising company might be less open to debate, since that’s the main product it sells — advertising. But given the billboard idea, I don’t think calling it a media company is off the mark. Google’s in the billboard business, filling up those that it owns (via software, its own web sites) and those it rents from others with ads.

Meanwhile, here’s one more jaw dropper from the

Q: Was your corporate motto, “Don’t be evil,” a direct response to Microsoft?

A: No. It had nothing to do with Microsoft. Larry and Sergey, and certainly I when I joined the company, spent almost no time on Microsoft. This is a press-generated focus. We don’t spend very much time talking about Microsoft.