Archive: July, 2006

At Gnomedex I picked up a copy of Windows Vista, and Office 2007.

Today, I thought I might try them out. Before I installed, I stopped to double check the system requirements: A 800 mhz processor and min 512megs of RAM. Minimum. Aargh.

1 ghz processor, 1 gb RAM and a 256 meg video card. Recommended.

Based on other OS installs have been right, it’ll need at least the minimum, and more likely will need double that. Hmmm. My one-year old Dell 9300 laptop already has 1 gig of RAM, and I’m not sure I can easily (or cheaply) add more. When I got it I moved up from a desktop with 392 megs of RAM; wasn’t that great. I got the upgraded video card: 256 megs, just to be safe. Now it’s barely recommended!

At least MSFT’s engineers recognize the RAM issue: Vista also allows you to plug a memory stick into your USB port, and use it as RAM. I’ve got 6 USD ports on my laptop, and can connect each one to multiple USB hubs. I’m using one port on a hub right now for my wireless keyboard, mouse, my Treo, and an external backup drive. That leave 5 ports – 4gb Cruzer’s cost $179.00 (CAD) at Costco. I’m not sure how fast Vista accesss RAM on those things; but that might be the only way to make it work comfortably on my laptop!

I was just reading some comments over at Mini-Microsoft. Did Steve Ballmer really say: “if you’re still using Google raise your hands.” – and if he did, did no one in the audience actually put up their hands?

As I showed in a post on April 24 A vast majority of people in 98052 use Google. 98052 is the zip code where Microsoft’s office are located. Were none of these peope present?

I just checked our data – nothing has significantly changed since April. I suggest that if Steve Ballmer really did pose that question, and no one actually did put up their hands, then Microsoft has a problem. Perhaps the Town Hall environment was the wrong place to ask this sort of question, but still, if that’s the only opportunity to do so, is everyone at MSFT afriad to speak up?

What does this say about other problems and issues?

I’ve been meaning to post about the Pay for Click (PPC) Click Fraud components for a while, and the request for suggestions. The article in ZDNet really pushed me to start posing all of you a question (below) today. Basically, Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, stated that despite all previous statements with regards to Google attempting to eliminate Click Fraud issues, he believes that it is not really a big problem, as the retailers factor in fraud to their costs.

As a former retailer, I’m keenly aware of how important a problem shoplifting and inventory shrinkage are. At the major sales periods: Christmas, Back to School, etc. I hired extra staff. I hired them to assist in the additional customer support, but also to deter shoplifting. Other stores didn’t; some lost their shirts (literally and figuratively). PPC Click Fraud is no different than shoplifting. Retailers go to all sorts of lengths to deal with the problem. But apparently, it’s not as serious a problem as it was for retailers when I was in the business. I cringe at the line “Let it happen!”;

Thanks to Barry Schwartz at SEW for pointing out this blog post by Emad Famous.

Basically, the W3C.org site has a page which recognizes supporters. In exchange for a $1000,00 donation, you get a link from a PR9 page, and one from a PR 7 page I know a lot of people who have paid more! (not something I recommend though)

Here’s how it works (for at least another hour) – W3C acknowledges W3C Supporters as follows:

Premier Supporters: Supporter logo, which links to Supporter Web site; Supporter product name, which links to Supporter product Web site.
Major Supporters: Supporter name, which links to Supporter Web site; Supporter product name.
Contributing Supporters: Supporter name, type of contribution (financial, goods).
W3C Supporters are acknowledged on the W3C Supporters page starting with receipt by W3C of the contribution. W3C acknowledges each contribution via electronic mail upon receipt of the contribution. Acknowledgment is for one year and is renewable. On an exceptional basis, W3C may authorize multiple-year contributions.