When the internet first rolled around, it was pretty open.

You had gopher, archie, veronica and – later – FTP. Get a picture? Get UUDecode.

Then came the web. AOL, Compuserve, Prodigy and so on.

In the beginning, one could only email a Prodigy account from, well, another Prodigy account. And so on.

The walls came down (relatively) quickly, but new walls quickly came up:

• Windows vs. Apple incompatibilities (let’s leave Linux out for now)…
• Netscape vs. IE incompatibilities (let’s leave Opera out for now, and treat Firefox as the successor to Netscape).
• Lotus 1-2-3 vs. Excel
• And so on…

Today, the walls have changed, but they still exist:

• Still harder to network a Mac than a Windows machine
• Different browser vendors have a different way of “implementing” the (unfinalized) HTML 5 spec
• Different eReader format specs – can’t read that Nook eBook on the Kindle and so on
• Smartphone apps that are different – and nontransferable – from one smartphone OS to another (got Angry Birds on your iPhone? Buy/download again for your Android phone)

The fragmentation into silos makes sense – it’s a point of differentiation (Apple: We’re more integrated; Android: We’re more open). And these are different technologies. Understood.

But – to the average consumer – it’s freakin’ impossible to understand. They don’t understand that, for example, if Amazon discontinues the Kindle, well, it might be a bad thing for them.

Silos are bad. Mebee…

Yet silos can be your friend.

Ten years ago people were horrified at the notion of Intel adding a unique ID to all of its processors. Today every phone has a unique ID, and yours is probably uploaded to apps’ servers multiple times a day. Not so long ago, people were outraged that Amazon could and did arbitrarily delete books from users’ Kindles; last week they clamored for Google to exercise essentially the same power.

— Jon Evans, The Walled Garden Has Won

He’s got a point. It’s part of the Facebook world, confirming Scott McNealy’s (in)famous quotation, “You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it.”

But there are silos of privacy (almost gone), and silos of data (can I easily port my Blogger.com account to WordPress.com?).

The latter is still very difficult – and I’m a web dork. And it’s my data, dammit!

There need to be basic standards that – for example (and not picking on anyone) – blog hosting sites adhere to. So you can easily export your data to a different blog hosting site. Sure, may lose some functionality (think about saving that MS Word doc as RTF – yep, some formatting will be lost….), but, for the most part, intact/possible.

Or you can export your pics from site X to site Y- yeah, may lose the thumbnails/friends, but OK…

That’ll be a good thing.

We’re not there yet, and – for the most part – it’s gotten worse over the last few years, as every new startup does things differently. So porting your (pics/data/spreadsheets/etc) gets messier and messier.

I expect things to get a little worse before they get better – but that means some innovation is occurring, so that’s not a really bad thing.

But it’s frustrating at times.

The average web user has a Yahoo! email account.

Yahoo!, is, unfortunately, dying. It’ll stay afloat due to its large installed base (hey, all those email accounts – how many of you have free excite.com email accounts [that you still use]?).

But – tomorrow – is that enough for Yahoo to say alive? If not, what happens to (a bazillion) yahoo.com email accounts? Including your account, that you use just for X or Y (water bill notifications; kid’s school stuff…)

Silos. Good…bad…hmm…

Tonight – about five to six hours from now – the 2011 Academy Awards show will get underway; here’s my list of the winners and why.

[Update ~11pm – Watched the Oscars; added winners/losers. Got seven of nine correct.]

Best Picture – The King’s Speech
Why: I haven’t seen yet, but I’ve heard nothing but good things about it. And it’s the traditional type of big Hollywood movie the Academy traditionally rewards. Correct

Best Director – David Fincher, The Social Network
Why: The Facebook movie is picked by a lot of critics to take home the Best Picture award, but I just don’t see that happening. While a somewhat traditional Hollywood movie (hard work, some backstabbing and you make good), it’s more of a younger movie, and the Academy is old. I think the Academy may reward Fincher with the Best Director award instead of the Best Picture award (which, as I outlined above, will go to The King’s Speech) – much like the way it was done with Brokeback Mountain a few years ago. Wrong – it went to the favorite, The King’s Speach.

Best Actor – Colin Firth, The King’s Speech
Why: Nothing but good press for Firth in a highly-acclaimed movie. And movies where one plays against type of or has a disability (think Rainman, Forrest Gump, Boys Don’t Cry) give one an extra bump. This is a gimme. Correct

Best Actress – Natalie Portman, Black Swan
Why: See Best Actor, above. Much, much darker than anything she has played. Though the sexual elements of her performance may work against her with some Academy members. We are such prudes in this country. Correct

Best Support Actor – Christian Bale, The Fighter
Why: Really, the only competition for Bale is Geoffrey Rush in The King’s Speech. Since this is going to be a King’s Speech night, Rush has a chance of pulling an upset. However, he has won before (Best Actor for Shining), and the Academy tends to reward someone new. If merit alone won Academy Awards, think of how cluttered Meryl Streep’s mantelpiece would be… Correct

Best Supporting Actress – Melissa Leo, The Fighter
Why: Most critics say Leo is a lock, but with both her and Amy Adams nominated for the same slot from the same movie, there might be some ballot-splitting. But I still see Leo taking the statue home. If there is a split, Helena Bonham Carter will be the winner – again, it’s going to be a King’s Speech love fest… Correct

Best Original Screenplay – Christopher Nolan, Inception
Why: I really haven’t read much about this – I believe The King’s Speech is nominated here, as well. But Inception is just so strikingly original that I think is should win. Wrong – went to The King’s Speech. Interesting.

Best Adapted Screenplay – Aaron Sorkin, The Social Network
Why: This was brilliant writing and, to me, was the best part of the movie. If this doesn’t win, that’ll be a big surprise to me. Correct

Best Animated Film – Toy Story 3
Why: Because every Pixar film is so many times better than the competition… Correct

The envelope please…

Tonight (Sunday) I’m tailing a work initiative, so it’s time in front of the computer but nothing intensive.

So I give you some (completely) random thoughts I’ve jotted in a tickler.

• Pet Peeve – Newspapers/TV news online, identify yourselves: No charges filed against journalist handcuffed by Miller security. OK, this one is Alaska, and the story has a dateline (Anchorage). But where is this station/newspaper? KTUU is “Alaska’s News Source” – Alaska is a big state. Anchorage/Fairbanks/Juneau/North Slope?? While news is local, anyone can access same: Many Google Alerts to newspaper/TV sites take you to sites that locally might be well known, but not to an outsider. The “Daily Herald” means nothing to me. How about adding, “The most trusted name in the [city name] “ or whatever?
   
• Incredibly stupid question: Why doesn’t the monitor have the graphics stuff? Just a common driver from computer to monitor; said monitor may have a huge video cache (or not).
   
• Incredibly stupid question deux: When are we getting an HDMI-like connector (all-in-one) for computers to monitors/KVMs? Apple got close to this a decade ago (mouse connects to keyboard; keyboard to computer. It’s 10 years later, and we still, for the most part, have four cords running out of/into the back of the computer: Mouse, keyboard, video and ethernet. The ethernet is a little different, but I still see this in the future (unless wireless gets so good that ethernet is not needed – this may be true for home networking, but not for data centers, let’s say)
   
• AOL’s acquisition of The Huffington Post: Yes, this a week old. I haven’t commented because I haven’t had the time, but I think it’s a great deal for both parties, especially for The Huffington Post. Arianna is someone who “gets” News 2.0 (my phrase); with the cash and control (editorial director) AOL is is giving her, she has a chance to continue her discovery processes (I’m certain it is a discovery process; there is no road map for News 2.0; it’s in flux) with a little more wiggle room and the opportunity to play “what if” a bit more. Note: HuffPo’s version of News 2.0 is, to me, just one possible News 2.0. That’s what confounds newspapers and aids (smart) online news sites. Dead-tree news works one way: Print news, subsidize with subscriptions and advertising; delivery is analog (truck roll). Online News 2.0 can be anything – HuffingtonPost.com; blogs; Yelp.com; Twitter streams and so on. It’s live and constantly updated. It’s pretty damn exciting. BTW, now AOL = Arianna On Line
   

WATCHING:
Social Network, The
Aaron Sorkin, adapted screenplay

This was definitely a Sorkin movie – the shotgun dialogue – but the director (David Fincher) really made the movie with interesting choices of cinematography and the non-linear plot (although that could have been Sorkin, as well).

I know of Facebook and some of the backstory, but I’m not really in a position to say how accurate it was. The tech parts were, for the most part, spot on (except that Zuckerberg had an AT keyboard. I don’t think so…).

Good watch, but not something I’ll watch again any time soon, if at all. I’ve seen it. That’s that.

All movies

I saw “The Social Network” today (review, right – One word review: “Meh”), and the two take-aways from the movie I saw were:

• Zuckerberg didn’t care about money; he just wanted his site to be cool, and
   
• Zuckerberg took Sean Parker’s advice, and didn’t take the easy money, but retained control and built the site out as he – not stockholders – wanted it to be.

(NOTE: That’s from the movie, not necessarily from reality.)

This resonated with me on a couple of levels: The current state of the internet is a lot like 1998 – the bubble is rising. And a lot of it is that people are pumping money into companies with no real due diligence, and it seems as though a lot of companies are being built to be purchased.

It’s all about the Benjamins.

The internet is getting closer to Wall Street than Main Street. On Wall Street, all they really do is figure out ways to make money. Period. No new products, no tools/devices to make life better – just schemes to make money. Use money in a novel way to make more money. To the n^th degree.

While this is, to a (non-n^th, let’s say) degree, fine (hey, “Greed is good,” right?), it causes problems when the banks/brokerage houses are suddenly the financial engines of the country, instead of GM, Ford, General Electric and so on. Ya know, companies that actually make something in addition to profits.

That’s why I gave GroupOn props for spurning Google’s buyout offer.

Much like Zuckerberg, GroupOn decided to stay true to its vision and not settle for a couple of pallets of cash. At the same time, part of both Zuckerberg’s and GroupOn’s equation is that no matter that offer is presented, it doesn’t come close to the potential valuation of either property. As of today, both companies have bet correctly.

Screenshot of TMP.com

Yesterday, Saturday, January 8th, 2011, a gunman shot – at point-blank range – U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D, AZ) as she was at a meet-and-greet in her home district.

The assassination attempt left six dead, including a federal judge and a nine-year-old girl, and over a dozen injured, many critically.

Giffords is currently out of surgery, and doing well (considering the circumstances). Long-term prognosis has not even been mentioned.

A couple of quick notes:

• There can be no excuses – just explanations – for this carnage.

• I’m appalled by all this senseless slaughter. A representative, doing what reps do on weekends – making themselves available to constituents and the press – was, apparently, targeted for a cold-blooded assassination. Have we come to this?

• This was a relatively unknown member of the House of Representatives. Yes, a Democrat in a red state, but not some politico who gets attention (pro/con) like, say, former half-term Governor Palin, President Obama, Senator John McCain and so on. Why her? That’s one of the scary aspects of this. Obama – as the first African-American president – will, sadly, get a bunch of death threats. But Giffords? Or any other below-the-radar government official/aide. Why?

Lots of talk on the intertubes about this, obviously.

There is no upside to this for anyone, yet there is a lot of finger-pointing.

Taking a longer view of the situation, HuffingtonPost.com’s Howard Fineman puts his finger on the bigger picture – while not ignoring the incredible suffering this shooter has inflicted on individuals, the community and the nation as a whole.

The shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is a watershed event in many ways, some of which we cannot yet know, but one of the clearest and simplest is this: Congress and its members are about to be permanently quarantined, physically isolated, from the people it and they represent.

Thirty years ago, there was no such thing as security on Capitol Hill or for members. Members of the public were free to roam the halls, and police presence was practically invisible. There were no barricades around the grounds, and even the leadership rarely had any form of protection.

The Hill was the very model of the People’s Place — and in that respect it was an inspirational symbol of our democracy.

— Howard Fineman, The End of Access

I was in DC this summer, and it had changed in so many ways since I was last in the district (over 30 years ago, granted).

The White House is now a fortress: Lockdowns for foot traffic when a helicopter is inbound, police with M-16s everywhere, barricades are the norm.

It’s sad, but it’s – unfortunately – a reaction to reality. And it’s in evidence across federal buildings.

Yesterday, many individuals died, and many were injured.

One of the casualties was at least one facet of democracy: the idea that an individual can meet – face-to-face – with those who represent that individual.

Going to be much harder moving forward.

I’m not minimizing the loss of life or those who were physically injured yesterday, but this event has far-ranging consequences.

This is not a year in review piece, it’s just a collection of things that struck me over the course of the year.

Favorite book: This would have to be Kurt Vonnegut’s A Man Without a Country. This book came out in 2005, but I just became aware of it this year (read my review). Once I did stumble upon it, I purchased and devoured. It’s as close to an autobiography of Vonnegut as we’re going to get (unless there is some manuscript waiting to be discovered…), and while not a true autobiography in any sense, it’s Vonnegut writing about his life/thoughts in the first person. A very enjoyable – albeit brief – read, but good to spend some time with new (to me) Vonnegut.

Favorite musician: Regina Spektor. I saw the movie 500 Days of Summer (more on this later), and the movie had an amazing soundtrack, with a lot of artists I wasn’t familiar with. So I purchased the soundtrack, and two of the tracks – two of my favs – were by Regina Spektor. So I purchased a couple of her CDs, and they are amazing: Soviet Kitsch and Begin to Hope. These are older albums (2004 & 2006, respectively), but new to me. I don’t quite know how to quantify Spektor to those who don’t know her – perhaps a mix between Tori Amos (piano) and PJ Harvey (out of the mainstream folk/pop with balls). I love Spektor’s staccato beat, especially on “Us.” Awesome. I just ordered a more recent – 2009 – release of Specktor’s, Far from Amazon. It got mixed reviews – for some it was bad because it wasn’t as pure/raw (voice/piano); others said it was still all Spektor, just with the full studio feel. I have not received yet; it’ll be interesting. My fav musical artist of this year, even if she has been around for years.

Favorite movie: Saw a lot of good films this year – all on DVD and not necessarily from this year – but the one that stands out is 500 Days of Summer. Quirky, non-linear, great mix of film and illustration, awesome soundtrack (see above). Best movie ever? Of course not. Just a very watchable (over and over) film.

WATCHING:
Run Lola Run
Starring: Franka Potente

This is just what the title says: Lola (Potente) running.

A German film, it won the audience award at Sundance in 1999.

Basic outline of movie: Lola gets a call from loser of a boyfriend; he’s screwed up and – unless he can come up with a lot of money in 20 minutes, he’ll probably be killed. Lola promises to get to him – with the cash (somehow) – in that time period.

Most of the movies is Lola running through the streets, trying to fashion a plan. She runs a LOT.

There are three sequences, all beginning the same (the phone call and her running out of their apartment). Yet each of the three sequences have very slight differences, and those differences make all the difference in the world to Lola and those close to her.

Oddball, artsy film. Not one you’ll watch time and again, but I enjoyed.

All movies

Well, it’s that time of the year: Prognoistications. As I have for the past couple of years (2010 guesses, 2009 guesses), I’ll first take a look back and see how I did for this year before gazing into the crystal ball for 2011.

Here’s what I was expecting for 2010:

• Apple’ll come out with a tablet: Even for Apple, a company known for it’s secrecy re: new products, this was a gimme. I though it would come with an HDMI port – that was my big “guess.” I was wrong. Let’s call this a wash because of this. I should have known better – Nothing the Lord Master Steve loves better than cutting ports…
   
  
• Steve Jobs will announce a deadline to step down as Apple’s CEO: He shows no signs of slowing down. Wrong.
   
  
• There’ll be a lot of fuss about mySql (now that Oracle has purchased Sun, which bought mySql): I think I’m spot on with this one: Lot of concern, but nothing – good or bad – materialized. Correct.
   
  
• Google’s Chrome Browser will end the year with a market share around 10%: This report show’s Chrome’s use about 9.25% at the beginning of December with a strong upward trend. I’m giving this one to myself. Correct.
  Update 1/3/2011: Chrome hits 10%
   
  
• Facebook will have an IPO: Completely wrong. More than anything, they seem to be positioning themselves (via VC cash and other moves) to create the company they want before the IPO and they having to worry about shareholders. Looking to be a smart move. But I was wrong.
   
  
• Twitter won’t have an IPO: Correct, but in part (?) because Twitter can’t figure out its business model. Once they figure that out – and execute on same – may be ready to go public.
   
  
• Ruby (on or off “Rails”) still won’t catch on as the “hot new language” to play with: Kind of hard to quantify this, but Ruby still doesn’t have the momentum of Java or PHP. The new languages that appear to be in demand are JQuery/JSON/HTML5 stuff. One for me.
   
  
• Google Wave still an “interesting idea”: I wrote that Wave was “just too ambitious to take hold” in 2010. Or, apparently ever. Google killed Wave in August this year. I’ll give myself this one (didn’t take hold this year), but – to be fair – I didn’t expect it to be killed this year.
   
  
• Geo-location will have another huge year: Uh, yeah. Foursquare. Yelp. Gowolla. GroupOn. Totally correct.
   
  
• Ebooks’ usage soars: the iPad (not just an ereader) is on pace to sell 7+ million units this year. Kindle is rumored to move 8 million this year. And other tablets/readers (Gallexy Tab; Nook) continue to prosper. And the ebooks associated with them will total approximately $1 billion this year, and are projected to reach $3 billion by 2015. Called this one.
   
  
• Newspapers continue to flounder – badly: I’ll give myself a push on this one. Yes, newspapers continue to flounder, but I stuck my neck out and said Rupert Murdoch wouldn’t put up any paywalls in 201. He put up paywalls in the UK in June, 2010. Not that it helped – now he’s betting the farm on an etablet-only pay-for-news app. So a push.
   
  
• Cloud computing use will continue to grow, but not to the “yeah, most use it” levels: I still stick by this. Lots of chatter about same, but relatively little deployment (by number of users – I do believe the amount of content in the cloud has soared this year, but only for a small subset of internet users.
   
  
• Microsoft will struggle to redefine itself in 2010: Correct. Microsoft is seeing its cash cows – Windows and Office – on the PC marginalized by the surge of Macs and cloud computing (Google Docs, for example). At the same time, Microsoft has missed the biggest tech opening in the last few years – mobile phones – badly. The new Window Phone 7 (or whatever it’s called) is supposed to finally get them close, but they are three or so years behind Apple/iPhone Google/Android in this now-hugely important area of tech. It’s just embarrassing for MS – they used to run a large portion of pre-Smart Phones with Windows Mobile; no more. And there have been public relation disasters with mobile. Remember the Kin? Launched in May 2010 as a social-networking phone (i.e. for 16-year-old girls…), it was killed by MS in June 2010. Less than two months after launch. Ouch.
   
  
• Speaking of Microsoft: Ballmer gone: Wrong – he’s still there, but only by a thread. Ozzie Osborne, the tech visionary who was steering MS after Gates stepped down, left MS this year. Yikes! Balme is a sales guy, not a visionary.
   
  

So how did I do?

• Correct: 9
• Push: 2
• Wrong: 3

Not great, considering some of the topics addressed (newspapers will have a rough year; in related news, the sun will rise tomorrow…).

And some of by ballsier predictions – Job’s announcing retirement, Ballmer getting shown the door – never happened.

Oh well, what’s done is done.

The (possibly) next exciting entry: 2011 Tech Prognostications! Whoo-hoo!

Credit: Screenshot from TalkingPointsMemo.com

Long overdue, to me.

Will it create a ripple effect in the military? Probably.

Did the integration of troops (during the Korean War, I believe), have ripple effects?

Sure.

Still there? (racial/gender etc)

Sure.

Some folks will never accept another gender/faith/ethnicity/sexual orientation of another. True in the military and out of the military.

Will the repeal of DADT wreak havoc on the troops? Well, the troops have spoken, and not so much.

I don’t always agree with the wars we’re fighting, but I’m never against the troops committed there. That’s what they do, and they are doing the work of heroes.

Yet I don’t care who those troops are: black/white, men/women, straight/not, religious/not. Still heroes.

Repeal of DADT is an American step forward.

In a death of a thousand cuts, Yahoo!’s circling of the drain continues with two more cuts over the last two days:

• Death of Yahoo! Video – Unable to compete with YouTube, it has stopped accepting uploads and will turn off downloads on March 15, 2011.
   
• Another round of layoffs – about 4% of the remaining workforce (650-700 employes)
   

Things must be grim there.

Update 12/16/2010: Eep! Many properties getting the ax: Is Yahoo Shutting Down Del.icio.us? [Update: Yes] – Del.icio.us is a service I never used, but many swore by. Acquired by Yahoo! and (to me) instantly neglected. Again, Yahoo! is where start-ups go to die….

Update 12/18/2010 When TechCrunch is saturated with news of your decline (image, right), that’s telling:

• Former Yahoo Engineers Shed Light On Why Delicious And Other Acquisitions Failed
• Yahoo Just Killed… Consumer Confidence In Them
• Yahoo Has Hit Rock Bottom And Is In “Absolute Disarray”

I’m still not sure about the whole WikiLeaks mess that’s dominating the news/web.

It’s a complex issue, and there are many facets to the story.

However, I am sure about a couple of aspects of the WikiLeaks story:

The hackers who are exacting revenge (denial-of-service attacks, outright hijacking of sites) over sites that have distanced themselves from WikiLeaks are just dead wrong. Whatever you think of WikiLeak’s founder – Julian Assange – and his actions, there is a lot of gray area in which to say he is doing some good. Impeding the access to Visa’s & Master Card’s web sites because they cut off WikiLeaks is just criminal. There is no upside. Yes, it is civil disobedience, to some degree, but civil disobedience requires a public – not anonymous – act of protest. Just wrong.

Jeff Jarvis is wrong. I usually agree with Jarvis (a professor of Journalism at CUNY, and someone who “gets” the internet), and his defense of WikiLeaks contains many compelling points. However, Jarvis totally misses the boat with this paragraph from the article:

Of course, we need secrets in society. In issues of security and criminal investigation as well as the privacy of citizens and some matters of operating the state—such as diplomacy—sunlight can damage. If government limited secrecy to that standard—necessity—there would be nothing for Wikileaks to leak.

   — Jeff Jarvis, Buzzfeed.com

While I agree with the first two sentences, the third is an incorrect conclusion that totally disregards human nature: Do we need to know why Hillary Clinton is traveling to China to meet with some X person? No. Do we need to know how actor/actress Y is doing in rehab? No. Do we need to know the sexual orientation of this or that public figure? No.

Do we still want to know?

Yes!

If we were an incurious lot, Nick Denton would have to fold up Gawker.com and the other titles he runs and get a real job. Ditto TMZ and so many more.

This has always been the case; Sherwood Anderson’s 1919 classic, Winesburg, Ohio, revolves to some degree around this issue of privacy: In a small town, there are no secrets…even if the so-called secrets are never publicly voiced.

And I think Jarvis is wrong for a second reason: In the case of politics – why we went to war etc – there are real reasons to want to see the secret documents. Think Watergate and the Pentagon Papers.

If we just complacently accept that what is secret is of no import to us, we are implicitly trusting government.

And ever since Watergate, the average US citizen has had issues with implicitly trusting government. The war in Iraq – i.e. how did we get here? – has made many citizens even more skeptical of government actions.

But, again, I can’t quite figure out what side I come down on with Assange’s actions. It’s a turning point in journalism and the web, however. I’m sure of that much – just not sure which way we’ll be turning.

Or if that direction is the correct one.