In transit

Sitting at the gate in FFM, with an hour to go. There is of course no free public wifi here, but I still have the UTMS usb stick that I used to access the Internets all those months (I now have a working ADSL connection at home, btw, after two false starts when the installers screwed up). The stick works here just fine.

This will have to be a brief post as the battery is running down faster than the hour of stick-time that I bought.

Next stop Osaka and Kyoto. It's been a really hectic couple of weeks lately, getting everything shipshape for the holiday season. And it is a season: I'll be away in Japan for two weeks, then two weeks home, then off to Canada and the States for two weeks over Christmas and the New Year.

I'd been a bit apprehensive about the chance of flying on an A380, given the recent engine trouble. As it happens, this is a 340; definitely large enough. I've now seen a 380 "live," there is one across the way loading up at one of the A terminal gates. It's huge. It's REALLY huge, even bigger than I thought it was. Imagine taking two 747s, slicing the roof off of one and the belly off of the other, and glueing them together along the seam. That's a 380. It's as long as longer than a 747, but at first glance it seems short because the body is so oddly tall. I'll admit to being relieved that I'm not flying on one, but I am also vaguely disappointed.

So, to Kyoto. I'm invited by friends from SL to talk to them for a week about the societality (nice word) of Second Life; specifically two topics: identity and character, and how these are developed; and the development of ethics and community values in a virtual world where neither of these needed to develop (consider the level of vitriol and abuse in the typical chatroom for an example of VWs where they did not develop). After that, I've got a guide book and a handy-dandy-phrasebook and a JapanRail pass that takes me almost anywhere on almost any train, and I'll let the Moment move me. I'll keep you posted, here or on Twitter or even on the dreaded FB.

Next post, gods and terrorists willing, will be from Kyoto.

Two wins for the price of one

The "very unusual and exciting" event that I cliff-hangered you about on Monday came to pass: we have won a building contract despite losing a competition. I will say no more here because I don't want Google leading people down this path, but anyone who wishes should mail me and I'll send you back a URL to explain (nearly) all. [Updated to ask for a few days' grace to actually get something written.]

(does happy dance)

Six down, twenty-four to go.

First day of summer

Summer arrived in Stuttgart while I was away. The chestnut trees are in full bloom, triggering an unusual allergic reaction: I have a dry, scratchy throat and eyes. The dandelions have been and gone, the roses are budding out. Toronto is at least three weeks behind us climatically, the magnolias were just starting and many trees were still bare.

I'm sitting in shorts and t-shirt in my summer office aka the balcony, having just eaten brunch out here (bacon and scrambled eggs with cheese and mushrooms), with a cup of coffee and a pair of telephones by my side. The temperature is somewhere in the high 20's, the sky is immaculate blue and there is a gentle breeze stirring the leaves of the trees in the schoolyard opposite.

Life is grand.

In geek news Microsoft announced last week that it has sold 2 million Zune MP3 players since the device was introduced in November 2006. Apple sold 10.6 million iPods last quarter. 'nuff said. source

In blogging news Dale is hitting a groove, writing well about the intersection between his beliefs and his massage practice. Quitting the cubicle was such a good move for him. He writes here about pain and self-control, here about poetry and meditation and his fifth blogday, here about maintenance and tennis balls, here about surrender:

I went to KCC last night. It was full of young people... It was nice to see them all there. Though I'm puzzled, as always, when young people come to the Dharma. How do they know, yet, that the world isn't going to make them happy? It makes so many promises. It's so beautiful, and so plausible. And it's so good at convincing us that our unhappiness is our own fault. If only I were twenty pounds lighter -- if only I weren't diffident -- if only I had enough resolution -- if only I did yoga every day -- if only I meditated every day -- if only I ran every day practiced the guitar every day went to the gym every day studied Italian every day read more demanding books learned to appreciate opera and Noh drama and Renaissance painting and memorized poetry and got out into the wilderness made more time for friends and understood quantum mechanics and stopped pressuring myself to do more things -- ah, then I would be happy.

and here about visitors to his massage practice:

If one more woman apologizes to me for being ten imaginary pounds overweight, I am going to scream.

1) You are not overweight
2) It would be no damn business of your massage therapist if you were
3) You are so beautiful that it makes my heart sing

Quite right. Go read.

Tired

Long day in the office, polishing up the second competition which is due on Wednesday. It's good but not great, we won't win this one but we might be in the money. I seem to have retained my grip on the conductor's baton with this project, and am regularly pushing the team into making decisions.

I spent the day swallowing "I told you so"s (how to punctuate that?) as they discovered what I had told them three weeks ago: that the strong uphill slope of the site would cause trouble, and that they must draw several sections to be sure that all parts of the building are actually above grade.

Surprise, surprise: the team didn't, and the building isn't. Heheheh.

By the way for those who asked, the first competition will be judged in mid-December.

Today's Friday Favourite is a wonderful bit of thrashing from a late, sadly missed guitarist. Crank it up and get your air-guitar going. [Updated: because that was so much fun, here's another.]

Shabbat shalom, my dears. Enjoy the weekend.

Twenty-three down, seven to go.

How failure looks

Let me quote from three articles. First, David Platt proved conclusively that the iPhone would be a flop:

The forthcoming (June 29) release of the Apple iPhone is going to be a bigger marketing flop than Ishtar and Waterworld (dating myself again, aren't I) combined. [...] Sell your Apple stock now, while the hype's still hot. You heard it here first.

Frightening, what? The bad news was confirmed by Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft:

There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance. It’s a $500 subsidized item. They may make a lot of money. But if you actually take a look at the 1.3 billion phones that get sold, I’d prefer to have our software in 60 percent or 70 percent or 80 percent of them, than I would to have 2 percent or 3 percent, which is what Apple might get.

Just by the way, there's an example of Microsoft Truth © in there: Windows Mobile has only 6% of the smartphone* market, not "60 to 80 percent." Ballmer is not actually saying that they possess such a market share, but that they would like to have it. Cunning ratbastards. John Gruber wrote a good rebuttal.

Well, the moment of truth arrived last Friday evening when the poor, doomed iPhone went on sale. Here's a market report from MacNN this morning:

Apple over the weekend sold more than 700,000 iPhones to rocket past analyst predictions and shatter AT&T's record by selling more iPhones in three days than Motorola's RAZR did in its first month. Apple's supply of iPhones depleted at more than half of its retail stores less than a week after the cellular handset hit shelves at 6:00 p.m. ET last Friday night. Buyers cleared out both Apple and AT&T stores in 10 states, with 95 of 164 stores selling out on Monday night, according to Bloomberg.

Yeah, that sounds like one hell of a failed product-launch to me. What a disaster.


* The point is the category of "smartphone." The vast majority of those billion phones are throwaways that one is given with a new contract, whether you want it or not. The iPhone is not competing with them, no more than Porsche competes with Yugo.