Google CEO as Obama economic advisor

Should anything be read into the fact that Google CEO Eric Schmidt is among president-elect Barack Obama’s economic advisors? Schmidt was listed among the luminaries present at the big economic confab in Chicago today along with former Harvard prez (and world champ gaffe artist) Lawrence Summers, Time Inc.’s Richard Parsons, Xerox’s Anne Mulcahey and others. A quick scan of the stage didn’t reveal Schmidt, but he’s on all the lists.

Not a Microsoft nor HP nor IBM person in sight or listed Interesting.

ERP swoon–Is it Microsoft specific?

Anecdotal evidence is that Microsoft ERP sales are in the tank this year, although it’s hard to tell how much of that is Microsoft-specific vs. the overall ERP category sucking wind of late.

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Circuit City sinks further into sunset

More bad news: Circuit City is shuttering 155 of its 760 stores and laying off their staffs. The cuts will affect thousands of employees and end Circuit City’s presence in 55 markets. The stores will close on Election Day with liquidation sales to follow.

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Sun CEO to open source ponytail

Okay, this is hilarious. Check it out. It’s got everything: Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz, open source, and Schwartz’s ponytail.  Don’t mock, you cynics. Faux Schwartz has a point: You don’t see Steve Ballmer open sourcing HIS ponytail.

Microsoft fills in some cloudware bits with Azure

As expected, Microsoft started to talk up some details of its cloud computing strategy Monday at its Professional Developers Conference.

Amidst all the cloud talk, there were a few deliverables mentioned in Monday’s keynotes including activation codes for four new Azure Services outlined by Microsoft chief software architect Ray Ozzie on Monday morning. Developers and VARs can use those codes to poke around and try out the hosted services.

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PDC priority: Proving Microsoft’s mojo

Has Microsoft lost its mojo?

There’s something different in the air. Microsoft is doing its best to drum up an uproar around next week’s Professional Developers Conference (PDC). The company’s code-name generator is in overdrive — nothing new there. But it’s become painfully obvious that the company’s ratio of code names to products completed on time, as promised, is dismal. Remember the infamous “pillars” of Longhorn? I rest my case.

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Ripped from the headlines: Avatar abuse

By Elaine Hom, Associate Features Editor

Imagine going to jail for a murder you didn’t commit.

Sounds like The Shawshank Redemption, doesn’t it? I’ll bet it’s all too familiar for the woman — who was recently jailed for murdering her husband. Not her real husband, mind you. Her virtual husband.
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Man bites dog; VAR loves vendor

When a VAR gives an unsolicited testimonial for a technology vendor, it’s unusual enough to warrant attention.

While researching a storage-related story a month or so ago, I called this VAR who answered the questions posed and then started talking about how much he loved working with Compellent Technologies. “They really get it,” he said. He lauded the Eden Prairie, Minn.-based vendor for its 100% channel fulfillment model. Compellent is publicly traded and is facing a world of consolidating competitors — Dell/EqualLogic, Hewlett-Packard/LeftHand Networks.

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Amazon tiers S3 prices, provides volume discount

Amazon Web Services LLC is “tiering” the pricing on its hosted storage system.

Amazon Simple Storage Service (or S3) in the U.S. had charged 15 cents per gigabyte of stored data. That rate will hold for the first 50 terabytes but now as you pack more stuff into the storage cloud the per gigabyte rate falls. If you have 50 to 100 GB the charge will now be 14 cent per GB. For 100 to 500 GB it’s 13 cents and so on. There are also charges for data transfers and other associated services.

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Microsoft plots SQL Server 2010

Microsoft’s database folks say that SQL Server 2010 (yes, that’s the shocking name of the next release) will make it out in the 36-month window the company has prescribed for database releases.  It’s promised for the first half of Calendar Year 2010. SQL Server 2008 shipped last August.

“We remain committed to the 24- to 36-month schedule” of upgrades, said Tom Casey, general manager for SQL Server. Internally, the product has gone under the code name Kilimanjaro. A CTP is promised for the next year.

In addition, there will be an update to the current SQL Server 2008, adding better data warehousing capability from Microsoft’s acquisition last July of DATAllegro. That update will be demonstrated at the Microsoft Business Intelligence Conference in Seattle this week. Those scalability enhancements known as Project Madison, should also be available in the first half of 2010.  Pricing and packagine remain TBD.

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