Microsoft Acquisitions and Investments - May 14

Here is a detailed graphical roadmap of Microsoft acquisitions and investments over the years. What a complicated web. How many of the acquisitions actually amounted to anything significant in terms of market share or revenue?

Setting up a Standing Desk - May 13

Yesterday evening I put together a standing desk in my office. It ended up being more work than I thought, as I have a relatively small 8x10 office, and had to switch around the layout to make it work.

I used an IKEA VIKA AMON table that I already owned, and switched out the (non-adjustable) legs that I had for adjustable VIKA BYSKE legs. I'm not too fond of the chrome look, but these were the only adjustable legs I could find that went high enough for me (43"). The legs were kind of expensive at $16 each, but at a total cost of just over $100 for the whole desk I can't complain. One note if you do decide to set this up yourself; the adjustable legs are slightly unstable when they are fully extended, and I would recommend using the included brackets to attach the desk to the wall. I haven't yet done this myself as I might still move the desk, and the stability is fine, but I do plan on using the brackets once I know for sure that I want to keep the desk where it is.

So far after about a day of using it I like it. My feet are sore but I'm sure they'll adjust after a few days. Standing is definitely making me more active at my desk, and I think I am focusing more than normal, although that might just be because it's a new experience and I'm paying more attention.

I'm going to give it a try for another week or so before I move my speakers, USB hub, and second monitor over. For now they're on my regular desk. In the meantime the rest of my office is a complete and utter disaster, with cables, books, and other stuff all over the place. I'm not even going to take a picture let alone post one, it's that bad.

Facebook PR Mess - May 12

Apparently Facebook hired a PR Agency to plant stories in the press that would discredit Google. In particular, according to various sources, Facebook was trying to make Google's stance on privacy look bad.

Interesting story for sure. I suppose this is a type of modern-day corporate espionage; rather than stealing information, ideas, or technology, Facebook is trying to reduce Google's market value.

At the same time, you have to think that one of the potential outcomes of any kind of privacy related PR is that the public is going to be more aware of privacy issues in general. This could really backfire on Facebook, as they already have someone of a tarnished history with respect to privacy (anyone remember Beacon?).

Mouse Mover on Google Code - May 11

A few weeks ago I mentioned that I was going to look into moving the source code for a small application I wrote to GitHub. After several days using Git, I found that although it is similar to Mercurial, I still feel more comfortable with Mercurial.

However, in the process of looking at Git, I discovered that Google Code hosting now supports Mercurial! In fact, their Mercurial support seems to be even better than BitBucket, which I was using previously for my Mercurial hosting. In particular, I had some issues with using BitBucket behind a firewall on a Virtual Machine that doesn't seem to be a problem with Google Code.

So anyway, I have now moved the MouseMover project to Google Code.

Microsoft Purchasing Skype - May 09

According to the Wall Street Journal, Microsoft is reportedly purchasing Skype for between $7 and $8 billion. That price seems high, but then what do I know. Om Malik has some interesting comments on why he thinks this is a good idea for Microsoft.

Update 2011/05/10 08:22 AM: Looks like it's official, with Microsoft to purchase Skype for $8.5 billion! That's quite a lot more than the $2.6 billion that eBay purchased Skype for.

All I can say is that Microsoft better not rename Skype "Microsoft Windows Office Live Skype Communicator Professional Edition 2011" or some such thing. Seriously. They would do that.

IKEA Manuals - May 09

If IKEA made Sci-Fi assembly manuals. Nicely done.

The Right to Read - May 09

It's only the 9th of May and I'm already at my limit for the New York Times paywall. You'd think that NYT would want people to read their articles.

This whole situation kind of reminds me of The Right to Read article by Richard Stallman. If you haven't read this article you should go do so now. In fact, it should be required reading for all Computer Science students.

Per-Vote Subsidization - May 09

Stephen Harper is moving to eliminate a per-vote subsidization system in place for political parties. I can't claim to completely understand this system, but based on the description provided in the article linked about, it sounds like a decent system for helping smaller political parties. At the same time, my tendency is towards "smaller government" and I do think that eliminating this system will reduce government spending.

That said, I worry that Stephen Harper is doing this because it is most beneficial to his own political party. I certainly hope that this is not the case.

What Google Sells - May 07

The next time you're using a Google product, remember this:

“We don’t monetize the thing we create,” Andy Rubin says. “We monetize the people that use it." (Levy, Steven (2011). In The Plex (p. 229). Simon & Schuster. Kindle Edition).

Of course, this isn't just limited to Google. Any time you are using a product and not paying for it, you aren't the customer, you are the product. This is one reason that, in many ways, I prefer paid web services over free ones.

Dave Winer on Osama Bin Laden - May 06

Dave Winer presents an interesting take on Osama Bin Laden's death with some follow-up here. Without going into ethics and morality, Dave raises some interesting questions. The simple fact is that the "real story" of what happened might not be revealed in our lifetime.

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