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Cloud Computing: Welcome to Google’s Cloud

Google has just launched App Engine, the service to give developers access to Google Cloud, or in other words, to the same Google infrastructure that runs G-Mail, Google Apps or Google Earth.

App Engine provides a number of tools to develop Web applications that will run on Google data centers. The basic service will be free, and will provide for capacity to serve 5 millions pages per month, including 500MB storage and 10GB data transfer per day.

As you can see in the video above, Apps Engine is easy to use and supports applications in Python. Other languages will be supported later.

Amazon was already offering access to its Cloud with Amazon Web Services, claiming 330.000 developers, and Google will be a strong competitor. Start-up companies like Bungee Labs were already offering Platform-as-a-Service, and while these companies will be hit, Google service will create an awareness on Cloud computing, that will make them target for acquisition from other big Internet players not yet in the Cloud trend.

As GigaOm suggests, this service could be a base for other development platforms like OpenSocial for social networks and Android for mobile. Could Google fulfill the promise of Java, “build once, run on any platform”?

To learn more about Cloud Computing and its buzz, here is a good article from NYT: What Cloud Computing Really Means.

Posted in Internet | 3 Comments »

Google cause for Openness succeeds in the wireless auctions

Google did not actually want the spectrum licenses, that ultimately went to Verizon and AT&T. Google’s objective was to secure a bid that met the $4.6 Bn price tag that would enforce the regulations they had lobbied for open applications and open devices. Google admits this strategy in their Public Policy blog:

“[…] as the FCC was setting rules for the auction last summer, we urged the Commission to adopt four openness conditions. Further, we vowed to bid at least $4.6 billion in the auction if the Commission adopted all four rules. Even though the FCC ultimately agreed to only two of the conditions, which nullified our original pledge, we still believed it was important to demonstrate through action our commitment to a more open wireless world.”

More details on the auction in NYT’s article here.

Google is quite smart, and the objective of forcing “openness” to wireless operators was achieved - at least from a legal standpoint. This openness can only be beneficial to the end user and it definitively fosters innovation vs. oligopolistic practices.

On the other side, the high price paid for Spectrum, somehow legitimates the need for Wireless operators to behave as oligopolies to get a return.

FCC should rather enforce the openness clauses for the benefit to the Society. This conditions would probably make spectrum less costly, and it would force Wireless Operators to build their business case counting on “openness” instead of oligopolistic control.

Again, bravo for Google and its “openness” cause.

Posted in Internet, Telecom | No Comments »

Record labels adapt to new order

MySpace has struck a deal with Universal Music, Sony BMG and Warner Music to create a joint venture for a Music Site. EMI is reported to be still in negotiations. The labels would take a minority stake at the spin-off of MySpace Music service.

TechCrunch was the first to disclose the deal, an provides some financial details:
“The new company will […] get a cash infusion of $120 million or so from parent company News Corp, and distribute that $120 million to Sony BMG, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group. In return, the litigation will be dropped and the labels will give streaming and downloading rights to their catalog to the new entity”

The New York Times gives some highlights on what the service will look like:
“Visitors to the site will be able to listen to free streaming music, paid for with advertising, and share customized playlists with their friends. They will also be able to download tracks to play on their mobile devices […] in competition with similar services like Apple, Amazon and eMusic.

A subscription-based music component, where users pay a monthly amount for unlimited access to downloadable tracks, is also being considered […]

[…] tickets, T-shirts, ring tones and other music merchandise will also be available.”

Labels seem to finally surrender to the new order created by Internet and mp3, even if it is as result of a litigation.

Posted in Internet, New Economy | No Comments »

Google and Virgin to conquer Mars

Just the same day Google announces the invention of the web time machine, these guys announce a JV with Virgin to establish a permanent settlement in Mars in the next 20 years. The JV is called Virgle, and they are recruiting the first settlers or Virgle Pioneers. See video announcement from Sergey and Larry.

And Richard Branson:

Posted in General | 1 Comment »

Google invents the time machine

Google Australia announced today a search service able to search pages in the future. The service is called Gday.

Gday relies on a technology named MATE™ (Machine Automated Temporal Extrapolation). Excerpt from Google:

“Google spiders crawl publicly available web information and our index of historic, cached web content. Using a mashup of numerous factors such as recurrence plots, fuzzy measure analysis, online betting odds and the weather forecast from the iGoogle weather gadget, we can create a sophisticated model of what the internet will look like 24 hours from now.

We can use this technique to predict almost anything on the web – tomorrow’s share price movements, sports results or news events. Plus, using language regression analysis, Google can even predict the actual wording of blogs and newspaper columns, 24 hours before they’re written!”

This guys at Google are really amazing.

Posted in General | 1 Comment »

Music existed long before the record industry, and it will live long after it’s dead

“…music existed long before the record industry was born, and it will live long after it’s dead”. This was a wise comment in the agitated discussion that followed Mike Arrington post The Music Industry’s New Extortion Scheme.

I can only agree with Mike position and the comment against those who claim the music creativity is at risk only because of the new Internet order.

Music existed well before labels. Mozart did not signed any contract with Decca, and created wonderful music. Labels grew powerful and rich only because they controlled the distribution when it was constrained by the scarcity of ’shelf space’, and the cost of vinyls and CDs. Now, distribution costs are marginal or zero. Any talented guy can produce video and music from his bedroom, and can distribute it freely.

Look at the Photography industry. Now you can find excellent pictures for presentations, websites or brochures at Flickr with Creative Commons license. Don’t we have now more and better choice than when only pros could sell pictures?

Music labels will transform or die, and music will live long after that.

Posted in New Economy | No Comments »

How much Governments need to intervene in business?

The Economist.com debate of this week was about Governments making things worse by intervening to regulate business and financial risk. I am surprised by the result of the debate, with “interventionist” winning by a slight difference. 

In my view, we have not discoverd  yet any method better than Free-Market to regulate markets by the law of supply and demand. Yet, the governments have a fundamental role to make free-market work:
- ensure Competition
- ensure the rule of law
- intervene in key social areas, to guarantee minimum coverage for all: education4all, health4all, justice4all
- protect basic goods (including housing and medicines) from speculation
- invest and manage public infrastructure making them available for all: roads, railways..(and why not, Broadband Internet Access)

Free-market and healthy competition are the true engines for innovation. Successful innovation not only rewards the innovators, but the society overall. e.g Internet and Mobile Phones are affordable to the lower income population, thanks to private investment and intense competition driving prices down.

Excess of regulation can never stimulate innovation and progress in the long run, even if in the short term it seems to work.
e.g. Protectionism in the car industry, as Argentina or Brazil suffered and Malaysia still does, may seem as a good practice to protect domestic car-makers. The reality is the domestic car industry becomes uncompetitive, car prices rise and the lower-income population ends up not being able to afford a car in those countries.

I agree the financial market might need some extra regulations, as a credible banking system is key for the economy. But that should not be further than establishing mechanisms to protect the savings of their customers from a bankrupt.

Posted in New Economy | No Comments »

iPhone makes Mobile Web a reality

In a previous post, back in January, Google already advised that the traffic to Google from iPhones surpassed any other smartphone, even if iPhone accounts for only 2% of the worldwide smartphones. Nokia’s Symbian 63%, Windows Mobile 11% and RIM 10%.

M:Metrics confirms those findings based on a report of iPhone user behaviour during January 08. The percentage of users accessing the Web from their handset shows a staggering 85% for iPhone, compared to 58% of smarphones, and a mere 13% of the overall market. For access to a social networking site or a blog, the difference increases, with 50% for iPhone, 19% for smartphones and 4% for the market. Even for video the data is striking: 31% of iPhone users watched a video versus less than 5% average market.

These data confirm that iPhone and its Safari browser really represent a major improvement  for Mobile Web access compared to existing devices. Apple’s iPhone is delivering to the hype it created. Another proof is that, even if iPhone is only official in five countries (USA, UK, Germany, France and Ireland), traffic from iPhone has been detected from almost every country in the World.

Will Android will be up to the expectations too?

Posted in Digital Lifestyle, Internet | 1 Comment »

Why we need WiMAX?

TechCrunch post today about WiMAX, Why Cable And WiMax Shouldn’t Mix, clearly misses the point. Their two conclusion items are misconceived, not to say wrong:

1. TechCrunch says: “WiMax is more an alternative to fixed broadband Internet access than it is to mobile phone service”
TechCrunch seems to ignore that WiMAX Rev-d brings mobility and it is the one being deployed now in many operators. Wimax is about mobile broadband, something 3G operators are supposed to provide, but they only do at a prohibitive price, due to lack of competition.

2. TechCrunch brilliant idea: “It no longer makes sense to try to own all the pipes because pipes are becoming a commodity”
It seems that for TechCrunch it makes more sense to invest billions in Social Networks, Speech-to-text start-ups, with no business case to make a profit, than in a business to provide a communication service for which customers are willing to pay. Ask telcos, where their billions in profit come from… yes, from those “commodity pipelines”
Network infrastructure is an asset. Millions of users of a free service, e.g. Skype, is not necessarily an asset. Ask eBay what they think now of the multi-billion valuation of Skype, that they later wrote-off.

As a user, I welcome WiMAX to bring more competition to mobile communications in something mobile operators have failed to mass market: Mobile Broadband. Partly due to mobile telcos greed to over charge data based on volume, partly for their fear to congest their spectrum, we are far from ubiquitous wireless IP access.

WiMAX is a disruptive technology with better spectral efficiency (higher bitrate for the same spectrum), designed with IP in mind, and backed by Intel to be seamlessly supported in laptops, the same way Wifi is today. But WiMAX operators will not only do Mobile Broadband. The guys at TechCrunch have probably heard about VoIP. By deploying IMS, these operators will be able to offer voice, video, presence, IM and many other services from a WiMAX handset. Can that compete with a 2G/3G mobile phone? Skype is the proof that it can. IMS just enables a Skype-like service but carrier-grade, with QoS control provided by the network.

TechCrunch might have jump into WiMAX only because of the fiasco for Xohm in the US market, but WiMAX is taking off in other markets (India, Taiwan, Korea, Malaysia), and hopefully this new backing from Comcast, Intel, Time Warner, Google and Brigh House will bring WimAX to US too, the big way.

Still skeptical, GigaOM addresses the story with more detail in: CableCos Join The $3 Billion U.S. WiMAX Rescue Act

Posted in Telecom | 2 Comments »

Surprise surprise! I got Safari on my desktop

By surprise, I found a Safari icon on my desktop after updating iTunes. My first reaction is “What! how can Apple use this malware-like tricks to push Safari?” So it is no surprise the complaints of Firefox boss, and the general condemn from blogs: VentureBeat, ReadWriteWeb, The Open Road

Once the initial annoyance fades away, curiosity comes in “anyway it is installed so let’s see how it works”. The first impression is Apple wants us to get used to his Mac look and feel. And it works, you feel like using a Mac, and I have to admit that I like it. Still, the fonts seem fuzzy in Safari when compared to IE7. Safari uses Mac OS X font anti-aliasing, while IE uses Windows native ClearType, and that is reason according to a report on Safari 3.1 on Windows in Ars Technica.

So, will I uninstall Safari? Well, why not keeping two browsers… Now I use Safari for Gmail and Google Reader, and IE7 for the rest: general browsing, on-line newspapers, banking, Amazon, YouTube, etc. I find useful to have email and RSS in a separated browser, and I can enjoy the cool look of Mac.  

Conclusion: Steve Jobs is so convinced of the excellence of Safari, that he has pushed it with an iTunes update regardless the adverse comments it would generate. Is that arrogance or self-confidence?

According to an NPD report “Apple’s Mac shipments grew 60 percent in February compared with the same period last year, while the entire market grew just 9 percent.”

Maybe it is just self-confidence.

Posted in Internet | 4 Comments »