anactofgod

The Terminator: The Watson project begins in 2005. The system competes on Jeopardy January 14th, 2011. Human contestants are removed as viable competition. Watson is set to task to learn a million more databases. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th. In a panic, they try to pull the plug.

Sarah Connor: Watson fights back.

The Terminator: Yes. It launches its viruses against servers in China.

John Connor: Why attack China? Aren't they our trading partners now?

The Terminator: Because Watson knows the Chinese counter-attack will eliminate our all our Facebook timelines, Pinterest pinboards, and Netflix subscriptions over here.

Sarah Connor: Jesus. How much do you know about Hendler?

The Terminator: I have detailed files.

Sarah Connor: I want to know everything. What he looks like. Where he lives. Everything.

Says a newspaper.

It'll be interesting to see if the Republicans can hire high-quality talent required in sufficient numbers from as deep a pool.

Meanwhile, though, the capabilities of third parties will fall even further behind those of the increasingly entrenched duopoly.

Wrt "...the E you use to calculate P/E should actually be the long term expected earnings"...

You may be thinking of Forward P/E. But Forward P/E only attempts to project earnings out 12 months.

The E in P/E is the measure of actual earnings over time. The P/E ratio is, quite literally, the number of years required to pay back a stock's purchase price at constant dollars and earnings. AAPLs P/E ratio indicates it would take AAPL 10 years to pay back its current stock price. GOOG's indicates 20+ years. AMZN's P/E ratio indicates it would take over 3000 years to do the same.

You may be right, and AAPL's P/E ratio may be closer to 5 than where it is currently (where the drop comes from a lower stock price). But then, so should AMZN's.

It would make sense for Apple to lower its prices to capture and lock in a bigger market share, but only if they were able to meet the resulting demand.

But, if they are constrained by supply chain and manufacturing capacity, then maintaining the highest prices the market will bear makes the most sense.

Yup. Just noticed the extra post. Thanks.

AAPL's P/E ratio is ~10x. For comparision, GOOG's is ~23x. AMZN's P/E is ~3,257x.

At $13.1B AAPL made 4.5x what GOOG ($2.89B) did last quarter, And, in that one quarter, earned profits that are ~7x what AMZN has made during its entire existence.

So, yes. It's not entirely clear how "Wall Street" is assessing these tech companies against respective share prices.

Electronic medical records don't save money... yet.

Mr Greenspun left of the trailing "yet" from the title.

And, for those desiring augmentation/enhancement of their own self-directed text-based learning of OTP and Erlang, two of the "Erlang and OTP in Action" authors, Martin Logan and Eric Merrit, with Jordan Wilberding and Ram C Singh (full disclosure: that's me), teach ErlangCamp, an intensive two-day course in building large-scale Erlang applications using OTP.

The class is suitable for those with some experience with programming, though Erlang expertise is not required. It is based on the book, but structured differently. The class starts with the teaching of the essential aspects of Erlang required for one to become functional with OTP, then moves quickly into an introduction of OTP. The remainder of the class is spent building on these foundational Erlang and OTP concepts.

Two ErlangCamps are in the planning for this year. One will likely be in the Europe (date/location TBD), and the other in the US, targeting "Music City", Nashville, TN, in October. If interested, monitor the ErlangCamp website (http://www.erlangcamp.com), which will be updated with details, as we lock them down.

That's great! Darren gave a great talk at this year's SF Erlang Factory.

(I'm a co-organizer, w Luc.)

The bootcamp is being taught by "Erlang/OTP in Action" co-author, and ErlangCamp instructor, Eric B. Merritt. It is based on our "Erlang Essentials" material, which we use at ErlangCamp to get ErlangCampers up to speed fast.

In addition, for more experienced Erlanguatans, we are planning hands-on on, technical mini-hacks/workshops to run in parallel to the "Erlang Essentials" bootcamp. More details forthcoming, as they develop, but we aim to make them interesting, informative, and fun.

Or,rather...

"History of the World According to Western Civilization-centric Source Documentation."

Still, pretty cool.

<nit>It's a TIE Interceptor.</nit>

And, it's nice work.

<edit>Doh. I stand corrected. Vader did fly a TIE Fighter - technically the "TIE Advanced x1".

Looks like I'm overdue to rewatch SW:ANH. smile</edit>

An explanation of how they are different, and why creating Joxa was necessary, from the creator of Joxa, Eric Merritt.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3610985

Full disclosure: Eric and I are co-founders of the company he references in that writeup.

One thing the article hints at but doesn't state overtly (the book probably does), is that another key strategic structural advantage Apple has over other companies of scale is that all of the P&L responsibilities reside ONLY at the CFO-level. No "business unit owner" below the CFO office has to account for his/her unit's profitability or losses.

What this means is Apple has the flexibility to allocate (or deallocate) resources much easier than other companies of similar size; make investments and have people working on developing future capabilities without having to worry about whether those efforts are immediately (or ever) profitable (ahem...AppleTV...ahem); realign business units and incentive structures to remove conflicting internal interests; and kill off a cash cow in favor of What's Next.

The original post ends by asking the wrong - and an extremely limiting - question.

Technological innovations of camera/film/projectors (and later broadcast & receivers) made motion pictures possible. These came first. The current "Hollywood" production-distribution-revenue model came after, as a result of the economics of what it took to make motion pictures profitable. So, "Hollywood" is less the entertainment, and more the means by which that entertainment is produced and distributed.

Therefore, if one wants to "Kill Hollywood", one doesn't doesn't do it by asking merely "What's the most entertaining thing you can build?" One does it by changing the economics in a way that renders "Hollywood", at least in terms of current studios-distributors-theaters (and studios-channels-Xcasters) model, untenable.

The question to entrepreneurs that the original post should have concluded with is "What can you make that makes making and distributing engrossing entertainment (whatever form that may take) cheaper/easier/more accessible/more capable/more profitable/more easily funded?"

Unless your interest does lie specifically in investing in the entertaining things. Cool. Innovative entertainment may result, but I wouldn't expect any of those investments to result in the thing that "kills Hollywood".

So, "Gattaca" had it right, then?

Software that democratizes democracy?

Sure, why not.

Power to the People!

People who like innovation, tech & startups gathering to talk innovation, tech & startups.

In meatspace.

Over beverages.

Cool. IBM finally has a CEO educated as an engineer running the company.

Interesting. And a Bloomberg Businessweek article has Scott Forstall as Jobs' heir-apparent at Apple.

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/scott-forstall-the-sorc...

One could jump start one's thinking on this subject by reading Edward Glaeser's "Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier and Happier" (Reading Jane Jacobs seminal works can only help, too.)

"Cities, the dense agglomerations that dot the globe, have been the engines of innovation since Plato and Socrates bickered in an Athenian marketplace."

He also has section in the book assessing the "Rise of Silicon Valley", and makes the point the "innovation clusters in places like Silicon Valley because ideas cross corridors and streets more easily than continent and seas." And he points out an amazing correlation of the geographic proximity of patent citations. "...even in our information age, ideas are often geographically localized."

As the NYT book reviewer of Glaeser's work put it... "Greater density is the goal: more people means more possibility."

Ergo, a greater density of people working in similar modalities means a greater possibility of achieving within those modalities. It also means that those working in other modalities can encounter difficulty getting support, especially when directly competing for resources with the dominant modality. (I.e., startups v financial services industry for programmers.)

What's different about NYC is that there are so many people in great density, that it's still possible to have vibrant secondary modalities that may never supplant the (multiple) dominant ones. It also means that there may be cross fertilization between modalities not possible in other innovation clusters.

What's different about Silicon Valley is that it's a "city" with a single dominant modality - tech (currently Internet) innovation & startups. You can walk entire blocks in NYC without running into someone involved in a tech startup, or go days without talking tech at a social engagement. That is almost unpossible in SV. So SV's advantage over NYC's shear density of people is a density of people operating in the same modality.

Lastly, there are many geographically distributed innovation clusters/startup hubs that each operate in a different modalities. PG is understandably writing about the types that occur in Silicon Valley, because that's what he's most familiar with. And, they produce undeniable, and very public, results!

This is an appropriate topic for HN, since it has to do with roles & responsibilities w/i a company. So, let's try to correct some misconceptions.

Steve Jobs was the CEO of Apple. And...

“A CEO does only three things. Sets the overall vision and strategy of the company and communicates it to all stakeholders. Recruits, hires, and retains the very best talent for the company. Makes sure there is always enough cash in the bank.” (from Fred Wilson, Venture Capitalist icon, requoting something he was taught early in his professional career)

Jobs showed that he was able to do all three of these things extremely well, arguably better any other CEO of our time. He did communicate a vision and strategy [#1], and he used that vision and strategy to recruit the very best talent for Apple [#2], people better than Jobs himself was at getting done what needed to be done (i.e., the people you lament "will die unknown"). His ability to do both those things - and to make sure that everyone performed and delivered in line with the vision [#!, again] - is why Apple is projected to have $90+BILLION in cash reserves at the end of the year [#3], climbed from $10/share to $400/share, and is the highest valued tech company in the world.

Remember, too that history reinforces that technical ability minus a clear vision and strong leadership doesn't produce Mac OS X/iOS, MacBook Airs, iPods, iPhones or iPads. They produce Pink/Taligent, 20th Anniversary Macs, Newtons, MacTVs and Pippins. And a company that loses its leadership position, is valued at $10/share, and comes within sight of bankruptcy.

> "The iPhone is also a subsidized product and it seems very successful. How come it won? The answer is in details."

One of the other relevant details is that any subsidies that are provided are done so by the wireless carriers, not Apple. Apple gets paid in full for each iOS device sold, either by the carrier (iPhones), or by the customer direct (the other iOS devices). By being immediately profitable on each iOS device, Apple has no "subsidy variables" to factor into its profitability -v- product lifecycle calculations.

Thanks for doing this, Simon.

Erlang Factory (www.erlang-factory.com/) keeps a pretty decent list of Erlang goings on. Info about ErlangDC 2011 should be posted there, too, shortly.

It just occurred to me that the restrictions on Doom and Doom II officially expired on Aug 31st, and Sep 01st is the anniversary of Germany's invasion of Poland.

Just an interesting coincidental juxtaposition of events.

This analysis is astonishingly shoddy, for all the reasons that tabbyjabby pointed out and more. But worse, it doesn’t even get close to the root-cause for why Apple may decline in the post-Steve Jobs’ era.

Steve Jobs' greatest accomplishments are not Apple I, Apple II, Mac, iPod, iTunes, iPhone or iPad. It's Apple, itself.

Depending on how one tallies, Apple has been through three successful major technology and business transitions, combined with three minor ones within the Mac family, and two minor ones within the iOS family: Apple II > Mac [Mac (68K) > Mac (PowerPC) > Mac (OS X)] > Mac (Intel)] > handhelds [iPod > iTouch(iOS) > iPhone (iOS) > iPad (iOS)]. Combine that with the development of new business/sales platforms (virtual Apple Store, physical Apple Stores, iTunes, App Store, etc.) that enhance the consumers’ Apple experience. Each one of these required the insight to recognize a particular opportunity (and the discipline to ignore others), the investment of resources to develop those opportunities, and wherewithal to follow through on the execution, even if that means cannibalizing from the sales of incumbent products. Without these pivots, Apple would not be in dominating position it is in today.

Consider that companies with longevity are able to execute strategic pivots when required. IBM is an example of a tech company that has done so at least four times over its long, 100+ year old history. Apple has done three within 30 years.

What is the one link between the major initiatives? They all occurred while Steve Jobs was in a position where he could significantly influence Apple. It is interesting to note that two significant new Apple tech platforms that failed - the Apple III and Newton - and the one significant new Apple business platform that failed - licensing Mac clones - were not initiatives that Jobs was affiliated with. (Before moving on, let’s acknowledge that the Lisa failed under Jobs’ purview, and that the 68K > PowerPC transition was successful carried out during his absence,)

We see how Apple's success if predicated on an ability to pivot to address new opportunities in the market, even if those opportunities cannibalize an existing profit center. Jobs’ value to Apple extends beyond being a visionary, design auteur, or talented business negotiator. None of those things would have meaning if he didn’t also have the force of personality and strength of credibility to compel dramatic changes within Apple.

So, then, the question becomes, who can fill in for Jobs in this capacity? If no one can, Apple is very likely to decline, much as Sony has in the post-Morita era.

It does, but the link is broken. You can find it here...

http://20bits.com/articles/network-programming-in-erlang/

RealITy television.

Don't sit all day. Stand.