Archive for February, 2008
Yahoo to Microsoft… pound sand!
Yesterday I found myself chatting with a former Microsoft programmer while here in Nashville and it was quite an eye opening discussion. I won’t drop a name because, well, because he only recently departed Microsoft. For obvious reasons this particular individual is not in position to be publicly speaking out against the company structure or internal business issues.
Our discussion was two fold… 1) I wanted to know his thoughts on the possible Microsoft purchase of Yahoo. 2) I wanted an insider opinion on Microsoft and its constant shortcomings.
1)It’s being reported in the Wall Street Journal that Yahoo has replied to the Microsoft offer saying it “substantially undervalues” the company. This is interesting to me because I don’t see a lot of companies lining up to make offers for Yahoo. And if Yahoo does end up selling at the current offer price, doesn’t that say to investors that Yahoo is indeed undervalued?
When I asked the former Microsft employee what he first thought when he heard of the offer, he said “I’m still kicking myself for not immediately buying Yahoo stock.” According to him, Microsoft is very serious about the deal and in his opinion Microsoft will eventually cut a deal for the company.
2)I brought up the success of open source, specifically Linux, Open Office, Firefox, Gimp, and other software that I use, and asked how Microsoft planned to address it. “Will Microsoft continue marketing overpriced products that already exist in the open source realm?”
I found his answer somewhat astounding. According to him, Microsoft has no interest in competing with open source for the individual consumer. Apparently, Microsoft is planning on shifting a LOT of its focus towards small business.
This to me is absurd. If Google and Open Office are both offering office suite products for free, why on earth would a small business pay hundreds and hundreds of dollars to be locked in to the Microsoft vortex? It makes no sense to me.
Then the discussion of innovation came up. Specifically, “why is Microsoft stuff in ‘me too” mode?” For example, every time Firefox comes out with a new feature… IE tries to follow along. When Apple cranks out a state of the art, innovative media device, guess who tries to follow along? I mean, am I the only one who remembers the Zune?
So, in the end I’m glad Yahoo has replied to Microsoft they they have. And I hope with everything in me they stick to their guns. While I believe Google needs strong competition and no one is currently providing it, a company like Microsoft would absolutely ruin Yahoo.
This is all my opinion of course…
Chicago to Washington DC, back to Chicago, then to Nashville, back to Chicago, then off to Lansing Michigan.
This how my itinerary reads from February 6th through February17th.
I’m only 28 years old, but this kind of roaming around isn’t as easy as it was back when I was circling the globe. I remember flying from Auckland New Zealand to Fiji, then to Seoul Korea with a final destination of Reno, NV (stopping in San Francisco), all within 55 hours.
Now I travel for a week straight and I feel like I’m coming down off of a two month caffeine binge.
It sucks when you start feeling old…
I’ve been meaning to get this post out for a few days now, but until now I haven’t known where to start. I had the opportunity to attend my second Conservative Political Action Conference this year, and even better… I had a seat on the official “Bloggers Row”.
Being on Bloggers Row was inspirational as well as educational. The inspiration was brought in by the fact that Mary Katherine Ham sat directly to the right of me, and NZ Bear to the left. To their sides were Rob Bluey, Erick Erickson, Ed Morrisey, My Man Mitt, and several other prominent bloggers.
It was fascinating being with a group of highly successful bloggers at the largest conservative gathering of the year. It was politically educational hearing their thoughts on the sticky GOP situation and the Republican Presidential Primary.
As most of us, if not all of us already know… John McCain should take the GOP win. This became an almost certainty when Mitt Romney dropped out of the race last Thursday morning during his speech at CPAC.
Through CPAC I noticed two groups. 1) Those who are not really “prominent” in the party, but keep close tabs on what goes on and vote every primary, went in to CPAC with arms crossed in refusal to vote for or support John McCain. 2) Those who are prominent, AKA: Pundits, columnists, and bloggers, went in to CPAC supporting Mitt Romney and doing their best to inform the rest of us about McCain’s short comings in regards to liberty and conservative fiscal issues. Continue Reading
I was planning on posting here at FVM for CPAC, but as it turns out finding time to actually post is a bit more difficult that I had originally thought. With this in mind, I’m trying to streamline the blogging efforts and keep it all in one place.
That being said… keep an eye on ConservaBlogs.com for CPAC updates.
My previous post pointed out the fact that I was on my way to O’Hare for a flight to DC, and that I assumed I would have issues getting out of the airport in the middle of a near blizzard.
Sure enough… I did.
It all started yesterday when my 2:00 PM United Airlines reservation was bumped to an earlier departure. Then, when I tried to check in online, I found out the second flight had been canceled.
Two down… third time should be a charm right?
Wrong.
This morning when I FINALLY got to the airport (took forever to hail a cab and then sludge through snowy messy Chicago traffic), I was told upon check in that my THIRD flight had been canceled.
I was then booked on UAL flight 610 leaving at 11:00 AM. Continue Reading
I’m getting ready to make my way to O’Hare International Airport, so the chances are high that I’m about to deal with canceled flights and the O’Hare nightmare that Chicagoans have become all too familiar with. If for some odd reason everything goes well, I’ll be in Washington D.C. tonight.
Tomorrow morning kicks off CPAC 2008, and I’ve been privileged to have a seat on “Bloggers Row”. I’ll be blogging CPAC here at Fresh Vision Media, over at ConservaBlogs.com, as well as the Sam Adams Alliance blog.
CPAC this year should be VERY interesting… especially after our “non-super” Tuesday finished out with McCain in the lead. As I understand it, McCain, Romney, Paul and Huckabee will be speaking, as well as President Bush and Vice President Cheney.
Being on Bloggers Row will give me a superb chance to meet a LOT of people at CPAC, so I’ll do my best to take pictures and post about it as often as possible.
Stay tuned!
CPAC BLOGGERS ROW 2008
Ace O’Spades
Alarming News
Atlas Shrugs
Bluey Blog
Captain’s Quarters
Conservatives with an Attitude!
Fausta’s Blog
FreedomWorks
Gay Patriot
Girl on the Right
HotAir.com
Hugh Hewitt
Human Events
Little Miss Attila
Mary Katherine Ham
Matt Sanchez
Musclehead Revolution
My Man Mitt
Newsbusters
Outside the Beltway
Politico
Reasoned Audacity
Red State
Riehl World View
Right Wing News
Sam Adams Alliance
Save the GOP
The American Mind
The Autonomist
Truth Laid Bear
-Eric Odom
A small but vocal minority on Flickr are already staging online protests at the prospect of a Microsoft takeover. Flickr is one of several popular Web 2.0 websites owned by Yahoo that loyal users fear will suffer under Microsoft ownership.
As soon as the news hit the wires that Microsoft is proposing a $44.6 billion bid for Yahoo, Flickr users began posting anti-Microsoft images, satirical “Flickr Live” logos and announcing they will abandon Flickr if it falls into Microsoft hands, fearing such a move would mark the beginning of the end.
In light of this, I’ve decided to post a collection of the rebellious images here. Each image links to the actual image page on Flickr. Continue Reading
Well… here it is! The very first original post here at Blogivists.com.
Sure, I might be posting somewhat prematurely considering the fact that while posting this our site is locked down and in “maintenance mode”. That being said, this blog can be found and seen so I figured why the heck not?
In this post I’ll talk about two things. First, I’ll plug this blog and explain what it’s all about. Second, I’ll talk a bit about what Blogivists.com is.
Eric Odom @ Blogivists.com
As if I don’t do enough blogging already!!!
I’ve decided to launch this blog as a sort of “developers” blog for Blogivists.com. In this blog I’ll write about some of the technical aspects of the community, as well as random updates that have to do with the back end of the system.
We have a LOT of cool things planned for the site, including a ton of theme releases, plugins, discussion forums, wiki’s and more! If you’re an RSS junkie like me, please grab my feed and stay tuned for updates.
If RSS is not your cup of tea, feel free to bookmark me and check back often.
Blogivists.com
I’m sure Mike VanWinkle and the rest of the Sam Adams Alliance crew will soon publish a much more detailed explanation of this site. But until then I’ll offer the short version.
Blogivists.com is an exciting new project being put together by Sam Adams Alliance. The project is being built around a vision to develop a web community where citizens and activists can set up free Wordpress blogs. The blogs are 100% free with no strings attached.
What do you get with a free Blogivists.com blog?
-100% FREE hosting for life
-Personalized domain (www.yourblogname.blogivists.com)
-Free Blogivists.com e-mil address
-Safe and secure blogging environment
-Like minded, limited-government seeking community
-Many themes to choose from (coming soon)
-Plugins that help make your blog more interactive
-Widgets to customize your blog
-Powerful world class Wordpress software
-The ability to embed videos and images
-LOT’S MORE!!!
I’ve built several communities like this in the past, but this one looks to be the most exciting. I’m honored to be a part of the Blogivists team and I look forward to the things to come.
If you ever have basic technical questions or would like to suggest a feature for the site, please comment here on my blog or drop me an e-mail.
Blog Hard,
-Eric Odom
eric@blogivists.com
