Martin Veitch

If Technology Press Releases Covered Great Moments In English History

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:57:07 GMT

How would tech marketers handle 1966 and all that?

I don't know about you -- indeed, how could I when we hardly ever meet? -- but I get lots and lots of press releases.

Google opens Apps Marketplace (and scares the bejeezus out of Microsoft)

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 10:23:35 GMT

Access to thousands of complementary services is another boost for Googel's challenge to Microsoft

In the great tradition of no-brainers, Google today opened the virtual doors to its Apps Marketplace, inviting us all to download, try out and purchase complementary services to its core productivity applications and communications suite.

Dyson's right: we need a bolder, ingenious Britain

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 11:43:51 GMT

Sir James Dyson's Ingenious Britain calls for help in rebuilding our reputation as great developers

Ruggedly handsome, hugely wealthy, highly personable and feted by all, there is a lot to dislike about Sir James Dyson* but it has to be said that he's talking a lot of sense when it comes to UK attitudes to technology.

HP-EDS UK boss: Election will see IT spend hiatus, not drought

Fri, 05 Mar 2010 10:58:01 GMT

HP Enterprise Services MD Craig Wilson predicts IT spending pause but that's all

In the third and final part of our interview with HP Enterprise Services (the former EDS) UK MD and VP Craig Wilson, we talked about ICT services after the impending general election and Wilson's view on a radically new model of services that he believes is coming.

HP-EDS UK boss: Civil servants are terrified by outsider views of IT projects

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 17:08:28 GMT

HP Enterprise Services UK MD Craig Wilson interview Part 2

In the second part of CIO UK's interview with HP Enterprise Services (the former EDS) MD and VP Craig Wilson we talked about the challenges to contracts between outsourcers and government and public sector.

HP-EDS UK boss on BSkyB, the merger and building an alternative to IBM

Thu, 04 Mar 2010 10:46:29 GMT

HP Enterprise Services boss on the 'new' EDS

In my experience at least, EDS always had a tendency to keep itself to itself. That's unsurprising as when it did appear in the press it was usually on the sticky end of stories relating to problematic public-sector projects.

'Twitter for business': Reed tests Salesforce.com's Chatter

Mon, 01 Mar 2010 17:02:59 GMT

Exhibitions giant pilots micro-blogging for information exchange

Being a simple bloke, I'm a big fan of Twitter as a simple way to air simple views. My only surprise is that the company is missing out on what may well be the big revenue source for this sort of tool -- B2B.

IT charge-backs can be a 'think of a number' game

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 12:39:24 GMT

Attempts to quantify IT spend are often artificial

For IT departments, the ability to charge back has long been regarded as either badge of honour or longed-for status symbol but ask CIOs about the process of creating a charge-back scheme and the clanking noise that you hear is skeletons falling out of the closet.

So You Want To Get Into CIO...

Wed, 24 Feb 2010 16:17:20 GMT

How to pitch CIO and a forward-features list... finally

You know, I've done a lot of things right since I started the job of Editor-In-Chief of CIO UK nigh on two years ago. My tea making wins universal approbation; I am a generous contributor to leaving-this-place/birthday/anniversary/I've-just-replicated card collections; I am a courteous colleague with a winning, lopsided grin for all; contributors often get paid in a timely manner; and I pay close attention to my personal hygiene (aside from in the case of the 'lucky' pullover I wear every day).

Jeremy Allaire weighs in on Apple/Flash stand-off

Tue, 23 Feb 2010 16:43:44 GMT

Brightcove CEO and ex-Macromedia CTO says firms must follow both Apple and Adobe dev models

The saga of Apple mobile devices and their (non-) relationship with Adobe's Flash technology has been revisited by many industry watchers ever since the announcement of the iPad last month and reports (for example, here and here) that Steve Jobs had described the ubiquitous Flash as buggy and overly demanding of system resources.

At 20, Photoshop is a spring chicken compared to veterans of PC era

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 11:32:15 GMT

Classic PC applications are in their 20s and even 30s

So Photoshop is 20 years old. Its menus and shortcuts appear to be an Enigma code to outsiders and it requires the sort of computer configuration usually saved for missile defence systems, but a whole generation has grown up and enjoyed gainful employment through this iconic collection of ones and zeroes.

Service downs brand-infringing sites but problem won't go away

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 13:38:11 GMT

MarkMonitor's Site Staydown Service closes sites that hurt clients' brands

I've written in this space before about MarkMonitor, the self-styled "global leader in enterprise brand protection" that helps fashionable or well-known firms fight fraudsters, counterfeiters, pirates and sundry other ne'er-do-well's. Today the company made available its Site Staydown Service, a sort of big red lever to let clients shut down websites threatening their reputations and income.

Atos Origin chief on EDS-BSkyB, Olympics, elections and man-to-man marking

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 15:58:39 GMT

Atos Origin UK CEO Keith Wilman says outsourcing deals will be less grey, more black and white

With Atos Origin announcing financials that appeared to show an improvement in the group's fortunes (and with analyst TechMarketView suggesting that the firm has entered the Top 10 in UK software and IT services companies for 2009), I spoke by phone this morning to UK CEO Keith Wilman about what's going on at Atos and in the sector. Here are the highlights of our conversation.

How much is Twitter worth? Maybe $7m per employee...

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 10:09:15 GMT

At a $1bn valuation, Twitter staff rub hands in glee

Considering that it has become the catalyst for much of the world's news, the water-cooler for global gossip and the most-watched technology phenomenon since Google, you could be forgiven for thinking that Twitter must have a payroll running into significant numbers. If not the People's Liberation Army's three million, Wal-Mart's 1.8 million or the NHS's 1.7 million, then something with lots of zeroes attached to it. The always excellent VentureBeat reminds us that, in fact, Twitter has only just reached the headcount that parallels the character limitation on its short messaging system: 140.

Microsoft rips up the Windows phone book and starts again

Mon, 15 Feb 2010 16:56:40 GMT

A rewrite of the firm's smartphone software can stir things up

So Microsoft wasn't messing when it said it had come up with something radical to fight back in smartphones. The announcement today of the Windows Phone 7 Series -- effectively a back-to-the-drawing board new platform -- bears the stamp of the old, Gatesian Microsoft, the company that did a U-turn on the web despite having piled cash into a proprietary network (and even the company that more recently but less successfully doubled down on Windows Vista security in another sharp piece of footwork).

10 Random Twitter Annoyances

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 12:43:02 GMT

We're too busy to tweet!

Twitter. It's like eating a digestive biscuit. You can't see it as one of life's great pleasures but it's better than nothing. It's good to have it on in the background, like the radio, or the TV when Hoovering. It's birdsong and the ticking of the clock, the old supplement from the newspaper you might pick up one day because you thought you might one day like to visit Ecuador/find out more about Hannah Waterman/take up Pilates. But by Christ there are some knackers on there and somehow they can be even more annoying on Twitter than in real life...

Microsoft's Mangelaars on Win 8, Apple & Google's Chrome ads blitz

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 12:26:29 GMT

Microsoft's EMEA consumer and online chief interview Part 2

In part one of CIO's interview with Microsoft EMEA boss of consumer and online, John Mangelaars, we focused on what Microsoft is doing in smartphones to fight back against Apple, RIM and Google. In part two, we roam across a bunch of subjects. Here are my (necessarily edited) highlights.

Microsoft to tighten grip on Windows smartphone designs

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 17:08:26 GMT

Microsoft will issue terms to partners to gain 'cleaner' experience

Microsoft plans include limiting handset makers to core specifications and designs as the firm seeks to stage a comeback in smartphones. The firm is expected to announce more plans at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona next week.

Will Apotheker exit fuel M&A at SAP?

Mon, 08 Feb 2010 16:55:11 GMT

CEO's departure could see SAP change strategy

Oracle's blitz on leadership in enterprise applications might well be working to destablise its deadly rival SAP after CEO Leo Apotheker walked away from the German giant, adding fuel to the suggestion that the German giant is stumbling.

Improving on Jonathan Schwartz's haiku (it can't get verse)

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 10:48:15 GMT

CIO launches global initiative to put the poetry back in the datacentre rack

Many watchers viewed the reign of Jonathan Schwartz at Sun Microsystems as a stint characterised by incomprehensible cryptic references and odd schemes that led to general lack of understanding and a dwindling audience. So when Schwartz on Wednesday said 'sayonara and thanks for all the pay-offs', taking his leave from the company that has become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Oracle Corp., it was only fitting that he did so in the form of a haiku, the form of Japanese poetry that, as you will know, employs up to three lines of a maximum 17 syllables.

Fallout from EDS-BSkyB: higher prices, more red tape

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 14:55:00 GMT

The judgment against HP-EDS in the BSkyB case means more complex outsourcing deals

So HP-EDS has finally been told to pay �£200m as an interim penalty in the latest installment of the saga surrounding the failure of an ancient CRM implementation at BSkyB. Like a lot of couples that end up facing each other in an expensive day in in court, EDS and BSkyB must have wondered how it ever came to this. One assumes that back in the day they looked at each other with dewy expressions, clinked champagne flutes and looked forward to a lifetime of, well, if not uninterrupted bliss then at least mutual tolerance and understanding.

There's no such thing as a business smartphone anymore

Wed, 03 Feb 2010 11:32:07 GMT

Vendors can no longer break phones into business and consumer categories

I stumbled on a full-page display ad in the London Evening Standard on Monday that replicated the already familiar iPhone campaign promoting apps from partners. However, while most of the apps pushed in the past have been largely consumer in nature, this one (which ran late last year in the US) focused on office tools under the legend: "Helping business get down to business, one app at a time."

Google's 'deep reading' fears lost in shallows

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 11:22:14 GMT

Google CEO Eric Schmidt fears for our reading and cognitive skills but who can change us now?

At the World Economic Forum in Davos last week the tone was one of uncharacteristic caution. Having been surprised by the big wave of financial chaos, most speakers appear to have been oddly sotto voce. Whisper it, but the masters of the universe were looking at their toes and perhaps expecting to see feet of clay.

Apple searches for a market with blank sheet of iPad

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 10:24:34 GMT

Few surprises but nice price and battery for Apple's iPad

In the end it was that rare thing: an Apple announcement shorn of surprises.

Oracle-Sun could still shake up servers

Mon, 25 Jan 2010 10:19:23 GMT

Obscured by Apple's tablet, the forgotten Oracle-Sun merger could yet put cat among pigeons

It's only January but Wednesday promises to be one of the biggest dates in the 2010 technology calendar with Apple (we assume) announcing its tablet product and, as a sideshow to the main event, Oracle discussing its plans for Sun. In different ways, levels of anticipation for each of these has been febrile with the usual borderline-lunatic fascination with Steve Jobs' latest "insanely great" release and the longer, flatter thrum of interest surrounding the combination of Oracle and Sun and its various regulatory complexities.