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Quoted – FOSS Devs’ Biggest Complaints: Documentation and Licensing – Linux Insider

September 26, 2013 by 2 Comments
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FOSS Devs’ Biggest Complaints: Documentation and Licensing

“What makes open source so good is often what makes it undesirable,” suggested Scott Testa, director of Entrepreneur and Business Boot Camp at Villanova University. “If you are a big corporation, you want to adhere to the license, but in some cases the legal issues are not clear. If you are a programmer, you just want to get the code writing job done.”

“What makes open source so good is often what makes it undesirable,” Scott Testa, director of Entrepreneur and Business Boot Camp at Villanova University, told LinuxInsider.

“By nature open source has poor documentation and problems trying to figure out if your intended use is legal,” Testa explained. “If you are a big corporation, you want to adhere to the license, but in some cases the legal issues are not clear. If you are a programmer, you just want to get the code writing job done.”

http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/78825.html

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AV Pioneer McAfee Covering Tracks in Murder Drama

November 19, 2012 by Leave a Comment
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Antivirus trailblazer John McAfee is on the run from authorities in Belize who are seeking him in connection with the murder of a neighbor. Although McAfee has been away from the tech world for a long time and no longer has anything to do with the company he founded, there are concerns that the emerging lurid details of his life and possible crime could taint the company that still bears his name.

John McAfee, founder of the eponymous antivirus software company, is wanted in Belize in connection with the murder of American Gregory Faull, according to news accounts. The San Pedro police department is said to be actively searching for McAfee, who has gone missing.

This episode is focusing a very public spotlight on the downward, highly destructive spiral McAfee reportedly has been on for years — a cycle that is said to include drugs, guns, prostitution and a lot of violence. His early days as a tech luminary — he was one of the first people to design antivirus software and to create a virus scanner — are clearly long gone, never to reemerge.

The McAfee Brand

It is fair to wonder how these events — now making international headlines — will impact the McAfee corporate brand.

On one hand, it is hard to imagine how they could have any impact. Though he founded the company, John McAfee has long been divorced from it, noted Scott Testa, director of development forChina Project Hope and a former marketing professor at Cabrini College.

“In an odd way, it could wind up even having some positives for the product line,” Testa told the E-Commerce Times. “After all, what do they say? ‘ There’s no such thing as bad publicity.'”

The events could wind up evoking feelings of familiarity with the McAfee brand among consumers, even after this drama recedes into the background, he suggested.

“I really don’t think there will be negative ramifications from a brand perspective,” Testa said, although “you can bet that Intel will do whatever it has to to disassociate itself from what is happening.”

A name change could be in the company’s future.

http://www.technewsworld.com/story/76613.html

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Quoted – Mild-Mannered Watson Skewers Human Opponents on Jeopardy

January 14, 2011 by Leave a Comment
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IBM‘s Watson supercomputer seems like an amiable-enough character, judging from his performance in a practice run against two top Jeopardy players. (Then again, H.A.L. seemed friendly and helpful too, until crossed by a human.) Should the emergence of technology that enables computers to understand and emulate human communications be viewed with any degree of trepidation?

“From an AI standpoint, the fact that IBM was able to build a computer that can interact on an intellectual basis with human speech clearly has ramifications that are far beyond Jeopardy,” said Scott Testa, a marketing professor for Cabrini College.

“But I think for people to accept that, it has to debut first in places like Jeopardy,” he told TechNewsWorld, “taking it to a basic level that people can understand and smile at before they let it make more complicated computations for them.”

http://www.technewsworld.com/story/Mild-Mannered-Watson-Skewers-Human-Opponents-on-Jeopardy-71651.html?wlc=1295064516

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Quoted – Hulu Revving Up for Bold IPO Move

October 13, 2010 by 3 Comments
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Hulu is about to make a big move — talk of an IPO within the next couple of months appears to be well founded. The timing is right, says BU professor N. Venkatraman, as the economy is expected to pick up in 2011, and the tech sector with it. “Media will be one of those sectors that will be redefined by tech, and Hulu wants to be seen as the leader of the pack.”

Hulu is expected to file a prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission for its initial public offering by the end of the year. It believes it can raise US$200-$300 million, according to an unnamed source in a Reuters report.

The final decision to move forward is expected to be made in November, the source said. If it does happen, the IPO is likely to be in April or May.

The deal would value Hulu at $2 billion.

Two billion dollars is likely a fair valuation for Hulu, according to Scott Testa, a marketing professor at Cabrini College.

“I think the partners want to take some money off the table with the IPO,” he told the E-Commerce Times. “Also, I think this may be a good time for the partners to go public from a balance sheet perspective. This way they will be able to get a tangible valuation for the company.”

Besides giving the investors an exit for their initial capital, the bulk of the proceeds will certainly be sunk into the company’s business model, continued Testa. “Data center investment is what I would guess — or buying data center space in disparate locations on worldwide basis.”

Google needs significant redundancy to keep YouTube operational, he noted. “When you are talking about video, you are talking about huge, big pipes — and fiber is expensive. It is not like running a website.”

http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/Hulu-Revving-Up-for-Bold-IPO-Move-71008.html?wlc=1287007214

 

 

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Quoted – Cisco/Taser Partnership Shows Private Cloud Hopes – Internet Evolution

January 7, 2010 by 5 Comments
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Cisco/Taser Partnership Shows Private Cloud Hope

The ambition is breathtaking: Using tools from Taser International Inc. (primarily a tiny camera worn on a police officer’s head), networking pipes from Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO), and a private cloud built by Equinix Inc. (Nasdaq: EQIX), Evidence.com means to do nothing less than revolutionize street law enforcement by capturing and saving every important moment in a cop’s day.

From arguments over speeding tickets through live-action footage of shootouts, the intent is to record it, then uplift it to a private cloud, all the time ensuring that the footage cannot be altered in any way by the police officers involved. This means the data becomes evidence that can decide how court cases play out.

So for Cisco, Taser, and Equinix a lot is riding on Evidence.com. If it works, that’s a shining proof of a new model of service that delivers benefits by turning real-world data into usable information — all without requiring capital expenditure on the part of the user.

But might it not work? Scott Testa, an assistant professor at Cabrini College and a longtime technology guru, says that “in theory” the Evidence.com offering “makes sense,” in large part because it plays into the reality that most police departments budget meager sums for IT. Buy the service in a package, using federal money, and that solves a local department’s IT problem.

http://www.internetevolution.com/author.asp?section_id=852&doc_id=186281&f_src=internetevolution_gnews

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