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It's Time for Aereo to Soar April 04, 2013 Aereo streams television over the Internet for a fee -- so far only in the New York City region. Its expected rapid rollout has not happened over the past year. Why? One reason is that Aereo was being sued by various broadcasters. However, the decision handed down this week from the Second Circuit Court of Appeals looks good for Aereo.

Yahoo and Summly: CliffsNotes for the Mobile Era? April 02, 2013 The IT industry is no stranger to youth worship, but Yahoo's multimillion-dollar deal for Summly pushes that notion into cradle-robbing -- well, high school-robbing, anyway -- territory. That's because the punchline beneath the headlines is the age of Summly founder. Nick D'Aloisio, 17, appears to have qualified as the world's youngest VC-backed entrepreneur.

What the iWatch Could Be if Apple Still Had Guts April 01, 2013 Steve Jobs was a guy who took big risks. The iPod was a big risk. The iPhone was even bigger, given that the market was dominated by companies like Nokia and BlackBerry, which had locked up the carriers in many regions. The iPad was riskier still, given what a failure the Windows tablet had been. Now that Steve isn't at Apple anymore, the company's investors and folks like Steve Wozniak are losing hope for the firm.

BlackBerry Z10: All Sizzle, No Steak March 28, 2013 When the BlackBerry Z10 was first in my hands, I was prepared to write a glowing review of the new device and operating system. I like BlackBerry. I thought I was going to be able to write how it was a real competitor to the Apple iPhone and Samsung Galaxy. I was hoping to be able to say BlackBerry was back. Unfortunately, I can't -- not yet. The new Z10 is better in some ways and worse in others.

The Fall of Apple and the Return of BlackBerry March 25, 2013 We tend to be slow to see change. If a company is on top, like Apple was, it takes a lot for us to see its fortunes have changed, as they clearly have post-Jobs. If a company is on the bottom, like BlackBerry was, it may be even tougher to see it on the rebound. We simply don't like the change in our worldview, and this isn't just with regard to companies but people as well.

Samsung's Galaxy S4 Dims Apple's Glow March 21, 2013 Talk about attracting attention. As I write this, there are more than a thousand recent news stories and opinion pieces on the Google News site about the brand new Samsung Galaxy S4. That's an incredible win for a company that a few short years ago wasn't well known in the wireless business. Since Samsung is successfully transforming how the world thinks about it as a smartphone maker, what can we expect going forward?

Dell's XPS 18: Radically Rethinking the Tablet March 19, 2013 From the first day of the tablet computing revolution -- April 3, 2010, when Apple's iPad became publicly available -- users have willingly traded limitations in computing form/function for innovations in access/interface. In part, that was because Apple maintained a careful line between the iPad and its traditional Macbook and iMac products to avoid self-cannibalization.

RIP Android: Google Loses Its Steve Jobs March 18, 2013 Andy Rubin was Google's Steve Jobs, and with him now booted off the Android product, that platform in its current form will pass. It is kind of funny to see the spin on this, which suggests this was Andy's decision. Yeah right, and I'll be buying that bridge in Brooklyn shortly.

Caveat Inventor: The New Patent Paradigm March 15, 2013 The most significant change to U.S. patent law since 1836 -- or perhaps 1790 -- is being implemented on March 16, 2013. Part of the America Invents Act of 2011, it concerns the doctrine of first-to-invent, laws concerning the protection of original inventors, regardless of whether they were the first to apply for a patent. The new law awards inventorship under a first-inventor-to-file standard.

The US Hasn't Lost Its Tech Edge March 14, 2013 There is much lamenting in some quarters that the U.S. has lost its road map for tech innovation. Many point to China as a country in a hurry to catch up to and even pass America in technology. They talk about how China is stressing tech-related endeavors and how forward-looking it is. I simply don't buy this argument. Why? Let's start with retailing and Amazon.

What's Eating Microsoft? March 14, 2013 Microsoft was once rapidly growing like Google and Apple. Then it changed. It became a very large, but very slow growing company. These days it seems stuck, struggling to break into other businesses. The growth wave Microsoft rode crested years ago, but it hasn't been able to catch the next wave.

The Employee Heroes at HP: Making an Impossible Turnaround March 11, 2013 It is very difficult to pull off a turnaround. This is because you typically start with a company that is unprofitable and lacking the resources to compete. You have employees who are still on the job only because they haven't been able to find another one, and you're selling products that few want to buy. To successfully execute a turnaround, you need heroic employees who are willing to step up despite the problems.

IBM's Big Bet on Cloud Analytics March 08, 2013 A growing number of established and emerging software and technology vendors are seeking to take advantage of the convergence of Big Data and the cloud. None has made a bigger bet than IBM. Since 2005, IBM has spent more than $16 billion on 35 acquisitions to boost its analytics capabilities. The company is hoping that this investment will generate approximately $20 billion in annual sales.

The Tooth-and-Nails Scrap for the No. 3 Smartphone Spot March 07, 2013 Until about six years ago, the wireless world was pretty predictable. BlackBerry and Nokia were the leaders, and everything was growing and stable. Then the iPhone earthquake changed everything. Android soon followed, creating more disruption. Today the global handset leaders are Samsung and Apple. However, the big story in 2013 is who will be No. 3. The competition will be intense.

Open Source's Deep Dive Into the Enterprise March 06, 2013 Server provisioning and configuration management and automation are the latest examples of where the tech industry is being driven, largely by open source software. The leading open source server and IT infrastructure automation frameworks, Opscode Chef and Puppet Labs' Puppet, sit on the leading edge of significant trends under way in enterprise IT.

VCE's Next Wave of Innovation March 05, 2013 Taken together, VCE's recently announced new offerings qualify as a generational step forward not only for the company, but also for the cause of converged infrastructures and, most importantly, for VCE customers and partners. Prior to this, the company's Vblocks delivered dramatic improvements in common data center metrics.

IBM: Giving Open a Smarter Strategic Advantage March 04, 2013 IBM just announced SmartCloud Orchestrator -- a massive open source initiative designed to help companies better balance public and private cloud resources and even switch vendors. This is in sharp contrast to the lock-in strategy that IBM used to found the technology segment -- largely because IBM learned the hard way that lock-in, while tactically sound, is strategically stupid.

The Dollars Are in the Details - and the Details Should Be in CRM March 01, 2013 The devil is in the details, the saying goes. When it comes to B2B selling, the dollars are also in the details. That's something I learned many years ago while writing about the reseller channel. Back in 2000, the Internet caused significant disruptions of traditional reseller relationships, because many large technology vendors expected online sales to eliminate the need for resellers.

GM Switches Partners for OnStar's Next Big Dance February 28, 2013 Several years ago, General Motors introduced a groundbreaking service called "OnStar," a wireless technology designed to keep drivers safer on the road. Since the 1990s, GM has used the Verizon Wireless network to link cars with OnStar. However, it announced this week at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona that it's switching to AT&T Mobility. This is pretty big news.

Benioff's Social Proof February 28, 2013 Salesforce came to New York this week for its annual winter meeting with customers. The company had two goals: test new ideas, and gather customer input. The event was held at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel for a relatively small group -- less than 1,000 -- rather than at the Jacob Javits Convention Center, which can accommodate the maintenance facilities for a squadron of F18s.