Hesh Wiener
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Mad Dog 21/21: CIO, Get Out Of That Glass House
October 5, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreChief information officers whose companies’ profits grew rapidly during the boom years of this decade seem to be outward-looking, ambitious, and interested in extending their influence far beyond the walls of their glass house computing facilities. That’s what IBM says, based on interviews it conducted with more than 2,500 CIOs, distilled into a study anyone can register to receive. The CIOs that IBM characterizes as leaders and IBM itself seem to be in harmony, which might not be such a bad thing if their companies can adjust to current business conditions as well as IBM has.
Spanning the IT
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Mad Dog 21/21: Big Blue’s Sun Strategy Gamble–IBM Without i
September 21, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreUsers and resellers of Sun Microsystems iron have been shaken up by Oracle‘s acquisition plans. IBM is trying to exploit the situation, picking off as many Sun accounts as possible. Big Blue says its Power-AIX systems have won over many customers and adds that its mainframes and System x products are making big inroads, too. What is missing from this picture is the i-on-Power line. This could prove problematic. IBM’s dropping the i may mean dropping business machines, too, opening market gaps that Oracle and Microsoft can exploit, even in accounts where IBM is nominally the prime vendor.
IBM
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Mad Dog 21/21: Terms and Conditions
August 24, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreThe 22nd Amendment of the United States Constitution limits a President to two terms. It is a model for other laws favoring electoral change, if not progress. Corporate client computers used to have term limits, too; they were usually replaced after 24 to 36 months. No longer. Companies are now slower to oust incumbent hardware and software. Significantly, Windows XP, launched in 2001, will survive for years on its own and also as a guest of Windows 7. This persistence creates a daunting challenge to an industry that had always counted on lively, progressive customers.
The imposition of a limit
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Mad Dog 21/21: Aiming for the Clouds
August 3, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read morePenelope realized it was the long absent Odysseus when the grizzled stranger shot an arrow through a dozen ax handles. The legendary William Tell split the apple on his son’s noggin with a crossbow bolt. American Revolutionary Daniel Morgan trained and led the riflemen that beat the Brits at Saratoga and Cowpen. And now Erich Clementi and his boss, Sam Palmisano, are taking belated aim at cloud computing, with particular focus on a market long in the sights of GoDaddy‘s maniac-in-chief Bob Parsons. IBM is battling in the boardroom with buzzwords. Parsons is nabbing the NOCs with knockers.
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: A Community of Common Interest
June 22, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreTFH Flashback
Editor’s Note: This is the first-page essay from the pilot edition of The Four Hundred, which was written by Hesh Wiener, my mentor and the original publisher of the newsletter. The first edition of The Four Hundred was published nine months after the launch of the AS/400 in June 1988, and was a joint production between Technology News of America, Hesh’s company and my employer way back then, and the Reed Elsevier publishing giant. The newsletter actually got its start in England first and was rolled out in the United States and Canada a few months
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Mad Dog 21/21: Playing For Keeps in Peoria
June 15, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreWhen Chief Pontiac worked out a settlement with his British adversaries in 1766 and retired to what is now southwestern Illinois, he thought his place in history was secure. Three years later, he was murdered by a Peoria. Today Peoria means Caterpillar, not Native Americans, and Pontiac’s name has faded, like the eponymous brand of GM automobiles. But no Pontiac suffered the ignominy of Windows Live OneCare computer security software, which, gelded and code-named Morro, will be given away, if it can be, by Microsoft, a company that just ceased making money.
Chief Pontiac: Survived years
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Mad Dog 21/21: Sometimes You Eat the Bear, Sometimes Its Porridge
May 18, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreThe computer industry is desperately in need of Goldilocks goods and services in these bearish times, things that are not too big and not too small, things that are just right. Can there actually be such offerings when there’s not just one kind of customer, and when industry folk and pundits alike say business conditions are bad and getting worse? Some people think the answer is yes. These are the hardware, software, and services vendors behind those little computers called netbooks. In addition, there is another constituency: People who are buying these things by the millions.
Once upon a time,
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Mad Dog 21/21: The Age of Acquire Us
May 4, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreIt looks like Oracle is going to buy Sun Microsystems. This will probably happen soon, but it’s hard to be sure. Not long ago it looked like IBM was going to buy Sun, at least according to a passel of ace reporters, but it didn’t happen. However as events unfold, one thing seems clear: Sun’s role in computing is huge. For an America suffering economic collapse, Sun is a necessity, which makes it a mother of invention. Sun is akin to hope, that strange invention, which may have feathers. And we need hope so much right now.
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Mad Dog 21/21: The Case of the Vanishing Equity
March 16, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreThese are hard times. Blue chip companies are reducing their profit forecasts, slashing dividends, and laying off armies of employees. IBM remains an exception. It is sticking to its earnings forecast of $9.20 per share or higher for 2009, up from $8.93 in 2008. It is not cutting its dividend. And while it has had layoffs, it is also hiring in Asia. But there is still one sign that IBM lives in the same harsh world the rest of us do: The company’s net worth, also called shareholders’ equity, is less than half of what it was a year ago.
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Mad Dog 21/21: That’ll Teach ‘Em
March 2, 2009 Hesh Wiener
… Read moreIt’s difficult to sell an IBM i server to a prospect who worries that the talent required to use the machine will be in short supply, and even more so to sell an AS/400 or System i shop a new Power System that requires fresh skills. Students have X64 machines and so, usually, do their schools. Power? What’s that? IBM is trying to educate the educators by making access to Power technology cheaper for schools and by supporting faculty members, researchers, and students. And it has a big educational shindig coming up in September.
As part of its effort to