Russian president Dimitri Medvedev, who keeps an active and delightful Twitter account, sure loves his gadgets.
His latest is the Android-powered iPad-clone Galaxy Tab by Samsung.
Over the weekend, Medvedev posted a flash review of the gadget to Twitter, posting a TwitPic of a snowy Moscow and writing:
"Winter comes to Moscow. Picture taken with a Samsung Galaxy Tab. It's convenient, but the quality isn't great :-("
Watch out, Mossberg!
Here's the image:
Join the conversation about this story »
Kevin Fogarty of ITWorld asks an interesting question: As IT funds start to flow again, are you getting your cut? Probably not, and for a couple of reasons.
A lot of that money goes to "IT Debt:" maintenance, repairs, and replacements on older machines and software that haven't been fixed for a while because the money wasn't available.
So no one expects all that money to be going directly to the help deskers with frustration-patterned baldness from pulling their hair out after talking to users, or the IT project managers with finger-shaped tan lines on their faces from the amount of time they spend in facepalm during and after business-unit project meetings.
Some facts:
IT people at large companies scraped their way to 0.38 percent raises on average between 2009 and 2010, according to surveys from PSRInc.
SMBs were stuck with increases of just 0.11 percent.
Industry consortium TechAmerica Foundation's surveys showed IT organizations cut 143,000 jobs last year and have brought only 30,200 of them back.
Janco's survey of more than 300 end-user companies shows the average of all IT professionals got 0.67 percent more in compensation this year than last, and that staff (1.27 percent) and middle managers (1.07 percent) did best of any other category not specifically delimited by a particular technology skill.
So tough times out there, but perhaps you already knew that. Still, it's certainly worth looking at the department budget to see what percentage of funds is going to gear and what percentage is going to people. Is it the right mix?
-- Don Willmott
Spotify, the streaming music service, has denied that it's talking to Apple about an acquisition, as TechCrunch had reported yesterday. Late last night, CNET reported that "Spotify's spokesman Jim Butcher said acquisitions discussions with Apple have never taken place."
For the sake of argument, let's assume the truth is somewhere in the middle: That Apple has considered buying Spotify, has maybe even gotten a free look -- Apple gets a free look at anyone -- and that the companies are not currently negotiating a deal.
In reality, it actually makes no sense for Apple to acquire Spotify, unless it can be had for very cheap.
Yesterday, when we first read TechCrunch's report, we briefly argued that it did make some sense for Apple to buy Spotify, given Spotify's popularity in Europe (the only place it is available) and given Apple's lousy attempts so far at "cloud"-based music.
But after sleeping on it, and some sense talked into us by MediaMemo's Peter Kafka, we now think that it makes no sense for Apple to buy Spotify, unless it is incredibly cheap.
Why not? Because Apple typically buys startups for three reasons, none of which likely applies here:
We can think of plenty of reasons for Spotify to want the world to think that Apple is interested in it -- that's a great way to get Google to overpay for it, for example. But it does not make sense for Apple to buy Spotify now. Unless, as we've said, it can be had for a very cheap price, which does not seem likely.
Read: 10 Ways People Are Using The iPad To Create Content, Not Just Consume It
Join the conversation about this story »
See Also:
by Brad Berman
The Chinese company known as BYD-that's Build Your Dreams-has an audacious plan to solve China's energy and environment problems. Readers of this site might know BYD as the carmaker backed by famed investor Warren Buffet-and as the top contender to bring Chinese-made electric cars and plug-in hybrids to the United States.
But it may come as a surprise that BYD views the U.S. market as somewhat irrelevant, and doesn't see high-volume sales of its all-electric e6 or the BYD F3DM plug-in hybrid as that high of a priority.
That's because BYD's Chairman, Chuanfu Wang, has a much bigger vision. "The goal is to create a zero emissions ecosystem," said Michael Austin, a Chicago-based BYD vice president with marketing and public relations duties. "And you don't create the zero carbon zero emissions ecosystem by just producing a whole bunch of electric vehicles." BYD's electric and plug-in hybrid cars, now available in China, will go on sale to U.S. private consumers as early as 2012.
Vertical Integration
I recently spoke with Austin, a former Motorola executive who began working with BYD about a decade ago, when he was looking for an affordable source of commodity batteries for Motorola cell phones. Of the three-dozen or so Chinese companies making cell phone batteries at the time, BYD was the only one with durable and safe battery chemistry-backed by its own intellectual property regarding battery technology. Moreover, the company's philosophy of vertical manufacturing integration allowed the company to reach an enormous scale.
"They own the chemicals. They own the mines. They refine the chemicals. They make their own cans for the cells. They did their own windings," Austin said. "They did every component of the build, and that total vertical solution got them in a place where they had the lowest cost, so they could control the market."
And what they did for batteries, they also did for cell phones. Currently, 30 to 40 percent of the world's cell phones, regardless of the brand, can be traced back to BYD. Now they are applying the same scale to solar panels and to automobiles. They have 100 million square feet of factory space. They make every component of the vehicle, except the tires and the safety glass. And for the past two years, the company's F3 sedan has been China's number one seller.
Coal-Powered Nightmare, Avoided
BYD needs its massive scale of manufacturing to match the size of the Chinese auto market. Last year, China bypassed the United States to become the largest automobile market in the world, and it continues to grow at an impressive rate. "If BYD were to sell tens of thousands of electric vehicle in Tianjin and in Beijing, it would create a worse environmental condition than China has today. All they have are coal-burning plants," Austin said.
Instead, BYD wants to couple solar energy generation with massive amounts of stationary energy storage using its batteries. Then, add efficient lighting at home-BYD also makes LED lighting-and electric cars for the road. "If you discharge to those energy storage plants to electric vehicles, then you have zero emissions." Voila! The ecosystem is complete.
Back in the U.S.A.
Given the size of the Chinese auto market, and the Chinese government's goal of making electric cars represent 10 to 20 percent of total cars sales, the U.S. auto market is nearly an afterthought.
Nonetheless, with that kind of scale driving production and reduced cost in China, it's possible to bring the same total energy solution to the United States. Austin: "We don't want to just sell electric vehicles in our U.S. dealerships. That's not selling the zero emission story. We want to sell solar panels. We want to sell solar-shaded parking. We want to sell LED lighting. We want to sell energy storage for your home, and charging stations coupled to energy storage, so we can do DC-to-DC quick charging. Oh, and you can use solar panels to charge your energy storage, that's now powering your vehicle."
BYD wants to work down the price of its electric car-without any subsidy-to $20,000 or less. Austin says that the price of BYD's EV batteries is currently at $350 per kilowatt hour. "That's lower than everybody else. Nobody else is even close to that," Austin said. "And that's where we are at today.
It all comes full circle, when you consider the effects of the Chinese economy on the price of gasoline. "BYD is completely convinced that the emerging markets are going to eat up all the gasoline. When China and India emerge, the price is going to skyrocket," Austin said.
The price in the U.S. and the developed world, that is. The Chinese government will continue to subsidize its gas to around $1.50 a gallon, according to Austin. "They don't curb their consumption. So, we'll get screwed with high prices, and they'll continue to consume at incredible rates," he said. Consider that less than six percent of Chinese currently own cars, but that around 30 percent now have the financial means to buy a vehicle. "There are 330 million cars yet to be sold," Austin said.
Reprinted with permission from PluginCars
