There are no lighthouses….

One of the reasons the lighthouses were employed many years ago was to warn of danger. As necessary today as they were 200 years ago. In the era of satellite maps, GPS systems, channel buoys, and other technology the voters have the lighthouse has become superfluous. One of the things that I talked about a few days ago was that if you look at the Fortune 500, 497 of the first 500 companies in that Fortune 500 list no longer existed. The reason for that is often simple strategy misplace. When IBM ascertained the initial market for computers, they made a huge misstep. At the same time, they could’ve dominated the market they did not. They gave rise to competitors, and competitors ultimately dominated the market. IBM went from one of the largest computer manufacturers in the world to sell off their computer business.

Now I applaud IBM for recognizing that they were no longer dominant or even in a good market position. What worries me today is the strategy many companies are deploying: to do parts of the solution. Here’s the reality of doing parts. Eventually, somebody will replace you. Or worse, the parts thing you’re doing ultimately are not the good parts. And so companies form their strategies and begin the concept of competition. But they end up losing. And the reason that they lose is that they do not look at the big picture. They only look at what we can do a picture or, as I sometimes like to call it, looking out the postage-sized picture window to see what you can see. Not very much at all. I understand the business concepts around the total addressable market. Sometimes called TAM, it says nobody gets 100% of the market. If you do get 100% of the market, federal regulators are visiting your office.

The reality of strategy is you have to be careful. There is, sadly, for most companies, a difference between capabilities and market. And, of course, a difference between market size and addressable market. Companies often spend years refining a strategy to find out they were wrong way too late in the process. One of my favorite books is the blue ocean strategy. In the Blue Ocean strategy, they took a look at businesses they created; a blue was a noncompetitive ocean. They were not, by the way, claiming that the companies that created those blue oceans maintained a blue ocean forever. You’re only as good as you were when you closed yesterday at five in the world of business. Today somebody else is just as good as you. But the ability of an organization to create that blue ocean is the ultimate driver. Unfortunately, most companies get mired in the red ocean and seldom have time to look around and realize that sometimes the red ocean is right by the blue ocean. You need to stop and look for a moment.

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Wandering the desolation of Digital Transformation…

I was discussing digital transformation, were several folks on the Internet recently. Or the inner webs or whatever you want to call the vast complication of humans and websites that makeup what is called the Internet. The discussions around the concept of digital transformation. Not digital transformation if we take a straight definition is pretty easy to understand. You take analog technology skews me, not technology. You take analog components and make them digital. If we take music as an example, an artist playing on stage is analog. The recording of that playing can be either analog or digital. But the MP3 file that is shared by all the fans is completely digital. So we think about the concept of digital transformation, and we take, for instance, music, music has moved well into the age of digital transformation. The vast majority of artists may still release an LP, they may still release a CD, but in the end there most likely to get their songs on the Apple iTunes Store or the Google play store.

Music is a great example because digital transformation changes not only how it’s delivered MP3 but also the cost. There was a time when you had to buy the whole CD if you loved the songs on a CD. Now you just by the song you love. Now the reality of digital transformation is very simply explained in the example of music and the music world. The problem is that the vast majority of the world around us is still not anywhere near the concept of digital transformation. People always run around screaming it’s the information age is the information age. I want to hit them with the information glass half-full or half-empty question. Can you verify and guarantee that any information you find on the Internet is truly correct and valid? Because if you truly believe everything you read on the Internet is real, I have a bridge in New York City I’d like to sell you. The reality is digital transformation is more than simply moving the information from analog to digital. In the information age is more than simply being able to Google how tall Mount Everest is. The digital transformation, which is the precursor to the information age, is the process where objects are created digital-first and digital-only. Once created, a digital object can be printed, but for the most part, the digital transformation around us has to do with making analog-to-digital.

So as we enter the age of digital transformation, we have to consider several factors. And I’ll end simply with this simple thought. Digital transformation is the act of moving from analog to digital. But a digital transformation culture is the act of a culture that only creates digital-first. Yes, we can still print a picture for aunt Jane because she likes physical pictures still. But the reality is we can print that picture. Digital transformation doesn’t preclude analog production. It simply means that whatever we were talking about it was created digitally first. So as we enter the age of digital transformation, do you still have no paper in your office?

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Turn your wall into a touch screen!

I remember the first time I was or used a projector. It was one of the old projectors that I used as a teacher. You could put a sheet of plastic on the projector and draw on it that projected onto a screen, and you could discuss the image. It was like having a giant chalkboard. As that technology improved, the next iteration was using a projector that connected to the computer. From there, things have continued to evolve. There are now 4k capable laser projectors. They are called short-throw because they don’t have to be 10 feet or less away from the screen.

Projectors are a topic I have long talked about. I backed on on on Kickstarter about a year ago, that easily fits in the palm of my hand. It takes USB or HDMI input. That means you can quickly put your cell phone on a large portable screen. Why? Well, I do that sometimes when I am showing Netflix or other media to another person. I do use the HDMI with my laptop also to show things on my laptop. That isn’t the brightest projector, so you need to be in a fairly light-controlled room. The laser projectors mentioned above can be in a room and still project with the lights on.

The newest (in the last three years) are projectors that have integrated pens. Now you can project on any wall, and it becomes an interactive whiteboard. The pens, included with the projector, do not open, so you can write on the wall and leave no trace. Those projects (there are three or four today) fall into the smaller projector reality. They are LED projectors but not as bright as laser projectors. Still, turning any available wall into an interactive whiteboard (which you can share via web meeting) is intriguing! It makes collaboration just a little bit easier, plus more people can see and get involved in a meeting that way!

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The mystery of Tomorrow…

v Many years ago, a friend of mine used always to say find the art of the possible. It’s not an easy thing to say and is not an easy thing to do. Many organizations lose their way from today to tomorrow simply by never finding the art of the possible. The ramifications of failing to seize today while planning for tomorrow are that you don’t arrive in tomorrow ever. Or if you do arrive, you’re not in a position that your competitors are, and you end up having to sacrifice tomorrow’s today for tomorrow’s tomorrow. If you look at the original Fortune 500 listing back in the 1950s, you’ll notice that many of the industries listed in that initial list are still around, but only three of the companies. Not a huge fan of IBM, but IBM is a company that understands survival. Never build today. Build tomorrow today.

Sometimes you will call that future-proofing. But at some future proving its future inviting. Making the future want to comment land in your organization build its nest and patch it young. Chasing Money (or Mission) is always hard. You see, the money is often in tomorrow, not today. The future is always where the mission is, which brings me to the fatalist view of the world built for today. I see many companies that do that, and I worry about it. I watched Apple computers do that from around 1992 to around 1999. Apple computers wallow in the world of today. The Apple Newton was an interesting toy, but it was never a tool. It was always a toy. Apple’s laptop and Macintosh business continued to lose market share year after year. Until Steve Jobs returned and then began developing the iPhone, Apple wallowed in mediocrity. The reason I picked Apple the reason I bring up Apple is there a great example of rising from mediocrity to greatness. But then I want to go back and remind you that the original fortune 500 companies only three companies survived from the 1950s.

The book Blue Ocean strategy defines why you can’t wallow in today. It defines why you must reach for tomorrow. Because in tomorrow lies the blue ocean, today you’re in the red ocean. And the reason that ocean is red is the sharks are drawing blood. The funny thing about blood in the water it doesn’t cause sharks to veer away. It causes sharks to bring their friends. And I’m not talking about the want to be a sharks on a shark tank. I’m talking about the kind of sharks that don’t mind eating the occasional human being. The same cultural today becomes one of failure. Again 497 the original Fortune 500, they struggled into mediocrity and disappear. Consume my more successful competitors. Many of the markets from the 1950 original Fortune 500 list are still there. Other companies dominate them. Watch the model of the idea they built tomorrow and make sure today’s still working. Companies that focus on today and of struggling, and then slowly disappearing.

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My review Surface Studio 2

I know as the firstborn child in my parent’s family, I never wore hand-me-downs. On one side of the family, my mom’s I was the oldest grandchild. I could’ve worn hand-me-downs from my two cousins from my father’s older sister on the other side. But for most of my childhood, they live pretty far away. I never wore hand-me-downs. However, in our house now, my wife often gets my technology hand-me-downs. She doesn’t care because she gets free IT support. So I gave her my surface studio. I love the surface studio line, of computers it is the best big-screen computer I’ve ever used. After long considerations and that little bit of research, I decided to get a circus studio to replace the surface studio I was giving my wife. You would think a former Microsoft employee would get a discount, but that is not the case.

(the image is of my Surface Studio, and Windows Live Writer with this blog open before the picture!) Having had a service studio now for more than four years, I rely on some of the base functionality of the product. The integrated camera allows you to log in with just facial recognition. In a bleary-eyed morning, that helps. My old Surface Studio had a reasonably decent processor and 16 gigs a ring. So it operated very efficiently, and I had a 2 TB SSD drive which was pretty fast. The new one we bumped up to 32 gigs and having that to terabyte SSD drive and of course slightly faster I seven processor. The dial and the patent continue to work. I think in the past the speakers are improved. I’ve already done a review of lab link Pro which I used to move from one PC to another. But overall, my impression of the surface studio is that Microsoft did a great job in the upgrade. The product is faster, and it now has a USB C slot.

My only complaint, the really big complaint, is that the surface studio only has four USB ports on the back to do at the fifth, that USB C which are limited before. Plus the additional one. What I have found, however, is that Microsoft does support the hardware using USB C pots. That gives you a video on adding USB ports USB three ports impact and really and truly a little bit more functionality and speed. I like that the server studio spends most of its real estate on the screen, not the actual computer, the base, or the computer screen small. And I like that footprint on my desk 32 gigs of RAM means I can run my programs without worrying, and a 2 TB SSD drive means I have a fast hard drive and enough room to do most of the projects I like to do. Overall my impression of the surface studio is that it is a massive upgrade to the surface studio. Search studio was a good computer. It is still a good computer. Server studio is a great computer. I give the surface studio two s 9 out of 10!!!!

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Chasing IU Basketball on TV and the reality of the modern viewing experience…

I know that I am a geek. I have no qualms or questions about that. Many years ago, I grew up in a small Indiana town called Bloomington. My father, mother and myself, and other family members were avid IU fans. Indiana University basketball was something we enjoyed. We also enjoy value football, but predominantly we were a basketball family, at least my dad and I were. I moved away to Cincinnati, Ohio, and the one difficult thing for me was that I did not have an opportunity to watch IU basketball games, except when I went over to Indiana to visit my parents, this was before the birth of the Big Ten network. Back when the only TV station that carried most IU games was a channel for WTTV out of Indianapolis, Indiana. And channel for WTTV, I would think of Indianapolis, Indiana, and didn’t agree with any of the cable companies in Cincinnati, Ohio. I missed IU basketball.

Not by the way that that was the only reason we left Cincinnati and moved back to Indianapolis, Indiana. It was simply a positive benefit. There was a time when I had two different cable providers so that I can get channel 4. And watch IU basketball games whenever I wanted to. One was cheap cable, and the other was dish network. I didn’t even think about not watching Indiana University basketball games when we moved to Maryland because the Big Ten network arrived. And that’s kind of what I want to talk about today, the evolution of entertainment because the reality of and what you can view now on the television or the Internet is huge. You never have to worry about missing your favorite team because you can watch them and watch all the games in various locations.

One of the things that I’ve been trying to do for the last few years remembers the past. It’s important to remember how things got to be the way they are. I remember when you could literally attach to your dish or cable system when there was a product that would rebroadcast your television wherever you were. Again my goal was to watch Indiana University basketball. On my many trips to Seattle, Washington, I can tell you that I missed many games. Part of that was that I could set up the VCR to record them, but small twins frequently used the VCR. The small twins took tapes out without regard.” Barney in. I had already wisely locked all the Barnie tapes because I did not want them erased. The VCR was not a good option for me at the time. That’s when I started rebroadcasting my cable signal so that I can watch it on my smartphone. Now, of course, everything’s got a DVR. And you can easily watch your TV on the Internet back then. I was one of the few. Oh my, how things have changed!

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Wandering the why of my blog….

I know my mind works differently than other people’s often. One of the things that always interest me is that every day, morning walk and walk past Porsche outdoors. Every day I walked by, and every day I think of myself that were mine, it would be in the garage! Not a rant, not the way think it should be, just an interesting thing I think about as I’m walking in the morning. One of the things that have influenced me over the years is several different books. I can say that the books that influenced me are probably not ones that many people read. Some of the books I read because my father handed them to me. From the time I was about eight or nine years old, my father would read a book, and he would hand it to me, and he would say, you need to read this. I can remember at first thinking no; I don’t. But I did it anyway. Some of the best books I’ve ever read were books my dad handed to me.

The goal of today’s conversation isn’t the topic of the books. Nor is it the ideas and concepts and thoughts that the books created in my head. It’s the connection between someone’s ideas and, of course, the reader consuming those ideas and generating new ideas of their own. Sometimes the reader will comment on a post and say thank you or dear stupid or wow, never thought of it that way. Or worse sometimes. But the reality is I don’t write for people to comment; while I love comments, I write for me. On social sites, someone who likes my posts and never comments always makes me think – I didn’t say something that person was interested in. That passes because, again, I come back to the fact that I write for myself. I see me expand that thought a little bit because I think it’s important to explain why you do things sometimes.

I write my wander project log because when I started scanning my father’s slides after he passed, I realized that there were thousands of slides and pictures with no story. I knew I was there, and some of the stories I could access because mom was there were some of the pictures there was the only dad there. Those stories were lost forever. That’s why I do the wander project. Originally my technology blogs were complaints about technology customer service. I moved complaints about organizational customer service to my yelp blogs. Then my technology blog evolved into technology storytelling. Then for a while, I was focused on doing technology reviews. I introduced the savvy tech guy blogs. I still do reviews, and I still follow the same review model, but I’ll do as many reviews now as I did 12 to 13 years ago. And then, about maybe five years ago, I started wandering into the concept of technology futures. That’s kind of where I am right now. I spent a lot of time thinking about what may be in technology. Thanks for reading; today’s kind of a recap of where I am, or more commonly known as a writer’s block blog!

Zen Series

https://discover.hubpages.com/religion-philosophy/The-master-and-the-flower

Futurist Postings

https://hubpages.com/technology/The-future-of-5g

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Freedom of speech within reason

The science behind the concept of climate change terrifies me. Not, and the way most people are terrified of climate change right now. I believe the human race can fix climate change. What terrifies me is the reality of people that don’t believe. Somehow in the last few years, science has become the enemy. I wish I had an answer to that because I don’t understand. I often talk about the concept of facts. Facts are moments in time facts or specific, but the most important thing about faxes they haven’t been disproven. The reality of debunked theories is that they aren’t facts. Just because freedom of speech empowers you to say what’s on your mind doesn’t mean you should. In fact, pending your role in society, freedom of speech may mean you don’t always say what’s on your mind. Sometimes you bite your tongue and keep your mouth shut!

In looking at Ethos and Pathos, I often wonder about both forms of communication. When do people drop both of those and slide into conspiracy? I’ve been reading a blogger who posts some of the worst conspiracy theory anti-whatever group is currently in the news posts, and I find myself dreading anything that person posts. The reality of conspiracy theory posts is that if you can get away from it, you have to stop going where you’re going. That makes me sad because the site in question is one I’ve been going to regularly for more than five years. But when all that stuff is published, I don’t want to be associated with it in any way. The reality of free speech means you have the right to say anything within reason. The most important part of free speech is the phrase within reason.

And truly, I understand that the concept, the parameters, even the very existence of reason have changed in the last few years. The reality of the truth! You see, as I said, you can say anything you want within reason. That is your constitutional right. But people forget the ethical reality of within reason. We all agree that shouting fire in a crowded house when there is no fire is free speech the United States and the European Union, and other groups of nations have put together rules that say a speech is illegal. And they clearly defined hate speech as any speech directed at another group or entity that debases their existence. Racism in and of itself is a form of hate speech regardless of the race you are quote hating on quote! It is not freedom of speech to do things that incite a riot. However, proving that spoken words generated a riot is nearly impossible. The intent is part things improve. So again, I will say freedom of speech and the United States is a constitutional right; the ethical and moral guidelines under which we operate in that constitutional right, however, is the phrase within reason.

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Voice control continues to improve

There are so many things I want to talk about right now from a social perspective, but I am trying to be fair and not spend all my time shouting from the mountain tops that we need to do better. Instead, today I wanted to talk about two things that are interesting/exciting. The first thing is the ever-improving reality that is Apple Car Play. I know, I use it when I am driving, that the product has gotten a lot better I use it more and more in other places. Voice control continues to get better and better. The other day I was wandering to a restaurant and ended up wanting to listen to a podcast. Using my voice, I told Siri to open my podcasts and play the one I wanted to hear.

I know many jokes about asking Alexa (the amazon voice control system) or asking Siri questions. You do, from time to time, get rather interesting results. But, the quality is better and better! Beyond Apple Carplay, there is that growing world of voice control. I mentioned Amazon Alexa already. I use Alexa frequently (at least 4 to 6 times every single day). Alexa has been integrated with many products. The integration is available in the market, and you can quickly download and enable the connection. I won’t go into the reality of home weather stations, but you can connect your Bloomsky and your Alexa, and then when you ask for the temperature, specify Bloomsky, and you will get the temperature where you are!

How can I say voice control is better now? Because, yes, there are errors. Yes, those errors are frustrating. But if you tried voice command five years ago versus now in a moving car, you would quickly realize that voice command is better. Cars are not quiet by any means. The ambient noise is pretty bad. But Siri, Alexa, and Google are much better now at learning, listening, and hearing. Even Cortana is better, although more and more things that use Cortana are removing that voice control system. I do use Cortana on my PC occasionally. Siri remains number one in terms of frequency of use. Amazon Alexa is number two but not by a lot, and then it is Google and finally Cortana. Voice control is improving, and that makes it effective!

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Vindication isn’t shouting louder than the other person

A phrase that I have heard throughout my life is “the facts are indisputable.” The reality of that statement itself is disputable. No fact should ever be unassailable. All facts are simply points of reference. But, when the fact in question is nuanced or positioned to create a new meaning, it is dangerous. I do understand that when assailed, many people respond with the negative. (you did that – no, I didn’t) I also understand that the court of public opinion will try and convict you if you speak out or don’t speak out when accused. I wish people would understand the golden rule of denial. The louder you deny something, the less likely people are to believe you over time.

The reason for the disbelief has to do with the fact that so many people loudly proclaim their innocence and then are convicted of the crime or found that they did do what they were accused of at the time. So in the court of public opinion, it is a bad idea to attack the idea that you were involved publicly, did, or contemplated the activity you are accused of in media. My grandfather once told me this. I have carried it with me for many years. Vindication is not being the last one shouting. It is something that I try to take to heart. Let me say that in the end, it matters how the world perceives you. We, as humans, hopefully, try to live up to the ideals we hold others to!

I find myself reading less and less news (which isn’t a good thing). I find myself trying to reconcile the anger people have right now. I am not able to fully comprehend the situation we have in the world today. The Pandemic changed everything, and many things will impact more due to that separation with people being locked away from each other. We are social creatures, we humans. Our enforced lack of social interaction has been hard!

I won’t call out groups of people that are proclaiming their innocence. I won’t give air time to people that are distorting facts to make their story stronger. They get enough airplay without my adding my voice. I will say this. You can use nuisance facts all you want. You can position things so that your position is stronger and the other is weaker. But just because the words pass your tongue doesn’t mean they will connect the way you would like them to with my ears!

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