Disruption Matters

Thank You Steve Jobs

Posted on October 6, 2011 by Jose Miguel Cansado

A genius.
Thank you for making the World a better place and inspire millions of people.

Posted in General | Tagged Steve Jobs | 2 Comments

Google TV should turn into Chrome TV

Posted on September 1, 2011 by Jose Miguel Cansado

Chrome has revolutionized web browsing. It has evolved the web in 3 years more than in the previous 10. ChromeOS, though, has failed to challenge the PC and laptop status quo, in part because it was conceived before the iPad era, in part because you resist to have a machine that is almost useless when offline.

But the area Chrome would revolutionize is the TV, and this is where Google opted for the Android-based Google TV. A mistake.

The TV and the Web are made to each other, and a ChromeTV would have much more impact in the TV industry than what Google TV might have. Why?
- A Web browser is something that any TV-set manufacturer would integrate without the legal issues of a platform like GoogleTV, owned by Google and tied to potential content rights and other patent issues.
- HTML5 and CSS3 provide a superb framework to develop compelling apps for big screens like TVs.
- The TV-set is “fixed” by nature. If it is connected, it will always be connected, unlike a laptop or tablet. Therefore you can live with just a browser on it. No need for a proper proprietary OS.
- The Web also on the TV? What else can Google dream that would better fit their search and ads business model?

Happy 3rd anniversary Google Chrome!!!

Posted in Internet, Media | Tagged chrome, Google, Google TV, Internet TV, TV | Leave a comment

Is Google that good? or Microsoft that bad?

Posted on March 21, 2011 by Jose Miguel Cansado

Comparing Chrome and IE9, I can only wonder whether Google engineers are genius, or Microsoft has lost its edge.

I fell in love with Chrome since it launched in 2008. It was so much faster, with a minimalist design, the single box for search and URLs, the start page with the most visited pages, the sandbox concept…

IE9 is the confirmation that Google’s vision of the browser was bright. So bright that Microsoft simply copied it… 2.5 years later. Only it is not yet there. See IE vs Firefox vs Chrome.

Chrome software updates are almost invisible to the user. The first installation is also pretty fast. I wonder how Google is able to do all those installs/updates without ever asking to restart the computer.

I just installed IE9 at home. During install IE9 lists all running programs and services that may conflict, and asks to close them all to avoid restarting the PC. I agree to close them all, but surprise surprise, after installation is done I am asked to restart the computer because IE8 had some component still running!! How come I had to re-start Windows7 when I install IE9 and no re-start with Chrome? What is the trick? Are Googlers so much smarter than Microsofters?

This chart from WSJ might give a hint of where the brightest talent choose to go.

Posted in Internet | 1 Comment

It is Time to Phase Out Nuclear Power

Posted on March 16, 2011 by Jose Miguel Cansado

It is easy to be against nuclear in the middle of the Fukushima crisis following the earthquake in Japan. It seems opportunistic. But it is not. It is just that a nuclear accident HAS happened.

If anything can go wrong, it will. When we deal with nuclear, that means disaster.

The nuclear plant was designed to resist an 8.2 quake. A magnitude 9 quake happened. One month ago ,the probability of a 9 quake followed by a 10 meter high tsunami may have seemed low. But it HAS happened. And the consequences are terrible. It is enough to deal with a natural disaster of this magnitude, to add a nuclear catastrophe on top.

It is not worth it.

There are other types of energies available. Those are less cost-effective today. Mankind has demonstrated that when enough brainpower is put to a task, we can send a man to the Moon. There is no reason why the same engineering genius that made nuclear power possible, can not make clean energy one day cheaper than nuclear. It is a matter of priorities.

It is time to phase out nuclear power. It is too dangerous. Sadly, we now have the proof… once more.

Goodbye nuclear. We CAN afford something better.

Posted in General | Leave a comment

Who said the iPad was not for creation?

Posted on March 5, 2011 by Jose Miguel Cansado

See the new iMovie and GarageBand apps that were launched at the iPad 2 special event, and you can not longer think that iPad is good just to consume content. (See demos around minute 40 to 60). Music creation and video editing gets easier than with a laptop.

Everyone can be a creator now. The age of a few elite artists with the means and the monopolized distribution is over. The long tail of content is going to be only bigger and longer.

Now we can confirm that personal computing did actually change forever in April 2010.

Posted in Media | Leave a comment

Copying Is Not Theft

Posted on February 21, 2011 by Jose Miguel Cansado

It can not be explained better.

Posted in Media | Leave a comment

Disruption: Technology or Business Model? Definitively, not Laws

Posted on January 28, 2011 by Jose Miguel Cansado

Kindle books have now overtaken paperback books as the most popular format on Amazon.com, according to the quarterly results just released.

For every 100 paperback sold, Amazon sold 115 Kindle books
For every 100 hardcover sold, Amazon sold 300 Kindle books
The Kindle store has over 810,000 ebooks
670,000 ebooks are priced at $9.99 or less

In just 3 years, Amazon has taken the eBook from nothing to mainstream. Amazon has managed to take the book transition to digital without suffering the pain the music labels went through with mp3. How did they do it? First, with a great device, the iPod of the ebooks. Second, no fear to cannibalize their own business. Third, force publishers to accept the $9.99 price policy. Same recipe as the iTunes ”take it or leave it” $0.99 a song.

Amazon and Apple set the example of companies taking advantage of technology to drive new business models that are changing industries. The Netflix $7.99 a month all-you-can-stream is another bold proposition for consumers, that is shaking the Pay-TV industry.

The right offer for digital content at the right price is not only changing industries in US. It is also driving piracy down. Meantime countries like France, UK and Spain struggle with nonsense laws that not only are useless against piracy, but that are also stopping the development of a legal digital content market.

Legislators in Europe should stop making laws to preserve the status quo. Else US companies will have total domination of digital media by the time old Europe reacts.

Posted in Digital Lifestyle, Disruption, Internet | Tagged Amazon, Disruption, ebooks | Leave a comment

Why Google Acquires Widevine?

Posted on December 10, 2010 by Jose Miguel Cansado

W3C’s HTML5 FAQ page might give some clues (see screenshot) about why Google buys Widevine, a DRM vendor that powers Netflix among others. What if Google adds DRM to HTML5 video?

Google did something similar when they bought On2 and open-sourced VP8 as part of WebM. This move pushed MPEGLA to make h.264 royalty-free for Web video. The iPad did the rest to accelerate adoption of HTML5/h.264 video in the web.

HTML5 video with DRM is what Youtube needs to convince content owners, movie studios in particular, that their content will be protected. Furthermore, HTML5 video with DRM, combined with cool HTML5 UIs, makes the Web Browser an ideal front-end for video on any screen. Where there is a browser, Google will make money with ads.

Adding open source DRM to HTML5 is consistent with Google’s web centric vision. Chrome OS is a perfect example of that vision, illustrated in this recent post on Google’s blog (with Eric Schmidt’s talk on the Chrome event this week).

I tend to think Google sees this acquisition more strategic than just adding DRM to GoogleTV.

Posted in Internet, Media | Tagged Apple, DRM, Google, HTML5, W3C, Widevine | Leave a comment

HTML5 and Netflix

Posted on December 9, 2010 by Jose Miguel Cansado

Netflix explains in this post how they use HTML5 for their UI frontend and logic

HTML5 brings to the table, the freedom to create rich, dynamic and interactive experiences for any platform with a web browser. In fact, we’re also using HTML5 to create the user experience for our iPhone, iPad and Android applications as well

[...] HTML5 [...] is delivered from Netflix servers every time you launch our application. This means we can constantly update, test and improve the experience we offer. [...] Our customers don’t have to go through a manual process to install new software every time we make a change, it “just happens.”

[...] our world class UI engineers can seamlessly move between working on our website, our mobile experience, and our television-based applications.

This clip shows a sample of how that HTML5-based UI looks on a PS3.

Posted in Internet, Media | Tagged HTML5, Netflix, Online Video | Leave a comment