Posts Tagged ‘evolution’

So much of our life has been moved to digital devices these days. Smart phones are one of many devices that have made an impression on our lives. Smart phones these days have become a must for most, whether it is for business or personal use, almost everyone has one.

On the plus side, smart phones enable users to conduct business from just about anywhere in the world. Access to email accounts, VPNs and other tools that make business move on a daily basis have become accessible from the palm of your hand. You can even administer your web server from your smart phone with the right application setup.

You’re carrying a small computer around in your pocket. It’ll be interesting to see what new devices will emerge in the market in the next few years. Tablets are becoming wildly popular, and mainstream consumers are starting to keep an eye on the newest innovations, joining the “tech geeks” in the “early adopter” line.

There are several players in this market with Google, RIM and Apple leading the pack, and dedicated fans rally behind each. With smart phones becoming so increasingly common, I’ve started wondering if it’s really for the best. Do we really need to check our e-mail every 10 minutes? If we’re not on Twitter, Facebook or one of our other social networks, will they be there when we get to our computer?

Being digitally connected all the time give us a false sense of “socializing” in the old school face-to-face sense, and that pull us away from those IRL (in real life) encounters. Numerous crashes have been caused by people texting or updating their statuses while driving, and there have been cases of people walking into a busy street while being distracted by their phones.

When it comes to technology like smart phones, how do you keep those devices from becoming a dependency? How do you keep yourself from letting them take the place of direct human contact rather? It’s something to think about as technology continues to evolve and permeate our lives.

-James

There are so many different types of Social Networks nowadays: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube Channels, the faded MySpace and recently popular Google+. They all have different features but are essentially used for the same purpose. Facebook is the largest player in the market, and every time it makes a change, the world collectively gasps … And a lot of people start yelling.

When Facebook launched back in 2004, it was designed with college kids in mind. I remember when you HAD to have a college email address to set up a Facebook account – the good ole days. A year or two later, Facebook created a separate section for high school students, and not too long after that, anyone on the planet could get a Facebook account, and the growing/changing audience necessitated changes in the platform.

Facebook is a great way to find old friends and catch up, and it’s also an easier way to update everyone all at once what you are doing. I found out my best friend was engaged on Facebook … That’s right. I found out by Facebook before I got a phone call. Facebook is like a drug – it’s addictive. Some people live there all day.

If you work for an IT company, you know that technology is constantly changing. To keep up with evolutions in technology and perceived needs of the growing user base, Facebook will update its platform every few months. If you have a Facebook account, you’ve probably noticed that they released a new layout this week. You’ve probably also noticed all of your friends’ status changes complaining about how they hate the way it looks, how “It’s too hard to use.” Those friends hated the old “new Facebook,” and somewhere down the road, they’ve learned to love and/or depend on that “new Facebook” which is now in the “old Facebook” category. It’s pretty annoying right?

Here’s my advice for the change-averse:

1. If Facebook didn’t change, it would get stagnant and someone else would introduce something better … The same way Facebook supplanted MySpace. DEAL WITH IT.
2. If you don’t like the changes Facebook makes, DELETE your account and move to a new Social Network like Twitter or try out Google+.
3. Instead of complaining how hard the new Facebook is to use, take the time to READ the instructions they have provided for you … From a desktop you are able to mouse over a section and it will tell you what it means and how to use it.
4. Last but not least – whining is for babies and last time I checked you were in your 20′s, 30′s, 40′s, and up – so suck it up!

Whew! Now that felt good …

- Natalie

In the beginning butter was churned by hand and water was fetched from a well. However, as we humans take a step forward, we acknowledge that time is of great value and we quickly redefine a process or function to allow for more precious time. Here at SoftLayer, our evolution hasn’t been much different. With each passing day new ideas are brought to the table, discussed and executed; later giving fruit to more success. As part of this fast growing company our Accounting Department has gone through its share of growth and discovery. In the beginning everyone from our Controller to our CFO helped in answering tickets and billed for upgrades. Now that our department has grown larger in size they can tend to more important tasks while we take care of our customers.

It is while executing every day responsibilities that we find new alternatives to simplifying our customer’s experience with us. Alternatives such as automation of Ram and Port Speed upgrades give our customers easier access to business expansion. Bandwidth upgrades no longer take a series of steps to complete. With a few clicks of our mouse we not only upgrade a server’s bandwidth capacity but we have the ability to choose the time in which this upgrade will take effect. In a matter of minutes a customer can move one or several of their servers into their Virtual Dedicated Rack. While this is all taking place their invoice is automatically being updated to show the recent changes and hence bandwidth allotment is immediately brought up to date.

Nevertheless we could not brag about our awesome tools if it weren’t for the genius minds of our friendly neighbors; our Development Department. Every single department within SoftLayer has their share of gratitude towards this great group of people. Here in the Accounting realm, many of our ideas have come to pass because of the effort of these developers. When something happens to go wrong as naturally things do, we turn to a developer for help. Within a matter of minutes a piece of code is revised and our world is back to normal once more. Automation continues to simplify not only our daily jobs but our customer’s path to business success. There is always a better way to do things and you can bet that there is more than one person coming up with the next “big” idea as I write this. Whether it’s redefining a process or writing the code that will make it all happen, innovation is in the hands of all of us here at SoftLayer.

American cars aren’t reliable. That is what the 70’s and 80’s taught me. Up until then it was about the only choice. Enter the Datsun’s, Toyota’s and Mazda’s they were lower priced and didn’t break down as often and it wasn’t like breaking a chicken bone to turn on the blinker. Today, American cars are much more reliable and the 3 or 4 I have had in the last 10 years have had few or no problems at all. But ask anyone my age and you got it; America cars aren’t reliable. You know what they say, “perception is 9/10th’s of the law” or is that possession. Oh well.

Would you rather have an RCA Small Wonder or Flip Video device? I bet that due to the great marketing minds of the world and the type of folks that read blogs you want the Flip Video and you are now on Google trying to find out what the heck an RCA Small Wonder is. This is probably more related to marketing but even now that you have searched and you know what the Small Wonder is, which would you buy? It’s the perception that RCA is old and wasn’t and still isn’t very reliable. It’s also why Radio Shack is now just The Shack, it was time to rebrand because Radio Shack was for the “Bolt-On” generation and The Shack is for the “integrated” generation. Where is all this leading?

In a recent meeting I was asked why we sell more LAMP stack operating systems (RedHat, CentOS, Debian, Etc.) than we do Microsoft Servers and the point was made that there is still the perception that Windows in insecure and has lots of bugs. I believe Microsoft has a huge mountain to climb to rid the world of this perception whether it is true or not, much like the American auto industry. Even if they release a secure and stable product today, and they have, it would still take many years for our society to realize it. Why? Because much like RCA, Microsoft was around when technology was just starting to become cool. As Lance (our CEO) would say, “RCA and Windows NT Server came out in a time period when the people using them were in a bolt-on mentality and today’s users are fully integrated into the technological lifestyle.” What does that mean? The bolt-on generation saw things happen and had do adapt: knobs on TV’s became remotes, rotary phones became push button became cordless became bag became cellular phones, arcade games became pong became Atari became Nintendo became Wii video games, Commodore became IBM XT became clones (running Windows 3.1) became Dell (running Windows 95) became servers (running NT4.0) became the Internet (running LAMP stacks and Windows servers), and this list could go on and on. I think I need a t-shirt that says “I’m a Bolt-on”. My kids however, are fully integrated into this lifestyle and don’t realize how bad some things were in technology to get to where we are today. They wake up every day and technology is everywhere they turn. Of course technology still changes quickly and people have to adapt, but the changes aren’t as life changing as they were when technology was young. The bolt-on society is much more forgiving of mistakes with technological advances where the integrated society wants perfection. They hear on TV and the radio that Windows is insecure and had/has bugs and they want instant gratification and perfect technology. Some of the bad stigma Windows has is due to the bolt-on generation using Windows desktop software and applying those bad memories to the new Server products from Microsoft. If Vista is unstable and insecure then Server 2008 must be as well, right? Linux, on the other hand, was a server OS first and then became a desktop tool. It just didn’t get scrutinized like the Windows OS’s and since it’s desktop product isn’t as mainstream its issues are mainly low key and under the radar.

Microsoft has some challenges in the coming years and may need to take a few lessons from the American car manufacturers and “The Shack”. I believe a large separation of the desktop OS’s and the Server OS’s is needed and it all starts with rebranding the server choices. Maybe the desktop OS keeps the Windows name but change the Server Operating System to “Insert cool trendy name here” and drop Windows from it completely. This is just my opinion and I could be wrong.

This was a long read so I think I will go get in my unreliable American truck and hit the road, I am just 33,000 miles from hitting 300K!