Author: John

My blog is about my personal opinions only and do not reflect or represent any company that I work for either past, present or future. I will not hesitate to use the benefit of my experiences in telling the story of what goes on in the real world. beep/bop/boop

How long does a blog take to get around?

Well, it looks like from 1 to 22 days according to responses I have.

Yesterday, I was paid the (maybe not so) ultimate expression of existence, I’m now being spammed.

On the first day, the guy I named my blog after, Joe Trippi commented on my blog. That seemed a whole lot more genuine.

I took a calculated risk by being the first IBM blogger, but it affords me the luxury of doing what I want since no one else here has a clue, especially corporate communications who thinks the world revolves around major media and not much else matters.  They lose their mind when the ever declining NY Times so much as picks their nose.  This works for me as I don’t have to deal with those losers (both parties above) and get to do work that they don’t realize is going on as they don’t have a clue what a blog is (unless they ask me).

What I know and they don’t is that social media is the way influential people want to communicate.  They are inundated by emails, telephone calls and the corporate flacks like the above mentioned.

I guess I’m now in the beginning of being in the masses of the blogosphere. Maybe I give myself too much credit, accept my apologies if that is the case.

In my title, I said I’d talk about my escapades of being a blogger, there you have it, a new target for spam.

An American in Paris?

Not really Paris, but Magny-Cours and a lot of other places Formula 1 visits.

For the first time since 1983, an American, Scott Speed is in what some call the most prestigious series in racing. I’m a huge F1 fan for any number of reasons. First of all, I love auto racing. Combine that with my love of technology and you see how Formula 1 fits in. These cars are the most sophisticated machinery you can drive. A lot of technology that is on our cars comes from the cutting edge development you find in F1. They’re more like computers on wheels. To give an example, the average car rev’s at around 3000-6000 RPM. F1 cars race at 19.000 RPM, staggering.

What else I like is that it’s international. I love America as much as (and much more than) a lot of folks and am proud to say so. But I’ve traveled and know that the world has a lot to offer, and I appreciate and enjoy most other countries. Formula 1 is on most continents from Asia to Europe to the America’s. There are fans rabid for their drivers, cars and sponsors from each country.

So it’s great to have an American complete the international equation, a home team for me. The closest I’ve had until now is Juan Pablo Montoya from Columbia who lives in the states. I’ll still pull for Juan Pablo also.

Speed (what a great name for a driver) will race for Red Bull , formerly the Jaguar F1 Team.

There have been 2 American F1 champions, Phil Hill in 1961 for Ferrari and Mario Andretti in 1978 for Lotus. Hey, there were no Americans winning the Tour de France either until Greg Lemond. Then it inspired some guy from Texas to lead 5 Americans in the top 17 in this year’s TDF while he was capturing his 7th straight tour.

Could it be the same in F1?

Boxer Rebellion


No, its not what you think.

I work at home, and I have a dog. She’s pretty much a lump most of the day, except of course when an analyst calls, at which point phantom bad guys appear outside of the door. This happens like clockwork destroying any sense of professionalism I try to have when speaking on the phone. She then loses her mind and barks like someone is trying to steal our house.

Top of the list in terms of barking veracity are the Fed-Ex/UPS delivery guys. She can hear these trucks leaving the loading dock 100 miles away, and knows when they are going to drive on our street. Next are sirens, which is funny as she stands on her hind legs and howls like a wolf, I still chuckle. Then there are the “garbage stealers” who come once a week and take our valuable discards along with the neighbor’s trash. Finally, the kids come home from school happy as clams about mid afternoon and yell and scream. This is good for a maintenance bark or two, nothing like UPS.

How do animals have this kind of timing? I dunno, it’s like kids who can embarrass you at the most inappropriate times with the things the can say.

I’ve had pets all my life….dogs, cats, fish, frogs and some other gross/slimey creatures I found on the way home from school. I love my dog, even if she doesn’t have the best sense of timing. I have an aquarium full of fish, they don’t make as much noise when I get phone calls, but then they don’t love me back or lick my face as much as my dog.

Blogging at IBM, a snowball rolling down hill

This time last year, we put up the developerWorks blog as the first external IBM blog site. It was a small snowball barely dropped from the top of Mount IBM.  It turns out be an end around being able to blog at IBM who now want to establish a company wide policy that will smother and restrict effective blogging communications.  Fortunately, IBM Corporate Comm’s is clueless and so behind the times and we were able to put this site up under their noses without much effort.  Since we did it without asking, it now can’t be taken down as too many people look to this site for blogs.  Many people are trying to get on to it so for now, we control the outbound blog content unlike comm’s department in Armonk which moves at the speed of smell.

Armonk communications is a bubble that can’t see past New York, led by a hot head who ran Ed Koch’s liberal political campaign.  Their lack of vision is the bane of much of the sterile communications that you read about when IBM is discussed.  While they see it as a well oiled machine, the rest of the comm’s team who actually does all the work, know that they are a ball and chain that has to be worked around to get anything done.  The developerWorks blog site is a prime example of how to work around people such as those in Armonk.

It’s funny, almost like the tail wagging the dog, as we are doing what we want, whenever we want, while the rest of every word written from IBM goes under the microscope at the home office, effectively removing any creativity or actual information that might be helpful.  If you don’t believe it, read a press release.  It is quite enjoyable to usurp the Stalin like control that they try to impose on everyone else, and act like a regular company who understands how to deal with the media.

I decided to list my blog there as I was the first official blogger for IBM analyst relations and have set many of the policies up until now, including starting and running blogging for IBM A/R.  When the corporate communications machine finds a way to destroy the effectiveness through obsessive guidelines overseen by people who have never written or likely read a blog, any control I currently have will diminish.  They are so paranoid from the monopoly trial that they manage to put effective PR into the stone ages. Fortunately, they are so obsessed with the media right now, the most effective communications program is on the analyst side as they don’t understand what it is.  Anytime they try to interfere, they treat A/R like pr and look silly.

At that point, my blog may or may not be on the corporate site depending on the rules and guidelines. Since I don’t care what they say (and best of all am not in NY, which the powers that be can’t see beyond) and have learned to be more creative about communicating through social media than they have, I’ll make that decision as needed on my terms.  I’ll likely then be on new social media platforms that are industry wide so it won’t be tough to stay ahead of them while keeping current with the rest of the world.  Since they move so slowly for fear of actually stepping out into the real world, I won’t have to worry about it for a while.

With prodding from the outside (thanks to the analyst community) and many unconnected but interesting bloggers, we got the fever. Now there is the internal blog with thousands of bloggers going at it (another IBM communication killer since the audience is IBM’ers), a mainframe blog, gamers and worst of all attention on this from the top.

What I see is momentum for blogging that started as grass-roots inertia (bottom up, not the usual top down) which I believe is best (ask RIM or Palm). Sure, we were a bit later than some companies, but it won’t be that long for us to catch up. Fortunately, I started my blog and put up the developerWorks site like we did and that is how it will be done.  All we need is a few rock stars to start writing.

Now the blog plan is prominent in the outreach plans for new products and announcements.  Normal companies do this and since I came from the outside where I honed my skills staying ahead of companies like IBM, it is important to connect on terms with the audience that are mutually agreeable and most effective.  I knew that I’d already won and would get the message of the company I represented if there were IBM communicaitons people in the room.  Sure, they were the 800 lb. gorrilla in the room, but as soon as I got time with the media or analysts, they were far more likely to work with me as A) I wasnt’ trying to write their story and B) I actually was working in the 20th or 21st century.  I’ll bet those same comm’s folks were hell with tabulation machines and IBM 360’s.

So it’s more like cells dividing, people from all over the world in IBM are jumping on this as they should. Many of the execs who are the busiest people in the world are blogging Buell Duncan and IWB.

I’ve watched trends for a while at IBM, lots of hype at first, then some catch on or fizzle out, but this one has legs…the snowball is now big, and for now the only blog site at IBM until the wonks in IBM corporate communications figure out how to sterilize this also.  The fact that I can write this clearly shows that they have no clue about social media at this point, nor do they move faster than cold honey.

If you’re reading this, you likely had something to do with IBM blogging brought to you by developerWorks. Thanks.  We offer more information on a timely basis that is more meaningful than you’d ever find from the wonks in Armonk.

Back to IBM, creative vacation scheduling

As we come to the Labor Day break (at least here in the States) it’s time for some to take time off. So, I though I’d comment on it to lighten up from the news of the world.

I’ve worked here for a number of years, more now than any other company, but it’s still the 8th company I’ve been employed by. In no other company has the scheduling of vacation been as creative as here. I’ve observed a number of trends.

First, let’s note that you start with 3 weeks vacation. My first job entitled me to 1, so it was precious to me. I had to plan to get the most out of it a broke new hire could get. The old schoolers here get European quantity time for vacation, so there is lots to play with.

The first trend I’ll call the “creative” schedulers. They always save their time by working around a holiday to “save days”. It’s a pretty good scheme. One can extend the time you have by adding the public holidays to your time off.

The other side of the coin I’ll call the “avoiders”. They purposely work while the “creatives” are off. This way the miss the creatives both coming and going. To them, it’s like getting 2 vacations even though one of them is taken at the office. Not that they goof off, they just get to avoid either people or craziness, and seem to enjoy it. I’ll give you an example, things slow down before a public holiday and it can take time to crank up right after, so the workload can be less. Conversely, let me point out that with fewer people in the office, if the brown hits the fan, guess who has to cover and let the scrambling begin.

The next category is the “travelers”. This one is not unique to any company or country. It’s what it sounds like, tacking vacation on to a business trip to enjoy a place you might not travel too. Let’s see, if you take time off with a business trip, over a public holiday it’s a twofer. Take your family and it’s really a good deal.

Then there are the “Fridays”. These are the folks that will take every Friday of say August or December off and work 4 day weeks for a month, guess they aren’t making plans to travel overseas that year. Tough to do in 3 days and see anything.

So pick you strategy and enjoy. For those that work hard, time off is good to recharge the batteries.

Finally, over the course of my employment at various companies, I’ve observed some that are like Wally in Dilbert. They are mostly on vacation whether at work or away. Ever worked with one of those?

The faces of humanity

Update: I posted this in 2005.  My daughters then bf got bent out of shape because I spoke the truth.  He was going to write a rebuttal, but didn’t.  This was before the Kardashian sex tape or their awful show that I never have watched.  It turns out that this was right all along and he’s done a 180 now that he is in the working world.  My sister has lost everything now, but due to financial mismanagement and the inability of her husband to keep a job, not due to natural disasters That is a different story.

I was going to call it the 2 faces of humanity, just thinking of what the folks in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama are going through bringing out the good and bad in some, but it occurred to me that there are many flavors of this subject. But for this post, I’ll concentrate on the simple good and bad.

What is happening in those states is devastating. I can only mildly relate as we’ve had some bad hurricanes here (Fran comes to mind in NC where some are still recovering) and a recent ice storm where we were out of power for a week, but it is bad there. My sister lives near Lake Pontchartrain and has likely lost her house. Her family got out in time and are living with my parents right now, lucky them. It’s not the same for those who have lost lives, jobs, family and other things like heirlooms and photo’s which are forever gone.

These catastrophe’s bring out the good in some folks. Already there are local fisherman driving around in bass boats rescuing people from their houses. There are organizations which are gathering supplies, people lining up to donate time and money to help. I read this morning where you can donate like the Red Cross , Samaritans Purse, and other good groups who are sincere in helping out. FEMA is organizing for the biggest relief effort ever. For those that get my feed via RSS, I’ll be visiting del.ico.us today to add them to my list.

Then there is the other side. I’ve seen reports of looters, the construction scammers, insurance fraud and many others. This is also unfortunately something that raises it’s ugly head during these times. I hope that this is kept in check.

Then the way we can act hit me. Through the power of DVR (i was scanning and deleting shows), I happened to watch back to back the hurricane coverage then the reality show, “filthy rich cattle drive” where the spoiled brat kids of celebrity’s are “roughing” it on a cattle drive. This is like going to a zoo to watch animals. These kids are the most narcissistic people I’ve ever seen, worried about how they look, trying to get make up, dry cleaning and Fed Ex in the middle of nowhere and me, me, me. This was supposed to be about helping a charity.  One of them of course was Kim Kardashian.

It’s just to ironic that these two faces of humanity are happening at the same time.

Natural disasters have been happening since the creation of the earth. There was the tsunami last year for example. Fortunately, people have stepped up and helped others through the course of history and I hope and pray it happens here.

A lesson that strikes me (besides the obvious of striving to be good) is to be prepared and to be able to take care of yourself in the many situations life will present to you. Acts of God like this (even for skeptics, this is the clause in your homeowners insurance) will continue, so dealing with it is inevitable. Being ready in anything is half the battle sometimes. Appreciate your family, friends and experiences in life. It’s times like this that remind you how important and fleeting they can be.

So it’s off to my now seemingly trivial day when compared to those now trying to put their lives back together.

Update on Sis: just heard from her and the house made it, but she won’t be able to go back for months. Thanks to those folks who sent regards.

My Dad’s contribution to WWII

I recently saw a show on the History Channel about the 5 deadliest weapons ever used. In no order, they were the Soviet 50 kiloton nuclear bomb, incendiary weapons, the VT fuse, machine gun and VX nerve gas. Why does this concern me? My dad helped the development of the VT or Radio Proximity fuse.

For a more detailed explanation of this, go to Radio Proximity Fuse. The net explanation is that instead of having to hit the target for a kill which was the centuries old way, the VT fuse detects a target by radar and detonates near (or in proximity) to the target, enabling a much higher kill rate.

So who cares?

It took over 2000 rounds to shoot down each kamikaze plane prior to the invention of the fuse. This was cut to under 400 rounds when using the VT fuse. It’s next to impossible to hit a plane diving at over 450 mph. This invention saved a lot of sailors lives who later came home and had families rather than having to pay the ultimate sacrifice. They cared.

Here’s what my Dad contributed. He helped with the testing and development of the Radio Proximity fuse at the Applied Physics Lab in John’s Hopkins University. Later he went to the European theater where he trained artillery units to use this device. Remember, they had no silicon chips, PC’s or CAD programs in 1941/42, they did it with slide rules and vacuum tubes.

Why does this matter?

The Germans were shelling London with the V1 “buzz bomb”. It was powered by a pulse jet that made a buzzing noise which gave it the name. When it ran out of fuel, the buzzing stopped and it fell to its target. The V1 traveled at near 600 mph, which made it very difficult for artillery to hit, or fighters that went 350 mph to shoot down. The intentions of the Germans was both terror and destruction in London. Remember that terrorism is used to cause fear in the intended victim and take away the spirit to fight. I don’t know about you, but I would find the sound of an air raid siren or a buzz bomb engine that quit very frightening as you count it down to explosion.

The British had their backs against the wall and the Germans were starting to demoralize them with this scare.

With the VT fuse, the kill rate approached 100%, making the V1 ineffective as either a bomb, or a weapon of terror. The fuse was a big factor in the Battle of the Bulge, helping to decide the outcome (no disrespect to the tacticians and soldiers here).

The fuse on the Atomic bomb was a Radio Proximity Fuse.  It helped end the war.

SO WHAT WAS DID HIS EFFORT DO?

His contribution helped change the tide, the momentum and win in both Theater’s of the war.  His work helped stop the kamikaze and V-1 terrorism against the Allies.

Later in the War, he raced jeeps around the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, but that doesn’t have a lot to do with physics or winning the war.

Growing up, he like most veterans he didn’t say much or brag about what they had accomplished. Rather, he said he was doing his job and was glad to help contribute in whatever way he could. That we could all have that attitude.

Way to go Dad.

Steve Mills on developers

I’m linking to this as it is an interview by Amy Wohl with Steve Mills and his take on developers.

Steve Mills on developers

I won’t spoil the read, but he talks about Linux, SWG’s different constituencies, and why IBM is different than Sun and HP.

Steve is a very interesting person, and since he’s very deep on many subjects, always a good read.

Today's SWG A/R blogging Inquiry


I work with some of the best analyst relations folks you could want to work with. We constantly strive for better methods/tactics and ways to improve how we do our jobs.

Today, we had an inquiry with RedMonk on writing blogs. All in all, it went well. I received several instant messages during and after the call about how informative this was.

The call of course was led by Steve O’Grady and James Governer. Each offered insight into how and why we could/should do this, and tips on how to be a better blogger. Not that I want to give our competition an advantage over us, but these guys know what they are talking about. Just google “do blogs work” and see who’s on top.

Personally, I liked the part when Steve mentioned fishing when discussing personal things about yourself and how to build relationships between analysts and a/r representatives. Of course, it’s one of my favorite topics and I knew he referred to some of our conversations (see my 14 spot redfish above).

I still find the most compelling reason to do this was a statement that was made regarding how the next job interview would go when the interviewer asks, “Where is the link to your blog”. That is a jaw dropper if you don’t have one.

So back to my teammates. I wonder if the law of averages or a bell curve applies here. Some will, some won’t, some will do it right away, others will get around to it? I don’t know. These ladies and gentlemen are very tenacious and adapt to new tools to get their job done, so I wonder who’s going to blog. I hear banter from the team about what good writers some are and that they would be good at this. My guess is that is true and I’m sure they would be interesting.

As for me, like a lot of things I do, repetition overcomes a lack of talent.

I know we strive to be leaders, so I challenge you guys to get out there and blog.

VC's and Mentoring

IBM announced the VC advisory council and mentoring programs today. It was a good announcement and it got plenty of attention. A new term for me came out, BRIC which stands for Brazil, Russia, India, China.

We briefed a number of the analysts, so here are some of the comments.

There was a theme of emerging markets, some as a delivery model, some for cost reduction. The partner network is key in these countries as they are huge opportunities and no one company can cover it. Good thing IBM has a solid partnering program

Open is a big word. Both standards and software. Gluecode and PHP are big for IBM, but RUBY is something that VC’s are looking at.

The council gives quick connection for the VC’s to our executives. Cutting through the maze is a major task at any big company.

A big software company in the northwest is scaring their VC’s with uncertainty and fear of competing with them.

Here’s a link to the lead exec for this, who’s always a good read when checking out IBM and partnerning…

Buell Duncan

Next blogging steps

When I originally started this blog, it was a self education issue. Afterall, I’m on a number of blogging committee’s at IBM, so I should be true to my cause.  I was the first blogger for Analyst Relations and set up the policies for a/r blogging.

My intentions were to post about what was going on in A/R, things I found interesting and some blogging progress I was making. I didn’t (and still don’t) have intentions of hitting the A-list for bloggers, but it happened anyway.

Nevertheless, part of doing any job right is delving into how things work to make it better. So today I added some links via feedburner like stat count, buzzboost for publicity and a headline animator for prior posts. I set up a del.icio.us account and will use that also. Modest improvements, but still on the plus side of progress.

I’ll be attacking trackback, not offered on blogger, but through a third-party source soon.

I’m open to suggestions that make this a legitimate blog with respect to protocol. All in the spirit of learning and improving.

IBM and Cool in the same sentence, Gaming

The marketing at some companies is really cool. You look at it and say wow, or you can imagine yourself going 196 MPH in that Porsche, maybe you see yourself rocking to your favorite tunes from your iPod. By contrast, other companies are stoic about marketing and plod along, which is ok for water heaters or area rugs.

IBM is in between, and shouldn’t be. I don’t ever imagine myself driving 196 mph in a mainframe computer, but sometimes you look at a product and say this is great, but somehow it doesn’t come off that way.

The under told story is that IBM makes some of the coolest products in our industry. Most folks don’t know it, but if they ever took a look at the products and design from IBM Research, you’d say I’d like to have one of these and you’d feel way cool about showing it off. Now, it would be nice to have shark storage capability in an iPod, but that would be difficult to wear on my belt, but I digress. The under told story is that we are in some great area’s like gaming.

IBM makes the processors for all the game boxes…GameCube, Xbox and PS2. You might say so what, but with those names you cover the majority of the non handheld gaming business. I have a teenager, so games are a part of my life without me having a say in the matter. I know that it’s a market with upside potential for sales and design…there are lots of teenagers and preteens with an insatiable appetite for video games. I ask, how many of these boxes are being sold and how many are going to be sold this upcoming Christmas?

Read about it at the Gamer Blog . Maybe you won’t be jazzed like playing “From Dirt to Daytona” but hey, IBM and cool are in the same sentence – the engine driving the game is ours. Maybe they’ll blog about virtual reality gaming soon, I don’t know. If you’re old enough to remember the movie “Lawnmower Man”, I know I could get amped to play in VR, and would like to know about it when it’s close to my home.

P.S. I’m going to talk more about Research sometime in the future because some of the most fantastic stuff you can imagine is there. IBM helped take man to the moon in the 60’s, and it’s come a long way since then.

Epilogue: It went nowhere as IBM left the chip business.  IBM and cool were never really in the same sentence.  Think of the blue suit, white shirt and red tie.  That is a better vision of reality.

developerWorks – IBM’s Resource for Developers

Since someone has to develop software, and millions do, here’s a place from IBM that offers resources to developers ranging from free code to tutorials and training.

developerWorks Link

I’ve also linked to the blog on my sidebar so you can read what IBMers are saying about the different subjects. Some have a particular area, other blogs have multiple contributors.

One of the gems of the site is the alphaWorks site. aW is the window to IBM Research for Software. It’s just like it sounds, software in the alpha stage that you can check out…pretty cool.

What is best about this, is that we set up the first blog site at IBM, right under the nose of the wonks at IBM corporate communications.  They have the mindset of the former Soviet Union, afraid to decentralize any power for fear that some non-sterile message might get out.  Since they have no clue about blogging and social media at the time of this post, we stealthily put up our site, gathered a group of people who were not afraid of stepping out of the brown shirt mentality of the communications guidelines to be successful and before it could be netted by the shrimp trawler that is Armonk PR, we had the only platform where people could blog.

The Shrimp netters shut down all other rogue blogging sites, but dW was so far advanced and accepted as the place to go to for actual information (not the corporate speak you get from a sanitizing department that is Armonk communications). So for over a year, we have enjoyed being the platform for social media.  It is enjoyable to be a part of leading this, as well as the person who was tasked to start-up and lead blogging and social media for IBM A/R.

Demolition Derby, a cultural overload

So I went to the Regional Extreme demolition derby with my son tonight. It was an overdose of cultural input.

The people watching was the best part, until the derby began. It was a sea of camouflage, Dale Jr. phones and tatoo’s….with a below normal count of teeth. It was a redneck’s dream for girls. Most were wearing clothes analogous to packing 10 pounds of manure in a 5 pound bag.

As for the rest of the audience, smoking was required, and most worked in construction or at a garage repairing cars. Weldon Welding sponsored many of the cars. The funniest part was when a Nextel walkie talkie went off, 50 people went for their phone…me too.

But when the race began, all was forgotton and all eyes and cheers were focused on cars smashing each other until only one was left running. In other words, spectacular.

All this heat, smoke, bugs, and to top it off, we were there too, and had a great time. Father and son

Why Delusions of Adequacy

Because with all the content out in the blogosphere, I’m not out to get or will ever be qualified for a pulizter. I’m going to put the things that interest me and products I work with and hope for the best.

While I don’t subscribe to his political beliefs, I do credit Joe Trippi for the name.

In his book, he said that some though the had delusions of grandeur, but they really had delusions of adequacy.  It was the perfect name.  One that lampoons a lot of things, yet is perfect for describing my effort.

http://joetrippi.com

He was out there and dug into blogging and made it a part of his job. Guess what, that’s what I’m trying to do. Wish me luck.

With this, I become the first official blogger for IBM.  I’ve been asked by the V.P. of Analyst Relations to set up a program for the company as well as policies related to this new practice.  I hope to set a trend.