Be Aware: Why is Apple so silent about itunes accounts being hacked?

Past July (july 4th/7th) there was an initial alarm on the websphere and social media sites (facebook and twitter mainly) that several itunes accounts have been hacked and we being used by some to buy different apps for the iPhone (mostly linked to a vietnamese developer called Thuat Nguyen).

There was no official announcement from Apple, no patch releases, no advice indicated
Official position goes into "400 iTunes accounts were compromised in this attack. That sounds like a lot, but keep in mind that's out of 150 million registered iTunes users, or around 3 ten-thousandths of a percent"
As the story has developed, the problem has grown far more serious than initially thought – not just that one particular developer and his apps - the Apple App store is filled with App Farms being used to steal.

Furthermore If you go a bit deeper into the investigation you will see that more and more cases have been reported and the seriousness of the cases have been increasing. What I mean by this? Well many itunes accounts are linked to a PayPal account which is linked to a credit card account. 1 + 1 + 1 = 3 you get it? Lots of people has reported this and we are talking about thousands of dollards in fradulental transactions

PayPal response: PayPal has acknowledged the fraudulent charges and is currently reimbursing customers. 

However, the company continues to insist that the security breach is "happening on the iTunes side."
Apple response: "But if your credit card or iTunes password is stolen and used on iTunes, we recommend that you contact your financial institution and inquire about canceling the card and issuing a charge-back for any unauthorized transactions. We also recommend that you change your iTunes account password immediately."


Judge by yourself
Yes people is not careful with their passwords and yes that may be pure password robbery, however the fact that itunes is not addressing the security issue is worrysome and not worth of a company that portraits itself as a customer advocat. There is some obvious security vulnerability that Apple can't or won't address. No other account from other reputable sites has been reporting such issues these days



BTW the case is far from close. Andrea told me yesterday that her account has been hacked. Fortunetly the only money there was from aple gift card (150 USD) so chance to get into PayPal, but be aware. Change your passwords and maybe time to stop buying in itunes with yor credit card until Apple does address the issue
Remember in Apple eyes, YOU ARE GILTY NOT APPLE

Related sources:
Link to thenextweb - sotry on app store hacked itunes
Link to tg daily - story on Apple itunes and the plague of scammers
Link to apple forum on itunes hacked

Dell Streak: my own review

I have been trying different Android lately and I go tmy hands into the Dell Streak lately. Until now most of the alternatives to the Ipad were Chinese Android devices, including the Huawei S7 which I was using for a while. Many of them were good devices, but to beat the Ipad specially when you don't have a brand you need more

So I took the Dell Streak, no expectations but excited (and 1 month later I am still using it quite regularly)


Hardware: beautiful, elegant, slim. Very sexy
Size and weight: Very light (220g). Fits on my trousers back pocket beautifully
Screen: crispy, however size seems like a big phone. No way I can use it to do presentations or prepare documents. Mostly great for web browsing, messaging and email reading 
Software: my unit has Android 1.6. Not enough. It needs at least 2.1 (which supposedly is coming any time on the coming weeks and will be using frodo (2.2) before the end of year).  You notice mostly on the screen transitions. Most of the Android apps are working. What it is nice is that if you are familiar with Android there is no learning curve
Battery: one of the weakest points of the unit. Gives you at the most 2 hours specially if you use the phone functions
Phone: obviously you are not going to use it to talk using it as a normal phone but it does a good job using a bluetooth headset or headphones. The speakerphone is not as good as it could be
Camera: great picture camera, one of the best I have seen but weak video 


Verdict: I love playing with this unit and doing my newspaper browsing while having breakfast. Or watching some youtube videos. But as one of the bloggers in Latvia asked me the other day "what do you do with it?", there is no clear usage. It could replace my laptop on the weekend, but for that it needs a better battery and android 2.1. Or it could replace my Blackberry on the weekend (even during the week), but it is not that easy to write quickly (having said that after several months I am starting to type rather quickly at the HTC desire unit that I usually play with)
And with a price tag of 500 Eur I believe it can't be a mass market. (it needs to be on the 250-300 Eur range)
furthermore having a unit as the Samsung galaxy coming along

BTW as the Samsung Galaxy gets a lot of press these days, this is a great review and comparison of both the streak and the galaxy (which I hope to be testing very soon)
Link to Know your mobile.com comporison galaxy vs. streak


Product Features
Screen 5'' WVGA (gorilla Glass Display)
1GHZ Qualcomm processor
5.0 MP (rear)/VGA (front) camera
3G (modem 7.2/5.76)
Bluetooth 
Battery 4.7 W
Memory Internal 16gb + Micro SD (external)
Measurements 152.9 x 79.1 x 10 mm

More details on features, I like this site

Link to gsm arena Dell Streak detailed product features

Thomas Friedman, The need for a greener world and some latest developments (I)

Lately I have read the entire and updated (2.0 version)  of Thomas Friedman's book "Hot, Flat and crowded",   
Taking it from his own website,

"...Now Friedman brings a fresh outlook to the crises of destabilizing climate change and rising competition for energy—both of which could poison our world if we do not act quickly and collectively. His argument speaks to all of us who are concerned about the state of America in the global future.

Friedman proposes that an ambitious national strategy—which he calls "Geo-Greenism"—is not only what we need to save the planet from overheating; it is what we need to make America healthier, richer, more innovative, more productive, and more secure"

In my opinion Friedman's book is still one of the most accessible but at the same time incisive and well researched books aound the problem and magnitude of the badly called (probably one of the worst naming strategies ever as the name does more harm that anything to the cause) Global Warming and to propose a number of initiatives, taking his points on how America (USA) can lead these changes


Being this one of my key personal and professional issues and having even as a company (Bite) taking a stand on green strategies I can recommend this reading

Interesting enough there a couple of development around 2 of the key ideas of Friedman's book: how to legislate on the US side (on the part of the book about Code Green) the Co2 emissions using price signals and secondly what he calls the "black box" or smartgrid

Chapter13 - The stone age didn't end because we run out of stones (you probably get the idea from the title right?) -
Basically the main point of the chapter is the need for the government to step in to make the polluting (and before some of you debates why, just think how the governments have stepped in to help people stop smoking - with taxes and education) fuels expensive enough and there are several options to do this, but at the end the options are a "direct" carbon tax or an indirect tax through a cap and trade system. As many of you know this summer the Obama's government failed to have approved through Senate the cap and trade proposed system

I really see this as a total failure of the US to see its won decadence and to recognize how f.... up they are and how this could be the only opportunity to get back at the lead (because the Chinese are going to take care of this issue in terms of leadership also). Furthermore while I am not happy really with Obama lack of strong stand on this one (did he used all of it on the health care reform battle) or if some of my friends the system (who designed a system that does not help your country to take or make the right decisions?), it is time to look at the future
First I don;t believe on the cap and trade as much as I believe the real effective measure is to apply a carbon tax. I think the cap and trade is dead, but I believe that the government will be back in 2 to 3 years and this time it will be with a carbon tax
Secondly is that most of the necessary regulation could come from the federal agencies imposing different measures and limits on emissions and other urgent and necessary regulations

By the way, on this point, I love the harsh and direct David Roberts blog post right after teh bill did not pass the senate and don't miss the follow up comments (really really interesting)
Link to David Roberts "On the death of the Climate Bill"

Rumours on the Indian 35 USD iPad (even if still at least a year away from hitting the shelves)

Yes, you read that right. Nope, it's not a typo. £25 (actually, £23 on current rates). Rumoured features include colour, multi-touch 10.5" screen, 2Gb memory, Flash compatibility, Wifi, Ethernet connection, camera and an optional extra of a solar charger.
That means word processing, video conferencing, web browsing and yes, the ability to play Flash videos, games for less than the cost of the AppleCare warranty on an iPad (3 times less, if we're counting).
The Indian technology sector is developing a name for itself for throwing out the rule book when it comes to the cost of consumer technology. Witness the £1,900 Nano car from Tata and for roughly the same price, how's about open heart surgery.


The caveats? The device is still a prototype and the government is on the hunt for a manufacturer. Their aim is to have the tablet on-sale in 2011.
Finding a company to produce the device on what must be wafer-thin margins might be a challenge, although with a potential home market of 1bn people, there should be plenty of opportunity to make profit on volume sales.



Link to Chinwag blog posting

Link to Android Tablet forum including YouTube demo video

Thoughts while flying Tablets + Mobile Operators role?

I was just reading Wired magazine (July UK edition) and I run into a print add of the dell streak tablet advertised jointly between carphone warehouse + o2

It raises the question (in my mind) of what should be mobile operators approach to tablets? Taking into account that most of small countries mobile operators (aka like Lithuania and Latvia) will never be on the radar screen of Apple (and 90% of our users can’t afford an iPAd nor they may not have a reason why), should we mobile operators offer other alternatives, mostly around Android based devices and also create a local (language and topics/themes) android ecosystem around smartphones and tablets, which are in my opinion about to exploit in Eastern Europe ?

will love to hear from you

New Android Tablets coming up: time to start testing devices, thus first testing impressions

Probably since the WMC this past February there has been as much talk around the Ipad as it was around all other device manufacturers, from mobile phones (&network vendors) ones to PC and even some start-ups, working on creating different tablet concepts all running Google's android platform as OS


It is good to read several ZDNet articles on the topic
Link to ZDNet's Android tablet army starts to form), which clearly puts it "The big difference with the Android tablet army is that the Apple iPad doesn’t have much of a head start..." as it did on the case on the iPhone. Get used to this ideas as many of these tablets will be “...poor man’s iPads” on deck. Note these devices won’t be iPad killers or anything, but Apple legitimized the tablet form factor and the followers are lining up. There will be multiple Android tablets waiting in the wings". Price point seems to be around 199 USD (150 Eur) and I am sure that a number of mobile operators will subsidize the unit price around 12 to 18 months contracts

For an end subscribers I still remain a bit skeptical, in fact I think that I could share some of ZDNet blogger Christopher Dawso, Would I buy an Android Tablet?

But let's look at some of my impressions testing one of the upcoming devices (Huawei S7 Tablet, which it seems will be available in Australia by year end, and is already available for pre-order at Expansys websites in UK and US
 

More on the iPAD: time to laugh

Yes, I am bias but you have to admit this is funny

Mobile Broadband across the Ocean – Notes from my trip

I have spent a little bit less than a week on the US and I have tried as usual  to try to be quite observant of mobile usage ecosystem, from people handsets to shops, commercial and the impact of the app world on daily life.
I come to 2 observations through the trip Android vs. iPhone penetration and then also on speeds on experienced broadband and mobile broadband (US vs. Europe)

Some more insights on the Ipad (II) and records sales to prove me wrong again?

With the iPhone we witnessed an interesting twist on PR. Case in points was the usage of the iPhone on a completely different manner (and intensity) did start creating notable problems to mobile networks. The cases of AT&T in the US and O2 in the UK did get lots of coverage. This was mean to explain how superior was the iPhone and how people did change their usage patterns and how unprepared the industry was. While there is some truth on the latter I always wondered how efficient was the iPhone on using mobile networks and/or WIFI resources.

This come to my mind again as I read just weeks after the iPad launch about some universities were having their networks collapsing with the arrivals of the Ipads on Campus. 

Some more insights on IPAD (I)

Before I start I want you (I am sure you are aware of if you read my blog) that I am not a huge fan of Steve Jobs and the PR around his products (and how they change industries on the supposed benefit of the end customer), even if I recognized its overall quality product portfolio and have some used some of them (mainly its laptops) in the past.

This week while in the US I have bought an iPad as a request from a friend of mine which gave me a very good excuse to try the product extensively on the store (furthermore I will ask him to write an extensive review for me to publish here). Once more I was drawn to my initial conclusion. It is an expensive toy for browsing. I don’t believe it is seen as a tablet at all but just a browser and viewer. It is just a complement and not a supplement by all means.

It is a large iPhone (So the big question is if you need another bigger one? –if you already have an iPhone. AS a pure media consumption device),

New duties, modernization and rumours

Part of my duties during my first 90 days is apart from familiarizing with the team, our main issues and defining and sharing a vision is to get together to our main vendors and discussing with others on opportunities to modernize and upgrade our infrastructure

One of the key areas (as even today Network is the main driver of CAPEX and one of the largest OPEX drivers) is the network, where also the strong efforts from Chinese vendors to enter Europe and NA has created a new wave of competition and opportunities for Mobile Operators. I took te opportunity not only to do so at the local/regional level but also at the HQ level by meeting them in Barcelona during the past WMC (Feb. 2010)

Interesting to note how Mr. Juris Kaza, by far the most active and well informed blogger on the Baltics' Telco space, makes a note of this and his understanding / reading of the rumors (which we officially commented with our position as of Today)


Juris Kaza on Bite Network Upgrade"

Green Network Deployment & Management

One of my objectives on taking over the network management at Bite is to manage to get our company as the most sustainable one in the Baltics and Scandinavia, both in terms of energy consumption, waste management and usage of alternative energy

Obviously all vendors are looking at these development across different MNOs and have understood that for these propositions to be successful there has to be a win / win, aka they have to have a positive impact on the operators results while helping the world one way or another

Extracting from Jupiter research study 'Green Mobile Networks & Base Stations: Strategies, Scenarios & Forecasts 2009-on this topic, "... the green mobile base stations report which utilised scenario-based models to derive estimates of base station power consumption, CO2 emissions and implied electricity costs, found that under the 'transformational model' – wherein operators invest substantially in power reduction in the base station, and place greater emphasis on addressing issues such as cooling, network planning and power management – total base station emissions would peak in 2010 and fall to 15.6Mt by 2014, achieving a 30% reduction”

A very simple view on 3 developments that help society in different ways is the following (off Grid population, bad access to grid population, good access)

IPad - Who are you looking for? I don't think you know (II)- A netbook?

If Mr. Jobs is going to insist that netbooks suck (Steve just remember there were 33 Million Netbooks sold in 2009, so I hope you are going o beat that eyes close) and iPads are better, you can't seriously expect people not to test that claim by comparing the two. You let's try on my side
I like how Adam Turner's on his column "Gadgets on the go" at the Sydney Herald Tribune put it
"...If I'm going to spend north of AU$650 (aka 500 USD, 400 Eur) on any product, I think I'm entitled to ask how it fits into my current computing environment. If I already own a smartphone and a desktop/notebook, I think I'm entitled to ask what problems a third computing device will solve and how its features will overlap with the devices I already have. I'm also entitled to ask what alternatives are available and how they measure up in terms of price, performance, features and usability...." I really love his assessment and I can most agree with all his points. Well Done Adam

So which needs are the ones that netbooks have tried to cover / satisfy? The segment of the market where surfing, reading, game playing and emailing dominate the usage model at a very affordable price and very easy to carry with you device

So why I think at least this version of the Ipad misses the point as an netbook

Some humour around the IPad (sorry in Spanish)

IPad - Who are you looking for? I don't think you know (I)

I am sure most of you were expecting me to say something about the recently launch Ipad and probably you expected me not to be too enthusiastic about it

Well I may say that it was impossible for the IPad to meet expectations. There has been so much talk in the market, so much hype (most of it feed it from Apple) that no matter how amazing the product would have been it would not have meet expectations

Furthermore I don't think Apple has gotten this right. Don't get me wrong there is enough Apple fanatics and sexy gadget lovers that I am sure they will do well in sales at least on the first year. However if the Ipod and the Iphone did change their industry or even create a totally new segment, the IPad won't
The product tries to be too many products in one and fails to excel on any

Out of the 3 options they chase (e-reader, netbook and tablet), let me comment today on e-reader and the comparison with the Kindle:
Mr. Jobs was probably not too happy with Mr. Bezos reinventing an electronics field (vs. him doing so) as the Kindle is the first "real" successful e-reader. I believe the Kindle is still far from being a market segment "creator" but so far they have done well and their improvements over several devices says that they keep listening and learning
Amazon(.com) have focused on what matters for an e-reader and what many e-readers fail to capture in the past
- Great screen to read for a long period of time
- Long Battery
- Lightweight
- Easy to use and easy to download
- Right pricing (not being too expensive so people will be willing to try)
- Great collection
Just analyzed the Ipad against on some of those key pillars (sexy screen but not good for continuous reading (are books printed in colour?), only 6 hours battery (you can't even read one whole book on that time), heavier and too expensive to try "just" as an e-reader and you will see Ipad will be far from killing the Kindle and dominate or re-invent this space

I could not disagree more with Ben Elowitz writing on Techcrunch about Top 10 Reasons The Apple iPad Will Put Amazon’s Kindle Out of Business (just check the comments on the article to see that I am not alone on this assessment). And I love one of the comments "...but this device is not made for real ebook readers, its really made for fanboys, that want others to think they read"

More tomorrow: Ipad as a netbook, Ipad as a tablet

Transitioning at work? New role, new organization, new peers? Read these books and shape your strategy

I have been through different transitions on my professional life. New countries, new clients, new company, new roles… I have always approached them with optimism, passion, open eyes and high expectations. As you grow into more senior roles you start understanding first that the initial days (the famous 90 or 100 days) are critical into the job (more in my opinion in corporations than startups) and that there are a number of personal experiences that have worked for you in the past that may guide you. However I also realized that your personal managerial recipe that worked in your previous role may not work (or not fully) in your next one.

So I was eager to do some reading on the subject and structure my thoughts a little bit. After some research I landed on 2 books from Michael D. Watkins
Read Michael's profile on linkedin 

Next wave in Smartphones: Google's Nexus and RIm's new devices

I have several topics to cover in the coming days as I have been out for a while. but after having had the chance to use the latest 2 RIM's devices (Curve and Bold) and having today played with Googgle / HTC Nexus I thought I will voice my opinion and put some interesting links to several analysis over the Nexus (mostly from the US)

Let's start first with the least exciting but always improving RIM devices as I have been using the Curve 8520 and the Bold 9700 in the past 2 months. Both the new Bold and the new Curve do come using the new device design started by the initial Bold (and then the Storm) but on a much lighter from (mainly the bold as the curve is very similar to the 8310). Both are very attractive, good quality screen, good keyboard (although I found the bold one a bit more responsive and fast). However I did have trouble integrating gmail over the Curve and the speed and the OS responsiveness on Curve was not great. The Bold (which I may say used integrated with normal BB email) does work beautifully and gives a good performance. While the curve uses one of the 2 standard batteries used by RIM lately the RIM boys have decided to keep destroying the environment and our pockets by designing a new battery for the Bold. However and on their benefit I may say that the new battery gives a much better performance
The BB app store is still on its infancy and clearly RIM is not getting much traction on this area. They be thinking on dedicating real brain power to how to push this area and its ecosystem. Overall good upgrades on the RIM portfolio and it you are thinking about a change from your BB today, I will go for the Bold 9700

Google (HTC) Nexus: As you may remember and before going back to the BB I was using HTC Magic with Android. I ws quite happy about the device. However with Nexus, the HTC boys on the hardware side and google on the software side have done an excellent job. Somehow some technical info on the HTC Nexus. The HTC-built and (soon to be) Google-sold device runs Android 2.1 atop a 1GHz Snapdragon CPU, a 3.7-inch, 480 x 800 display, has 512MB of ROM, 512MB of RAM, and a 4GB microSD card (expandable to 32GB). The phone includes the standard modern additions of a light sensor, proximity sensor, and accelerometer. The Nexus One has a 5 megapixel camera (way better than the iPhone or the RIM ones) with LED flash, and we have to say so far the pictures it snaps look pretty decent (and the camera software is much faster than the same component on the Droid).
I like the form factor. A bit taller than other devices, the display is large (very) and crispy. The software and OS performance is impressive and extremely quick (as much or more than the iPHONE). Finally something were they have really improve from the Magic is on the tactil Keyboard. Kudos here
So the battle is on. Clearly the Google label and the push in Europe by initially Vodafone is going to make this phone on my opinion this year's best seller. With this and the other android additions the scale is here for the apps on google to start battling Apple app store

A couple of links worth your attention if you want more info on the Nexus:


Engadget Blog on Nexus Google (HTC)

WJS WALTER S. MOSSBERG Blog on Nexus Google (HTC)

350 Million users - Enough for facebook to make money?

Part 1
I attended last Friday an event in London from NMA (New Media Age) Magazine, "Marketing to young people through social media" http://www.nmalive.co.uk/, where among other interesting speakers was David Parfect, agency sales group head from Facebook

See David's profile on Linkedin

First It was interesting to have a good glance at the latest metrics from facebook (mostly focus on the UK market) and find out facts such as:

• there are 23 million active users in the UK (350 Million worldwide)
  
• During the last year the average time spent on the site (25 minutes per day) has almost triple and now doubles the time people spend in MySpace (BTW lots of discussion around about if MySpace is dead or is not) or Bebo and finally
• the largest segment is the 25-34 years old, with the 15-24 just 1% behind
• and 83% of the 15-25 years old segment perfers to use facebook more than email to communicate
  

The rest of David presentation focus on the different tools out there in facebook (and they are in the process to rol out a number of new ones in the coming months) to allow companies and advertising agencies to develop interactive campaigns in order to become a real advertising preferred channel
Will that be enough to be profitable?

Part 2

Well let's listen first to the opinion of John Naughton, from the Observer, on an article that he published this past sunday which I found very relevant and containing some interesting and documented opinions on his side "Facebook now has 350m users - and there's no point in advertising to them"
Some excerpts from his article(

Read John's full article on The Observer

• "...But even Zuckerberg must be wondering how he can monetise the little darlings (referring to their 350 million users)...It can't go on like this, can it? The software-engineering and server-farm infrastructure needed to support 350 million users burns money, and so does the bandwidth they use"

• "...Facebook is the most glaring example of an unsolved puzzle: how to convert social networking into a sustainable business. Twitter, the micro-blogging service that is now in a runaway growth phase, poses the same puzzle....The truth is that investing in social networking represents the triumph of hope over experience"
• "The conventional wisdom used to be that the key to online revenues was advertising.... Google is a special case because it specialises in search, the only area where online advertising really works....Everyone who uses the web has experience of the ineffectiveness of online advertising"
• The inescapable conclusion is that anyone who thinks advertising is the key to sustainable online businesses in any field other than search should think again.

Clearly John does not think facebook is going to be making much money in the coming year

So where do you think lies the answer? David, John,...

Part 3

My opinion is that indeed just traditional online advertising is not how facebook is going to make money. However John fails to see that facebook is not really trying to focus on traditional online advertising but on interactive advertising
There are 2 areas where I think facebook can make money:
- Online: their rankings, third party develop applications and companies running interactive campaigns (rankings, competitions, multiplayer games,...) in facebook can really boost their revenue. This is today's facebook focus, however the big question is how well they are executing and how fast can they go, as there are other companies battling their space
- Mobile: with the arrival of smartphones a lot of interactions, engagement and conversations can happen on their mobile. However it is quite amazing I have failed to hear from facebook a clear strategy around mobile

So I believe facebook can make money, probably even lots of money.
However I remain skeptical on their execution capabilities and mobile strategy

More to come and will love to hear your opinion

Gazing into 2010 (I)

Imagine Steve, Bill, Google Boys, Warren (Buffet) and myself get together to chat about 2010 and the Telco space. Warren is not really in the mood for TMT investments but he is listening. Bill believes that Windows will finally make a play in the mobile space with their first good mobile product Windows Mobile 7.0. The rest smile and say to him good luck because being good most of your handset suppliers like HTC are now with the Google Boys and Android.
Google boys look puzzled but excited. They brought to the chat more than 50 devices with Android for 2010. However not enough apps and transactions yet (why is Steve managing to do just with one device?) and it is still unclear how long it will take for mobile advertising to become a reality. There is still not enough money on mobile search, “… no worries we just bought AdMob and there is lots of room for smaller companies to play on this space and find interesting niches and then we will buy them. How many companies will they buy in 2010?
Warren is observing the Advercontent (advertising based games and applications) space, but just watching and learning and maybe China, India, Brazil and South Africa is where real scale will happen for this (pair with finally fast enough networks and accessible medium end handsets, we can see the big smiles on Huawei and ZTE fellas). The internet boys don’t make any money on social media but he does believe mobile in these territories may be the place to monetize social media (content, analytics, location based). He also took several calls to listen to some interesting ventures on m-payments and micro-transactions in Africa and the Middle East. Hmmmmm
Why we did not invite Nokia to the meeting? They are too busy sorting out their house. It is true, first they shout OVI for president, now Symbian is not good enough, and now instead of embracing Android or buying Palm OS you are going to create another Linux based OS!!! Now we start understanding why they did not come today or they are not going to WMC 2010
Hey the RIM boys got to the meeting late. The rest has already divided the mass market application space between them and some upcoming startups. However vertical oriented apps is going to be an upcoming segment and the blackberry device is king here. Can their OS and their app store be a business oriented apps thriving space and take upcoming tech young companies on the ride. Warren is listening and nods
Where is Steve? Did he leave to launch another apple phone (model) or they were just getting ready to open up the app store next year. We agree on gave him the 2009 champion, will he win again in 2010?
As we were walking out the room, Warren said what about the operators? I said we need together again for lunch to analyze that one

Sad things happen when you see what is considered innovation (From Enrique Dans blog on "Promusicae y el uso del dinero público")

Many of you may or may not know that there a number of options by the State in Spain to have access to public funding for innovative projects
In the past we have been trying to obtain such help and we have been finally lucky on obtaining some help
However it is amazing to see that on the "Plan Avanza", probably the most ambitious of the plans launched by the goverment, in which we invested quite a bit of time and resources to submit our application and were turned down because we were not innovative
When I read Enrique Dans Blog and see that a public association has gotten 1 Million Eur to develop a solution that mmCHANNEL and another handful of companies in Spain already have and that adds no value to the end user, one wonders
"Promusicae y el uso del dinero público". Si, el Estado es muy "sensible" a los lobbies de poder http://bit.ly/TzUkW