The very last town hall meeting from Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer

I was really touched to listen to Bill Gates’ last Q&A session on Friday at the employee town hall meeting and sad to see them both with tears in their eyes.  it’s obvious that Bill and Steve have a lot of deep affection for each other as the in jokes and laughs between them as they reminisced about their early days, about Bill’s lack of a degree, taking Steve away from business school, fooling around at the office, and what they think of the leadership team  and the vision for the company in years to come.

I was also moved to watch Steve in tears towards the end of the session and seeing Bill wipe his eyes was very moving.

Obviously the event was designed for internal staff only but I’ve found a video courtesy of the Austrian Ready blog where Bills Secretary shares some insights into Bill and the dress code. 

Video: Dress to Impress

 

I had a search around for some other videos and I’ve found the following videos which were also shown at the meeting. 

 

Paul and Bills first company – before Microsoft – Traf-O-Data

 

At Harvard:

 

This video shows Bill’s father and sister talking about working with him at Microsoft:

 

The birth of Microsoft and the early days:

 

So what did Microsoft really sell???

 

His vision for a computer on every desktop:

 

Explanation of the Albuquerque photo with the original members

 

Jeff Raikes (who has now managed to look after the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation) talks about Multiplan and successes and failures and how they moved on from their mistakes

 

Early impressions about Microsoft and Bill as an entrepreneur:

 

How the GUI evolved:

 

The DoJ, competition over the browser and growing pains:

 

Not wanting to go public with the company:

 

Starting Microsoft Research:

 

Paul Maritz and product reviews with Bill:

Typical work schedules at Microsoft. I think some of the product teams still do this based on some deadlines even now

 

Ray Ozzie, J Allard and Craig Mundie talk about Microsoft: change and innovation

 

You can find other videos about Bill here on the Microsoft site here:

 

This video, with Melinda Gates, I’ve left till the end – it has some wonderful sentiments in it.  and I love the mission statement for their foundation:  “all lives have equal value”

Powerful stuff, and just the right thing to do that will enhance deserving children’s lives throughout the world.  Certainly something to reflect on…

Technorati Tags: Bill Gates,Bill and Melinda Gates foundation,traf-o-data,Ray Ozzie,Jeff Raikes,J Allard

Do not read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly

I first saw this video years ago but found it again on Travis’s blog.  Wise words and advice indeed.  The best tip is the title of this post.

Oh, to be able to go back in time and follow all of the advice you know now.  I would have been braver, said no much more often than I did.  I would have not had that “Just one more drink” on several occasions, backed out of several “dares” And I certainly wouldn’t have gunned the throttle 2 weeks ago and killed my car either…

I would not have tolerated the emotional abuse that I took from 2 of my friends, and I would have been much more tolerant of some of my friends in need when they needed me the most.

There are lots of other bad habits I also wished I’d broken when I was younger

 

And I wish I’d taken more note of this video when I watched it the first time and watched it when I was young.

 

- and I didn’t do the sunscreen tip either – still don’t…

Technorati Tags: Life tips

Put your monitor to sleep

- and turn out the lights when you leave are just 2 of the 10 ways to try to curb global warming and improve your carbon footprint.

I found these tips on Microsoft’s Environment site (which links to the MSN green site too).  It’s good that we’re collating all of our green IT initiatives together so that documents like being a great environmental leader don’t get lost amongst other stuff we produce. 

I have 2 energy saving tips:

Try to grow your own vegetables.  you don’t need much space – a large pot will do, and you’ve saved all that diesel and food miles – as the food doesn’t have to travel far to get to your kitchen.  Also – the satisfaction of actually eating something you’ve grown from seed is wonderful.

My techy tips.

Try to make your gadgets last a bit longer.  Do you really need to buy another newest / latest / greatest / smallest device?  (Jason would say yes!)

Work from home as much as possible.  with Wifi, Broadband, VOIP, Webcams, you could try to spend one day a week at home – and save on that petrol as much as you can.

Technorati Tags: Green IT,environment

Looking at Bill Gates’ photo album

I found this lovely slideshow on CNN of Bill Gates’ early photos and hearing him talk about them. It’s almost as if he’s sitting next to you on the sofa, flicking through some prints

This image is one of his early business cards and it’s interesting to hear how and why he decided to set up in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

The deck and narration doesn’t take too long to get through – only 6 minutes, but it’s certainly worth a look at as it gives a different perspective to his public persona that we all know so well.

Certainly worth a look – and the links at the end of the slide show (here and here) are also work a read

Technorati Tags: Bill Gates,CNN

Office Communicator – on voice and video

I suppose there’s one small benefit to being without a car at the moment is that I get to chat to a lot of my colleagues on Communicator and video.

Here’s my call with Jane this morning.  I have 1/2Mb broadband, Jane has about 1Mb. We were chatting about how things were during the rest of TechEd IT Pro week, how her session went and how Rhonda from my panel won Speaker idol on Friday – Woohoo! (you can see the heats here on TechEd Online by the way)

The yellow triangle above the call duration window tells me that the call quality is poor.  But what did I actually notice?  A slight latency in our voices which meant we can’t interrupt each other too much, and a bit of lip sync between the voice and video.

But I saved a bit of carbon by not going into the Office today (130 miles) but I expect I used all of that up in all the electricity I used from making all those coffees …

Technorati Tags: Office Communicator,Video,TechEd,Speaker Idol,Jane Lewis

I’m not really a geek then?…

I’ve been playing Server Quest and I’m totally rubbish at it, my scores are far  too dismal to admit in print (some of these geeks obviously have too much time) but playing it has reminded me to tell you about the TechNet plus subscription offer that we’ve been running in the UK for a while now. 

Here’s info about Server Quest…

Are you geek enough to win the entire office’s respect? Prove it. Play Server Quest, where you’ll navigate through the perils of office life, protect the server, and keep clear of the arrogant sales guy. Look for it online at www.server-quest.com.  This spring, play Server Quest…and give a geek a chance.

If you want to renew / take up the offer of a TechNet plus subscription and  use my promotional code which is  ITPro1 you can get 30% off a new TechNet plus subscription and 10% off renewals.  the promotion is open until 30th June so you’ve got a few more days to make up your mind about it.  You can have a listen to the intro of Server Quest to see what the benefits are too…

Oh and if you live in the US, Kevin’s blog has the link to the US version of the offer…

Technorati Tags: Server Quest,TechNet Plus,Kevin Remde

Why, oh Why does this still happen?

I received an email yesterday that left me stunned.

"National Electronics Week" is a show now on at Earl’s Court.
"We urge everyone to come along to the event, celebrate our world class capabilities and put the UK electronics industry back on the map," added Simon Payne. "The event is far more than a showcase of
products and services, it is a major networking opportunity, a place to interact face-to-face and cross-fertilise with peers in the industry."
The XJTAG girls – follow the link below to download a high resolution image – will be welcoming visitors to this inaugural event. The XJTAG team will be on stand C61.

Photo caption: XJTAG’s international models Gemma Massey and Laurena Lacey will be welcoming visitors to National Electronics Week at Earls Court (17-19 June).
For more information about visiting National Electronics Week, visit www.nationalelectronicsweek.co.uk. Information about XJTAG.

Well…. I’m speechless

Why the relevance of hard hats to the electronics industry? (note to the Advertising agency concerned perhaps?) – and the footwear doesn’t exactly comply with the Health and Safety executive requirements either.

I honestly don’t think that this should be portrayed as a suitable image for 21st Century organisations where the proportion of young women following STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) disciplines is reducing year on year and the challenge of getting young girls to take these career options is getting harder.  All of us who work in the Technology (and Science) industry, have a responsibility to encourage the next generation of young people into taking up IT, science and maths careers –  and not promoting marketing images like this that seems to put the industry back years and years. 

Fortunately someone has seen sense and the image above has been taken down from the site but obviously we’ve got a long, long way to go here.  I’m just amazed that in these enlightened times when we’re all too aware of the dearth of females in IT and technology this sort of perception is still propagated out there…

Thanks to Jan  from the BCS for forwarding the mail.

Technorati Tags: Women in Technology

New VOIP as you are video

My good friend Bob who works over in the Unified Communications team at corp. sent me the link to this VOIP as you are video (link to the  older video of PBX’s chatting to each other is here by the way…).

It’s a 15 minute long video  available here about the Legend of Dan Wilson and how hard he tries to prevent the installers taking the PBX switch away and replacing it with a new one.  So he takes up residence on top of the PBX and tries to talk to the installers about using Unified Communications and VOIP and leave the hardware where it is – just interoperate with what you have and already have integrate with all of the hardware you already have. 

I’ve got my eyes on the “rip and replace” guy with the bluetooth headset though – who does he remind me of???  Thank goodness someone sees sense at the end, and there’s a nice little love story in there too from his adoring co-worker Jenny…

it’s a bit of fun when you have time and good info if you weren’t aware of how well UC interoperates with what you have, how much productivity you can gain and how much you can save…

Technorati Tags: Unified Communications,VOIP as you are,Office Communications Server

The HTC Diamond Touch – my next phone?

I’ve been chatting to Angus today by IM- he’s been helping me with an Excel problem that someone contacted me about and the subject got around to phones.   Well he started to rave on about his latest phone that he’s bought – the HTC Diamond Touch and I must say I’m impressed.  But I’ll let him tell you in his own words…

I have had an ongoing rant for the last year or so about crummy hardware that just doesn’t work and seems to fight against the software.  This has been particularly true in some of the mobile devices I have been using.  To protect the innocent (erm) I shall say no more.  However, I do have something I really want to RAVE about.  I have recently bought the new HTC Diamond Touch – this is the first time in about 3 years that I have a smart phone as opposed to a PDA.  I thought that losing the keyboard would be painful, but the Diamond’s design and 3D Flow interface MORE than makes up for it.  It is a fantastic device; fast and sleek.  It has a metal case and a very high resolution screen which not only makes it tough but also easy to see.  It is also very small, something that might cause a problem at home since my partner has her eye on it!

I have a couple of gripes, the first being it uses Opera as a web browser and I had yet to get that to work.  It just will not connect to the internet.  Also the screen fades way to quickly when on the telephone, so you continually have to wake it using the on / off button to get at the keyboard to enter PIN numbers or extensions. Quite frustrating.  On a positive note the onscreen keyboard resizes on touch which makes it easy to use and I like the fact that if you hold a key down you get the shift function without having to hit two keys.  Very good for one-handed texting or emailing.  The killer feature is of course the touch flow which allows you to scroll easily, and quickly and gives seamless transitions between photos – which have great detail and resolution from the good quality camera built in.  Also the there is a “virtual” scroll wheel – run your finger in a circle around the centre button – which resizes text or zooms a photo. GREAT!.  That means if I don’t have my glasses on I can easily read the text, oh and speaking of reading.  I use my phone as my alarm clock but in the morning I have a hard time to focus on the screen – showing my age! – but that is no longer a problem with the HTC Diamond Touch since there is a very large analogue clock on the home page.. like the old 70’s style flip clock which is easy to read

Well done HTC a delightful device.. if I get round to it, or feel brave I might try a registry hack to do something about the screen fade on call, and once I get the internet browsing sorted I shall be happy… next project is to get Co-Pilot installed..

 

I’m surprised that Jason hasn’t got one yet – he’s usually the first to talk about cool stuff like the Diamond cradle and other cool things like that. 

So what do you think?  Too much of a Gadget – or a must have device?  And should Microsoft be buying them for all of us in the UK then?  Well I can ask…

 

Technorati Tags: HTC Diamond Touch,Windows Mobile 6.1,Smartphone

Unified Communications TechNet event in Leeds/Bradford

We’re running some events in association with our partners who specialise in these areas – its a way for us to be able to get so some more places as venues are sometimes difficult to find in some towns.  So here’s a Unified communications event that we’re holding in a couple of weeks:

Wednesday 2 July 2008, Leeds/Bradford: TechNet event in association with Black Marble – Microsoft’s vision for Unified communications

We talk about the “new world of work” and the “millennial generation”, but what does that mean for how we go about communicating in business ? This session will look at how life is  changing and how Microsoft technologies like Live Meeting, Round Table, Exchange and office communications server fit together to address communications needs of a modern business,  giving a broad overview of each of the technologies, and demonstrating as many of them as possible (within limitations imposed by the venue). We’ll look at the move from voice mail to unified messaging, the difference between UM and the presence driven world of Unified communications and look at the new devices from Microsoft and partners which are going into this market.

Give us some feedback as to whether this format for events works – we’re trialling them for a few months and we’ll continue them if they’re successful. 

Technorati Tags: TechNet,Unified Communications