LinkedIn and laziness

Would you agree that LinkedIn is not "thinking for users" as others (esp.Apple) do? Basic virtue of the human nature is laziness, and it's well understood by the most successful consumer companies and inventions.

Consider TV Remote Control. Consider iPhone. Facebook...

Now on LinkedIn, the most "active" function is "connecting to people".
It actually makes me think that very soon everyone will be connected to everyone, withing their area of expertise.
Is this the ultimate goal for LinkedIn and it's customers? I doubt it.

LinkedIn is not thinking hard enough for its users. And its users, being business-oriented, have little time to actively use LinkedIn effectively.
And this is why it's not as popular as Facebook.

LinkedIn's user want to upgrade jobs. How does LinkedIn help this goal?
It helps people to connect and then relies on their actions.
As many have found out, the only reliable part of web user is inaction (well, make it a single click).

It would help if LinkedIn figured out your future job aspirations and found those jobs, and suggested them on a "single-click menu".

It would help if LinkedIn figured what people might be useful to you, and mutually introduced them (not based only on past, think "future").

It would help if LinkedIn suggested you groups to join, based on your skills and activity, and introduced groups to people, and well as people to group moderators.

Now all it does is "keeps you linked in"...

Office 365 arrived

I have watched Microsoft's Office 365 introduction for IT Professionals.

It was interesting until they revealed you still need to install 800M distro onto every computer where you intend to have access to your "online" documents. And keep that patched. Oh yes, and no Mac/Linux version.

Next.

(The only advantage is low entry fee, which may be interesting for small businesses. But then you will have Office-format documents, and as you grow to medium-size, it won't be easy to migrate away from that format, just ask others. That's when the paying spree begins.)

UH-OH, and don't forget the Patriot Act!

Apple's iPad 2

Went to Mayer, tried iPad 2.
Body shape is much better, and weighs a little bit less.

But - same so-so screen, and yes I want it even lighter.

Overall it's not a good buy at 579-989 AUD.
Holding on until iPad 3 with Retina Screen...

Internet Explorer 9 loves Binging

I have installed IE9 and I can't find an easy way to stop it from sending my Address Bar typos to Bing. It's simply not in Internet Options.

NOKIA still "Wows"!

Have you seen the new NOKIA N9 announcement?

Have you tried to roam the city in "3D" Nokia Maps?

All I can say is "you still kick ass, guys!"

Keep the good stuff coming, get some spots on TV.

Adobe Updaters

Dear Microsoft,

Will you please buy Adobe, too?
We are sick and tired of their separate updaters already.

Yours,
PC Users.
------------------
Dear Adobe,

I don't believe you need to place Adobe Reader's shortcut on my desktop every time.
If you run a survey you'll probably discover that people just double-click PDFs, not go the way of "Show Desktop, Run Reader, Find Documents to read".

Yours,
Sergey Zak

New [i]MacOS X 10.7 Lion

Microsoft failed, when they tried to bring Windows Desktop to Mobile devices.

Will Apple succeed in bringing the iPhone [in]experience to Macs?

Is this the end of Desktop Paradigm as we know it, that was initially developed by Xerox @PARC, and later went into the backbone of Mac's success, thanks to Steve Job's genius vision and stamina?

The biggest "switch" is about to come.

RSA compromised. How to protect?

In a disappointing bit of news last Friday, RSA is compromised by "an extremely sophisticated cyber attack".

This time, for real.

While RSA does not disclose exactly what was stolen, knowing the technology, one can still design a mitigation strategy.

I will recount options for those who's eager to do something to protect themselves.

1. Switch to a different token vendor. This is the most disruptive and costly measure, but if your trust is lost, and you have the budget, this may be your strategic option. It will require to replace your authentication server, and may introduce other problems as well as disrupt business. While RSA took the lion's share of the market, there are still other companies who make tokens and develop two-factor authentication technology, you just have to look out. Besides, "security by obscurity" principle, while often being laughed upon by experts, seems to work for many customers.

If you prepared to wait and see, I would advise the following mitigation strategies to reduce the risk of being exploited by someone logging in on behalf of your user:

2. Replace all SecurID tokens. Call RSA and request all of your tokens to be replaced by new, UNCOMPROMISED tokens. This last one is important thing. Unfortunately, you won't be able to verify if your new tokens were compromised, unless RSA publishes full list of compromised token's serial numbers.

Depending on exact fields of data stolen by hackers, and the way RSA kept their token records, you may have the following options:

3. If the data stolen includes token serial numbers and private seed keys used to initialize tokens, but does not contain token-to-client mappings (every token in the list is "anonymous") then attacker may not know which token they should recreate for attacking your company. Your protection measure may be to remove serial number white labels from the tokens, and file off (yes, I mean mechanically) the embossed serial numbers on the back of your tokens. This would probably require a temporary recall of tokens from your users, unless you can delegate the task to your end users. Also ask you users to never give tokens to anyone, even "just to see", and never leave them unattended or exposing the back side (upside up on the table). Also be sure your internal records, containing [previously public] serial token numbers, are secured and were never compromized. If this cannot be done, seek another option.

4. If stolen data records contain seed keys, serial numbers, and client names linked together, the worst has happened. Someone can recreate your token, and the attacked will know which company the token's for. This effectively removes one layer of protection (something you have). Remember, though, that still have other layers. One option would be to require all users to change PINs. You can increase complexity requirements for PINs, for ex, require 6-digit PINs where previously they were 4-digit only. Since only one part of your security mechanism was compromised, you still may rely on user PINs and obscurity (unknown VPN address, unknown VPN group password, unknown user name, unknown PIN), depending on your business requirement. Also remember, that, as tokens expire, the exposed data becomes more and more obsolete with time. In the interim solution, you may want to consider options.

Keep safe.

NB. This article does not constitute a formal advice, nor will I accept responsibility for you taking my advice, as well as neglecting it.
Every business should carefully revise their security mechanisms, based on new input, including this article.

Nokia partners with Microsoft, adopts Windows 7 Phone

In a much speculated and quite expected move, Nokia is finally moving past Symbian.

Today, an open letter from Steven Elop and Steve Ballmer, both companies declared partnership and vowed to bring "stellar hardware, innovating software and great services" to mobile phone customers.

As I wrote in November, this will be a perfect match between Nokia's hardware capabilities and capacity, and Microsoft's innovative mobile OS and tight integration to most popular desktop environment, Microsoft Windows.

With hardware giant like Nokia in their allies, Microsoft is sure to make a major dent in mobile marketplace. Mobile users will win from improved innovation rate, better compatibility and increased usability, and simpler integration between mobile devices and desktops.

Nokia Ovi suite could be reformed and re-incorporated to bring value to all Windows 7 Phone customers. That would be an important step to increase it's market adoption rate and usefulness.

Vendor-specific social platforms are doomed, that's why Ovi must go beyond Nokia to really succeed and compete with the best.

The deal will invigorate mobile market even more, adding to the battle between Google's Android and Apple's iPhone ecosystems.

It's a great day today for both companies, and I am looking forward to help them improve their act.
I used to be a Symbian fan, but it's been long time to move on.
Nokia hardware was quite competitive, but sad truth is that Nokia simply could not make first-class software for few recent years.
When that is changed and outsourced to a partner as great as Microsoft, everybody wins!

Skype sends empty vouchers to some clients

As a highly original New Year's present, Skype is sending vouchers to some of the clients who had paid for premium services (had balance) and been affected by the failure in December.

Funny part is that some of the vouchers are empty - they contain no code to redeem.

I personally have received a voucher with the code and successfully redeemed the value of $1.

I am sure they should pay more than $1 to the folks who received the joke.

Stay tuned!

Happy New Year and let your presents be real.
SZ

UPDATE: Skype is resending the letters, this time with the $1 code.