We all have read of Apple's purported $200MM purchase of Topsy. TechCrunch speculated that part of the reason for that purchase is for Apple to have a better read on App Store relevance. I read that and chuckled because Apple already is sitting on a treasure trove of relevance and for the life of me, I don't understand why they won't just go and mine it from and for us.
I have had this conversation with every Apple Executive I know and unfortunately I don't have the relationship with Tim Cook (who I admire greatly) that I did with Steve Jobs. Long ago I would have emailed or called and he would have (like he did on multiple occasions) responded with either, "That's a good idea" or something like, "Why would I do that?" (which was his way of telling me he thought it was a stupid idea).
So, since I don't have that and the Topsy acquisition happened, here we go and maybe this will make its way back to Cupertino.
Please answer these questions and '"follow" along:
Do you own an iphone, an ipad or an ipod touch?
If you answered yes: Do you have any apps on your device that you downloaded through the App Store?
Still answering yes?
I have an iphone and an ipad.
I have downloaded both free and purchased apps. I downloaded one yesterday in fact that I paid $7.99.
Do you know what it was?
Do you know any of my apps?
Do I know any of the apps you have?
Do you want to know mine?
I want to know yours!
If you knew mine, would you be inclined, just possibly, to try or purchase one because you discovered something new that I already knew and had tried and liked?
I know I would reciprocate, but I have no idea what apps you have on your device or in the cloud. But, I know you have something there that would pique my curiosity.
See where I am going?
Apple is sitting on at least the second largest social network in the world and billions of downloads (and missed dollars) by not letting us "Follow" each other's App Downloads.
They don't need Topsy to know what is relevant. My friends and those who I follow shape relevance, or I influence relevance for them.
Turn it on Apple! You have it all waiting for us; for your App Developers and a community (yes, I know that sounds so 1999) that is waiting for you to go develop!
Anything I can do to help, just let me know!
Standing by...
PS: I think Apple has something bigger up their sleeves for Topsy applications than App Store relevance and I'm excited to see what that might be.
Showing posts with label techcrunch. Show all posts
Showing posts with label techcrunch. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Working From Where?
Yesterday's TechCrunch covered the new irobot and Cisco In-the-office-out-of-the office-work-from-home-telepresence-robot-thing.
We've seen these things in the GE ads where the robot-thing can allow
the sick children to attend school, even though they are home or
hospital bound. But, this puts a whole new spin on things. Are we
getting closer and closer to the autonomous worker? My friend Fred
says, "You must be present to win". Is this being present? What will
Marissa Mayer do with this? What is clear is that our ability to be
where we are, even when we are not, is getting more and more
technologically advanced. We need to monitor, experiment and see what
works in our environment, and then judge. But, one thing is for
certain, we must try what is new and not ignore the future as it rolls
through our front door. The generation behind us is watching to see
where we will land as it relates to where and how they will work.
(picture courtesy of TechCrunch)
To see my further faith-based application of this bolt of thinking you can go to: http://purposedworking.blogspot.com
To see my further faith-based application of this bolt of thinking you can go to: http://purposedworking.blogspot.com
Monday, March 21, 2011
Engineering vs. Liberal Arts
Posted on TechCrunch this AM:
Engineering vs. Liberal Arts: Who’s Right—Bill or Steve?
Posted: 21 Mar 2011 05:40 AM PDT
When students asked what subjects they should major in to become a tech entrepreneur, I used to say engineering, mathematics, and science—because an education in these fields is the prerequisite for innovation, and because engineers make the best entrepreneurs.
That was several years ago.
I realized how much my views have changed when the The New York Times asked me to write a piece for its “Room for Debate” forum this week. The paper wanted me to comment on the divergence of opinion between Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. In a speech before the National Governors Association on Feb 28, Gates had argued that we need to spend our limited education budget on disciplines that produce the most jobs. He implied that we should reduce our investment in the liberal arts because liberal-arts degrees don’t correlate well with job creation. Three days later, at the unveiling of the iPad 2, Steve Jobs said: “It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough—it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our heart sing, and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices”.
Because I am a professor at the Pratt School of Engineering at Duke University, and given all the positive things I say about U.S. engineering education, The Times assumed that I would side with Bill Gates; that I would write a piece that endorsed his views. But, even though I believe that engineering is one of the most important professions, I have learned that the liberal arts are equally important. It takes artists, musicians, and psychologists working side by side with engineers to build products as elegant as the iPad. And anyone—with education in any field—can achieve success in Silicon Valley.
Here is what I wrote for The Times.
It’s commonly believed that engineers dominate Silicon Valley and that there is a correlation between the capacity for innovation and an education in mathematics and the sciences. Both assumptions are false.
My research team at Duke and Harvard surveyed 652 U.S.-born chief executive officers and heads of product engineering at 502 technology companies. We found that they tended to be highly educated: 92 percent held bachelor’s degrees, and 47 percent held higher degrees. But only 37 percent held degrees in engineering or computer technology, and just two percent held them in mathematics. The rest have degrees in fields as diverse as business, accounting, finance, health care, and arts and the humanities.
Gaining a degree made a big difference in the sales and employment of the company that a founder started. But the field that the degree was in and the school that it was obtained from were not a significant factor.
Over the past year, I have interviewed the founders of more than 200 Silicon Valley start-ups. The most common traits I have observed are a passion to change the world and the confidence to defy the odds and succeed.
It is the same in business. In the two companies I founded, I was involved in hiring more than 1000 workers over the years. I never observed a correlation between the school of graduation or field of study, on one hand, and success in the workplace, on the other. What make people successful are their motivation, drive, and ability to learn from mistakes, and how hard they work.
And then there is the matter of design. Steve Jobs taught the world that good engineering is important but that what matters the most is good design. You can teach artists how to use software and graphics tools, but it’s much harder to turn engineers into artists.
Our society needs liberal-arts majors as much as it does engineers and scientists.
But I need to acknowledge the difficult reality: that employment prospects are dim for liberal-arts majors. Graduates from top engineering schools such as Duke are always in high demand. But PhDs in English from even the most prestigious universities, such as UC-Berkeley, can’t get jobs. The data I presented above were on the background of tech-company founders—those who made the transition into entrepreneurship. Most don’t. And, as you can note from Bill Gates’ speech, there is a bias against liberal arts and humanities.
Angelika Blendstrup is an author and a lecturer who holds a PhD in Bilingual Bicultural Education from Stanford. She says that her liberal-arts background is “great for writing papers or PhDs, but it would be better to have studied engineering and have a choice of jobs”.
Charles River Venture Partner emeritus, Ted Dintersmith, on the other hand, received a PhD in Engineering from Stanford. But he also studied liberal arts. Ted says “It doesn’t have to be either/or—I double-majored in Physics and English, and never regretted combining two such different disciplines”.
So there is no black and white here. We need musicians, artists, and psychologists, as much as we need bio-medical engineers, computer programmers, and scientists.
My advice to my students—and to my own children—is to study what interests them the most; to excel in fields in which they have the most passion and ability; to change the world in their own way and on their own terms. Once they master their domain, they can find the path to entrepreneurship. They can then come up with creative ways of solving the problems that they have encountered, and apply their ideas to other fields where their knowledge adds value. Maybe they can team up with the hard-core engineers who develop the clunky, inelegant, over-engineered products that Bill is famous for; maybe work with Steve to create the next iPhone or iPad.
You can read more views and witness the lively debate on the New York Times web site.
Editor’s note: Vivek Wadhwa is an entrepreneur turned academic. He is a Visiting Scholar at UC-Berkeley, Senior Research Associate at Harvard Law School, Director of Research at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at Duke University, and Distinguished Visiting Scholar at The Halle Institute for Global Learning at Emory University. You can follow him on Twitter at @vwadhwa and find his research at www.wadhwa.com.
Engineering vs. Liberal Arts: Who’s Right—Bill or Steve?
Posted: 21 Mar 2011 05:40 AM PDT
When students asked what subjects they should major in to become a tech entrepreneur, I used to say engineering, mathematics, and science—because an education in these fields is the prerequisite for innovation, and because engineers make the best entrepreneurs.
That was several years ago.
I realized how much my views have changed when the The New York Times asked me to write a piece for its “Room for Debate” forum this week. The paper wanted me to comment on the divergence of opinion between Bill Gates and Steve Jobs. In a speech before the National Governors Association on Feb 28, Gates had argued that we need to spend our limited education budget on disciplines that produce the most jobs. He implied that we should reduce our investment in the liberal arts because liberal-arts degrees don’t correlate well with job creation. Three days later, at the unveiling of the iPad 2, Steve Jobs said: “It’s in Apple’s DNA that technology alone is not enough—it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the result that makes our heart sing, and nowhere is that more true than in these post-PC devices”.
Because I am a professor at the Pratt School of Engineering at Duke University, and given all the positive things I say about U.S. engineering education, The Times assumed that I would side with Bill Gates; that I would write a piece that endorsed his views. But, even though I believe that engineering is one of the most important professions, I have learned that the liberal arts are equally important. It takes artists, musicians, and psychologists working side by side with engineers to build products as elegant as the iPad. And anyone—with education in any field—can achieve success in Silicon Valley.
Here is what I wrote for The Times.
It’s commonly believed that engineers dominate Silicon Valley and that there is a correlation between the capacity for innovation and an education in mathematics and the sciences. Both assumptions are false.
My research team at Duke and Harvard surveyed 652 U.S.-born chief executive officers and heads of product engineering at 502 technology companies. We found that they tended to be highly educated: 92 percent held bachelor’s degrees, and 47 percent held higher degrees. But only 37 percent held degrees in engineering or computer technology, and just two percent held them in mathematics. The rest have degrees in fields as diverse as business, accounting, finance, health care, and arts and the humanities.
Gaining a degree made a big difference in the sales and employment of the company that a founder started. But the field that the degree was in and the school that it was obtained from were not a significant factor.
Over the past year, I have interviewed the founders of more than 200 Silicon Valley start-ups. The most common traits I have observed are a passion to change the world and the confidence to defy the odds and succeed.
It is the same in business. In the two companies I founded, I was involved in hiring more than 1000 workers over the years. I never observed a correlation between the school of graduation or field of study, on one hand, and success in the workplace, on the other. What make people successful are their motivation, drive, and ability to learn from mistakes, and how hard they work.
And then there is the matter of design. Steve Jobs taught the world that good engineering is important but that what matters the most is good design. You can teach artists how to use software and graphics tools, but it’s much harder to turn engineers into artists.
Our society needs liberal-arts majors as much as it does engineers and scientists.
But I need to acknowledge the difficult reality: that employment prospects are dim for liberal-arts majors. Graduates from top engineering schools such as Duke are always in high demand. But PhDs in English from even the most prestigious universities, such as UC-Berkeley, can’t get jobs. The data I presented above were on the background of tech-company founders—those who made the transition into entrepreneurship. Most don’t. And, as you can note from Bill Gates’ speech, there is a bias against liberal arts and humanities.
Angelika Blendstrup is an author and a lecturer who holds a PhD in Bilingual Bicultural Education from Stanford. She says that her liberal-arts background is “great for writing papers or PhDs, but it would be better to have studied engineering and have a choice of jobs”.
Charles River Venture Partner emeritus, Ted Dintersmith, on the other hand, received a PhD in Engineering from Stanford. But he also studied liberal arts. Ted says “It doesn’t have to be either/or—I double-majored in Physics and English, and never regretted combining two such different disciplines”.
So there is no black and white here. We need musicians, artists, and psychologists, as much as we need bio-medical engineers, computer programmers, and scientists.
My advice to my students—and to my own children—is to study what interests them the most; to excel in fields in which they have the most passion and ability; to change the world in their own way and on their own terms. Once they master their domain, they can find the path to entrepreneurship. They can then come up with creative ways of solving the problems that they have encountered, and apply their ideas to other fields where their knowledge adds value. Maybe they can team up with the hard-core engineers who develop the clunky, inelegant, over-engineered products that Bill is famous for; maybe work with Steve to create the next iPhone or iPad.
You can read more views and witness the lively debate on the New York Times web site.
Editor’s note: Vivek Wadhwa is an entrepreneur turned academic. He is a Visiting Scholar at UC-Berkeley, Senior Research Associate at Harvard Law School, Director of Research at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at Duke University, and Distinguished Visiting Scholar at The Halle Institute for Global Learning at Emory University. You can follow him on Twitter at @vwadhwa and find his research at www.wadhwa.com.
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