Steves Geek Speak - Latest Comments

Re: Why IE9, Windows Phone 7 and Windows can’t replace my Chrome, Android, Google Apps combination

kinthiri — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 10:38:55 -0000

I'm not going to address anything you've said to your satisfaction because you were so antagonistic in your approach and I don't care that much.

I am not a "tech writer" as you put it. This is a blog post, by an opinionated blogger, on a personal blog that happens to be about technology in general. I have worked in ICT related fields since the mid-1990s, so I think I have a pretty good background on the market. I currently run a business that requires me to keep up to date with a lot of different fields.

This blog post was not trying to be "cool" or discuss what was good or bad about IE9, but to convey my personal opinion about why I do not believe IE9 + Windows Phone 7 + Microsoft's online services can compete with the services provided by Google in the form of Chrome + Android + Google Apps.

If you missed that, then might I suggest you press Ctrl-F and search for the word "ubiquity" and maybe read the paragraph that mentions Office 365 again.

IE9 has a minuscule market share. Its not till you group all versions of IE together, including IE6, that IE actually has a dominant market share. IE9 barely registers on its own.

But this post wasn't about IE9 on its own, it was about the whole package Microsoft provides in an attempt to compete with Google's offerings. IE9 is only part of that offering. A pretty, but essentially limited and useless, part of that offering.

* Office 365 only has full functionality with IE9. Google Apps works within any browser.

* IE9 doesn't work well with the rest of the web without effort. It can render pages, but a lot of important functionality on the web *still* needs to be written twice because of IE9. Once for every other browser, then once again to get the full functionality of a complex site in IE,

* Don't even get me started on the browser built in to Windows Phone 7, WP7's performance issues, or its functionality limitations (such as screen resolution, SMS messaging limitations, and ... the list goes on).

May I suggest that if you are going to make statements about what browsers you use, you do so from a computer that isn't running Windows XP with a very outdated Firefox 4.0. It would probably help your argument as well if you were aware that IE9 was released in March 2011. Not "2 years ago."

Thank you for your opinion. I'm sorry you missed the point of the blog post, but I hope you've learned something useful today instead.

Re: Why IE9, Windows Phone 7 and Windows can’t replace my Chrome, Android, Google Apps combination

Alki — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 05:54:21 -0000

What a useless article. You have not in any way said why exactly or mentioned any specific tasks that Chrome and android beat IE9 and windows phone 7. I think you're just a sensationalist fan boy not because you went on and on (without any concrete point) about how good Chrome, Gmail and android are - everyone is entitled to their preferences - but the whole article just clearly exposes your ignorance of IE9/Windows phone (and even Apple/iTunes).
From the very first sentence, you just showed you utter lack of knowledge of Tech in general and yet people are meant to take your opinion seriously? IE9 came out like what...2 years ago? And you're proud to say "i used IE9 today for the 1st time..." like that makes you cool?! Forget the fact that it has even bigger browser marketshare than Chrome, you, who is supposedly a Tech Writer, have only just tried it and (did not come here to give us your first impressions but) immediately decided that its not comparable to your beloved Chrome which you probably took weeks to get the hang of.
I have used Chrome as my default browser for the last few years and sometime last year installed IE9 just to see what its like (i also installed Safari for the same reason and i've had Firefox long before Chrome came out). I also set Bing as my default search engine on it just to try that out too. I have been using IE9 and Bing since. Now this obviously wont be the case for everyone, there might be functions on Chrome which aren't available on IE9 (for instance, i'm not a 100% sure, but i don't think you can bookmark your whole browsing session with IE9 without bookmarking each tab individually - which isn't exactly something most people ever have a need for, but if you ever did have to save your whole browsing session and had, say, 30 tabs open, would be quite annoying) but for simple everyday use, i think IE9 is extremely capable and like you rightly mentioned, much nicer to look at.
To end it all, your argument changes from 'why Chrome, Gmail and android are better' to basically talking about the business model of Google - talking about open source! what has that got to do with the argument?

Re: How to deal with Bandwidth Bandits

Wez — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 06:09:23 -0000

live audience loved it.

Wez

Re: How to deal with Bandwidth Bandits

kinthiri — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 02:29:43 -0000

Performed in front of a live audience :-)

Re: How to deal with Bandwidth Bandits

Dave — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 17:55:26 -0000

Goatse it and screenshot the forum signatures once done please! - Chopper

Re: Google Plus Adds Games, Gives Away Your Private Info

tannercampbell — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 08:43:03 -0000

Oh boy. It's the internet, the global community, if you don't want these things known about yourself then use a pseudonym (which Google now allows), create a separate gmail address, and fake your profile info. If you're really THAT concerned about it. In my opinion ... this is a global community, as I said up there, and if you don't want to be part of it you can absolutely choose not to be. It's all optional.

Re: Google Plus Adds Games, Gives Away Your Private Info

Carole Rice — Sat, 13 Aug 2011 10:27:43 -0000

Great article and my concern too.

Re: My digital lifestyle and why I am so excited for your future

One of the Trevs — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 05:26:55 -0000

Even an old fart can get something out of digital technology! I always loose the paper, can usually find it in bits and bytes! Got to get digital TV sorted now. Maybe when I'm on the pension I'll have time if the altzhi ... what was I saying???

Re: Google Plus – A very good start

Madeleine Begun Kane — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 15:39:49 -0000

Thanks for your insightful comments. I'm inclined to agree with you.

Re: Public response to Telecom problems unreasonable

kinthiri — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 01:08:40 -0000

I think you're wrong in your assessment, Mike. Telecom has not had a monopoly on the mobile market since Vodafone bought out BellSouth in 1998. At the time, the Commerce Commission forced them to sell to Vodafone the cellular bands they had been leasing to BellSouth up to that point. Since then, it has been a very significant downhill slide for Telecom in the mobile market.

Its interesting you bring up BT in the UK. Mr Reynolds thats now at the head of Telecom was previously in charge of BT during the period when BT was forced to unbundle the local loop and allow wholesale access to the land lines. BT had much the same reputation that Telecom has here and have successfully managed to turn around their reputation, much as Telecom has been doing for nearly 3 years here.

However, like Telecom, BT never had an exclusive monopoly in the mobile market. In fact, other big telcos like Virgin, Orange, 3 and so on had been doing very well in the mobile market and BT was never the dominant player. Much as Telecom has not been dominant since BellSouth sold out to Vodafone.

People have this massive anger against Telecom for past misdeeds performed during a phase when they were the incumbent in the land lines. However, that is no longer the case either. Telecom are now forced by law to offer wholesale prices to their competitors at essentially the same rates as they sell to their Retail company. That is why there was a very significant separation of the company into multiple divisions that are each run as independent companies. They have paid the price for their behaviour during the 1990s and early 2000's.

As for cost of internet. Yes, I agree, we still pay significantly high prices here. But that is not Telecom's fault alone anymore. Orcon, Vodafone and Telstra could all significantly drop their prices with very little hurt to their bottom line. However, all the companies maintain the status quo because its very good for their bottom line. What incentive does Telecom have to do so when the others aren't going to either? A good example is Telstra Saturn on the Kapiti Coast.

Telecom has every right to profit from their business. They are a publicly traded company in which anyone can buy shares. Their first priority, as with any and every business, is to their investors and stock holders. If a customer doesn't like the way they do business today, the customer has lots of choices and can easily take their business elsewhere in today's market.

But to take your attitude and complain that because they've done bad things in the past, they should suffer indefinitely, and people should take delight in their woe, is just wrong. They have spent the past 3 years trying to make up for the mistakes that were made when Theresa Gattung was head of the company. And as someone who used to be a very vocal critic of the company, I personally think they have made amazing strides.

As for your comment about coverage... Vodafone definitely does not have a better coverage than Telecom. Not by any stretch of the imagination. Take a drive down the west coast of the South Island or the lower east coast of the North Island and you'll see what I mean. Vodafone might have better coverage in the larger urban areas where the majority of people are (although I think thats mostly subjective, I'd call them about even now days) but Telecom has a much bigger rural coverage than Vodafone. Telecom has also historically had a much more stable network.

Vodafone suffers outages as well. The primary difference is they have a GSM network to fall back on when the UMTS network goes offline. And because the majority of UMTS devices are also backwards compatible with GMS networks, its seamless to pretty much everyone except the mobile data users. Telecom don't have that option. So when there is a glitch in their UMTS network, everyone notices it.

Sorry dude, but your arguments just do not wash. They're emotive and based on past transgressions. You're essentially hanging Telecom for deeds they've already paid a huge price over. Thats not fair, by any stretch of the imagination.

Re: Public response to Telecom problems unreasonable

Nikki — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 22:33:27 -0000

Reaping benefits of no Competition?? Sorry?!?!? Voda have been the market leader in mobile share for almost the last 10 years??? How is that having "no competition?" It isn't about price? It's about the fact that people are emotionally looking at the issues instead of accepting what has happened and accepting that people are actually trying to fix it instead of lying and bullshitting as the previous management have and moving on. Hell most people this has affected aren't as angry as people who haven't been affected by the outages at all? How does that even make sense?? Please someone tell me because to be honest unless you LIVE in the South Island and use an XT phone or it severely impacted you because you just HAD to contact someone who had no internet or landline and only an XT phone in the South Island (or Taupo South to be specific ) - it's really not even something worth commenting on is it?

Re: Public response to Telecom problems unreasonable

mike — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 21:56:38 -0000

i think its not just this tho. telecom hav been screwing over nzers forever whether its the price of their phones to the insane internet prices. vodafone do the same but atlast you get the coverage. if u compare it to the uk. same has hapned, british telecom is useless aswell. they were reaping the benefits of no competition for so long. now thrs competition why should peopl put up with it? i dont agree with what has hapened to th staff. no one should go through that but its telecoms own doing.