Speaking in Tech

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen, Ed Saipetch and Sarah Vela. Our special guest this week is Christopher Lynch, Partner at Atlas Venture and former CEO and President of Vertica (which was sold to HP last year) and Acopia (which was sold to F5 in 2007)

This week we discuss...

Housekeeping:

“Speaking in Tech” will be podcasting from the Dell Storage Forum coming up June 11 - 13 in Boston as a dedicated session at the conference grilling Dell executives in front of a live audience 

After we introduce Christopher Lynch, we discuss...

  • A VC’s view of the Facebook IPO
  • Facebook’s impact on other VC’s and irrational investments
  • Jump back to Chris and his roots growing up in Boston
  • From punker to VC
  • From DEC, to Prominent, to Lucent
  • The leap to Arrowpoint and eventual $5.7 Billion acquisition by Cisco 
  • As President & CEO of Acopia Networks, sold to F5 for $210M in 2007
  • As President & CEO of Vertica Systems, sold to HP last year for $320M
  • How ex-yahoo CEO Scott Thompson helped marry HP and Vertica
  • Thoughts on Leo as a leader? From your vantage point, what did the transfer to Meg look like?
  • Now at Atlas Venture focusing on Big Data

Next week we'll be concluding our special discussion with Chris Lynch in Part II

Direct download: SiT-9.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 2:07am EDT

After catching up with Ed and Sarah, we start off the podcast with an interview with Eric Eyre of the Charleston Gazette about the paper’s investigation into a suspicious $24 million Cisco router purchase by the State of West Virginia using U.S. Federal Stimulus Funds for the purpose of “homeland security”. The enterprise routers, which are sized for at least 500 users and are typically used for thousands of users, were purchased for schools and libraries with a single computer.

The original story appeared in the Charleston Gazette: http://wvgazette.com/News/201205050057

In the interview we learn:

  • A Cisco rep confirmed the routers were dramatically oversized
  • At one library, the router cost more than the structure of the library itself
  • The routers were purchased by the state without a formal Request for Proposal by a single person after consulting with a Cisco salesman
  • The Cisco salesman retired after the $24 Million deal
  • Of the 1,064 routers purchased, 366 were never installed and are sitting in a warehouse


We get unwound with our special guest this week - Fred Nix, a vSpecialist at EMC

  • We dig into what a vSpecialist really does
  • We explore how critical vSpecialists are to the culture of EMC
  • How EMC has evolved internally
  • Recap Fred’s skiing accident


Finally, we wrap up with “10 Big Questions” for Fred Nix.

Direct download: SiT-8.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 2:27am EDT

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen, Ed Saipetch and Sarah Vela. Our special guest this week is John Mark Troyer, Director, Social Media Evangelism at VMware.

This week we discuss...

Housekeeping:

  • Due to a schedule conflict the podcast from HP Discover had to be canceled
  • “Speaking in Tech” will be podcasting from the Dell Storage Forum coming up June 11 - 13 in Boston as a dedicated session at the conference grilling Dell executives in front of a live audience 

In other news... 

  • VMware View 5.1 announced  
  • When did VDI turn into a dirty word? 
  • What in the hell is VMware Project Octopus? 
  • VMware Certifies vSphere(TM) 5 to Run on Open Compute Project Architecture 
  • VMworld coming up August 27-30 in San Francisco 
  • 10 Big Questions for John Troyer 


10 Big Questions for John Troyer 

Direct download: SiT-7.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 1:36am EDT

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen, Ed Saipetch and Sarah Vela. Our special guest this week is Mark Twomey, also known as Storagezilla.

This week we discuss...

EMC World in Vegas is coming up

Apples Taxes
The New York Times explains “How Apple Sidesteps Billions in Global Taxes” -
It’s not a a European Sex Club trick: “Apple was a pioneer of an accounting technique known as the “Double Irish With a Dutch Sandwich”

Google vs. Oracle:
Former Sun CEO: Jonathan Schwartz, Sun Founder: Scott McNealy and Java creator James Gosling contradict each other and demonstrate why Sun Microsystems was a disaster.

Klouchebag is the rage... this week http://klouchebag.com
Klouchebag is the Anti-Klout score based on Anger, Retweet Abuse, Social Apps and English Misuse

Twitter account of the week is @PinlessPics and the blog of the week is http://textfromdog.tumblr.com/


Direct download: SiT-6.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 11:45pm EDT

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen, Ed Saipetch and Sarah Vela. Our special guest this week is Chris Evans - The Storage Architect.

This week we discuss...

  • Sarah comes back
  • Our special guest, Chris Evans - The Storage Architect
  • Greg gets his Nexus Galaxy.... but the trip to the store didn’t go well
  • Ed addresses recent complaints about his language on the show
  • Chris Evans becomes the official “Speaking in Tech” Ambassador to the UK
  • Dell Storage Forum and HP Discover in June

Megaupload case starts falling apart

According to The Register, the case against Kim Dotcom appears to be falling apart because “Megaupload has never been served with papers in the US”.

  • Difference in privacy laws between the US and the UK
  • Will file sharing site like Dropbox and Google Drive be impacted by file sharing pirates?

All of a sudden Software-defined Networking (SDN) is the rage and Cisco is getting kicked in the press

  • How SDN’s are different from traditional networks
  • OpenFlow ecosysteam
  • Will virtual networking and SDN’s achieve the prominence of server virtualization or will it look more like storage virtualization?


“10 Big Questions” with Chris Evans

Direct download: SiT-5.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 12:54am EDT

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen, Ed Saipetch and Sarah Vela. Our special guest this week is Brian Katz from Sanofi Pharmaceuticals, where he is in charge of the mobile engineering group.

This week we discuss...

  • Sarah goes AWOL after only 3 episodes
  • Live podcasts coming up in June at Dell Storage Forum in Boston and HP Discover in Las Vegas

Special Guest this week is Brian Katz 

Brian works at Sanofi Pharmaceuticals, a global pharmaceutical company where he is in charge of the mobile engineering group. You can follow him on twitter @bmkatz and on his blog at http://ascrewsloose.com

This week we talk about...

  • Google Drive Launching Next Week!
  • Google Drive details: 5 GB for free, launching next week for Mac, Windows, Android and iOS
  • Various internet reports claim that Google will be launching Google Drive next week with 5GB - more than double the 2GB that come with the popular Dropbox. From the reports, Google Drive will work “in desktop folders” on Mac, Windows, iOS and Android.
  • Meanwhile, a leaked VMware Memo Outlines View 5.1, Project Octopus Launch Plans, the cloud storage service referred to as "Dropbox for the enterprise," by the end of June, according to the leaked document.”
  • Katz on Cunsumerization: “You want me to do what?!? A mobile strategy challenge!” http://www.ascrewsloose.com/2012/03/14/you-want-me-to-do-what/
  • Are “acceptable use” policies effective?
  • Mobile security: The distinction between iOS devices and Android on security and compliance
  • BYOD: It’s not about saving money
  • 10 Big Questions for Brian 
Direct download: SiT-4.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 1:58am EDT

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen, Ed Saipetch and Sarah Vela. 

This week we discuss...

  • Eddie on the west coast
  • Sarah dispells pregnancy rumors
  • Greg complains about Best Buy 
  • Facebook snaps up Instagram photo-sharing app for $1 billion
  • Is this the beginning of "Bubble 2.0"?
  • Facebook mobile app sucks
  • Cloud Wars erupt
  • Citrix goes open-source with CloudStack
  • Cloud confusion reigns 
  • 10 Big Questions for Ed Saipetch

Direct download: SiT-3.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 1:07am EDT

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen, Ed Saipetch and Sarah Vela. 

This week we discuss...

  • Last week was a good first week, it only goes downhill from here
  • Thanks to The Register for support

Creepy "Girls Around Me" app has Been Yanked From The App Store

“Girls Around Me — the creepy geo-location app that allowed you to stalk and find personal information about girls in your neighborhood without their knowledge — has been pulled from the iOS App Store.”

  • Dudes have been doing this for awhile with nearly every geolocation app and especially with newer apps like Banjo, Glancee and Highlight and even basic apps like Facebook, fourssquare and Twitter
  • Every geolocation app is a potential creeper app
  • Sarah is tired of the predatory dudes/damsels in distress framework that ends up occurring in these discussions. 

GigaOm: "Systems to handle big data might be this generation’s moon landing"

“Gather the kids are the TV, were going to watch some real compute power here...” The moonlanding was an event... this “big data” project is the means to event, possibly some significant discoveries but it isn’t by itself an event on scale with the moon landing.

Dell buys Wyse

“Since Wyse is private and apparently not huge, Dell isn’t disclosing how much it is paying. Wyse is big enough to have sold more than 20 million thin-client systems worldwide; it claims that 200 million people touch its products every day. It sold a million units last year, and has a strong presence in the health care and financial services sectors, both of which have a lot of appeal for Dell generally.”

Apple’s IPad Is No. 1, Even With Heat, Consumer Reports Says

“The new iPad’s high-resolution screen provides the best detail and color accuracy of all tablets Consumer Reports has seen"

Sarah nails Greg with 10 Big Questions

Direct download: SiT-2.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 1:14am EDT

Speaking in Tech - Episode 1

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen, Ed Saipetch and Sarah Vela. 

This week we discuss...

  • New intro music
  • What happened to Nekkid Tech
  • “US gov agencies & colleges are now demanding access to Facebook accounts”

According to a report by MSNBC, US government agencies and colleges are now demanding access to applicants’ Facebook accounts — through friending and/or actual password requests. No longer can users hide behind Facebook’s privacy options, because if you want a job or a college degree, you have to give up the goods.

  • “Amazon, Eucalyptus team on cloud compatibility” 

Looking to build out its portfolio of cloud services, Amazon has partnered with Eucalyptus to deliver an Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) product. As part of the deal, Amazon Web Services (AWS) is letting the IaaS provider tap into its application programming interfaces (APIs). Eucalyptus says it is now “fully compatible with the Amazon Web Services API, which means you can use or reuse your existing AWS-compatible tools, images (AMIs), and scripts to manage your own hybrid and on-premise clouds.”

  • “New iPad users slowed by expensive 4G network rates” 

Users quickly are discovering the new iPad gobbles data from cellular networks at a monstrous rate. Some find their monthly allotment can be eaten up after watching a two-hour movie.

  • The return of "10 Big Questions"

Sarah vela goes on the hot seat

Direct download: SiT-1.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 12:04pm EDT

Hosted by Greg Knieriemen with trusty sidekicks Ed Saipetch (@edasi),  Sarah Vela (@orchid8) and our gurest, Tom Petrocelli (@tompetrocelli).

This week we discuss...

  • SXSW Recap, Spring Break for Silicon Valley
  • Emergence of the "Social Enterprise"?
  • "Social Enterprise" tools
  • Tom and Greg bump heads on quality and timing of Forrester research
  • Heads in the sand on Google privacy
Direct download: NT23.mp3
Category:Technology -- posted at: 10:44pm EDT