The great thing about Software

In software today you can "drop it in and see what happens" and if it explodes into a thousand pieces, you know you have to go back and re-think it. I keep having to remind myself that software is different. There's zero cost to such an explosion, if you have a backup copy of everything of course. It's quite easy to try, try and try again.

The best software products are applications that do things users care about.

Back in the 80s it was Wordstar, dBASE and then Superbase/Access. Lotus 1-2-3 had a macro language, it was weak, but it was widely used because 1-2-3 was so popular with users. Today it's WordPress.

The best one of all of course is JavaScript, a very bizarre language in a totally underpowered environment that reaches into every nook and cranny of the modern world. It's not an easy environment to work with, you'd never design one that worked that way, but the draw of all the users makes up for its sins. It's just amazing to see the collective energy and ambition of the JavaScript community. I've been programming a long time, on a lot of platforms, and have never seen anything like this. See fotodesignarri for an example.

AWS Enterprise Summit, Frankfurt

Amazon, Google, Twitter, Facebook, Apple ...

How would you define the amazing companies that are so often quoted in presentations? Those companies that innovate and create and make great products… What do they have in common?

They all share a lot of small things done right. Everything matters, and everything adds up. That’s the message of this paragraph: there are no shortcuts.

What' s different about the above companies is that they are learning machines. They have an intense bias to action and a high tolerance for risk, expressed through frequent experimentation and product iteration. They hack together products and services, test them and improve them, while their legacy competetion edits project plans in Powerpoint.

Now that we know, we just need to leave our own mark in the world. In the Cloud.

Zum Beispiel hier in Deutschland: Cliqz in Offenburg.

(Die Cliqz GmbH ist ein Münchner Startup mit 62 kreativen Köpfen aus 26 Ländern. Unsere Motivation ist es, dich schneller und sicherer durch das Internet zu navigieren. Die Cliqz GmbH ist eine Mehrheitsbeteiligung der Burda GmbH.)

Und hier die Presentationen der AWS Summit.

Siehe insbesondere die von Marc Al-Hames, Co-CEO, cliqz.com (Burda) und Timo-Klaus Barthelmes, Head of Digital Innovation, Aesculap AG.

Thirsty fish

The central problem is not that...

You think too highly of yourself

Nor is it that you think too lowly of yourself

Instead, it is that you think constantly 

of yourself.

-From "Aphorisms for Thirsty Fish" by Wu Hsin.

Written 2,500 years ago, and yet, it feels like it could’ve been written yesterday. 

Happy St. Patrick's day Joyce!

 

Sportlerehrung in Trossingen

Es ist ein kleines Jubiläum gewesen: Zum 25. Mal haben die Stadt Trossingen und die Sportvereine ihre erfolgreichsten Sportler ausgezeichnet. Und jeder, der herausgestochen ist mit seiner beeindruckenden Leistung erhielt als Dankeschön und Anerkennung neben der Urkunde noch einen Gutschein für den Eintritt wahlweise in die Troase, ins Auberlehaus oder ins Harmonikamuseum.

„Es ist schön, dass so viele aktiv Sport treiben“, erklärte Bürgermeister Dr. Clemens Meier. "Die Stadt gebe jedes Jahr fast eine Million Euro für den Sport aus, für Vereinszuschüsse und für die Sanierung der Hallen. Trossingen sei „auch eine Sport-Stadt“.

Ob Ringer, Läufer, Fechter, Kegler, Handballer, Reiter, Karateka oder Leichtathlet – sie alle haben wieder Großes geleistet und durften nun den Beifall des großen Publikums in vollen Zügen genießen. Denn sie verhelfen mit ihren großartigen Leistungen der Stadt Trossingen auch zu Aufmerksamkeit über die Kreisgrenzen hinaus und standen deshalb zu Recht im Mittelpunkt.