What does Bill Gates know about raising chickens?

chickBill Gates is a blogger, did you know that? His blog is called Gates Notes and generally covers areas of interest not only to Bill but also to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which means there’s more coverage of malaria than Microsoft. His latest post that a reader pointed out to me today is about raising chickens, which Bill says he’d do if he was a poor woman in Africa.

I’ll wait while you follow the link to read the post, just don’t forget to come back. And while you are there be sure to watch the video…

For those who don’t bother to read the post, BillG thinks […]

By |June 10th, 2016|2016|80 Comments
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My first Seeking Alpha post ran today

IMG_0826 (1)I know many readers are tired of my (too) many columns about IBM. So I won’t be posting the latest one here at all. It’s over on the Seeking Alpha investor blog. You can read it here. I mention the post simply because some readers do care about such things.

The Seeking Alpha post is about IBM earnings and how the company is using old business to prop-up new business and not being at all upfront about what’s really happening.

The Seeking Alpha column is also a complaint about blog posts related to earnings in general because they are often written by people who think they know a lot about financial numbers but clearly know […]

By |May 31st, 2016|2016, analytics, Business, Companies, Family, Gadgets, Media|51 Comments
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The Problem with Analytics

IBM-Bigdata-AnalyticsThere is a difference between knowledge and understanding. Knowledge typically comes down to knowing facts while understanding is the application of knowledge to the mastery of systems. You can know a lot while understanding very little. Just as an example, IBM’s Watson artificial intelligence system that defeated the TV Jeopardy champs a few years ago knew all there was to know about Jeopardy questions but didn’t really understand anything. Ask Watson to apply to removing your appendix its knowledge of hundreds of medical questions and you’d be disappointed and probably dead. That’s the problem with most analytics, which is why it can be a hard sell.

The answer to this problem, we’re told, […]

By |May 23rd, 2016|2016, analytics, cloud computing, Companies, strategy|126 Comments
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Apple and Didi is about foreign cash and the future of motoring

DidiAppApple this week invested $1 billion in Xiaoju Kuaizhi Inc., known as Didi — by far the dominant car-hailing service in China with 300 million customers. While Apple has long admitted being interested in car technology and has deals to put Apple technology into many car lines, this particular investment seems to have been a surprise to most everyone. Analysts and pundits are seeing the investment as a way for Apple to get automotive metadata or even to please the Chinese government. I think it’s more than that. I think it is a potential answer to Apple’s huge problem of foreign cash and a grab for leadership in what may well be […]

By |May 14th, 2016|2016, Companies, Finance, Government, Industry, strategy, Technology|62 Comments
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Why wind turbines have three blades

bigturbine00:17:12:16

Steve Jobs

… You know throughout the years in business I found something which was I’d always ask why you do things and the answer you invariably get is oh that’s just the way it’s done.  Nobody knows why they do what they do.  Nobody thinks about things very deeply in business.  That’s what I found…

The quote above from just over 17 minutes into Steve Jobs — The Lost Interview is for me the greatest insight and the biggest idea in the whole movie. I find myself applying it to many things. You can, too. Just ask why?

In this column I’ll try […]

By |May 6th, 2016|2016, Technology|108 Comments
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