November 2004 – Page 14 – To Talk of Many Things

Personas drive business strategy at Best Buy (or vice versa)

Personas drive business strategy at Best Buy (or vice versa). Earlier in the spring I blogged about Best Buy using personas. It’s interesting to me to see how those personas have started to permeate Best Buy culture – with customers being labeled with the name of the persona, as discussed in this Wall Street Journal… Continue reading Personas drive business strategy at Best Buy (or vice versa)

Personal Information Architectures

Personal Information Architectures. Gene has an interesting post about personal information architectures, something he spoke about at the recent Future of IA Retreat. While the recent interest in social classification and folksonomy is a large reason to talk about personal info. architecture, I think that Thomas Vanderwal has also been talking about the issue for… Continue reading Personal Information Architectures

Attorney General and Commerce Secretary Resign From Cabinet

Attorney General and Commerce Secretary Resign From Cabinet. John Ashcroft and Don Evans are the first members of President Bush's cabinet to leave as he heads into his second term. By DAVID STOUT. [NYT > Home Page]

Fiber to my home

Fiber to my home. A few weeks ago Verizon announced that they were rolling out fiber to the premises in parts of more states, including Essex and Middlesex counties in Massachusetts. I live in Middlesex, and when I stepped out on the porch to take in the mail this afternoon what should I see but… Continue reading Fiber to my home

Lind on generations in warfare.

Second Generation warfare is relevant to us today because the United States Army and Marine Corps learned Second Generation warfare from the French during and after World War I. It remains the American war of war, as we are seeing in Afghanistan and Iraq: to Americans, war means “putting steel on target.” Aviation has replaced artillery as the source of most firepower, but otherwise, (and despite the Marine's formal doctrine, which is Third Generation maneuver warfare) the American military today is as French as white wine and brie. At the Marine Corps' desert warfare training center at 29 Palms, California, the only thing missing is the tricolor and a picture of General Gamelin in the headquarters.

I suggest that the war we have seen thus far (in Iraq) is merely a powder train leading to the magazine. The magazine is Fourth Generation war by a wide variety of Islamic non-state actors, directed at America and Americans (and local governments friendly to America) everywhere. The longer America occupies Iraq, the greater the chance that the magazine will explode. If it does, God help us all.
[John Robb's Weblog

Lind on generations in warfare. Second Generation warfare is relevant to us today because the United States Army and Marine Corps learned Second Generation warfare from the French during and after World War I. It remains the American war of war, as we are seeing in Afghanistan and Iraq: to Americans, war means “putting steel… Continue reading Lind on generations in warfare.

Second Generation warfare is relevant to us today because the
United States Army and Marine Corps learned Second Generation warfare
from the French during and after World War I. It remains the American
war of war, as we are seeing in Afghanistan and Iraq: to Americans, war
means “putting steel on target.” Aviation has replaced artillery as the
source of most firepower, but otherwise, (and despite the Marine's
formal doctrine, which is Third Generation maneuver warfare) the
American military today is as French as white wine and brie. At the
Marine Corps' desert warfare training center at 29 Palms, California,
the only thing missing is the tricolor and a picture of General Gamelin
in the headquarters.

I suggest that the war we have seen thus far (in Iraq) is merely
a powder train leading to the magazine. The magazine is Fourth
Generation war by a wide variety of Islamic non-state actors, directed
at America and Americans (and local governments friendly to America)
everywhere. The longer America occupies Iraq, the greater the chance
that the magazine will explode. If it does, God help us all.

[John Robb's Weblog

John Robb's Weblog

Here's a good question. What will change over the next four years? What issues will we be facing in the next election? [John Robb's Weblog]

CSM

CSM. Iraq's growing insurgency has no shortage of funds, and it is waging ever more lethal and sophisticated attacks against a US-led coalition still hampered by a paucity of on-the-ground intelligence. “We just don't believe there's any lack of funding,” says a senior US military intelligence officer with extensive experience in Iraq. Indeed, the insurgency… Continue reading CSM

China Checkmates the US in the Middle East

China Checkmates the US in the Middle East. AT. China locked in part of its future energy needs with a long-term arrangement with Iran via a $100 billion 25-year deal (for 10 million tons of LNG a year). It is expected to increase to 15-20 million tons a year. An additional agreement on oil worth… Continue reading China Checkmates the US in the Middle East

Introduction to MSH

Introduction to MSH. System administration has always been Windows' Achilles' heel. The graphical tools that simplify basic chores just get in the way when there's heavy lifting to be done. And CMD.EXE, the hapless command shell, pales in comparison to the Unix shells that inspired it. Win32 Perl has been my ace in the hole,… Continue reading Introduction to MSH

The state of rich Web apps

InfoWorld: The state of rich Web apps. Unlike a Web application that manages state information almost entirely on the server, an rich Internet application achieves a more balanced distribution of that information between server and client. The benefits that flow from this arrangement can include responsiveness, context preservation, and offline capability. [Tomalak's Realm]