Archive for the 'Personal' Category

A Mormon Author’s Perspective on Mormon Church vs. WikiLeaks

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 14-May-2008
in Personal
. Comments

Jesse Stay, an online friend of mine, has weighed in on the controversy surrounding the release of copyright material owned by the LDS church by Wikileaks.  He says,

As an author, and Social Media developer, and Mormon, I thought I’d pipe in on what I think of the WikiLeaks issues going on. It’s as simple as if J.K. Rowling were to have her content posted and shared on WikiLeaks - she’d be doing the same thing! This is a matter of copyright, not secrecy.

I encourage you to read his full blog post.  Excellent.

read more | digg story

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Tribute to the late LDS President Hinckley

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 4-February-2008
in Personal
. Comments
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A very nice tribute of President Gordon B. Hinckley who passed away last week by Glenn Beck.

Why You Need to be Organised to be Creative

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 10-November-2007
in Business Excellence, Personal and Work
. Comments

Mark McGuinness over at the Business of Design Online blog has written a series of articles (see links bel0w), on getting organized and improving creativity.  Often many of us pitch creativity versus organization and structure erroneously.  I believe organization and structure create (pun intended) an environment where creativity can flourish.  Here is was Mark thinks:

There, I’ve said it. Organisation, structure, discipline and habit – these often seen as threats to creativity. Not to mention corporate-sounding phrases such as ‘time management’ or ‘workflow’. We like to think of creativity as a space for untrammelled imagination, free from all constraints. Yet while freedom, rule-breaking and inspiration are undoubtedly essential to the creative process, the popular image of creativity overlooks another aspect: examine the life of any great artist and you will find evidence of hard work, discipline and a hard-won knowledge of the rules and conventions of their medium.

Here are links for articles 2 through 5.  This is a seven part series so be sure to catch the conclusion.

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Goodbye Myrio

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 31-October-2007
in Communications, Innovation, Personal and Work
. Comments

Myrio Logo

Dear friends and colleagues,

As I depart Nokia Siemens Networks (Myrio was acquired in 2005 by Siemens and is now subsidiary of Nokia Siemens Networks), today marks the end of an era for me–11 amazing years.

When we started working on the technologies that became Myrio, we had a
dream that one day companies all over the world would be delivering TV
services over IP. We were certainly not clairvoyant enough to predict how,
what is now called IPTV, would develop over the coming years, but we knew
the power of Internet combined with entertainment would create amazing new possibilities. Although IPTV seems so “well duh” now, this was not the case–even just 5 years ago.

I want to take this opportunity to thank each and every one of you for
believing in Myrio and the possibilities it created. We could not have done
it without you!

In 2005 Steve Jobs gave the commencement speech at Stanford.

Full text:

http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html

Youtube:

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I want to share a short excerpt from that speech. He said, “You’ve got to
find what you love. [sic]. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life,
and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great
work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you
haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the
heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it
just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you
find it. Don’t settle.”

Myrio and IPTV have most certainly been a labor of love.

As I sign off, I extend my best wishes to all of you.

Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish.

-ryan

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Why are we happy? Why aren’t we happy?

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 16-October-2007
in Personal
. Comments

Psychologist Dan Gilbert challenges the idea that we’ll be miserable if we don’t get what we want. Our “psychological immune system” lets us feel real, enduring happiness, he says, even when things don’t go as planned. He calls this kind of happiness “synthetic happiness,” and he says it’s “every bit as real and enduring as the kind of happiness you stumble upon when you get exactly what you were aiming for.”  This video is from the 2004 TED conference.

http://static.videoegg.com/ted/movies/DANGILBERT_high.flv

More conference information on TED can be found here.  The original video can be found here along with other great presentations.  I would encourage you to take some time and view as many as you can.

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Ready or Not, AT&T Sells Uverse

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 1-March-2007
in Microsoft and Work
. Comments

Om Malik, from Gigaom (see links on right), has written a piece on AT&T Uverse deployment of the Microsoft IPTV platform.

It is hard to get a grip on AT&T’s IPTV efforts. Dubbed Uverse, some say AT&T’s television service it is still stuck in neutral, plagued by technical problems. AT&T, however feels otherwise, and has started making a strong marketing push for the service, according to a report in San Antonio-Express News. The company claims that it has ironed out all the technical glitches and is now ready to take on the cable operators.

We’re ready to take our foot off the brake and step on the accelerator, John Stankey, AT&T’s group president for operations, said Tuesday. By the end of the year, we will be up and running in every significantly sized market where we operate.

Fascinating, since it was only a couple of months ago that the company’s tech troubles were highlighted in the Wall Street Journal, pointing to the problems with Microsoft IPTV software.

From everything I know from publicly available sources and people close to the Microsoft product, the Uverse deployment is stabilizing (apparently, enought that AT&T feels compelled to begin limited rollouts), however the actual deployed service will have far fewer features than AT&T had hoped for and an order of magnitude fewer features than the Microsoft marketing machine has been pitching for the past 2 years.

The actual Uverse product looks very little like what Microsoft has been showing to the market, at trade shows and other public events. Many features of dubious customer value, like “instant channel change” are conspicuously absent from the Uverse deployment. However, their absence is not by choice, but due to poor architectural choices and a poor understanding of service provider economics. It looks like Microsoft is learning the hard lessons about building a scalable IPTV solution–lessons the rest of us learned years ago. It would also appear AT&T is learning a tough lesson about listening to the Redmond marketing machine.

Unfortunately for AT&T, the next lessons will be even more painful as their “partner” begins competing with them for their own customers. Just look at what’s happening with Xbox Cinema on Xbox Live. Microsoft has gone to great lengths to ensure their brand remains prominent in their IPTV offering. There will be no question in the mind of Uverse users that they are using a Microsoft product (insert joke here).

The Uverse service gives Microsoft a prime opportunity to upsell subscribers to other Microsoft products like Media Center PCs, powered by Vista and mobile devices powered by Windows Mobile. These devices do not have to be connected to the AT&T Uverse service but connected directly to Microsoft “over the top” of AT&T.

Thus far, Microsoft has played nice (relatively speaking) with its service provider customers in the mobile arena. This is not surprising when you recognize that they have the financial resources and investor backing to be very very patient when entering new markets. However, just as the success of the iPod precipiated Microsoft dumping its “Plays for sure” partners and building their own “iPod killer”, the Zune, I believe the iPhone will inspire the monopolists in Redmond to take a harder stance with wireless operators and begin to push for concessions that give them more control over the mobile devices running Windows–just as they do on PCs today. The emphasis for Microsoft will shift from providing capabilities that give wireless operators the platform and toolsets to build compelling wireless features, to the virtues Windows Mobile for the wireless consumer. The service providers differentiation and value add will diminish to the point that the average mobile consumer won’t care from whom they get the service, but only that they have the latest version of Windows Mobile and Microsoft mobile applications (has anyone seen this movie before?).

This same fate awaits AT&T in their wireline business as their Uverse subscribers increasingly look for Windows and Windows applications, caring less and less about the network (and service provider) that delivers them. The next few years should be interesting.

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Why I joined the EFF

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 21-February-2007
in Content, DRM, Innovation, Personal and Politics
. Comments

EFF LogoRecently, I joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF). Some might equate the EFF the ACLU of the digital world. So, those of you that know my political leanings might ask, why? Let me try to explain.

Regular readers of this blog know that I work in the telecommunications industry. Specifically, for the last 10 years, I have been working to create products that allow telecommunications service providers (specifically telcos) to deliver broadcast quality video over Internet Protocol (IP) over their networks. Our customers, the service providers, demand we create innovations in IPTV which give them competitive differentiation over the incumbent video service providers–typically the MSO (Multiple Service Operator) the cable company, or the Direct to Home (DTH) satellite company. Our ability to deliver these innovations is constantly under threat from traditional media sources which continuously fight new technology. The EFF, is working to protect the rights of consumers to fair use which I believe protects our ability to innovate.

Does the EFF sometimes come into conflict with technology companies, yes. In many cases, the same companies that lead the innovation charge are also working with traditional media companies on schemes to “protect” digital content. Where this “protection” limits consumer freedom, the EFF steps in to fight for consumer rights. Interestingly, it appears to me, that wherein the EFF and technology companies are in conflict, such conflict is limited to the short-term interests (some would say shortsighted) of that company. Protection of consumer rights, is to the long-term benefit of all technology companies–whether they recognize this in their frenzy to generate quarterly results, depends on their ability to look beyond the numbers.

The EFF is fighting to protect consumer rights to fair use of content, whether it be in analog or digital formats.

Check out the Intellectual Property section of the EFF website. Two areas of particular interest are Digital Rights Management (DRM) and the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA). I encourage you to read the EFF information on both topics DRM and DMCA. For those of you who have PVRs or are contemplating a new HDTV purchase, the Digital Video Restrictions information is eye-opening.

EFF RSS Feeds can be found here.

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Urban Legends Reference Pages: 2006 Federal Excise Tax Credit

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 11-January-2007
in Communications, Personal and Politics
. Comments

According to the folks over at Snopes.com, this urban legend appears to be true.  They have a great explanation of the refund amounts as well as the reason almost everyone qualifies for this one time credit.  Make sure you take advantage of this and pass this along to everyone you know.
Urban Legends Reference Pages: 2006 Federal Excise Tax Credit

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Siemens vs. Microsoft on IPTV (Part One of Two)

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 6-January-2007
in Communications, Microsoft and Work
. Comments
Over at ITVT, there is a two part interview with representatives from Siemens and Microsoft debating their varying approaches to IPTV technologies and the market. Of course, I am biased as my team and I make many of the decisions about the Siemens approach to the market as well as many of the technology choices in our solution.
It will be very interesting to hear the Microsoft marketing machine as they respond to our perspective as captured in part one.   The Microsoft marketing machine has typically done a very good job in “responding” to critical reviews of their IPTV solution.
For those of you who don’t understand the approach Microsoft has taken in IPTV, it is typical Microsoft.  Take the best ideas from the market leaders (embrace), and modify the established approach to enhance your competitive position (extend).  Classic Microsoft.
For IPTV,  Microsoft used several plays from this well worn playbook. For example, Microsoft embraced much of the established ideas in IPTV, but they created a new concept they called “instant channel change”.  Before Microsoft came into the market, no one knew they needed and “instant” channel change, but Microsoft’s marketing team convinced the market that IPTV could be better only if it included instantaneous channel changing.  In my view, this is not exactly the kind of disruptive feature a telco needs to convince a customer to leave cable or satellite and move to IPTV.
What Microsoft did not tell customers, was that to achieve “instant” channel change,  it would require a completely revamped broadcast architecture, deviating from accepted IPTV architectures, extensive use of unicast, and a complete dependency on Microsoft technology (codec, DRM, streaming servers etc.).  Complete technology lock in and reliance on Microsoft.  Who really benefited from instant channel change, well Microsoft, of course.  As we and others began to question the market value of such a feature, the market took a critical look at Microsoft’s approach.
In the end, the technological complexity (think cost, $$$) required to achieve this effect and the fact that it relied on Microsoft server software (which everyone knows is not even close to carrier grade), could not be justified by the business case.  Will instant channel change come to a TV near you, possibly, but a number of vendors have shown how to achieve the same result in a standards based fashion–with no Microsoft lock in.
Instant channel change is just one example, but Microsoft has been very quiet about most of their competitive differentiators as of late.  Why?  Well, they are under the gun to get AT&T working beyond trial subscribers.  Of course the Microsoft marketing machine would have us all believe they have “launched”, well that is a matter of perspective.  My belief is that AT&T cannot deploy anywhere, anytime to any subscriber nor can they market the service at full speed because Microsoft is still working through service debilitating bugs and cannot show the scalability that AT&T needs to go full speed ahead.

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Can!

Published
by
Ryan Petty
on 27-December-2006
in Personal
. Comments

Rick Reilly: Strongest Dad In the World From Sports Illustrated, By Rick Reilly [SI Premium Subscription required]

[Article text for the rest of us] http://cjcphoto.com/can/

I try to be a good father. Give my kids mulligans. Work nights to pay For their text messaging. Take them to swimsuit shoots.

But compared with Dick Hoyt, I suck.

Eighty-five times he’s pushed his disabled son, Rick, 26.2 miles in Marathons. Eight times he’s not only pushed him 26.2 miles in a Wheelchair but also towed him 2.4 miles in a dinghy while swimming and Pedaled him 112 miles in a seat on the handlebars–all in the same day.

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Continue reading ‘Can!’

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