Sun Buys Lustre - A File System!!!

OK, so I'm cynical, but am I to believe that this is mere coincidence?  Netapp sues Sun for patent infringement over Sun's ZFS file system.  Sun sort of denies that it infringed, tries to change the subject, and attempts to incite a civil war between Texas and California.  A week later Sun buys a file system company.

Once again, let me stress that I am no lawyer - but like many (not all) lawyers, I do have several humanesque traits - such as common sense (and at least two nice suits).  If nothing else, does not the timing of this make you scratch your head?

The move is pretty good as a hedge in case a judge slams Sun with an injunction and won't let them ship ZFS - especially since I figure a big revenue hit for a quarter or so makes them technically insolvent - so if that happens they will need to be able to ship something.  Lustre has long been an accepted, well utilized file system within that bastion of capitalism and business computing - the scientific community.  I don't think it runs unless the admin either wears a white lab coat, or sandals in the basement of an academic lab.  I have no idea how easy or hard it would be to drop Lustre in to replace ZFS, I can only surmise that there weren't many other options at hand, though I'm sure they could also have used Redhat or Suse's file systems.

Regardless, it sure doesn't instill rip roaring confidence in their defense of the Netapp case.  Sun does have a habit of doing things like this with no regard for what others might think, or even without how it might possibly affect their legal stance, so it's hard to say.  I mean, it's not like they just OEM'ed Microsoft Windows server or anything...........Ooops.  I'm starting to feel like either I'm in the twilight zone, or the industry is just screwing with me.  Either way, cut it out.

Netapp vs. Sun - War Of The Blogs

First, Jonathan Schwartz, long time blogger and person not afraid to say seemingly loony things at any given moment (which I like, fyi) tossed out this one in response to the lawsuit.  The JS blog fans seem to like it.  I like the fact that he intentionally spells "Netapps" instead of Netapp (and do NOT try to make me believe it was a simple error - I learned such moves from Dick Egan et al in the day, masters of this game).  I don't buy any of his argument, but his fans clearly do.  Some compare Netapp to the evil EMC directly.  That ought to ruffle some feathers. 

Not to be out-blogged, Dave Hitz countered thusly with this.  This is a particularly excellent blog if for no other reason than Dave made up a word - Litigoperation.  I'm always looking for a new word.  (My son was very bummed to find out Ginormous was made and official word, so he went on to create "togus" for totally bogus - he seems quite pleased with it thus far).

JS says Netapp never did something, Dave pops up an email that seems to prove that false, and off we go.  Dave does get the best line of the match in with "For me, one of the most important rules of open source is that you give away things that belong to you."  That's just stellar.

Question:  is the stuff going on in public domain like this admissible as part of the proceedings?  In which case, would you not want to make sure you were accurate in your statements?  Just wondering.  Any lawyers out there??????

Finally, why is it that west coast law suits always remind me of 7th grade girl fights?  No offense, of course.  I got my arse kicked by a 7th grade girl.......

Greg Reyes, And The Red Sox.....

Greg Reyes, former CEO of Brocade, was convicted of 10 counts of fraud involving backdating stock options.  The practice, in case you are unaware, is when executives knowingly issue stock options in arrears, when a stock price was lower, to create instant value and wealth.

The practice, unfortunately, was widespread and far reaching.  Reyes is appealing, and continues to tout his innocence.  The Justice Department clearly went after him with all it's weapons, as an example and poster child for how this corporate badness just won't be tolerated.

In everything I've read, Reyes didn't really profit personally from the act - he was already loaded.

So, this chapter continues, but it does hopefully show the next generation that they will either have to resign themselves to doing things the right way, or find new ways to cheat.  I like Greg personally.  He is a tall, rich, charismatic person who embodied the "go go days" of the storage market.  He came from money, made his own on top, and now is facing 20 years in jail. 

Which gets me to the Red Sox.   You skate through some times, when everything is smooth sailing and you can do no wrong.  Brocade and Greg did that thru the gold rush.  The Sox were up 12.5 games a month ago - and goofy fans said "it's all over!"  Party on.  The problem is, if it's too good to last - it won't.  Now the stinkin Yankees are 5 games out, and I'm losing sleep. 

You can't skate in this world - you gotta put in the effort even when you are winning.  How many companies lost the magic they had because they got cocky or arrogant and figured it would never end?  We act like it becomes our "right" to succeed.

Here's 43 years of chemically depleted knowledge for you:   Don't cheat.  Don't lie.  Never, ever think that anyone owes you your rightful place in life - you gotta earn it every day.  The worst is when you truly believe that you know better, or are above the law, or that since you are smarter and better looking, that little things like rules and morals don't apply to you.  Those are the people to stay away from. Those are the companies to run from.

The Sox better start playing the game the old fashioned way again, and get their heads out of the clouds, because I can't take another riches to rags NY ending.

Trip Report

Life is weird, thankfully.

Months ago I shot my mouth off to IBM storage mucky  muck Andy Monshaw about something or another, and the outcome was that we would go break bread, drink drink, and solve all problems.  If that didn't work, we'd do the former and I'd listen to him bash EMC.  Andy has an almost worrisome, deep-rooted hatred of the Hopkinton folks, and it's good fun to get him spun up on something they did or didn't do. Or might do.  Or might think about doing. 

So after endless schedule massaging by poor people on both our ends, a date was set for last Thursday in Manhattan.  Wouldn't you know that day was also going to end up to be Game 2 of the Franklin Little League National League playoffs - and the Dodgers, of which my 12-year old Jason is a proud member of, were up 1 Game to nill.  I was bumming that I was going to miss the game, but a date is a date.  Plus, we were up one already.

I arrived via train (which is a far more civilized way to get to NY until one can rake in enough dough to fly private) right on time, and headed off to 590 Madison ave, where I was shuffled off to the 17th floor of some ridiculously expensive real estate.  Upon exiting the elevator, I was greeted by a lovely receptionist who sat seemingly alone amongst pieces of art that probably were individually worth more than my entire collective being.  There were no people anywhere.  Quite a lovely spot, however.

Andy appeared out of some hidden wall somewhere and we got down to business.  I won't tell you what was discussed, but suffice it to say that the conversation turned lively and interesting - not adjectives typically used when describing anything IBM.  We were joined by Mary Coucher, VP of Biz Dev for Andy's group - a downright smart, passionate, and non-standard cookie cutter IBM'er.  I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Prior to dinner we stopped at some roof top hangout where one of Andy's "comms" people was having a going away party.  I don't know what a "comms" person is, but there were lots of them.  While Andy was kibitzing over a Jameson or two, Mary and I worked on solving world peace.  We got onto the subject of next generation storage applications like video surveillance and the home media market, which got us to what each of us watches on TV (recorded, of course).  She has Desperate Housewives, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Soprano's, and 24. As she is saying this my phone rings, but I don't answer it.  A few minutes later I take it out, and on the screen is John Slattery's number.  Slats is my college roommates bro, who I happened to call the day before as he lives in NY to see if he could hook up for a beer.  He is also "Dennis" on Desperate Housewives and has been making out with Eva Longoria for the last few months.  I was curious to research just how hard work that was.  Plus, he's married to George Clooney's X, and that alone is worthy of discussion. I've known him forever, and even though he's been in a million things, no one really knew him that much until this gig.  Now he's a regular in People and my 15 year old daughter is trying to hook me up with her.   

My phone rang again, and this time it was my wife.  Mary was chatting with someone and Andy continued to kibitz with his whiskey, so I answered.  She proceeds to tell me how Jason just hit his first home run - a monster 3-run shot to spark a slow rally to tie the game and send it to extra innings.  I was psyched, and completely horrified that I missed it.  They ended up losing in the 7th or 8th, but Jason didn't care.  He spent 10 minutes describing the whole thing - clearly out of his mind happy.  Made me feel like crap.

Anyway, I was knee deep in IBM sport drinking by then, and still had dinner to attend, so I left well enough alone.  We all went off to some Mexican place (that was out of this world, but of course I can't remember the name of it nor where it was) and argued everything from CMOS to Salsa.  It was entirely refreshing to engage in debate with very smart IBM folks who weren't just pushing their tired old "we're IBM so we are right" rhetoric.  Andy, Mary, and Carl (Andy's "ops" guy, whatever that means) were definitely willing to listen - and not automatically assume they were blessed with divine correctness.  I've had IBM executive discussions that have been wildly irrational - the kind that end up sounding like a business version of the Black Knight scene in The Holy Grail.  This, thankfully, was not one of them.  Perhaps there is hope for the mighty Blue Knight after all.  The way they were talking, I can't wait to see what they come up with, as they were downright giddy with how "un-IBM" some of their impending moves were going to seem.

So I leave the joint and am about to jump into a cab when Carl, the Haitian French speaking Andy Ops guy tells me that I just need to walk up a block or two and over a block or two and I'll be back at my hotel, The NY Palace.  43 miles of poor shoe walking shin-splint inducing hard labor later I found the hotel.  It was still early, and I wanted a nightcap.  The Palace is a beautiful hotel, but one that tends to frequented by 80 year olds with zillions of dollars who must head off to bed by 10 because the 6 seat bar from the Shining tucked into the corner was all closed up.  Figuring that this is NY I just popped out to find a watering hole with a bit more zip to it.  I rounded the corner and ran into the W on Lexington - which is a modern joint that caters to 20 year olds with zillions of dollars.  Upon entering the Whiskey Bar, I realized that I was too old, too ugly, and too lazy to fight my way to a glass of wine.  I gave up and went back to the Palace.  When I got there, I asked the doorman why the Shining shut down at 9pm?  I half expected him to call me Mr. Torrance.  He told me that the real bar - Gilt - was on the second floor, and that was open and ready for me.  I found it, and it was perfect.  Neuvo, Ian Schragerish joint without a big crowd, and with the best per glass wine list I've ever seen.  With the exception of the art deco purple chunk of art that made one end of the bar look like you were inside a golf ball, the place was great.  I drank my $35 glass of a nice Barolo and headed off to bed.

I headed out early to catch the 8am express to Boston.  As I'm walking through Penn Station I notice this guy leaning against the stand where the cops and soldiers are always hanging out - right outside the Acela express club.  It was Jeff Garlin - who is Larry David's manager in Curb Your Enthusiasm.  In an amazed state (this was number two on the list of discussed TV shows the previous evening), I say "Hi Jeff, I love the show", because A: I do - it's one of the funniest shows ever put on TV, and B: because you say that even if it weren't true, because that's just what you do.  An hour later I'm in the cafe car on the train (and I don't care what anyone says, that train food, nuked in a plastic bag, is fantastic) talking to my wife on my cell about seeing Jeff, and doesn't he walk right in and stand in line 12 inches in front of me.  Not being shy, I say "hey Jeff, say hi to my wife" and make him take my phone.  My wife has no idea what I've done, happily continuing her tale of how the dog ate the curtains or something. He patiently listens to this, until he gets a chance to say hi and introduce himself.  My wife loves the show as much as I do, so it all worked out.  He couldn't have been a nicer guy.  He also lost about 50 pounds and had wiffle instead of his big curly hair.  I almost gave him a show idea based on my real life battles with the recycling people, but figured I had worn out his hospitality.

Friday night the Dodgers (our squad) won the first series.  Every person there felt compelled to tell me what a great hit my son had.  Too bad you weren't there..... Sunday we played game 1 of the NLCS.  Trailing 5-4 in the bottom of the 6th (we only play 6 innings, so it's really the bottom of the 9th), our superstar Kyle draws a walk.  Our #3 hitter, Frenchie (a 2 handicap - which is supremely annoying), smacks a double and brings Kyle home to tie the game.  Our cleanup hitter strikes out.  Now it's Jason's turn.  My son, god bless him, inherited all of my genes, the poor bastard.  He is smart and funny, but short and stumpy.  He makes me look tall.  He is slightly faster than a large office building.  He is good looking though.  Anyhow, Jason rips at the first pitch for a strike.  He looks at strike 2.  He fouls off the next pitch.  Even in Little League, you don't want to throw a strike when its 0-2, and this guy just got away with one.  He grooves the next pitch, and Jason belts it over the fence for a walk-off home run and team victory.  As he goes by me at first, he says "happy fathers day. I didn't get you anything else".

How cool is that?

The End Of The Duopoly?

It had to happen sooner or later, but Brocade?  I would have lost the farm on that bet.  In retrospect I'm not sure why I was so surprised - the logic is sort of obvious - but I just never saw it coming.

I think that I, like most, stopped thinking about it.  Emulex and Q-Logic have shared a spectacular 50-50 share of a flat HBA market - each at about 70% gross margins, for a long, long time.  Both companies have printed cash by fighting over a point of market share here and there - but neither dumb enough to screw up a perfectly good thing by bombing price.  They both knew their component portion of the OEM sale was so insignificant, as long as they were good citizens they could ride along under the radar.

I can paint a picture where Brocade steals a big chunk of share - first by forcing price cuts (which the others will very begrudgingly have to match), then by leveraging the fact that they are higher in the value chain since they own a lot of the switch footprint.  In theory, they could give away the HBA's and make it up in switch margin, thus destroying a perfectly nice little market.  I doubt they would do that, they have a chance to be able to change the game by adding intelligence at multiple points - the way Emulex would also like too - but having the switch as a core engine gives Brocade a leg up.

I can also paint a picture where not much changes except for Emulex and Q's stock prices.  Q has a broader business base on the component side, and Emulex hedges with its InSpeed stuff, but HBA's and the fat, juicy margins that came with them have been both their bread and butter plays.  One can't help but think this will cause some concern.

You have to hand it to them, they don't back down from giants like Cisco, have withstood a huge distraction with a stock option fiasco, surprised everyone by acquiring their then biggest competitor, and now are going to try to screw up a long established market.  It would not surprise me to see CEO Mike Klayko wearing a Curt Schilling like "Why Not Us?" tee-shirt while mowing the lawn.

First power became an IT hot button - and now HBA's?  What's next - super model backup services? 

Random Thoughts....

Does anyone else smile when they think about about TSA losing it's employee's private data?  It only included name, date of birth, social security number, payroll information, bank account, and routing numbers - which is a super added bonus and really makes stealing those identities a breeze.   I guess I shouldn't be happy about it, even though I swear those folks go out of their way to make sure my airport security experience is as painful, unorganized, and annoying as possible.  A public cavity probe in the middle of the Mall of America would have been more appropriate.  The fact that our own government is stupid enough to allow non-encrypted data of such magnitude to even exist, let alone float around willy nilly, is astounding.  So much for hoping for legislation to make people use common sense.

Iron Mountain quietly bought the assets of startup Avalere, who had some pretty big and interesting plans in the area of data categorization and classification.  Those ideas turned out to be much bigger than their funding source, however.

Don't be surprised to see all the big guys enter the service provider market, either directly or indirectly, within the next year.  From Microsoft to EMC, it will happen.

Maybe the coolest gizmo I've ever seen in storage is the new Drobo box from Data Robotics.  I am not supposed to talk about it yet, but if it lives up to what I've seen in the first 24 hours, there will be a lot to tell.

I'm tired.  Tuesday of this week I acted half my age and went with some pals to see Elvis Costello at a small venue in Boston.  I love Elvis, and he was great as usual.  I drank a bit, and got home a bit late, only to face the awful truth of 6:30AM, at which point I had to go back to Boston to catch a flight to Chicago to give a pitch at Storage Decisions (which again was stocked to the gills with storage folks).  It will be interesting to hear the feedback, as I have limited recollection of even being on stage.  I had to sprint out of there to catch my return flight, which in Chicago means you sit in traffic for an hour or so.  I made the plane by 9 minutes.  Good for me?  Au contraire.  After about 8 years of being either Platinum or Executive Platinum on American (which gives you the right to pay more money to upgrade your seat to a barely tolerable state), I didn't fly enough last year.  You would think I had personally offended the CEO's wife by how fast they downgraded me to "slug" status.  I still have dozens of "upgrades", which I paid for, that I apparently no longer have the right to use.  Better yet, the plane was mobbed, and a very nice 400 plus pound woman occupied the seat next to me, and most of mine - but we left on time.  Then we promptly sat on the tarmac for 3 hours.  I got home at 2AM, only to arise at 6:30 again - this time because my 3-year old daughter decided that's was a good time to tell me that her brother called her a name.  I haven't recovered.

I've been playing with Media Center in Vista for about 5 months - and am waiting on AMD to ship the cable cards they have been promising for a year or so to build my mongo centralized home media center.  I may end up spending 20 grand to save one hundred bucks a month from the cable company, but I will figure this out.  Between AMD and Microsoft, it can be an infuriating experience.  Once I master it I'll either publish a best practice - or I'll fund a company to make this stuff actually work. I can't be the only idiot who wants to control my own home content distribution system. Joost is going to be way cool, fyi.

Cheers

The Politics Of Dancing.....

If you really want to get folks to get all nuts about something, involve politics - or not even - all you have to do is mention political figures and kazaam!  The whole world goes nuts.

I wrote this article in CW about the lost emails of White House staffers a few days ago - and if you haven't read it, please do and make sure I'm not the crazy one here.  The article is about lost data, not politics - but judging by the comments posted on-line, and the hundred plus emails I've received (on every conceivable side of this non-issue) have taught me that I have found a way to stir the pot!  I love a good controversy, but this one has taken on a life of its own, and it's not a rational one.

Some folks got a tad personal, assuming that I must be a crazed liberal Democrat as I mocked the administration around the whole notion of "losing" emails.  I am a (albeit disillusioned) Republican - I even voted for Mr. Bush (twice).  Calling me an idiot is fine, but please, get your assumptions in line!  My vote has nothing to do with the fact that the White House "lost" data.  Oh yeah, threatening to cancel your subscription is a nice touch, but for a free publication?  What's next, a self-imposed twenty minute sit-in? 

So, if you are able to read the 1200 or so words without automatically moving to any extreme position, you should find that the article is an accurate representation of the real issues - privacy and data retention. I don't care if it was Bush, Clinton, or my aunt Louise who was losing the data, I would have written the same piece.  Data retention, protection and privacy issues transcend politics and yes, even religion - at least in my book. I'd rather listen to Paris Hilton discuss 18th century literary influences than engage in a political or religious debate via the media. 

So, the deal is I promise to only call a spade a spade -  and only in areas that I belong in. I don't, and won't, start non-IT related arguements just for sport - there's plenty of places you can do that without my help. For those who are lathered up on this one, re-read it as if you were not looking for a spot on Crossfire.

Now to really make you lose your mind - I worked at TJX one summer during college, and yes, I inhaled.

On a positive note, it appears activism is not dead.  Why can't we put some of that mental energy to use getting our tech issues resolved?  I really have to believe that if you used the same level of zeal on your backup vendor, the stuff would actually work by now.

Finally, one last thought for all of you regardless of political affiliation - if you went to your boss and told them you couldn't find data deemed critical, what would happen?  Would a political action committe come to your rescue?  I'm guessing no because in the business world, when things matter, politics and religion are secondary to economics - and that data will cost somebody a lot. 

Monday Thoughts....

Remind me never to complain about being in Orlando again.  The weather has been stellar, and back in Boston it is 35 degrees and raining a foot an hour.  Glad I'm not a marathon runner also (I'm not, though that may surprise you), as they discussed canceling the event for the first time ever.  They elected to go forward, which is ridiculous, but should make for entertaining video on the news.  Why I continue to reside in the great Northeast is becoming a better question all the time.  Arizona seems nice.

Orlando must the U.S. leader in cheesy gift shops, surpassing Vegas in my humble opinion.  Middle America is frightening.  It is hard to imagine ourselves as the tech whizzes and global super power extraordinaire when in line at a drug store behind four non-related (seemingly) people with full-on mullets, and supremely bad facial hair - and those were the ladies.

I've already begun to receive the usual bulk batch of press releases since SNW starts today.  Emulex announced an independent company validated their performance is superior to Q-logic in a VMware environment.  The only problem is I've never heard of the company (Demartek) and the full report link doesn't work, not that I'm insinuating anything.  So yes, of course I am biased in such things, I don't think anything worth proving should be done by anyone other than ESG Labs, so take it with a grain of salt.  Having said that, testing aside, the play is brilliant.  Why wouldn't you attach yourself to VMware in any way you could?  I'm surprised that more folks haven't figured that out - creating parallel branding to VMware is a very, very smart thing to do right now.  It will be interesting to see how many of the vendors at SNW have overt VMware programs under way.

In this morning's USA Today, the front page banner is "25 Stocks You Should Have Bought".  People pay for this?  Why not pay the hotel staff to sneak into my room and hit me in the head with a hammer instead?

Speaking of VMware, the story they tell is one of the best you'll hear.  I'm having trouble figuring out how Microsoft or Xen, etc. will be able to catch up.  This game may be over before it starts and others will have to figure out how to play above (or below) that line.  Second, EMC really has to be commended for leaving VMware alone - though now I think they have no choice.  I'm amazed at how separated they really are - you would think that there would be much tighter integration with the EMC product set, but if anything, it's the opposite so far.  EMC might be being a bit too nice in all of this - words I never thought I'd say.

What Is Cisco Doing????

Cisco made multiple announcements yesterday about their investments into the SMB space ( SMBs Move Center Stage--Become New Growth Engine of the IT Industry and a release, Cisco Raises SMB Commitment To A New Level) - really talking about initiatives and investments Cisco is bringing to market to this explosive area of the world.

They also announced the completion of the their acquisition of Neopath - an IP based, file virtualization platform who is geared right at that same SMB space.  While details were not disclosed, the dollars were small - presumably sub-$50 million (I do enjoy saying things like that - putting the descriptor "small" in front of $50 million dollars, though I probably don't have $50 in my pocket or bank account), the principal appeared sound:  put value into the IP network that Cisco owns, take value out of point products and manual labor that they don't.  I had no issue with the deal, and thought it very cheap and very smart.

With Cisco, or anyone really, the issue is "if" they can make a ton of hay with a technology or a product acquisition, it's "will" they - or more importantly, will it get enough attention to ever live up to its opportunity.  Sometimes its yes, sometimes its no.

This is a new one.  This morning I open up my email to find this story from Beth Pariseau that blew me away - "Cisco's Move To Kill Neopath Shocks Users, Analysts...."

Cisco issued an EOS (end of sale) announcement that effectively kills all products and services that it just bought.

Now in no way do I consider myself as smart as the folks pulling the strings over in Ciscoville, so what am I missing here?  Isn't some shareholder going to wonder why the company just gave some people $50 million or so and then told them to pack their bags and head on home - and oh yeah, take your crummy stuff with you?  Maybe there is some very sane, rational explanation for this, but if so, don't you think they might have told someone what that was?

Things like this make me re-evaluate my position on Cisco eventually ruling the universe.  Thank god I can still put my monopolistic hopes and dreams on Microsoft.

Public Finance 102....

Some follow up in CW on the VMware IPO and other boring finance things.