arsenal

Off-topic: Happy Arsenal Sunday

Arsenal 2, Fulham 1. All is right in the universe.

Now if only we could score first, I'd sleep a lot easier at night.

Robin Van Persie (a better man/player than Thierry Henry, or will be) and Hleb both scored. The Hleb goal is fantastic. You can feel the elation in the crowd as he scored. And you can see the shock and awe in Fabregas' face in this picture:… Read more

Adium, the Mac-based instant-messaging king

Given all the great consumer-facing open-source software available, I figured that I'd try to evaluate and write reviews on those I use most often. Open source long ago stopped being about developers for other developers. Here's proof.

Adium is quite simply the best instant-messaging (IM) client available. Period. It has its flaws and is, in some ways, deficient compared to iChat, Apple's own IM client. But its strengths vastly outnumber its weaknesses. I've been using it for years. In some ways, it's very similar to Trillian on the Windows platform in that it allows you to combine nearly all of your IM services (Yahoo!, MSN, AOL, Jabber, etc.) into one client.

But Adium actually goes further and provides more.… Read more

Arsenal sign "Dudu" and the under-hyping of open source

Arsenal just lost Thierry Henry, the greatest striker in a generation, and replaced him with...Dudu? Eduardo da Silva (aka "Dudu" was born in Brazil, but is a Croatian national) scored 34 goals in 32 games (Don't try that at home, kids). In true Arsene Wenger (Arsenal manager) fashion, Arsenal went for the unheralded da Silva over the over-hyped Eto'o, Owen, Torres, etc.

What does this have to do with open source? Well, not much. (Let's be honest: I just needed some happy Arsenal thoughts. :-) But I do think that open source could be the da Silva of software. Both over-hyped and under-hyped at the same time. Over-hyped in some places (Croatia??? :-), and under-hyped in others (everywhere else).

I spend an inordinate amount of time talking open source with fellow open sourcerors and denizens of the Old World (i.e., proprietary software companies). We talk constantly about open source and its impact on the world of software.

But with open source taking a rounding error of a percentage of total software sales, it clearly has a lot of room to grow. The vast majority of software users still don't know much about open source, and probably won't until it's conveniently packaged and priced at $9.95 at your local Wal-Mart, Carrefour, etc. Open source, to me, is vastly under-hyped relative to its potential.… Read more

The Open Source CEO: Fabrizio Capobianco, Funambol (Part 5)

In this fifth installment of the Open Source CEO Series, I talked with Fabrizio Capobianco, CEO of Funambol, the mobile open source company. In one of my only happy moments as an Arsenal fan, I watched Arsenal (my club) beat Juventus (Fabrizio's club) in the Champions League quarter-finals at Fabrizio's house. I'm not sure he has ever forgiven me for this....

Fabrizio brings a very different perspective to open source than those I've interviewed up until now. His company, Funambol, is focused on the mobile space - think an open source Blackberry server. Very cool stuff, and it couldn't have happened to a better person (with worse taste in football :-).

Name, position, and company of executive Fabrizio Capobianco, CEO, Funambol… Read more