Who Knew NIST Could Be So Sexy?
The National Institute of Standards and Technology has been in existence since 1901--responsible for promoting economic development via standards setting and measuring. Vital work, to be sure, but seemingly dull, at least to the non-measurement scientists among us. But now something really intriguing his happening. The onrush of the smart grid, cloud computing, green energy, sustainable manufacturing, e-health, and a new wave of cybersecurity threats has suddenly placed NIST in the middle of some of the most crucial technology advances of our era. One result: it's a great time to be Pat Gallagher, the newly appointed NIST director. "NIST has never been asked to perform such significant,

Consumer Tech Invades the Enterprise
...... and brings plenty of bugs with it. The trend has been a long time coming, but corporations are finally caving in and okaying the use of free or mostly-free social networking Web sites as in-the-office software applications. Facebook, LinkedIN, Twitter, Google Apps, etc. are becoming the everyday tools of the knowledge worker--elbowing aside stodgy programs like Microsoft Outlook and the like. Corporate IT managers have been forced to accept the inevitable and lower their guards. Unfortunately, though, allowing workers unfettered use of social networking and Web 2.0 sites is like leaving the back door open on a restaurant. A lot of bugs are coming in. Here's the pr

Social Networking for Global Citizens
When Google launched Orkut in 2004, the social networking site seemed to have the potential to eventually grow to rival MySpace and Facebook in size and influence. That didn't happen. Early on, Netizens from Brazil became such avid users of the site that many people from other countries felt out of place and settled elsewhere. These days, according to Wikipedia, about half of Orkut's users are Brazilian and another 18% are Indian. (Apparently Indians aren't put off by Portuguese. What could that mean?) The first social networking site that seemed positioned to be global didn't work out that way. Now, along comes an upstart with truly global ambitions. It's

The (Attempted) Rebirth of Silicon Graphics
Silicon Graphics Inc., or SGI, is one of the storied Silicon Valley names. Co-founded by Jim Clark (who later co-founded Netscape) in 1981, SGI was a pioneer in powerful desktop engineering workstations and, later, super-powerful servers. The company got hammered by Sun Microsystems and other competitors and became a shadow of its former self after the dot-com bust. It filed for bankruptcy in 2006, limped along in a zombie state, and then was picked up in May for about $25 million by Rackable Systems--which bought it out of a second bankruptcy proceeding. Rackable renamed itself Silicon Graphics International to squeeze the remaining brand equity out of the Silicon Graphics name. Mark Ba

Globespotting and International Students
I was pleased to get an e-mail message today from Online Colleges.Net telling me that Globespotting ranked in the top 10, overall, among blogs that appeal to international business students. Here's the list: "100 Best Blogs for International Business Students " A lot of the people who post comments on Globespotting are angry about one thing or another, which, of course, disappoints me. I hope my blog can build bridges across cultures and continents.