Vanessa the Visionary!

I stayed home with Benjamin today so Vanessa could attend a Microsoft(!) event. No, it was not your usual Microsoft event, as there were no IT nerds and geeks discussing the newest release of Microsoft software. Actually, the majority of the attendees were women! Based on the usual gender breakdown of Microsoft events, I am sure this was quite the statistical anomaly.

The event Vanessa attended was called "Vision to Venture: The Event for Women Entreprenuers". She was initially nervous about attending, since she doesn't have a business (yet), but I encouraged her to go, to at least hear the speakers and do some networking. There was a friend who also attended who had a code that knocked the price of the admission by half, but it was already pretty cheap to begin with. Plus all attendees received a free copy of Office Small Business 2007. They also gave a way a laptop, but alas my dear wife's name was not picked.

Vanessa said she learned a lot at the event. The three main speakers were all quite informative and entertaining. One of the interesting tidbits of info is that women start up more businesses than men. Another interesting fact is that many small businesses fail because they don't think big, and thus shoot themselves in the foot in regards to growth potential.

Seems Microsoft is smart in doing some forward thinking by advertising their small business services to these bright ladies. As for my bright lady, she tells me her priority at this point is raising our boy, and so will wait until she has more time before she makes the move from vision to venture.

Big 12 > ACC...? Discuss.

Congratulations to Kansas, winners of the 2008 NCAA Basketball National Championship! And congrats also to everyone who watched the game, as it turned out to be one of the best championship games in NCAA history. You may be asking, what was the best NCAA championship of all time? That title, according to ESPN, goes to the 2006 Rose Bowl title game between UT and USC. (Hook 'em Horns!)

Had some UNC friends in town for the Final Four, so we went down to meet up with them this past weekend in San Antonio. Turns out their flight got delayed and so they had to rush straight to the Alamodome and we didn't get to see them at all. Needless to say, they weren't too happy after Kansas basically blew out the Tarheels in the first half of that game. On a happier note, they were able to sell their tickets to Monday's championship game for a pretty penny. Word of warning, turns out there were undercover cops busting people for selling tickets after the game, charging them with scalping and fining them $2000. Ouch.

The Alamodome is not a good place to watch basketball. It is a football stadium, but in order to be able to sell more tickets, they use it for basketball. I remember when the Spurs used to play there and how there really wasn't a home court advantage because the fans were so spread out from the court. My point in all this is that I was shocked at what some people paid for the nosebleed seats for the Final Four. The shot below is taken from the worst seats in the Alamodome, which still cost these unlucky stiffs $275. Better to have put that money towards a nice HDTV.

Why I love being a Dad...

...because I get to receive smiles like this!

Must...Resist...the Mac side.

I never thought the day would come. I am actually considering switching sides. As a long time Windows PC user and even enthusiast (yes I subscribe to Maximum PC ), my defenses are ever so slowly being worn away.

It all started about a month ago. I was starting to look for a new phone. These days, you can't help but think of the Iphone when looking for a new cell phone. The closest thing Sprint has is the HTC Touch. My buddy Tino recently got one, and after playing with it a bit, it was definitely one of the best Windows Mobile phones I have used. I started thinking that this would be my next phone for sure. But then...

Last week, we had some friends in town, staying with us for SxSW Interactive. They are both industrial designers, and both big fans of Apple products. They pulled out their Iphones and what struck me was how easy it was for my wife to figure out how to use it. I think my dear wife will be the first to admit that she is no techie, and that was when it really hit me - "Apple products just work." My epiphany? People buy Apple products because they work out of the box. No need to tweak or install 3rd party apps to make things work. People are not just paying large amounts of $$$ for the pretty looks and design, but more so for the usability of the whole platform.

Okay, so you may be saying, "Well, duh, of course. Average Joe does not want to mess with his computer, he just wants it to work. Like a dumb toaster." From a usability standpoint, I would argue there is nothing wrong with wanting your toaster to be able to make toast, easily and effectively, without having to tweak it or install a third party "toaster" app. You may then say, "Part of the fun of PCs is found in installing, configuring, and tweaking your system to get it to run the most effectively!" I would say yes, true. I have built my fair share of desktop PC systems and I did and still do enjoy it. It is great to see how many 3D Marks your rig can pump out after you've dropped in that new Nvidia card! But I would then argue that with Apple switching to the Intel chipset, a lot of the things that once could only be done on Windows based computers can now be done on Apple systems, especially with the ability to dual boot both OSes.

You may then say, "PCs are cheap". This is probably the strongest argument for not switching sides. Seems like every week Best Buy is advertising a decent system for $500 or less. The PC definitely wins in that regard. For the price of a MacBook Pro, you could conceivably get 3 equally powerful PC laptops. Since I am nothing if not cheap, this too has always prevented me from going Mac. But then you could argue about quality over quantity.

Finally, the other factor that is making me consider the Mac more, is simply peer pressure. I have a very good friend, Alex, who has been working with Windows PCs as a web developer/programmer for the past five years and he is planning on making the switch soon. I greatly respect his opinion, and if he is seriously considering the Mac side, it makes me start to wonder as well. He was in town for SxSw as well and he said he was almost embarassed to pull out his Lenovo at some of the panels and be the lone PC among the sea of Apples. See photo above for an example of this new phenomena.

We went to the local Apple store a few days ago, and I will be the first to admit, the MacBook Pros are beautifully designed and aesthetically pleasing. They work out of the box. They work with the Iphone. My friends are going Mac. Help! What am I going to do?! Thoughts? Comments? Do tell...

PS. A few links to some blogs of those who have taken the plunge...

A Hardcore Windows Guy Gets a Mac..
Reflections on a month of Macbook experience
and, finally, a whole site devoted to changing platforms -
Switchingtomac.com