BoomTown » hype

While Fanboys Breathlessly Await Steve Jobs's Apple iTab, They Should Probably Thank Bill Gates Too

Kara Swisher — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 15:10:54 +0000

Way back in the fall of 2001, when BoomTown was but a less-aged version of myself, I attended a keynote speech at the now-defunct Comdex show in Las Vegas, where Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates continued to bang the drum for one of his long-running obsessions: The tablet computer.

“The tablet takes cutting-edge PC technology and makes it available whenever you want it, which is why I’m already using a tablet as my everyday computer,” Gates said at the time to the audience gathered at the MGM Grand Garden Arena. “It’s a PC that is virtually without limits and within five years I predict it will be the most popular form of PC sold in America.”

Well, that did not happen.

But Gates did keep his promise about using a tablet–he kept on doing so and also harping on the topic all the time, with Microsoft even releasing a giant tabletop Surface several years ago and supporting multitouch in the coming Windows 7.

I recall Gates talking about the idea of how important the tablet is on innumerable occasions, more than any single concept I can recall.

It is ironic, then, that all the hype has suddenly and firmly coalesced around the particulars of the tablet that Apple (AAPL) will be unveiling in the coming months.

And now that CEO Steve Jobs is back fine-tuning the whole shebang, the obsession has moved into overdrive, punctuated only by endless stories about every single new app for the iPhone and fights over some of those new apps for the iPhone.

It’s a complete aside, but how ironic is it that Apple has somehow managed to make Google (GOOG)–the Skynet of the Internet–seem like a victim over this Google Voice shrillathon?

Back to the Apple tablet, which is playbook hype for iconic computer giant.

Besides being a secret project everyone in Silicon Valley seems to know about, the coming device is enjoying full-on breathless reportage of every single possible button and every possible feature, with every single bit of functionality parsed, dissected, masticated and spat back out.

But let’s be honest–in the end, this Apple tablet is probably going to be some kind of giant, sleeker, more glorified and doubtlessly niftier version of the iPod touch, called the iTab or the iPad or the iAmSoCoolAren’tI?, at three times the price.

Now, as it turns out, Microsoft (MSFT) is also at work on a table device, this time called the Courier.

This development became known recently after a demo video of it in use was somehow “leaked”–three guesses about which software giant in Redmond, Wash., put that out, and the first two don’t count!–to Gizmodo.

It seems to be some kind of tablet mixed with a journal mixed with a day planner, with a hinged two-page look. Digital writing and a stylus are involved, but also lots of touchscreen action.

Well, I say, good for Microsoft, and perhaps for Gates, who has now mostly disengaged himself from the day-to-day particulars of the behemoth he built, including the Courier.

Nonetheless, in all likelihood, Apple will still garner the most buzz in this tablet faceoff and will, more than likely, sell more.

A delicious irony, given that in their fascinating and long-running rivalry, it has usually been Jobs playing the hopeless dreamer and Gates the one who makes bank from the dreams of others.

No longer, which should make this round between Microsoft and Apple the most interesting of all.

Speaking of dreaming of dreams, it is always a good time to post the video of Susan Boyle singing “I Dreamed a Dream”:

Now That There's FaceFeed, Does That Make Twoogle More Inevitable?

Kara Swisher — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 22:59:43 +0000

MicroHoo. Check! FaceFeed. Check!

And Twoogle? Let’s check!

Yahoo (YHOO) and Microsoft (MSFT) have finally partnered. Microsoft is already a big investor in Facebook. And today, the huge social networking site just picked up online content-sharing site FriendFeed, which is chock-a-block full of ex-Google execs.

Now, one has to wonder if it wouldn’t be easier if Google (GOOG), the cash machine of a search giant, finally ponied up and bought the most recent star of Web 2.0?

That would be, of course, Twitter.

While previous rumors in the early spring that Google was imminently poised to acquire Twitter proved premature, the investors of the fast-growing microblogging service and Google execs have got to be thinking the same thing right about now:

Do we need each other to make some real-time noise?

It’s true that a lot of the hubbub around the idea of Twitter selling out has been mostly hype.

In addition, there are a lot of good arguments to be made that the San Francisco start-up is likely to be fine on its own and will soon find some very lucrative revenue streams.

Still, it is probably very disconcerting for Twitter to be holding onto the tail of the tiger of its own phenom and hope that it will not turn out to be a bad decision to imagine it will always be thus.

Linking up Twitter and Google is certainly a big idea, giving Google de facto ownership of real-time search, a big lift in the status-update game and yet another major and innovative Internet name brand.

It would also likely ensure that Twitter will dominate its sector for a very long time.

In other words: Gentlemen–and, since this is Silicon Valley, I do mean pretty much all gentlemen–start your engines.

Because whatever happens, it certainly will be fun to watch from the sidelines as MicroHoo, FaceFeed, Twoogle and more crash into one other and make the Internet as thrilling a place as it has ever been.

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

D-Day: In the Seventh Year, We Didn't Rest (Mostly Because of Meetings)

Kara Swisher — Tue, 26 May 2009 07:07:19 +0000

We launch the seventh D: All Things Digital conference in Carlsbad, Calif., today, after a long weekend of preparations and way too many meetings, as you can see in the video below.

(Including packing the swag bags for attendees, upon which one of my kids sits in this photo.)

The conference kicks off with an evening interview tonight with Twitter co-founders Biz Stone and Evan Williams.

Walt Mossberg and I will be asking the pair about everything from their business plans for the hot microblogging service to the huge hype around their start-up to the state of innovation in Silicon Valley to what they plan to do next.

BoomTown will update after the interview, but you can follow the proceedings–in live blogs and video–as they happen on our All Things Digital D7 site here, so check early and often, starting at about 6:30 p.m. PDT.

Here’s the final prep video, including several meetings Walt and I attended today, a view of the ballroom being outfitted and another movie review–we took the staff to see “Terminator Salvation” last night to get pumped–by my annoying geek brother:

[ See post to watch video ]

When Overhyped Silicon Valley Start-Ups Collide: A Picture Is Worth 1,000 Words

Kara Swisher — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 07:28:31 +0000

Here is a great chart, posted on Flickr by Facebook third-party app maker Narendra Rocherolle, that shows the rising popularity of the search word “Twitter” on the social-networking site’s Lexicon.

Facebook’s Lexicon counts “occurrences of words and phrases” on its Walls over time.

Facebook, which had tried to buy Twitter late last year, has recently done a redesign that some critics are saying is too much of a panicked reaction to the hype around the microblogging service, although Twitter’s audience is just a tiny sliver of Facebook’s.

Still, Twitter’s becoming the digital trend of the moment, especially in the what’s-hot-today media, has to have last year’s golden child, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, more than a just little irked.

Here’s the chart (click on it to make it larger):

Apple, Apple All Around, but Not a Drop of Thinking

Kara Swisher — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 14:13:26 +0000

Hey, did you hear that Apple is launching some sort of new notebook thingamabob today?

If you didn’t, it can’t be because the Apple-product-release-hyper-hype cycle let you down.

Below, for example, is a screen grab Techmeme’s top stories early today. This list will balloon to more and more obese proportions as soon as the much-leaked rumors–a new MacBook from a single piece of godlike metal! With a sleek black border! And some secret-looking inputs to spin gold from hay at home!–about what the iconic computer maker is up to are officially confirmed or not this morning.

That you can always feel the anticipation in the air whenever Apple makes any move is, in a way, fascinating.

And the news-to-come was even boosting Apple’s shares yesterday, which have been taking a severe beating in the recent market meltdown and, before that, on false rumors of a heart attack suffered by Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs.

All seems to be forgiven from when Apple (AAPL) underwhelmed at its “Let’s Rock” event only a month back, where its ho-hum redo of its iPod line failed to live up to all the breathless excitement of its fanboys.

No matter. Next!

AllThingsD.com’s Johnny Apple-blogger John Paczkowski of Digital Daily will be there, of course, posting at the media-clogged launch, as it happens, and mightily contributing to the blog-smog that will start collecting over Cupertino, Calif., at 10 a.m. PDT.

Don’t say we didn’t warn you!

Webby Congrats to "Here Comes Another Bubble"

Kara Swisher — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:21:20 +0000

BoomTown was the first to put up the hugely popular spoof video called “Here Comes Another Bubble,” by the San Francisco-based Richter Scales.

And, the first to report on the controversial story of it then being taken down by YouTube (GOOG), in a fight the group had with a local photographer, Lane Hartwell, who objected to the use of a photo she took that was in the video without her permission or payment to her for its use.

The Hartwell photo was removed, and the copyright controversy eventually died down. And the video still remains very funny and even more realistic than ever, given the series of crazy Web 2.0 funding valuations of late.

And now “Bubble”–which opens with a BoomTown interview with investor Peter Thiel, who denies such a thing as a bubble in tech–has won a Webby Award for Best Viral Video.

Well, congrats to the creators of the video, which mocks the current Silicon Valley culture with affection, set to the tune of Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire”: