Wak Oentoenk

Despite all the hype and excitement about the mobile data market, it is very difficult to get reliable data on how it's actually developing. The mobile operators don't like to release full details of their sales, and surveys of users cost a lot of money to conduct and therefore are usually available only to people who pay.We're left to chew on anecdotes, partial information released by companies that are trying to push a point of view, and unscientific "polls" of online enthusiasts.So I'm always...

True story: Back when I was working at Apple, we received a report that there had been a burglary at a company that had a lot of Macintosh computers. The thieves took every one of the Macs -- and left behind all the Windows PCs.We were delighted. Not about the burglary, mind you. I'm afraid we were pretty callous about that, and besides we figured the company was insured. But we loved the idea that even criminal lowlifes knew which was the better computer.In fact, we loved that idea so much...

The announcement of Amazon FPS made my whole week, on a lot of different levels. I'm excited about the service itself, I'm excited about what it means for the development of web applications, and I'm excited about what it'll eventually do for the mobile data world.Okay, I'm just excited.About FPS. Before I talk about what it means, I should give a quick overview of what it is. FPS is a web service, meaning it's a set of online APIs that the creator of a website or web application can use to perform...

Because of the cool toys, of course. But for me, there's also something else: Making a difference in peoples' lives.I'm sure that sounds corny, and not everyone feels the way I do, but for me there's something very compelling about the ability of technology done right to improve the lives of lots of people, in ways you don't expect and can't plan for. I got my first taste of that years ago, when I was a Mac software developer in the early days of desktop publishing. I was mostly creating PostScript...