The V Word

“Virtual” will be a mantra in 2008; plus, Gates’ CES curtain call, brain signals are in, Sony enters the battle, Microsoft reorgs, and more software news of the week.

Virtual is definitely the word of the week and looks to be an enormous focus of software development in 2008. This was also the swan song week for virtual legend, Bill Gates, on stage at the Consumer Electronics Show as chairman of Microsoft. Gates reminisced over his 30-year legacy, his role in innovation, and what he’s most proud of.

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SANDHILL.COM BLOG POST OF THE WEEK:

Up Next for Mobile: Revolution or Evolution?

Tony Baer The IT and consumer electronics worlds have had a kind of chicken and egg relationship dating back to invention of the transistor. Following the Internet bubble, the flow of innovation has shifting from computers to gadgets. And in some ways, so have the excesses of hype, as we’ve read reports of the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) undergoing the same kind of bloat that previously afflicted Comdex.

If there’s a single platform that’s considered a barometer for the pace of innovation, it’s the mobile hand device. From the plain vanilla voice (and more recently, text) phone, it’s now taken for granted that, depending on target demographic, your device should be able to take pictures, play music, provide web access, deliver email, enabler location-based services, or make electronic purchases.

This being the week of CES (and the week before MacWorld), we had an interesting conversation this morning with Sony Ericsson CTO Mats Lindoff, who gave us a midterm assessment on trends with mobile platforms. Maybe there was something gamey with our connection (we think not!), but what we thought we heard was more evolutionary than revolutionary.