Apple's Revenue Source

Apple's Revenue Source.

Worst Parking Job Ever

The point of this video is to say BMW X5 is a real SUV with German horsepower under the hood...

联想的"乐phone"真的能乐起来吗?

说话难听点, 损一下联想的"乐phone"吧.

最近看到联想花大力气(就是花钱贝)给最新的乐phone做宣传, 满天的中文网都有相关报道. 联想信誓旦旦地要和iPhone挑战. 首先要说的是, 这一个竞争目标定得好 - 要比就比最好的. 勇气可加, 也有志气.

可是话说回来, "乐phone"实在是有点雷人. 外观设计有够丑, 这也就算了, 连软体平台都落后. 现在新出的ANDROID手机都用2.1了, "乐phone"还用1.6呢 (而且还没上市), 虽然以后会升级, 可是起步就落后了. 用ANDROID做平台, 并不是没有代价的. 软件的核心技术在谷歌手上, 也要服从开放平台的合同要求. 再谈"乐phone"这个名字.  就联想这么大的一个公司, 主打的产品竟然和对手的名字类似, 走出大门在国际市场上就有抄袭的嫌疑, 这不是天生就挂着"山寨"的味道吗, 走到哪里都一股土味, 没有创新.

好的宣传, 有的时候能把死的说成活的. 可是电子产品不能只靠呼悠. 苹果在6个月内在大中国市场卖了近两百万部iPhone, "乐phone"在六个月内如果能卖超过六十万只我就败服.

No More "The Next iPhone" Story, Please

I feel I've had enough of this "Gizmodo-got-the-next-iPhone" story.  Too much already!

I couldn't stop reading news from geek blogs, but there is so much news, redundant news, about the "next iPhone" and how the poor software engineer lost it and how he could also loose his career.  Gizmodo and media, please, stop.

Here is the problem, although I was one of the people who jumped into the link once I learned the next iPhone was leaked, the consequence is the exposure stole the show from Apple and Steve Jobs.  Apple fans will pay for this sentimentally later, I guarantee it.

Apple and their engineers are sometimes called "magicians".  They are good at controlling the release of their products air-tight.  You see, that is the beauty of this game.  They create the curiosity, they build the hype, then they release it with a bang during the Mac World events.  The speculation and secrecy form a big magnet that draw people's attentions (and stock prices, but I'm not a AAPL holder), The release of their product creates the "Wow" factor, on the day of the event, NOT before that.

Imagine yourself attending a circus/magic show.  If someone tells you what magic will be performed by the magicians and how exactly they would do the trick by revealing all the secrets in the magicians' toolbox right before the show, would you still have the same amount of enthusiasm and excitement when you watch it?  How about knowing the final score before watching a soccer or basketball game? I know I would not.

People in general agree that revealing magician's trick is un-ethical, so I would argue that Gizmodo's release of the new iPhone is also unethical (and perhaps even not legal).  For the least, they should have put a "Spoiler Alert" on the title.  But they won't, of course - It's all about money.  They paid five grands for it, so they need to get it back and make more money and create more publicity.  Indeed, they have achieved the goal.  The traffic at their server was so high that they had to shut down the comment feature to maintain accessability.  Gizmodo has done it...at the expense of stealing thunder from Steve Jobs in two months and the excitement from some Apple fanboys.

The highly speculated and anticipated Apple product-announcement was suppose to be the biggest bang in 2010.  If what Gizmodo claimed was NOT the next iPhone when Apple announce it (which I kind of wish at this moment, although the possibility is small), Giz will become a loser in this game.  However, if the phone is what it is intended to be, instead of saying "we got a new iPhone for you" by Jobs, he would have to say "we're ready to put the prototype you saw a couple of months ago into mass production".  You see, that's NOT Apple.  That's not their game, not in the tech world anyways.

So this is where I'm disappointed.  Yes, I chose to see what the next iPhone look like. Now I kinda wish I didn't make that choice.  I like to watch the show from Apple, from Jobs, without knowing what would be unwrapped during the show.  I wonder if someone else shares the same opinion as I do, or am I the only person in this world that wants to stop reading more news about the upcoming iPhone?

How many iPhone Apple Sold in China in Six Months - How about 2 Million?

Here is an interesting article reflecting the dynamic of the Chinese market (the same market that took over the U.S. as the No.1. market for the auto industry) - Apple's revenue in Greater China (that is, Mainland China + Hong Kong + Taiwan) for the 1st half of the fiscal year (six month period) was about $1.3 billion, according to Apple's own COO Cook.

At a retail price of ~$622 per unit, that's more than 2 million units of iPhone sold.

Given that China has about 1.3 billion people, even there is only a small fraction of rich people can afford a luxury consumer product like the iPhone, the number of total units sold is quite impressive.

Strange weather in Northern California this year

I thought the weather in Northern California would be nice and warm by this time of the year. 

Former Microsoft executive Tim Chen rumored to head Google's Greater China operation

DigiTimes reports that Microsoft's former CEO for Microsoft Greater China Region will get a new work badge at Google and lead Google's Great China operation (which became a controversial failure lately).

This is interesting because in July 2005, when Kai-Fu Lee, another former Microsoft Vice President left the company for Google, he was sued by Gates and Ballmer.  Will Microsoft sue Google and Tim Chen and repeat what they did a few years ago, or will Microsoft let Tim go rather quietly?

Inside Apple's automatic graphics switching

Ars Technica just posted a blog that explains how Apple's OS controls the graphics switching for prolonging the battery life of the new Macbook Pro.

Apple is Apple. Their pursue for perfection and attention-to-deal is to the level of desperation.  I give lots of respect to the quality of their product, their innovation and their design execution.  Most companies/people will satisfy to the level of "good enough", and that's the difference between a product that charges for >60% GM and a product that survives at 20% GM.

Sometimes when the marketing department writes an excellent Marketing Requirement, the engineers give the finger and claim that's "mission impossible".  At other times, a poor marketing strategy or product definition causes a disastrous failure, regardless how good the engineering execution was done.  Writing a good product definition/strategy, completing a good engineering execution of the implementation, beating every other competitor by at least several months on product release, and making lots of money - Apple's success recipe is easily said, but few company comes to the comparable level.

MJ Imitation Gone Bad

西游记中红孩儿的老爸是谁？

从开心网看到的, 分享一下. 不论是谁写的, 真能忽悠!

"西游记中红孩儿的老爸是谁？99%的人肯定不知道！"，看到朋友们都无一例外地说是牛魔王，可见大家对于《西游记》还是有一定了解的。然而，事情的真相到底是怎样的，红孩儿这样一个杀得孙悟空差点挂掉的小妖精（这样的妖怪在《西游记》中并不多），他的父亲到底是谁？他的家世究竟是怎样的？

红孩儿本领之高、势力之大、背景之奇特是《西游记》全书所罕有的。红孩儿号称"圣婴大王"，一副婴儿面孔，真实的年龄却有300多岁，口能吐火鼻能喷烟，方圆几百里地的山神土地都是他的杂役，动不动就被他抓来烧火顶门、提铃喝号。就是观音菩萨他也全然不放在眼里，他假扮菩萨骗八戒，甚至还要和观音菩萨动手。凡此种种，就连牛魔王自己都望尘莫及，他儿子又是怎么做到的？

如果红孩儿是牛魔王与罗刹女（就是铁扇公主）的儿子，那么红孩儿身上应该有一半牛的基因，外型上也应该和老牛有几分相似，可是他却完全没有，红孩儿长得非常漂亮，西游记里描写红孩儿的诗云："面如傅粉三分白，唇若涂朱一表才。"，可见红孩儿完全没有老牛的血脉。此外，牛魔王和罗刹女都不会吐火，可是红孩儿却吐火吐烟，而且吐得还是三昧真火，这就很奇怪。孙悟空刚见到红孩儿时上去就套近乎说"我和你父牛魔王是结义兄弟"，红孩儿举枪便刺，大骂道："泼猴头！我与你有甚亲情？哪个是你贤侄？你是哪里人，我是哪里人，怎么得与我父亲做兄弟？"可见红孩儿完全不相信，也瞧不起牛魔王这个所谓的父亲。

最蹊跷的便是红孩儿和菩萨相遇的情形。当孙悟空请来观音菩萨时，红孩儿说："泼猴头，错认了我也！你把我圣婴当作什么人？" 说罢便举枪猛刺，最终还是菩萨用如来给的金箍收服了他。当然，红孩儿的法力绝对不可能比观音菩萨更强大，可是他却根本不把观音菩萨这样一个佛界高层放在眼里。红孩儿最终被菩萨收编之后非但没受任何处罚，相反"不降反升"从一个占山为王的妖怪变成一个有编制的神仙（观音菩萨的善财童子，相当于高管的个人助理），这就引出一个疑问：红孩儿究竟仗着谁的势力才能如此嚣张，获得这样的待遇？

罗刹女嫉恨孙悟空是因为孙悟空请观音菩萨收了她的儿子红孩儿，倒是老牛没有对红孩儿的事大发雷霆。这是否也说明了红孩儿的父亲另有其人呢？

我们可以深入分析一下：

1）红孩儿是个婴儿，可是实际的年龄却有300多岁。这就说明红孩儿是在天上长大的，天上一天地上一年。

2）红孩儿没有半点老牛的基因，即使被穿了天罡刀也没现出牛的原形，可见他的生父决不是牛魔王。

3）三昧真火是道家的绝密功夫，牛魔王不会，铁扇公主不会，红孩儿竟然会，那只能是有一个祖师级的老道教的

4）红孩儿敢把几十个山神土地抓来当奴隶使唤，就算太上老君的两个道童下凡作孽的时候（金角大王和银角大王）也不敢，仗谁的面子？

5）敢打观音且观音不仅不修理他，反而给个个人助理的编制，这一切定是看在一个比菩萨身份更高的神仙的面子，能是谁？

以上所有线索，都指向一个人，那就是太上老君!

我们知道铁扇公主罗刹女做的是火焰山的买卖，每年当地居民给她献贡，她就把芭蕉扇拿出来扇两下灭灭火，老百姓就可以往来通行、放牧耕种，第二年烈火复发，再等大家送吃送喝，她再灭火，周而复始。老百姓并不恨她，反而还很尊敬她，拜她为"铁扇仙"，而罗刹女既不会耽误扇风，也不会把火焰山的火扇灭，因为这就是她的营生之道。然而，我们都知道，火焰山是当初太上老君炼丹炉里的两块砖掉在凡间形成的，为什么太上老君会安排罗刹女在这里做这样的好买卖，坐收渔翁之利呢？一定有一个原因让老君心甘情愿地这样做。

再来看罗刹女手中的芭蕉扇，《西游记》第53回里讲了太上老君的5件宝贝，其中就有芭蕉扇。可能有的朋友认为罗刹女手里的芭蕉扇和老君的芭蕉扇不是同一把扇子，那我就想反问了，《西游记》里有几件宝贝是有两件以上相同的复制品呢？何况这还是太上老君的法宝。而且《西游记》中说的很清楚，芭蕉扇产于昆仑山混沌开辟之地，除了太上老君和极少数几个能从混沌开辟活到现在的祖师级人物有可能得到之外，罗刹女又是怎样得到芭蕉扇的呢？

以上事实都说明，罗刹女是太上老君小情人，火焰山是太上老君"包养"罗刹女的产业，而红孩儿正是太上老君和罗刹女的私生子。当然，一个单身女人带小孩不容易，而太上老君位高权重所以决不能公开此事，所以还得给红孩儿安排一个名义上的父亲，于是便有了牛魔王这一层关系。所以牛魔王在凡间受到诸多照顾，但是红孩儿却看不起他，而孙悟空到火焰山去找罗刹女借芭蕉扇的时候却见不到罗刹女的丈夫牛魔王，这位昔日的拜把兄弟，他去了哪里呢？文中说的很清楚："入赘积雷山玉面公主"那里。作为被戴了绿帽子还不敢吭声的牛魔王来说，既然老婆是人家的情人，那你就管不得我出去找自己的情人了。

Landing a Boeing on Highway..with the help of a Grand Cherokee

超級星光大道 20100402 - 林育群-I will always love you

Somehow this guy looks like Susan Boyle in "Britains Got Talent". But they both got talent!

好象被"和谐"了

这几天发现我不能在新浪发博了. 一开始以为是浏览器的问题, 因为每次打开都发现说页面的HTML有错误. 后来试验了几个不同的, IE, Firefox和Chrome，问题都一样．　

我猜是不是我在新浪的博客被和谐了．不关闭，也不让我发.

但我相信,　中国的互联网是开放的.