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Im just trying to get a message to you,” sang Spence in his best Barry Gibb-like falsetto. The Disco Drudge was in full Bee Gees mode after hearing that a company called NaturalNano is offering a nano-based paint that can block cell phone and other wireless communication. The spray-on paint, which includes technologies developed by Ambit, touts the use of metalized halloysite nanotubes to create a passive radio-frequency shield. The company dismisses comparisons with illegal jamming by saying its product is an intelligent cellular and Wi-Fi control. “Hey, who cares if the baby sitter is calling to tell you that the kids have been rushed to the trauma center—you just enjoy that Yanni concert in peace,” cackled the Kitty.
Spence was checking Netflix to see if there was a special unrated version of “March of the Penguins” when the KattPhone interrupted his search. The caller asked what Spence thought of Sun head honcho Scott McNealys open letter to HP CEO Mark Hurd promoting the idea of a converged HP-UX/Solaris 10 platform. Spence said that, certainly, the new tree-hugging, environmentally conscious McNealy seems to be trying to play nice with everybody. “Meanwhile, Sun Senior Vice President Larry Singer is quoted by theinquirer.net proclaiming that HPs Itanium event is like trying to put lipstick on a pig,” noted the crony. “Singer must be channeling the old McNealy,” snickered Spence.
Spence bid his pal adieu and skatted into downtown Boston to hook up with a media-maven pal for a few brews and see what was new on the entertainment front. The pal said a file-sharing service called Mashboxx is set to challenge iTunes dominance in the download market. Mashboxx touts a P2P network filter called Snocap, developed by Napsters Shawn Fanning, that will reportedly filter out illegal music files. Mashboxx hopes to promote the concept of pay P2P file sharing and claims to have current and pending deals with major music labels.
“Speaking of stolen files,” said Spence, “did you see that Ernst & Young recently lost data the old-fashioned way—by the actual physical theft of some of its computers?” According to The Miami Herald, four E&Y auditors left their Dell laptops inside a conference room while they broke for lunch. A surveillance video showed two thieves enter shortly afterward and toss the laptops into a backpack and scoot.
Soon, Spence himself had to scoot back to the office, where a Penguinista called the KattLine about a statement made by Eclipse Foundation Executive Director Mike Milinkovich at the Open Source Business Conference in San Francisco recently. When the subject of software licensing and sales popped up during a panel discussion, Milinkovich predicted that folks may eventually witness “the death of the software salesman.” “Well, as Arthur Millers Willy Loman said, after all the highways, and the trains, and the appointments, and the years, you end up worth more dead than alive,” mused the Mouser.