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Posts Tagged ‘brian-goldfarb’

Earlier this week Facebook made the landmark (and long-awaited) announcement that it was going to enable the “Open Stream“, granting developers far more access and flexibility to Facebook data than they had before. To commerate the event, Facebook held a special Technology Tasting at its Palo Alto office, where it gave everyone an idea of exactly what developers could do with the new data.

We saw some impressive demos, including an example from Plaxo of how social sites could symbiotically exchange data with Facebook, followed by a walkthrough of the upcoming version of the new Seesmic Desktop. But out of all of them, by far the most visually impressive was a pair of applications put together by Microsoft. Yes, that Microsoft. In less than 72 hours, two small teams managed to put together a pair of applications built on the new Facebook APIs that really show off just how robust a Facebook application can be. The first app was built in Microsoft’s Silverlight platform, while the other is based on .NET.

I managed to get some footage of the demos during the event, but honestly it didn’t really do the apps justice (that’s what I get for trying to record with a video camera in each hand). So I got in touch with the team at Microsoft, which put together the high quality walkthrough video above. The video is narrated by Brian Goldfarb, Director of Microsoft’s Development Platform Group. Are the apps innovative? Not especially. But damn if they don’t look cool.

For those of you itching to try these out for yourselves, I’ve got bad news: you can’t. At least, not yet. But Microsoft will be releasing an SDK and the source code for both of the apps in the near future.

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There has been some doubt lurking in the trenches about whether Google has a solid, organized enterprise strategy. But there have been some recent developments that indicate that Google might have a viable game plan to become a player in the enterprise space. Yesterday, Google rolled out Google Apps Directory Sync, a tool that will let businesses sync the user account information in Google Apps with Microsoft Active Directory or Lotus Domino. Google says it’s using technology from Postini, security and compliance company Google acquired in 2007, to import information from users’ LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) systems, which includes mailing lists, groups, and user aliases, to a user’s Google Apps account. This utility will help many businesses, schools etc. who are currently using Google Apps save a lot of time and energy when it comes to importing information to their Google Apps system.

Following up on our story about the hilariously absurd use of goats to mow the lawns around Google’s headquarters instead of lawnmowers, we were able to get a comment from PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. PETA is okay with letting the goats be goats (eating grass and looking cute), but they have some major concerns about how they’ll be treated in doing these tasks.

Says Amy Cook, an Assistant Manager of Marketing for PETA:

PETA has no problem with letting goats do what goats want to do (e.g., look cute and eat weeds), but we do have concerns about how the goats may be transported, whether they are provided with access to shelter during storms and shade as well as water during hot weather, where they are housed when they aren’t “working,” what kind of veterinary care they receive, and what becomes of old and/or excess goats. PETA has found over and over that whenever animals are used by a business to make money, corners are cut and animals often suffer as a result. And that really gets our goat, if you’ll pardon the pun.

You think Google, with its “don’t be evil” mantra, would be kind to the goats. But then again, they have been cutting food supplies to employees during tough times, so you have to wonder if the goats would be left without an ample supply of water as well. Also, veterinary care seems like one of those goat perks that might be on Google’s cost-cutting checklist.

But you never know. I’m going to reach out to Google for comment.

Update: And here’s the response from Niki Fenwick, a Google representative:

Google takes the wellness of our employees very seriously and we pride ourselves on having a responsive and adaptable culture. The lawn-mowing goats are not, of course, full-time Google employees - but we would certainly respond directly to any concerns about their treatment. I can confirm that during their time in Mountain View, like other Google employees, each goat is entitled to a free organic lunch.

Love me some organic salad, hope the goats do too.

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