Developers, it's all your fault
Grady Booch, an IBM fellow and inventor of UML, is using his position to preach the gospel of moral responsibility to software developers. During an interview with Charles Cooper at Cnet, he says that...
View ArticleThe scantily-clad "ring girls" flap: Vanco and Gartner responded professionally
In my Editor's Note last week, I wrote about the fact that Vanco, a U.K. network service provider, featured two scantily dressed women in its booth at the opening reception of last month's Gartner...
View ArticleWhy dont women speak out? We are damned if we do, and damned if we don't
The ongoing discussion of a vendor's use of scantily-clad women to attract attention to its booth at last month's Gartner Symposium/ITXpo following my Editor's Notes on the subject has yielded some...
View ArticleThe IT profession 'ain't above these things,' one reader says
Wow. You just never know what's going to rile some people. Eric Helland of Milwaukee was so upset by my last three Editor's Notes that he took time out on Thanksgiving Day to write a letter to let me...
View ArticleI'm sick of the Big Dramatic Apologies. Where's Facebook's ethical beacon?
I'm tired of Web 2.0 execs perpetrating massive privacy abuses -- in a desperate bid to "monetize" the Web -- and then issuing the Big Dramatic Apology after the outcry is too much to ignore. Speaking...
View ArticleBehind the scenes: Frank Abagnale of 'Catch Me If You Can' fame talks about...
If you've read the book or seen the Steven Spielberg movie, Catch Me If You Can, you know who Frank Abagnale is. I conducted an interview with the former con man in October, and we focused on data...
View ArticleEthics in the CS curriculum
Students should have classes in ethics, but who should be teaching them?
View ArticleMicrosoft wins this OOXML battle, but loses the war
You'd think that sooner or later even Microsoft would learn there's a right way and a wrong way to do things. But whenever it has a choice it persists in choosing the wrong way. There are lots of smart...
View ArticleBad Microsoft, good Microsoft
There's a right way and a wrong way to do almost everything, and in the last couple of days Microsoft has done exactly the wrong thing in one case (and handed the opponents of DRM a powerful argument...
View ArticleWanted: a clue on Windows licensing
I don't know Eric Ligman, but he seems like a nice enough person. Yet you get a different picture from headlines like "Microsoft Exec Rages Against Vista Upgrade 'Hack'" and "Microsoft exec loses his...
View ArticleGartner says businesses should monitor social trends -- well, no duh
Gartner Inc. has issued a press release with the headline "Gartner Says Enterprises Must Anticipate How Societal Trends Will Impact Their Business and Customers."Seems painfully obvious, but what may...
View ArticleArmy of fake social media friends to promote propaganda
Does a code of ethics still exist in Intelligence firms? Does it disappear behind closed doors, dirty deeds done in the dark and used against the American people who are supposed to be free to express...
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