The Beatles Create a Buzz

With the recent announcement that Apple's iTunes would now be offering all The Beatles' albums, an internet craze began.  Within the first 10 hours of the announcement, Google news found more than 3,000 stories on the announcement.  This type of coverage of a band that hit its prime nearly 40 years ago is unprecedented, and begs the question, how much hype and coverage would The Beatles have incurred during the internet era?  We will soon know more about this question, as this announcement only adds to iTunes 14 million songs offered and will surely increase the 10 billion songs downloaded yearly recorded by iTunes.  This is just another step in the direction for IT dominance by Apple, as they have continued to improve their competitive advantage in the internet music industry with the additional offerings of The Beatles.

Do you trust facebook?

With word that facebook is likely to introduce a new email service, one must consider the privacy capabilities of facebook.  According to the article "5 Ways Facebook Could Threaten Gmail," Facebook apparrently is about to launch its own email service.  But with the recent privacy issues concerning Gmail, does facebook have the cyber power to be more secure with personal data than Google.  My gut instinct is no, and i personally wouldn't trust facebook to handle my email.  However, Facebook has a reputation with the younger generation that may be more willing to try this out.  The only way to know this will be to wait and see, but something tells me this idea is gonna flop.

Is Microsoft slipping?

With the recent announcement that Microsoft CEO is choosing to sell nearly $2 billion of stock, one must wonder whether the feeling inside Microsoft headquarters is one of pessimism rather than optimism.  Like all things in life, the business world is under constant change, rarely does one company stay on top of a particular industry over a long period of time.  Microsoft has been at the forefront of the IT industry since the introduction of the computer, but has recently been rivaled heavily by companies such as Google and Apple as the computing industry has moved more mobile.  While Microsoft is launching its smartphone to compete with the aforementioned companies to compete in the smartphone market, it is quite apparent that the proportion of Mac users is steadily rising.

Therefore, this announcement may be a sentiment that Microsoft executives may feel the pressure from their competitors.  CEO Steve Ballmer states that he is excited about Microsoft's new product offerings and prospects, but its hard to believe he would sell as Microsoft just initiated a dividend boost and buyback company if he were that confident.  These are stock characteristics of a maturing company with low growth, which is where I believe Microsoft stands today.  It is likely we will see a new tech giant emerge as the software leader in the next 10-20 years, as the business world always has a way of being cyclical.