Steve Jarvis as Morning Keynote for SST

Steve Jarvis, Vice President of Product Operations for Expedia U.S. will be the morning keynote at this years South Sound Technology Conference, held March 9th in William Philip Hall on the University of Washington Campus. The morning segment and following panel which includes members of the local technology community and industry will focus on the explosion of mobile application development over the last year.

As the VP of Product Operations, Steve is responsible for the health and growth of all lines of business. Jarvis carries P&L responsibility for the air, car, hotel, package, cruise, insurance, and destination services businesses of Expedia’s US operation.

Prior to joining the Expedia leadership team, Jarvis was Vice President of Marketing for Concur’s Small & Midsize Business segment providing strategic leadership for brand, differentiation, advertising, and market development functions.

Prior to joining Concur in 2010, Jarvis was Alaska Airlines’ Vice President of Marketing, Sales and Customer Experience. In this role he was responsible for design of the airline’s customer experience, setting priorities for differentiation in a lower cost industry environment. He also led customer research, brand and advertising, sales functions, marketing programs, customer care, and in-flight product.

Prior to joining the Alaska executive team, Jarvis served as Vice President of E-Commerce and Acquisitions for Destinations.com, a Seattle-based online travel portal. Jarvis has held technology related positions at Autodesk, Intermind, and AT&T Wireless. He started his career at Boeing as a design engineer after graduating from the University of Washington with a bachelor’s degree in aeronautical engineering and master’s degree in business administration.

This is just another great addition to a lineup of speakers and panelists which include experts in cybersecurity, entrepreneurship, data integrity and networking both socially and technically. With an lunch keynote by White House Cybersecurity Coordinator Howard Schmidt it is sure to be a well attended and interesting event.

Register now for the SST Conference 2012

Howard Schmidt to Keynote at SST 2012

Big news for the SST Conference 2012, one of the keynoters for the event will be Howard A. Schmidt, the U.S. Cybersecurity Czar (official title Special Assistant to the President and the White House Cybersecurity Coordinator) for the United States.

Howard is the former Chief Security Officer for Microsoft and Vice President of Security at Ebay.

The South Sound Technology Conference is scheduled for March 9th in William Philip Hall with breakouts in different rooms.

The steering committee has met a few times and a program is being developed. Though not firm, we are looking at a more fully realized track in mobile applications this year. Last year we had a popular panel, but wondered if there was enough going on in mobile development in the South Sound to be impactful. That question has been answered over the last year with a boom in development and solutions. Therefore were bringing back a panel at a minimum and likely expanding to a second breakout session.

On May 18th, 19th and 20th we will be holding a South Sound Entrepreneurs Weekend. This is an offshoot from last years conference as well. In order to prepare for it, we will be asking several companies and organizations from the area to describe for us what type of tech company in the area would help their business grow and what solutions would they provide. Basically, we want to drop some business ideas into the hopper for a little fermentation before we break them out at the entrepreneurs weekend. (It must be close to a holiday for that metaphor to exist).

As the program solidifies more information will be forthcoming. As always, your ideas are welcome. Remember to save the date: March 9th.

Virtual Scavenger Hunting Once More

It is that time of year when the students of Living and Working are sent virtually scavenget hunting. It is a reasonably large class this year, so ten teams are competing for grades and prizes. Since I first started sending folks off on the hunt several years ago, the ability to find items has become far easier. The first hunt listed ten items that they were to find or create on the web. The list is up to three pages and nineteen items, some with several parts necessary to be complete.

Though I once had the teams send URL addresses or screen shots when they were found, the hunt has gotten large enought that it is far easier to have them gather up the items in two batches, and send them off bundled together.

Also, the seach items have gotten a bit harder. My favorite now is to find out the married name of my oldest sister. It is also a scary one. Keeping in mind that many people have their security questions for log in's as family member names (consider the often used "mothers maiden name"), you would expect that this is an impossible task without knowing me personally. Not so. Even though I have not posted this information anywhere, it is possible to discern the answer through a combination of publicly accessible sites.

Whether I am asking for directions to a home that costs below market value and fits a particular set of characteristics, or local news that is over twenty years old, it is designed to cover a multitued of search techniques, sites, search engines and indexing.

Kickstart your Arts Endeavor

I am a big fan of the web site Kickstarter. It is one of a new set of fundraising platforms that use the idea of crowdsourhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifcing or in this case "crowdfunding" as a model to generate money for your art project. They aren't all art projects, but most are. One project that I have backed is the book and film, "The Cicada Princess" from which a picture appears above.

You have to apply to Kickstarter and are vetted by the folks who run it as to whether your project is likely to succeed, or meets their guidelines. Because this is a subjective process, you will find a LOT of detractors on the Web. Google "Kickstarter Scam" and see what I mean.

However, my experience as a "backer" on several projects has so far been a very positive one. I probably won't be backing more in the future until some of my current backed projects come to fruition. However, as an exercise in shadowing how projects get done (and face obstacles unforeseen) it is extremely valuable. For someone who is interested in getting a behind the curtain glimpse at the ups and downs of getting an artistic endeavor out the door, it is cheap. You are able to follow along with your project and if the timeline gets pushed for completion, there are generally plenty of other backers pushing for news. That may not be comfortable for the person creating the art, but they sign up for it when they use the site.
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The project owners are required to fix a deadline and a target minimum of funds to raise. If they aren't able to reach that target amount by the deadline, no funds are collected. The money that is pledged by donors is collected using Amazon Payments.

So are, of the projects I have backed, all have hit their targets. Some at multiple times their minimum level. With the exception of the Stageright Productions folks and their unique performance of the "Pirates of Penzance", all have seen their projects pushed out. Some by a little, due to shipping timelines from China or from production errors. Others because they chose to take more time to finish. http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
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Because I know some of the parties involved, I am not worried about the delivery. With others, it is obvious that they have a lot of friends and family backers, which makes the need to deliver all the more important.

I am looking forward to two family Christmas presents from my backed projects: The board game "The Road to Canterbury" and the Wohttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifnderland card game "Borogove".

If you are looking to fund an arts project, or even a product like "B-Squares", take a look at the site. Make no mistake, you will still need to do the heavy lifting as far as contacts are concerned, but the mechanism they provide, even at a 5% fee, may be a good value to you.

A Platform Discussion

Over the last few days in class we have been discussing the idea of what a platform is. From the very basic definition of platform to the impact of companies or organizations that are successful in pulling off a platform play.

On Wikipedia, under platform, they list over twenty kinds, from a diving platform to a political parties platform. The one that has the greatest relevance to the Internet and the World Wide Web is provided this definition.

Platform technology is a term for technology that enables the creation of products and processes that support present or future development. It establishes the long-term capabilities of research & development institutes.

Whether a computer operating system provides a platform for applications, or TCP/IP stacks provide a platform for Internet technologies to develop, the impact and power behind a platform is tremendous.

Just ask Google engineer Steve Yegge, who in a post that was meant to be between peers ended up going public. He deleted it afterwards, but it was too late. Elvis had left the building.

PC Magazine has an article on the topic here and it is worth the read.

Here is just a taste of what he wrote in his post as reported by PC Magazine:

"Amazon does everything wrong, and Google does everything right," he wrote. Yegge criticized the company's hiring procedures, operations, charity giving, accommodations, compensation, and what he perceived to be lack of perks. Founder Jeff Bezos, he said, was "an infamous micro-manager" on the level of Steve Jobs, who made "ordinary control freaks look like stoned hippies." (Amazon did not respond to a request for comment.)

"But there's one thing they do really, really well that pretty much makes up for ALL of their political, philosophical and technical screw-ups," Yegge wrote. About a decade ago, Bezos realized that "that Amazon needs to be a platform."

"A product is useless without a platform, or more precisely and accurately, a platform-less product will always be replaced by an equivalent platform-ized product," Yegge wrote.

Where it hurts is that Yegge points the finger at Google+ as doing it all wrong, claiming that "is a prime example of our complete failure to understand platforms from the very highest levels of executive leadership."

The question is, is this a Jerry McGuire moment for Steve Yegge, where he is applauded internally but ultimately jettisoned? Or will the public/private posting error (if it really was in error) be forgiven in favor or harnessing the passion that he shows in his post toward creating a successful platform out of Google+

Steve Jobs and History

After Steve Jobs passing from pancreatic cancer, there has been a huge number of articles and remembrances about the man and his impact on technology. There will be many books written in the future as well.

I just wanted to add a few of my own thoughts while they are fresh to me now. I talk about Steve Jobs in my classes. How could you teach about entrepreneurship and technology and not. Or the evolution of the Internet and the Web as well. The latter may not be the first topic that comes to mind, but his impact has been felt there beyond the personal computers and digital players that have come from the company.

I was able to meet Steve Jobs in person once in my life. He was at the University of Washington Seattle and visited the tech fair. I don't even remember the year, though because he has just launched the NeXT Computer and gave a presentation at Meany Theater I believe it was around 1989-90. I was working at Microsoft at the Time.

He has had an interesting life, and his relationship with Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple is in itself a character study. You can read "West of Eden, The End of Innocence at Apple Computer" for some background on the relationship of Steve to the company. You can even watch some of the recent biopics that have come out like "The Pirates of Silicon Valley from 2005". And that film came out before Steve brought Apple back to be the giant it once more is. Steve Jobs life may become its own course of study.

However there are two things that I like to point out when talking about his life. He has helmed two different billion dollar companies. Apple and Pixar. His company he founded after being ousted from Apple, NeXT Computers, made it easier for Pixar to create Toy Story and Finding Nemo. It was on a NeXT Computer that Tim Berners-Lee set up the very first World Wide Web server.

A Full Ride, Living Stipend and a Job in Information Assurance

How does a full ride scholarship, a living stipend (because the funding organization wants you to work on research and studies) and employment once you’ve earned your degree sound? That’s what the Information Assurance Scholarship for Service program does, and is doing for two graduate students currently at the Institute of Technology. And there is more to come in the next three years.

To create a powerful incentive for students to enter the Information Assurance field, the Department of Defense is offering the program described above. As they put it:

Nearly every day, the United States faces growing threats and attacks against our critical government systems. DoD’s mission is to address the Nation’s urgent security challenges and to proactively seek solutions to protect and defend our information and information systems. One of the key security challenges DoD faces daily is assuring that the Department's information, information systems, and information infrastructure are protected and available in order to support the Department's transformation to a secure net–centric environment.

To continue to provide the growing number of trained personnel needed, DoD is working with universities across the country, known as, often referred to as CAEs, to develop and expand IA–related curricula and to offer programs of study for future IA professionals.

Universities must qualify in order to provide the scholarships and earn a National Centers of Academic Excellence in Information Assurance designation. Then that university has to pass muster during an NSF (National Science Foundation) site visit to be vetted to provide that opportunity. If you would like to apply for the scholarship, you must attend a qualifying institution.

As it happens the University of Washington has qualified as one of the universities to offer it. Last June, led by Dr Barbara Endicott-Popovsky, the Director of Center for Information Assurance and Cybersecurity at the UW, the site visit by the NSF was conducted and included visits to the Institute of Technology at the University of Washington, Tacoma.

The visit was such a success that they asked that Barbara increase the budget in her proposal.

Three months later Barbara sent out the announcement:

The NSF has officially awarded us $2.1M to fully fund 18 graduate-level scholars over the next 4 years to fully immerse in information assurance (IA) studies! Further, we received an additional $ ½ M on top!! This truly launches us on the national scene as a significant IA presence in the Northwest and in the field at large!
There are only 30+ schools in the US who have had similar awards, our sister iSchool—Syracuse University—being one of them, along with CMU, Johns Hopkins and Purdue. There are only 200+ such scholars in the US at any one time—we’ll have 4 this year—we are in elite company!!

Once again I am reminded of the strengths we have in the South Puget Sound to help generate success in research and technology in the area of Information Assurance and Cybersecurity. With our partners in academia to the North, and in particular UW Seattle’s Information School, we can be part of future solutions to the challenges described on the CISC (Center of Information Assurance and Cybersecurity) site:

The challenges of information assurance are not going to be solved easily, quickly, or independently. Solutions will require new research, new capabilities, new products and services, a spectrum of broadly and specially educated professionals, a much more aware public, and much innovation and broad collaboration. Washington is a convergence of international commerce, military defense, and network-based software development. As such, it is both vulnerable to disruption, and is the home of a spectrum of professional talent and organizations that can be well served by the presence of a national center of excellence.

If you are interested in applying for the program, consider applying to the graduate program at the Institute of Technology at the UW Tacoma or the Information School at the UW Seattle.