World Technology Awards 2001 94
struanr writes: "Nature has published the winners and finalists of the World Technology Awards, which are run by the World Technology Network. "These are about those individuals whose work today will, in our opinion, create the greatest "ripple effects" in the future... in both expected and unexpected ways." There are some big names chosen here, and some glaring omissions."
Nice. (Score:2)
I give my congratulations and my thanks.
Re:Nice. (Score:3, Interesting)
What Linus did create was a kinship among software developers that blossomed into a community. This community formed distributions and companies to market their newly created softwares. I suppose he did create a new commerce system in which OSS was popular. For this he deserves an award for changing commerce and how people everywhere are viewing copyrights for software.
Re:Nice. (Score:2, Insightful)
Slackware forever
I agree. 8.0 is da bomb
Re:Nice. (Score:1)
Well Said! (Score:2)
Linus and friends have created a great (the best) hobbyist operating system, so good that it stands up well even against "real" commercial operating systems. But the design of the operating system is nothing revolutionary; it is based on 30+ year-old ideas.
Anyway, I am glad to have the pressure on Microsoft (and others) and to see Open Source and Free Software benefit as well. Thanks linus!
I went to this, it was fun (Score:3, Interesting)
My personal favorite is the University of Surrey's satellite center -- I think constellations of LEO microsatellites, using packet-switching, are going to be one of the most interesting technologies in the next 20 years. There are some ways to get the costs down to the point where you could have flatrate global email from an LEO constellation for about as much as US nationwide 2-way pager coverage, which may not seem like much, but when applied to non-human operations like trucks, containers, etc. sending telemetry, it's very exciting.
Not to take away undue credit, but... (Score:2, Interesting)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the Open Source software model founded by that hippie, shoeless slob Richard Stallman? If open source didn't exist (don't know how anyone can claim they "invented" OSS anyway), how could have Linus copylefted the Linux kernel in the first place?
Re:Not to take away undue credit, but... (Score:1)
True, Linux didn't invent it; but his proliferation of it has done some very good things for the "OSS Way". The Linux kernel has been one of the most successful examples of something truly *free*.
Re:Not to take away undue credit, but... (Score:1)
Re:Not to take away undue credit, but... (Score:2)
You are wrong so I correct you.
The open source software model was founded by that limpy, gun-fanatic, geek Eric Steven Raymond, when he wrote the paper "The Cathedral and the Bazaar". While Eric didn't invent the open source model, he put into words and clarified what had by that time already become a large philosophy for a large group of programmers.
The sholess slob hippie Richard Stallman is the creator of the Free Software Movement, which has a completely different philosophy. Of course, free software existed long before Richard Stallman started his evangelizing, but Richard put into words what many people felt, and decided to do something about it, and thus was the gnu project started and the free software foundation founded.
Since copyleft is a phrase invented by Richard Stallman, it has absolutely nothing to do with open source, so the fact that Linus copylefted his linux-kernel is not of particular interest in discussing the origins of open source.
But the fact that linux is freely available with source code, and that it created a large following of programmers and users, is relevant. The fact that linux was free and popular eventually resulted in what is now known as the open source movement, first observed and described in detail by Eric Raymond.
Shawn Fanning? (Score:2, Insightful)
Waddabout Bill? (Score:1)
Re:Shawn Fanning? (Score:1)
Firstly: They are not choosing people for what they did in a particular year, they are choosing people in general who have had important effects.
Secondly: In terms of entrepreneurship, he DID found a company that grew explosively, catered to a market including almost all people online, and offered a product everyone used. It was illegal. He got burned. That doesn't mean he wasn't an entrepreneur.
Thirdly: Shawn Fanning created, almost single-handedly, a new market niche, and a public awareness of an issue that had to be addressed, that of digital piracy. His work did, in fact, "contribute significantly to the advance of emerging technologies for the benefit of business and society" as their criteria requires.
Re:Shawn Fanning? (Score:5, Interesting)
This year's choice is Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani of New York City. I find their choice to be unwise, probably prompted by feel-good patriotism rather than by clinical reasoning and good journalistic intregrity.
In New York City, Mayor Giuliani may have had the biggest effect after the September 11 events, and possibly would loom that large in the public eye in all of New York State, but I question his impact to the world, or even the entire United States.
A better choice would have been Osama Bin Laden, in spite of how reprehensible his actions may have been, or how hated the man has become in America and other NATO countries.
Bin Laden had an unarguably huge effect throughout the world with his successful attack and toppling of the World Trade Center towers on September 11, 2001. Laws and personal freedoms throughout the world have been wrenched into a new status, and the ripple effect will be felt for years to come.
His is now a household name spoken as a curse or a blessing. We all know who he is and don't tend to have luke warm feelings towards the man.
Perhaps speculation about Bin Laden had saturated the press too much, or perhaps Time Magazine wished to focus on the positive rather than the negative, but their choice for POY 2001 is still, to me, very questionable.
Whereas I didn't agree with Time Magazine's choice for POY 2001, I don't disagree with Nature's choice of Shawn Fanning as the winner for both the categories of Entertainment and Entrepreneurship, or for being a finalist for the category of Marketing Communications.
Fanning's product and company (Napster) had a huge effect on the Entertainment industry, and he definitely qualified as a stand-out entrepreneur.
---
(1) Prior precedent for individuals with a very negative effect on history was set in 1938 by choosing Adoph Hitler, and in both 1939 and 1942 by choosing Joseph Stalin.
Re:Shawn Fanning? (Score:1)
Re:Shawn Fanning? (Score:1)
- Firiel
Re:Shawn Fanning? (Score:1)
Napster, as of now, was NEVER legal. Any trading done can be prosecuted no matter when it was done. Napster can be sued for what was traded on it's system at any point.
Re:Shawn Fanning? (Score:1)
It's also amazing that Linus Torvalds gets credited with "writing the Linux kernel" (way to go man!) and "inventing" the Open Source development model, and quite ironic when compared to other prominent figures (RMS, Alan Cox, Bruce Perens) who really *care* about the Open Source community (as opposed to Linux who sees it as a handy development model).
When will an awards ceremony look past celebrity status and rate people who really make a contribution? And when will they learn to write the truth about people instead of trumping them up to make their articles looks amazing? Next we'll be seeing Rob Malda getting an award for "creating Slashdot and writing every bit of text subsequently added to the site"!
John Markoff? blech.. (Score:1)
Who are the idiots responsible for these awards? Linus responsible for "establishing" Open Source? NOT! (no disrespect to the man but jesus, he didn't invent fire either) Shawn Fanning?! That is soooo two years ago.
Re:John Markoff? blech.. (Score:1)
Re:John Markoff? blech.. (Score:1)
Re:John Markoff? blech.. (Score:1)
Because Jesus, it's dumb. I hope that's your point.
List of winners (Score:1, Redundant)
* * *
BIOTECHNOLOGY - Winner: Dr Craig Venter, President & CEO, Celera Genomics Inc., USA. Dr Venter was selected for his work on sequencing the human genome.
COMMERCE - Winner: Mr Linus Torvalds, Programmer, Transmeta Corp., USA. Linus Torvalds was selected for his work on Linux and the Open Source Software Paradigm.
COMMUNICATIONS TECHNOLOGY - Winner: Mr Robert Metcalfe, Vice-President Technology, International Data Group Inc., USA. Robert Metcalfe was selected for his work as the inventor of the Ethernet and the founder of 3Com.
DESIGN - Winner: Mr Stefano Marzano, CEO, Philips Design, Italy.
EDUCATION - Winner Dr Venkataraman Balaji, Head/Principal Scientist, International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), India.
ENERGY - Winner: Dr Paul MacCready, Chairman, AeroVironment Inc., USA. Paul MacCready was selected for his considerable work in the area of flight technology and solar-powered transport.
ENTERTAINMENT - Winner: Mr Shawn Fanning, Founder, Napster Inc., USA.
ENTREPRENEURSHIP - Winner: Mr Shawn Fanning, Founder, Napster Inc., USA.
ENVIRONMENT - Winner: Dr Geoffrey Ballard, Founder, Ballard Power Systems Inc., USA. Geoffrey Ballard was selected for his work as the founder of the leading fuel-cell manufacturer, Ballard Power Systems.
ETHICS - Winner: Dr Sharon Beder, Faculty Member, Department of Science and Technology Studies, University of Wollongong, Australia.
FINANCE - Winner: Mr Thomas Weisel, Founder and Chairman, Thomas Weisel Partners, USA.
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY - HARDWARE - Winner: Mr Gordon Moore, Chairman Emeritus, Intel Corp., USA. Gordon Moore was selected for his work at IntelCorp., which he co-founded in 1968.
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY - SOFTWARE - Winner: Prof. Olivier Faugeras, Research Director, ROBOTVIS Group Sophia-Antipolis Research Unit, INRIA, France. REALVIZ creates commercial products for the film and advertising industries, amongst others, using geometric information to reconstruct 3D scenes and co-ordinate artificial elements
LAW - Winner: Prof. Lawrence Lessig, Professor of Law, Stanford University, USA.
MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS - Winner: Mr Mark Viken, Senior Vice President, Information Technology Products Division, Sony Electronics Inc., USA.
MATERIALS - Winner: Prof. George Whitesides, Professor of Bioorganic/Physical Organic Chemistry & Materials Science, Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, USA. George Whitesides has pioneered the development of 'soft lithography'. This microfabrication technology is having a tremendous impact in many areas of micro- and nanofabrication.
MEDIA & JOURNALISM - Winner: Mr John Markoff, Technology Correspondent, New York Times, USA.
POLICY - Winner: Prof. Christopher Freeman, Professor Emeritus, Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU), University of Sussex, UK.
SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP - Winner: Mr Agus Gunarto, Managing Program/NGO Worker, Yayasan Rona Alam (Rona Alam Foundation), Indonesia.
SPACE - Winner: Prof. Martin Sweeting, Director, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL), Surrey Space Centre, UK. Since 1979, Professor Sweeting's team at the University of Surrey has pioneered engineering techniques for small satellites and has developed a series of highly capable, yet inexpensive micro-satellites, built for around US$3 million each.
THE ARTS - Winner: Mrs. Steina Vasulka, Artist, Art and Science Laboratory, USA & Mr Woody Vasulka, Artist, Art and Science Laboratory, USA.
TRANSPORTATION - Winner: Governor Jaime Lerner, Governor of Paraná, Brazil.
Re:List of winners - Take with a grain of salt (Score:2, Informative)
Did the border move while I was celebrating the new year?
:-)
Re:List of winners - Take with a grain of salt (Score:1)
Ballard isn't the only player in the fuel cell game, but they have done a great job of promoting themselves, and do have good tech.
Re:List of winners - Take with a grain of salt (Score:1)
http://www.ballard.com/facilities.asp [ballard.com]
Microsoft? (Score:1)
Hmm...
Glaring omissions?
Guess yer talking about Microsoft. We all know how much *THEY* innovate!
:D
Re:Microsoft? (Score:1)
LOL (Score:2, Funny)
FINANCE
Winner: Mr Thomas Weisel, Founder and Chairman, Thomas Weisel Partners, USA.
I love it when a guy who is basically named "Weasel" wins a finance award. It reminds me way to much of the old law firm saw, "Dewie, Cheayum, & Howe"
-Frums
Better the MS-DOS? (Score:1)
It is good to see that they know what they are talking about... *sigh*
Congrats to the winners (Score:1, Funny)
Re:Congrats to the winners (Score:4, Funny)
I agree completely - instead of hiding his talent between moronic technical news posts, please give this man the soapbox he deserves. A man of Jon Katz's talents should have nothing less than his own web site, where he can publish more stories, more often, without having to compete with Slashdot's stories. And furthermore, this new site should have a complete lock on Katz's work, so that no other site can publish it. That's a moneymaker right there, VA, and the entire Slashdot community would stand up and applaud such a fine measure.
(Now let's see how many people moderate me down as a troll before they figure out what the real message is...)
Lifetime achievement awards? (Score:2, Insightful)
Now, I admire Bob Metcalfe as much as anyone, but the creation of Ethernet is hardly recent. The recognition of Torvalds, Gordon Moore, and Michael Dell (a finalist) likewise begs the question: Hasn't anyone done anything in technology lately?
I would suppose that this award is like the Nobel, in that it is given once time has proved that the nominee's accomplishments are not a flash-in-the-pan.
odd results (Score:3, Insightful)
Shawn Fanning of Napster for Entrepreneurship? Napster was nice and all, but did Fanning really make a business? It seems to me that he had an excellent idea for a piece of software, it got big, and someone threw money at it. It sort of road the coat-tails of a technology boom. And look at them now. You can't really make a sucessful company by following their business plan. They hardly have one, and it hasn't been particularly profitable. The entertainment category award makes much more sense to me.
And I'm all for Bob Metcalf, but the blurb on him didn't really say anything about what he's done lately. Yeah, ethernet is great and all, but these are the 2001 awards. Ethernet is not new.
Same with Gordon Moore. His little writeup is all about stuff he did back in the day. And yeah, a lot of it is still relevant, but surely 2001 had some hardware development that's more interesting than a 'law' everyone has been quoting for years.
Think of the Nobel Awards (Score:2)
Also, since this prize has not been around for that long, it still has to contend with "queued" up winners, just as the Nobel did in its early days. Is it really fair to hand out the award for hardware to an individual of lesser importance when someone like Gordon Moore is sitting in the wings without a prize?
Bob
Getting RMS mad... (Score:3, Insightful)
But! It's really misleading. It makes it sound like the idea of giving away your code was invented by Linus and it wasn't. It wasn't invented by RMS either, but RMS would claim that he's the guy who's done the most for it. Heck, RMS doesn't even get a token "GNU/Linux" in these awards.
Re:Getting RMS mad... (Score:1)
I think this is the wrong prize to the wrong person for the wrong reason. The course of free software would definitely have been different without Linus, but this smacks of "Linux Torvalds, the inventor of the Linux Operating System". Still, perhaps Linus will be more diplomatic about getting an award for establishing a paradigm than RMS would have been
Dunstan
Re:Commerce??? (Score:1)
Where's Steve Case? (Score:2, Interesting)
Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:5, Informative)
If you're not familiar with Singer, here's a good page [uic.edu] about him. The short version is that he advocates infanticide until 28 days for disabled newborns and euthanasia for people with cognitive
disabilities. He first made it big in the animal rights community, but many are abandoning him after he tried to justify some forms of bestiality (see this [tnr.com]). Here's one of his quotes:
Sounds like a real champion of animal rights, huh?
Also, as other posters have mentioned, although he's well deserving of the award, Linus didn't establish the Open Source software model. Some of the posters have said RMS did, but there are a couple issues with that:
RMS would say he's not for Open Source, he's for Free Software
The model was around long before RMS, he just successfully described & codified it in the GPL
Re:Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:1, Interesting)
Before you say something bad about him, read one of his books, with an eye toward the same sort of "absurd conclusions" (e.g., it's okay to kill a newborn, because it doesn't have a personality) as, oh I don't know, that there are as many positive odd numbers (which are all whole numbers) as all positive and negative whole numbers and fractions of two whole numbers combined. This is absurd, but any mathematician will tell you its a fact.
There was a time when it was 'absurd' that the descendent of a savage from Africa brought over to serve Europeans should have the same right to elect the officials in the given European government as the Europeans themselves. Absurd!
Re:Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:2)
adj.
1.Ridiculously incongruous or unreasonable. See Synonyms at foolish.
By definition, absurd conclusions are unreasonable. Conclusions are supposed to be arrived at by reason. Therefore, using this criteria, his conclusions are obviously wrong.
So you're saying most of his writing has significant logical flaws yet you agree with his most important conclusions? That's more than just absurd, it's moronic.
I believe that every human life has value. Singer also advocates euthanizing people with cognitive disabilities. Once you start assigning less value to people based on a disability that opens the door to debate on what constitutes a disability. Maybe people with ADHD should be considered disabled, are of less value, & should be euthanized? Who decides the criteria?
It's only true because there are an infinite number of positive odd integers, and also infinite positive & negative whole integers, & fractions of 2 integers. If you add infinity to itself, however many times, you still have inifinity. I don't consider that absurd.
Re:Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:1)
First Mathematics doesn't say that there are as many positive even integers as there are integers alltogether, it simply states that injective mappings exist between the two sets. For finite sets, that is functionally equivalent to saying that they are equal in number, but when dealing with infinity such phrases as "as many" don't make much sense. It is not absurd at all, you simply don't understand the subject matter.
Now you almost got a good analogy with the slavery thing. The point of comparason you *should* have made is that in both examples of ethics, the society seems wrong because they have a different definition of "human life"
Peter Singer is an interesting fellow. I think he's wrong, and dangerously so. But he's an intelligent man who has made significant contributions to his field.
An example of Singer's bizarre ethical system: Killing a newborn isn't murder because it isn't a person yet. Buying a big screen TV is murder because you could have sent the money to Unicef who would have saved an innocent life with it.
He is a skilled essayist, and makes both claims difficult (though not impossible) to refute.
Though to his credit, he lives his philosophy, he strictly limits his income, and donates the vast majority of what he earns to charity.
If I had gone to Princeton, I'd take one of his classes for sure.
Re:Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:1)
With the glut of humans on this planet this seems reasonable to me, it's about time we shifted our breeding away from massive quantities and shoot for some quality.
Sex with animals does not always involve cruelty
Of course it doesn't, a little farmboy is hardly going to cause harm to a cow.
Now, where is my asbestos suit....
Re:Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:1)
Re:Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:2)
C//
Re:Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:2)
Most classic inventions weren't really invented the first time by their so-called "inventors," but rather were popularized by them. Inventions which fail in one culture are often later reinvented in another where they finally capture the public eye for whatever reason. One culture might regard an invention as a curio, the next adopts it and it changes the world. Go figure.
C//
Singer is not a crackpot (Score:2)
Princeton doesn't tend to appoint crackpots to its faculty, and they haven't in this case.
Re:Take These Awards with A Grain of Salt (Score:1)
Hmm. Please clarify. Do you mean that his statement is wrong and sex with animals does always involve cruelty? Or do you mean that what he said is true, but he shouldn't have said it? In that case, why?
Big freakin huh. (Score:1)
Re:Big freakin huh. (Score:2)
I think linux is pretty good, but I don't see why it's necessarily good to save an obsolescent idea.
Re:Big freakin huh. (Score:1)
I'm not sure we won't get modded down as offtopic for debating this here - I'm sure it'll come up again someplace more appropriate; but I think Linux's strengths and continued viability are testament to the idea that monlithic kernels weren't obsolete at the time and they aren't any more so today.
But that issue aside, my point was more that whether you like the monolotihic design or not, forwarding it's strengths through design is something Linus really did do as opposed to incorrectly attributing the open source design to him.
When did Linus Show up? (Score:2)
Clearly it's a politica aware and not a politically correct one at that.
Pretty weak list... (Score:2, Insightful)
In the area of computer technology, I'd say that only Gordon Moore deserves this level of recognition. Gordon almost single-handedly created the microprocessor industry as well as provided essential direction on mp design. Say what you will about the purity of Intel's mp designs, the fact remains that designing for manufacturability is as critical as designing for pure performance.
As has been said elsewhere, Linus did something evolutionary, but they give him far more credit that is fair (he didn't create the OSS...he DID popularize it).
Bob Metcalf is a pioneer with twenty years to rest on his laurels and other networking technologies are fundamentally better, just not as popular. Bob is the next most legit candidate.
Shawn has contributed to some of the most important dialog on intellectual property and copyright laws by the actions of a curious kid, but he did this without attempting to do anything more interesting than share ripped music, so he can hardly be called cerebral or a major contributor.
Re:Pretty weak list... (Score:2)
While Mr. Torvalds didn't invent the idea of free software, he mostly created the operating system that is the paradigm for the whole concept: Linux. That's a pretty big achievement considering how far we've come from the original Linux kernels one decade ago.
Re:Pretty weak list... (Score:1)
Open Source... (Score:1)
Old achievements? (Score:2)
Names such as Bob Metcalfe, Shawn Fanning, and Linus Torvalds stand out.
Metcalfe, since his retirement from 3Com, really hasn't done anything useful. He's made a lot of money as a columnist, which really isn't deserving of a "World Technology Award," especially when he makes bold predictions of the internet's demise, and Linux being old technology. I know, those examples didn't happen in 2001, but to be honest I haven't paid attention to him much in 2001.
Shawn Fanning.. in the beginning of 2001, I don't think Napster was completely deactivated, but I'm pretty sure it was crippled beyond usefulness by all the record-company imposed filters. Furthermore, he had the idea first. It wasn't a new idea, or something that nobody else would have come up with, and he certainly didn't do the best implementation of peer to peer. If he had to win at all, it should have been in 2000, if not 1999. By the end of 2001, Napster had become totally irrelevant.
And last, Linus Torvalds.. What he did is remarkable, but it seems kind of arbitrary picking 2001 as the year to give him a prize. I don't know about this one, maybe he deserved it. But why 2001?
Re:Old achievements? (Score:2)
Napster was still big in a lot of people's minds, especially journalists, in early 2001.
Nature, one of the sponsors, just published info now; I guess because it was a year-end thing. Also, they probably have a 3 month leadtime anyway.
Consider the source... (Score:1)
Many of the WTN's choices are in fact questionable. The nominations are somewhat well-balanced, but going through the list of winners reminds one of the good old boy network -- senescent, white has-beens and businessmen caught up in an orgy of co-promotion and intralaudatory gibberish.
How could it be any different, with an awards committee co-chaired by the likes of GlaxoSmithKline, CNBC, and Enron? And don't forget how hard Nature has been trying to broaden its readership. On reflection, it seems clear that the point of this exercise was not - as advertised - to recognize achievement going forward, so much as to allow companies in need of makeovers to associate themselves with names they consider to be influential in the present public consciousness.
In the most charitable interpretation, one can see this as their attempt to honor achievement as they recognize it.
That, my friends, is an honor that most of us could do without.
- Cantankerous in Cantabrigia
P.S. -- What on earth has Michael Schrage ever done to merit the press' accolades -- besides strenuously cultivating his friendships?
A bit of analysis by country (Score:2, Interesting)
No. of wins - No. of finalists --- Pop. in millions
USA : 12.5 - 60 --- 263
UK : 2 - 12 --- 58
Japan : 0 - 7 --- 125
India : 1 - 4 --- 936
France : 1 - 3 --- 58
Brazil : 1 - 2 --- 156
Germany : 0 - 3 --- 82
Switzerland : 0 - 2 --- 7
Finland : 1 - 1 --- 5
Netherlands : 0 - 2 --- 15
South Africa : 0.5 - 1 --- 41
Italy : 1 - 0 --- 57
Australia : 1 - 0 --- 18
Indonesia : 1 - 0 --- 195
Iceland : 0 - 1 --- 0.27
Taiwan : 0 - 1 --- 21
Canada : 0 - 1 --- 30
Russia : 0 - 1 --- 148
Kenya : 0 - 1 --- 31
For pure weight-of-numbers there's no competition; the USA is miles ahead, with the UK and Japan fairly entranched in 2nd and 3rd places. More intersting is to compare this with their population.
When you do this, the USA is still very successful, with the UK only marginally ahead (probably due to it's univeristy system). Iceland however steals the show; although they only got a finalist, their population is a tiny fraction of most of the countries' major cities. *
It's also clear that many countries are majorly underachieving; Sweden, Belgium and Sapin spring to mind as non-appearers, and Russia, Canada Austrialia and the Netherlands didn't do spectiacularly well.
How much of this is due to the innate bias in the selection process is debatable, but then doing an analysis on these figures is pretty random anyway, so what the hell.
* Yes I know, one isn't a very good sample size
Brown
PS. If anyone's wondering, I considered a win to be a bit better than a finalist, but not that much.
PPS. The
Sideshow Bob? (Score:1, Funny)
Jeff Bezos invented what? (Score:1)
1. Mr Jeffrey Bezos, Founder, Amazon, USA.
I am so tired of hearing about Jeff Bezos. Give me a break! He's the number one finalist in commerce? Exactly what did he do that has made him so talked about besides raise a lot of money from a bunch of rubes who thought that doing commerce on the internet was so, like, *totally* different than opening a store physically.
We're just gonna' have a web site! Oh yeah, we'll need to worry about the supply chain and inventory management and IT staff, too -- and uh, yeah we'll have to worry about packing and shipping and returns. That's okay though, because we're gonna' lose a ton of money by not learning *anything* from companies that have been doing these things with catalogs for decades!
C'mon. Commerce on the web was a forgone conclusion. He didn't invent *anything*. If anybody should get a commerce award it should be Tim Burners Lee -- he invented the web.
Tim Burners Lee (Score:1)
Amazing that no one from IBM... (Score:1)
What a pile of crap (Score:1)
Linus did a great job writing Linux (which is a kernel), but the rest of this citation is utter rubbish. He is always ready to point out that he could never have accomplished what he did without the earlier work of the Free Software Foundation.
IMHO the FSF deserves the credit for establishing the free software movement, but others will doubtless differ. We should all be able to agree though that it wasn't Linus Torvalds.
John Carmack - Entertainment (Score:1)