Category: Four pillars

Every now and then I get a message I dread, telling me that my password has expired and that I need to set a new one.

Why do I dread it? Let me think. I have no problem with the majority of my web accounts and signups and subscriptions. For the most part, I set my password once for each of those and, once I’ve done that, I never really have to change it.  That’s the theory anyway.

As I learnt more about identity theft and phishing and strong passwords and weak passwords, I tended to make sure I used passwords that were considered at least marginally complex, not to be found in dictionaries, both alpha as well as numeric, case-sensitive where possible, and not even vaguely connected to anything else in my life. If that wasn’t problem enough, I then had to make sure the passwords were such that I could construct a question that would help me work out what password I had chosen. This may be fine if you use things like “the name of your first pet” or “your primary school”. What kind of question would beget the answer “X4bh3A21”?

So I started doing something else. I brought in a materiality test. I used really complex passwords only where my identity could be used to do something with money. The rest of the time, I kept things simpler.

When OpenId turned up, my life got a lot easier.

I now had a system. Two types of password. One type to be used for general things, “strong” yet easily remembered, and OK for use in multiple contexts. A second type to be used for things you did with money, “stronger” and not that easily memorable, and explicitly not to be used in multiple contexts. OpenID in use where possible, Sxipper where possible.  Both password types didn’t need resetting per se; I chose to make regular changes to the ones that had the possibility of financial impact.

If only it were that simple.

Work passwords don’t tend to work that way, for some reason. You get regular messages to change them. Particularly for things like laptops.

And for Blackberries. Oh yes, Blackberries. I’m one of those guys who doesn’t particularly like device proliferation, so I don’t keep a separate work mobile. As is the case with many of you, my Blackberry is my phone as well.

If only it were that simple.

I have a Blackberry with a non-standard keyboard; even though it is QWERTY, the letters are distributed over 14 keys rather than 26; 12 of the keys represent 2 letters each, and the two remaining keys have just one letter each. The double-letter keys toggle between the two letters on the key, while the single letter keys behave as normal. Beyond that, 10 of the keys also have numbers on them, accessible only by pressing some other function key first. So now, when I set a complex password for the Blackberry, I need to think of something else. I need to think about the number of keystrokes I need to use in order to enter the password. Oh for the days when an 8-character alphanumeric password required just 8 keystrokes.

And the moral of the story is that passwords are passe. Or soon will be.

Incidentally, I love trivia. And one of the pieces of trivia I delighted in finding out many decades ago was this:

If you were restricted to using only one row of letters on a standard QWERTY keyboard on a typewriter, the longest word you could come up with was ….. TYPEWRITER.

In similar vein, I tried to figure out the longest word I could make on the multi-tap Blackberry keyboard, if I restricted myself to the letters that came with “tap 1”. Now the letter set for the 14 keys is as follows:

QW ER TY UI OP AS DF GH JK L ZX CV BN M

The first tap therefore produces Q E T U O A D G J L C B M.

I guess I was mildly delighted to find that the longest word I could construct was …. CALCUTTA!

Little things please little minds :-)

Some of us are passionate about our faith and our beliefs. Some of us are passionate about science and things scientific. Some of us are passionate about both. (I belong to this category). Some of us believe that being passionate about both is not possible.

Whatever your particular position in the debate, I would urge you to take a look at these photographs.

I’ve had a childlike interest in science all my life, and I guess I’ve striven to have a childlike faith as well. Ever since I was old enough to read and understand anything at all, I’ve found snow crystals fascinating.  Over the years I’ve had quite a few opportunities to see snow crystals under a microscope, some botched gloriously, some mildly successful. Over the years I’ve seen many blown-up photographs of snow crystals, and I’ve been pleasantly taken aback every time.

This time, “taken aback” is too weak;”fascinated” does not do it justice. “Entranced” is not enough. Neither is “spellbound”. Even the vernacular “gobsmacked” is woefully inadequate.

So I’m going to go back to my Sixties roots and claim I was “blown out of my mind”. Seeing the photographs conjured up other images in my mind, images of military-industrial artifacts covered in a fine dust and made part of a majestic monochrome world.  Seeing the photographs reinforced my passion for science, and further reinforced my belief in a creator.

Let me know what you think.

Last Friday was Byte Night. Every year, people from the industry sleep out “rough” for one night. Their aim? To raise funds for NCH’s projects to do with leaving care and youth homelessness.

This year I was privileged. Privileged to take part, privileged to have a number of my colleagues with me, privileged to be sponsored to the tune of over £12,000.  When we added in the money collected from our donations to the auctions, and from our participation in the auction itself, we were not far off our original target of £25,000.

Last Friday was an incredible experience. Not for the sleeping out rough per se: we only experienced a very small, almost infinitesimal part of what young homeless really experience. But what we did experience mattered:

• We understood a tiny bit about being out in the open and cold and hungry. Thankfully, we had a dry night.
• We understood a little bit about the role of care and support in providing youth homeless with an anchor in difficult times. How food and clothing and shelter and a shoulder to lean on really mattered.
• We understood something about how organisations like NCH can help provide this care and support. They were magnificent. The entire evening was special. Particularly the street theatre put on by people who’ve been helped by NCH.

And we understood something very important, how community matters. The camaraderie amongst the sleepers-out was amazing. There were some crazy moments and some great conversations.

We also learnt something about humility, as we watched the tireless devotion, good-humouredness and energy of the people who made events like this happen. People like the staff of NCH. People like Jenny Agutter, who’s been there eight of the last 10 years. People like James Bennet, the founder of ETF now with Ernst and Young, who’s been committed to roping in people from all over the industry.

My thanks to all of you, for your incredible generosity. I intend to go back next year; let me know if any of you is interested in joining me, or in helping in any way.

An aside: I also learnt something about justgiving, how it worked, how useful it was, and I was impressed. Now that’s the way to make fundraising simpler…..

I learnt recently that Bungie, the people behind Halo 3, has done something quite unusual. For the last decade or two, most start-ups have had acquisition by Microsoft (or, more recently, Google) as their goal. Bungie, having achieved their goal, have apparently agreed terms with Microsoft to go back to being an independent company.

This by itself would have intrigued me, maybe just a bit. Coming on the back of Halo 3’s incredible success, it would normally have intrigued me even more. But what got me is the following quote from the BBC article:

On the Bungie website, Frank O’Connor, lead writer on Halo, explained the move to the community of fans: “Bungie has long been built on creativity, originality and the freedom to pursue ideas.

“Microsoft agreed, and rather than stifle our imagination, they decided it was in both our best interests to unleash it.”

Put this in the context of the following quote from Microsoft:

Shane Kim, corporate vice president of Microsoft Game Studios, said the company was “supporting Bungie’s desire to return to its independent roots”.

He said Microsoft would continue to invest in Halo entertainment property with Bungie and other partners, such as Peter Jackson, on “a new interactive series set in the Halo universe”.

“We look forward to great success with Bungie as our long-term relationship continues to evolve through Halo-related titles and new IP created by Bungie,” he added.

So let me get this right. Microsoft are letting Bungie go back to being independent, recognising that they might “stifle” Bungie’s “imagination”. Wow.

Sometime in 2000, when I chaired the technology incubator at what was then Dresdner Kleinwort Benson, I remember getting into conversation with Professor N “Venkat” Venkatraman about a related subject: in those days, so many startups seemed to have “bought by Microsoft” as their exit strategy. Venkat remarked that the trend could not continue, for two reasons. Firstly, Microsoft were running out of a critical currency …. their equity was no longer attractive to new hires. Secondly, partly as a consequence of the equity currency problem, but more as a result of becoming mainstream, they were unlikely to remain the only game in town for startups who wished for a trade sale exit. In both cases, we came to the conclusion that at some point Microsoft would no longer buy companies outright, but instead take a minority stake. That way, the potential problems to do with attracting talent or retaining speed and agility could be solved.

And now, seven years later, we have Bungie jumping. With Microsoft’s blessing, and while Microsoft retain a stake. Intriguing. Very.

Maybe the Blue Monster is working after all. Something’s changed.

Every now and then I start thinking about what the inception, brokering and delivery of masses of event-driven asynchronous “services” would look like, and, for some inexplicable reason, somewhere along the line I start thinking about the weather.

Particularly since I came to the UK, I have been fascinated by the weather. When I got here, I could not believe just how much media time was devoted to the weather, be it TV or print or radio. After staying here for a bit I could not believe how much people actually talked about the weather, how much the caricature of English people always talking about the weather turned out to be true. Once I’d been here for a few years, I could not believe how changeable the weather was, how often a day that started with bright windless sunshine could end in wet and windy.

Talking about people talking about the weather reminds me of one of my favourite Mad Magazine cartoons, I think it was Don Martin who did it. Titled Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions, the first frame showed a person walking in from the outside, completely drenched from head to toe. And an observer asking “Is it raining outside?”. The cartoonist then proceeded to suggest a series of answers, ranging from “No, I always get into a shower fully dressed” to “%@*£”. Incidentally, while recuperating over Christmas, I treated myself to this: the entire Mad Magazine oeuvre available on disk. Fantastic stuff. Sergio Aragones and his Marginal Thinking Department never failed to amuse me, whatever my mood.

Talking about the changeability of the weather. I am gently tinged with trepidation as to what tomorrow night holds, as we try and raise funds for homeless youth. Do try and help us, you will find the link here and in my sidebar. My thanks to all of you for your incredible generosity, we have already raised nearly £10,000.