Open Source and Contracts

August 1, 2005

Joi Ito has an interesting post (and see the comments) on why open source code is like contracts. Many of the contracts I’ve seen were unabashedly borrowed literally from someone else. This is as it should be, of course, assuming the client is only charged the incremental cost of the work, or a fixed fee.

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Driven to Distraction

August 1, 2005

Via Infectious Greed, some alarming statistics in a WaPo article on the extent to which drivers are filling their cars with consumer electronics.

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The Real Difference Between Globalization and Outsourcing

July 29, 2005

I’ve just discovered Christopher Koch’s blog at CIO.com (via a link from Nicholas Carr’s blog), and a post with this title he wrote in April. A few lines in that post gave voice to a concern I’ve had for some time about outsourcing: There’s no strategy and not much more skill needed to offload work […]

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The Slow Death of Traditional Software

July 29, 2005

Nicholas Carr writes about the death of the traditional software licensing model and views of software as a service. Quoting from Christopher Koch: It’s unreasonable to expect vendors to discount up front and then cut maintenance fees on the back end–they have to get their money somehow. Customers bombard them with requests for new features […]

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On Leaking Knowledge

July 28, 2005

Phil Windley has an interesting post about leaking knowledge – the loss of knowledge through employee departures – and what you can do to minimize the problem. Here is a link to a short interview on the topic by ITBusinessEdge.

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New Ontario Consumer Protection Legislation for Online Agreements – II

July 28, 2005

Back in April I posted a short piece on the new Ontario consumer protection legislation. It comes into force on Saturday. There are many articles on the new legislation and most of the large Toronto firms have now published newsletters or client advisories describing the new legislation in great detail.

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M&A Checklist

July 28, 2005

The Dealmaker has posted a CEO’s M&A Checklist. Jeff Nolan has a couple of additions.

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E-mail Boilerplate Redux

July 27, 2005

As usual, Ernie nails the absurdity of overlawyering, this time in another piece on email disclaimers.

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AsiaLaw Article on Indian Outsourcing of Legal Services

July 26, 2005

I was interviewed for a recent AsiaLaw article on offshoring of legal services to India. It’s an interesting article, but because of the contributions of the author and the others who were interviewed. :) At the time I was interviewed, my thinking was that offshoring would for some time be principally aimed at lower level […]

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Do You Need to Have “the Best Programmers”?

July 26, 2005

Joel on Software blogs this topic with a typically provocative and engaging point of view. In short, depending on your business, yes – there is a difference – a big difference. Quote: Here’s why: duplication of software is free. That means that the cost of programmers is spread out over all the copies of the […]

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Security Breaches from Loss of Handheld Devices

July 26, 2005

WaPo has a piece on the growing problem of threats to data security caused by loss of handheld devices. Increasingly, Blackberries and PDAs are repositories of vast amounts of proprietary and personal data. As they become more common, the threat to data security from their loss becomes more significant. Quote: The ability to carry vast […]

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Behind the Scenes on Data Theft

July 26, 2005

The NYT has a story that goes behind the scenes on the theft of data – often from wardriving – from merchants. Quote: Along a crowded stretch of highway just south of Miami’s downtown is a shopping area that might be called the data theft capital of the United States. In the wireless hacker equivalent […]

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