Commodity Computing

Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz has a very nice post about not only his company's new, ultra fast chip, but two radical shifts to his company's business model. It's very well done.

So when we announce (via this webcast) the fastest microprocessor the industry's ever seen (the benchmarks are staggering) - and say we're entering the "commodity microprocessor market," what does it really mean? It means we're no longer limiting ourselves to serving an internal market, inside Sun. Instead, we're opening ourselves up to the broadest market possible - where the opportunity's largest.

Despite having what's arguably the single biggest competitive advantage our systems business has ever had, we've separated out our microelectronics business - and told them to win on the open market, as well. ....

....To add fuel to the fire, the blueprints for our UltraSPARC T2 (I personally like the moniker, "Niagara 2" - named after Niagara Falls, btw, and the great volumes of water that pass over them), the core design files and test suites, will be available to the open source community, via its most popular license: the GPL. Making Niagara 2 the only commodity silicon whose core designs are available to the open source community - whose strength, and market power, only grows by the day.

These are all huge changes to our business. Driven by a simple philosophy: the open market is bigger than any internal one. But ultimately, why now? A simple reason: because customers building infrastructure for the internet have been asking us to do so.

• Posted by John Battelle at 6:09 AM
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Dear Washington: Let Us Buy DoubleClick

Google's policy blog points out that everyone's buying ad-related companies, implying that it's time to move on and approve the DoubleClick deal.

• Posted by John Battelle at 5:23 AM
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Oh Lord. Helmet Cams

Tim shows us what's up in the UK.

• Posted by John Battelle at 9:02 PM
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Ask Eraser

While I'm obsessing on issues related to the DBoI, I failed to cover the AskEraser last week. Fortunately, Ars did.

Ask.com took a major step toward protecting protecting the privacy of its users when it announced yesterday that it would be launching a new tool that would allow users to use its search engine anonymously. The tool, called AskEraser, will ensure that users' search records will not be retained by the company in any form for any period of time. Users will be able to set AskEraser settings in their privacy preferences, and the company says that the settings will be clearly displayed on results pages so that users will always be aware of the privacy status of their Ask.com searches.

• Posted by John Battelle at 5:40 PM
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Politics.

Look, if you've read this site for a while, you know that from time to time I delve into politics. Not that I want to, or that this site is about it, more that politics forces its way into the site - the issues I care about deeply often intersect with politics. Well, often enough.

Today is such a day. Atty General Alberto Gonzales is in hot water - again - for possibly lying under oath about a bedside visit to an ailing former Atty General, a clandestine visit that had to do with securing (unsuccessfully as I understand it) permission to execute a warrantless domestic-spying program.

What the hell does this have to do with search?

Everything, everything, folks. The core issue here is warantless wiretapping. In other words, access to your Database of Intentions without due process.

My hand aches. I can't write much more. I may voice post on this Friday, as I have some time in the afternoon. But I sense a Big Story brewing, and I am, well, pleased it's finally breaking.

• Posted by John Battelle at 5:35 PM
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