the storage anarchist

1.011: administrivia

Sorry for the delay in posting - it has been a bit busier than normal for the past several weeks. But I'll be back soon, with thoughts on such subjects as the "Laurel and Hardy" battle that's brewing (starring Sir BarryW as Laurel and HHSNBN as Hardy), the realities of net usable storage for various platforms, and a few other choice topics that I won't reveal just yet.

Meanwhile, I'd like to call your attention to several new things around my blog site itself.

First, some of you have noticed the sidebar widget I added recently that displays "the anarchists interests" - a list of blog posts and news articles I've read that I thought might also be of interest to my readers. I try to update this frequently, even when I'm not able to post myself on the topic. Give it a glance once in a while - you might be surprised!

By the way, this ability to share interesting posts is a neat side-feature of using Google Reader as my feed reader. And Google Reader also available for the iPhone and iPod touch, which means I can actually follow my feeds from just about anywhere without having to wade through articles I've already read. Pretty cool!

Second, there's a bunch of new EMC employees who have ventured out into the world of public blogging recently (and a few more to come very soon). Several of these employees have agreed to be linked on the Community / Blogs page over on EMC.com, even though most of them are in fact personal blogs that are not hosted, funded or edited by EMC. I've also added many of these to the Google Custom Search widget "search blogs of many emc employees" available on the sidebar. If you're looking for the opinions or assertions of EMC employees, this is a great place to start. For you newcomers, the list of bloggers currently included in this custom search is maintained in post 0.028.

Other recent additions to my blog site include the recent visitors widget, and the visitors also liked widget, both from Feedjit. The former displays the physical location of the last 100 or so visitors to my blog superimposed on a dynamic map (click on the widget to see a detailed map), while the latter lists other posts that visitors to a particular page also viewed. Useless trivia, or interesting perspective? You be the judge!

Finally, and if you're ever looking for old posts from my blog, you might want to visit the archives and categories page. I've shortened the timeout on the archives list in my sidebar, but the complete list is always available on that page.

Enjoy, and I'll be back to my regular programming soon, I promise.

1.000: happy anniversary, baby!

Today marks the 1-year anniversary of this blog.

My my, where did the time go?

I guess I was a bit optimistic with my chosen numbering scheme, as I allotted 3 digits for the post number, but I managed to craft only 78 posts. Not sure if that's good or bad - surely there are several readers who would have preferred that I'd done a few less posts (or a few less posts about their products, perhaps ).

All in all, I think not a bad start.

Oh sure, I've left a few loose ends, and I've opened the door on a few topics that I never quite got into. Hopefully it has still been been interesting to you, and maybe you even had a good chuckle every once in a while. To be sure, your comments, criticisms and feedback has been much appreciated, and I hope that I can expand the conversations in the coming year.

In fact, I'd really like to hear from you about what topics you'd like me to explore. And I mean that, whether you are a customer, prospect, competitor, work colleague, industry analyst, peer, friend, journalist, or someone who just happens to find my blog interesting - I wanna know what you wanna know...

So please, write a comment to this post with your questions and/or topic proposals, and I'll see about working them into my agenda, and maybe I'll hit more than 100 posts in my second year.

Many thanks to all of you! You've made the first year of storage anarchy better than I could have imagined!

ttfn!

0.077: ...priceless!

It's Friday, I'm back from a three-day trip out to EMC's Santa Clara Executive Briefing Center, the New England weather is the best its been all year, and somehow I just don't feel about blogging enterprise storage technology today.

So I won't.

I have taken a fair bit of ribbing this week about my apparent taste in music (many of you missed the fine print at the bottom of my last post). Sadly, the experiment failed - I have roughly the same number of subscribers this week as I had before enlisting the Britney factor. This week's musical reference will probably just dig me in deeper, but I'm wondering if maybe I picked an artist on the wrong side of their career slopes.

But you have to admit, when a major pop star names her "emancipation" album after your company, that's pretty special. Add in her TV & radio promo tour and the inevitable concert series, and that adds up to a boatload of global goodwill and brand awareness.

And while I most definitely am not a fan-o-Britney, I will admit to appreciating (and enjoying) most of Mariah's music.

The E=MC² album is perhaps a bit more "produced" than I prefer, but undoubtedly it will give her at least a couple more #1 singles - enough probably to put her atop the Billboard charts for all time total chart-topping hits. In fact, "Touch My Body" has already topped Billboard, pushing her past Elvis (who had 17 BB #1 hits). Two more and she'll tie The Beatles with 20.

If only she'd released the album a couple of weeks earlier - I could have had some REAL fun with it on Lirpa Sloof Day!

 

0.072: wanna get away?

For those that haven't seen it, Southwest Airlines has been running an ad campaign called "wanna get away?" for the last year or so, depicting many of life's embarrassing moments when you just wish you could disappear. They even ran a "wanna get away?" contest for the best user-submitted  video over the past several months.

Unfortunately, Joe Tucci's entry missed the cut-off date:

 

This is in fact the actual video of the auspicious event chronicled by Dan Shaughnessy in yesterday's Boston Globe. You can see the rest of the videos from the EMC/Red Sox visit to Japan here.

UPDATE 03/31/2008: Joe "Fastball" Tucci was back in the office today, and one employee stopped to rib him in the cafeteria about his wild pitch. In true form for an ex-catcher, Joe grinned and replied "Yeah, but he should have caught it!".

Oh well, it probably would have been disqualified for being too similar to the original:

For those of us of in New England who have been living through the incessant repetition of Southwest's ad campaign throughout the entire Red Sox and Celtics seasons (in HD with Surround Sound, no less), the word that the contest is over is hopeful news that we'll soon see something different for the coming baseball season. 

Unfortunately, this year's Mohegan Sun commercial will probably have a rather detrimental effect on NESN's Red Sox viewership - especially since they tend to run the same commercial dozens of times each game.

Now THAT'S gonna make me wanna get away, for sure!

 

technorati tags: Joe Tucci,Joe & Oki,Joe Tucci Video,Wanna Get Away?,Joe's baseball gaff,Red Sox Japan,EMC,EMC Japan,Southwest

0.071: changes in latitudes, changes in attitudes

I took off for a week-long sojourn to the Conch Republic [history] last week, where I celebrated the half-century mark of my life with friends and family on St. Patrick's Day .

It couldn't have been better - from the boat drinks by the pool and the strolls down Duval St. in the unseasonably warm (and humid) weather, to an afternoon listening to Michael McCloud and sucking down Land Shark lager at Schooner Wharf, to the tours of the homes of Hemingway, Truman, Audubon and more butterflies than you can possibly imagine, to watching some of the most picturesque sunsets I've ever seen from Mallory Square and Fort Taylor State Park. And then there were the dinners at Louie's Backyard, Blue Heaven (in the company of chickens), Salute' and El Siboney (twice!). Not to mention the night life! [link intentionally omitted ]

Yes, Key West is a great place to turn 50, even if you're NOT a pirate (did I mention that it was Spring Break?)

Amazingly, and even though I did bring my laptop, I was able to resist the temptation to respond to the storage news of the week. With all the R&R I was enjoying in Margaritaville, it was a struggle to keep my fingers off the keyboard (NOT!).

Something about the weather just made it all seem so...unimportant!

But trust me, the week's events didn't go by without notice...
 

0.054: viral video marketing

If you also follow Chuck Hollis' blog, you've already seen this.

But for the rest of you, the wacky bunch over at wallstrip.com have created a vidblog about EMC and its recent stock surge (here on YouTube or here on wallstrip.com). Wallstrip.com also covered the VMware IPO earlier in the year, if you're interested in a little flashback here at years-end.

Now, I don't think either of these videos are going to meet David Vellante's standing $1,000 challenge for anyone to create a viral storage video that gets more than 225,000 YouTube views within 12 months. But they are politely fun and surprisingly accurate (and no, they weren't sponsored by EMC).

EMC did sponsor a contest this year for home-made viral videos - you can see the entrants and winners here.

I don't know if they're planning to repeat the contest in 2008, but if you have the Viral Video itch, you could always just save a screen dump of David's challenge (in the comments to my hitachi rifs mr. t post) and post your entry on YouTube. Drop me a pointer, and I'll handle the advertising for you (and I won't even ask for a cut!).

 Happy Holidays!

0.052: ahhll-be-bahhk!

Wow, where did the time go?

Seems like only yesterday, I was doing back-to-back blogs on Thin Provisioning with the Boys of Wikibon. But all of a sudden, here it is 32 days since my last blog post.

No, I didn't fall into a crevasse. And I wasn't censored by my management. And I didn't just give up - no such luck (sorry, HHSNBN).

Like my blogging cohorts Storagezilla and Len, I just got overloaded with other things, and blogging didn't make it onto my todo list for the past month or so. (Unlike Chuck, our job descriptions don't include "blog at least twice a day!").

So, I apologize for my absence. The time was well spent, including face-to-face meetings with key customers, prospects, industry analysts and yes, even my family  over the Thanksgiving holidays. Got a complete physical and my first over-50 plumbing checkup(doc says I'll probably live, at least  long enough to pay his bill). Even snuck in a vacation week in Olde Victorian Cape May, all dressed up for the holidays, where I took more than a few photos that I'm rather proud of.

Most importantly, I had the honor to participate in three separate customer advisory events, one of EMC's "secret weapons" for making sure our roadmaps and plans are aligned with our customers requirements and expectations. Hopefully I'll be able to share a little of our learning from those with you in the coming months (and if you're one of the customers who participated in those events, thanks again for investing your valuable time to provide us with your insights and feedback).

And of course, it's the end of the fiscal year, the end of the biggest quarter of the year, the time for getting budgets and headcounts aligned for the coming year, and the time we prepare materials, collateral and positioning for our Q1 sales kickoffs and announcements. Oh, and it's the holiday season to boot (thank goodness for Amazon.com this year!).

Lots going on.Thankfully, in my absence, my blogging peers have kept the misleading blogketing, chicken littles, and market share fiction writers in check (thanks, guys - I owe you a couple 's, to be sure ).

So, in the inimitable words of the Governator, I promise, I'll be back, and soon!

0.037: storage anarchism recategorized

At the request and suggestion of several readers, I have re-categorized this blog, classifying my posts along specific storage themes, topics and technologies. Hopefully, this will make it easier for new readers to find topics of interest and follow along. I've also simplified my sidebar a bit to make it easier to find things. Thanks for the suggestions.

And while I'm here, thanks also to Margaret Rouse for making my "Hitachi math" infamous as the September 27, 2007 entry on her Overheard in the Blogosphere blog. The anarchist is honored to share space alongside the likes of Larry Ellison and Bill Gates...and Margaret's blog has claimed the pole position in my own blog reader.

0.034: a baker's dozen

Another week, and another couple of EMC employees have started their own blogs. It's starting to get crowded around here!

First, I'm proud to introduce my friend and colleague Dick Sullivan and his Energy Matters blog, focused (obviously) on matters related to energy-efficient data centers and Green IT. A fellow member of EMC's internal Green Team, Dick is a key interface between the Storage Product Operations development organizations and EMC's customers on matters green. I expect his insights on how to reduce your energy footprint through more efficient use of currently available products and technologies will be of interest to practically everyone.

Second, a "nod" of welcome to Andrew Chapman and his insightful Compliance - Never Talk When You Can Nod blog. 'Nuff said

Significantly, each of the 13 "bloggers who work at EMC" now included in my EMC Blogger Search have distinctly unique areas of focus, offering a broad spectrum of insights into the people who work at this place Where Information Lives(tm). And I know of at least a couple more who'll be joining, just as soon as they conquer their stage fright (come on in, the waters' fine!)

Finally, on a personal note, I have to apologize for the delay in getting part 3 of my tiered storage series out. Some family matters have taken me away from the keyboard for the past couple of weeks. Thanks to those of you who've emailed to ask if all it OK - it is now, and I should be back on my stride next week.

0.032: seek and ye shall find: another emcer is blogging

Len Devanna simply can't resist a stage. Didn't make it in broadcasting, washed out as a JavaScript Jockey, and now finds himself saddled with the onerous chore of corralling the blind genius of 35,000+ EMC Web 2.naughts into a cohesive (if not yet fully coordinated) eBusiness presence.

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

The self-proclaimed eBiz Junkie has started his own blog, and his inaugural topic is quite fitting: Web 3.0 and the emerging importance of community-driven search. Sort of a human twist on grid computing, where lots of people spend a little bit of time each to build a contextual and referential search utility. Clearly a topic worthy of more than a casual fly-by, and it clearly has Len's attention. I hope he explores more topics like this.

In fact, I'd like to think I was one of the first bloggers that Len alerted to his presence precisely because my new Google Custom Search Engine is sort of an infantile pre-cursor of the whole trusted advisors-driven search engine. Lots of people are already using it, and he wanted in. So Len's the latest addition to the EMC CSE (available at the top of my blog's sidebar).

Let's all give a Big Hand for Mister Len Devanna!

0.030: new site tool - snap shots from snap.com

I just installed another handy little tool on this site called Snap Shots that enhances links with visual previews of the destination site, interactive excerpts of Wikipedia articles, MySpace profiles, IMDb profiles and Amazon products, display inline videos, RSS, MP3s, photos, stock charts (like for EMC and VMware) and more.

Sometimes Snap Shots bring you the information you need, without your having to leave the site, while other times it lets you "look ahead," before deciding if you want to follow a link or not.

Should you decide this is not for you, just click the Options icon in the upper right corner of the Snap Shot and opt-out.

Oh - and like my embedded Google CSE, it is very likely that these snap shots don't work if you're viewing this post in an RSS reader. Sorry - you'll just have to drop by my actual blog to utilize these new tools - the storage anarchist.

0.028: new site tool - search the blogs of emc employees

I've been experimenting with the Google Custom Search Engine, and I've come up with a CSE that searches across the corporate and personal blogs of several EMC employees. I've integrated it directly into my blog site (in the sidebar), or you can test-drive the non-integrated version here:

If you use Google Home Page, you can integrate this search using this button:

Currently, the search domain for this CSE includes posts and pages (but no links) from the following blogs:

Oracle Storage Guy (Jeff Browning)
the storage anarchist (Barry Burke)
Never Talk When You Can Nod (Andrew Chapman)
Andrew's Blog (Andrew Cohen)
Cornelia Davis' Weblog
Len's Blog (Len Devanna)
Info Muse (Brian Fitzgerald)
Dave Graham's Weblog
Chuck's Blog (Chuck Hollis)
A Journey in Social Media (Chuck Hollis)
dotConnector's Blog (Dr. Subramanian Kartik)
Mark's Blog (Mark Lewis)
Adventures in Corporate Education (Gina Minks)
No there there (Peter Quirk)
Polly Pearson's Blog
Craig's Musings (Craig Randall)
Dave Talks Shop (David Spencer)
Energy Matters (Dick Sullivan)
Information Playground (Steve Todd)
Storagezilla (Mark Twomey)
The Backup Blog (Scott Waterhouse) 
Virtual Geek (Chad Sakac)
 

Note that this search does NOT currently include the blogs of the following EMC subsidiaries and acquisitions. They each have their own well-established and topical social networking infrastructure. If you have interests in their products and markets, I encourage you to visit them directly.

Geniant
RSA: Speaking of Security
Planet VMware

If you are an EMC employee (or subsidiary) with your own blog and you'd like to be included (or removed), please drop me an email using the "email the anarchist" link in the sidebar. I'll update this page whenever I add or remove blogs to the search engine.

And I apologize in advance for the blogvertising - it's the price Google extracts for this custom search engine. Any revenues that I may collect from these adverts will be applied to the cost of running this blog site; excess will be donated to charity.

June'08 Update: EMC now list many employee blogs on the Community pages of EMC.com.

technorati tags: EMC blogs,EMC bloggers,EMC weblogs,EMC,EMC blog,EMC social media

________________________________________________________________________________

change log

2007-08-17: First post
2007-08-20: Added references to Geniant, RSA, and VMware social networking portals
2007-08-27: Added "Confessions of an eBiz Junkie (Len Devanna)"
2007-08-28: Len changed the name of his blog. One more, and then you're out, bud!
2007-09-05: Added "Compliance - Never Talk When You Can Nod (Andrew Chapman)"
2007-09-07: Added "Energy Matters (Dick Sullivan)"
2007-10-29: Added "dotConnector's Blog (Dr. Subramanian Kartik)"
2008-01-18: Removed Josh Maher's blog
2008-02-06: Added "Information Playground" (Steve Todd)
2008-03-11: Added "The Backup Blog" (Scott Waterhouse)
2008-03-26: Added "Info Muse" (Brian Fitzgerald)
2008-04-05: Added "Polly Pearson's Blog"
2008-04-05: Added "A Journey in Social Media (Chuck Hollis)"
2008-06-19: Added "Dave Talks Shop (David Spencer)"
2008-06-19: Added "Virtual Geek (Chad Sakac)"
2008-06-19: Added "No there there (Peter Quirk)"
2008-06-21 Added "Adventures in Corporate Education (Gina Minks)"

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

0.023: kirby's next vacation?

Ok, normally I wouldn't do this. But I was among the first to welcome Kirby Wadsworth to the blogosphere (just like I scooped everyone this weekend on the entrance of Barry Whyte). So I think I've got dibs on this one.

Will Kirby get to finish his Revivio story, now that F5 is purchasing Acopia? His first installment was a definite cliff-hanger - I'm sure I'm not the only one who'll be if the story remains unfinished.

In any event, here's hoping that the acquisition doesn't stop Kirby from blogging - I mean, seriously, what would we do without the Sanity of the OSG around here (restrain yourself, 'Zilla-man).

0.022: be careful what you ask for

A couple of weeks ago, in the midst of what I'd like to believe was a very insightful debate on the merits of the SPC benchmarks, Barry Whyte of SVC-fame and I exchanged a couple of comments on Tony Pearson's blog. Silly me - in the heat of that debate, I suggested that Barry should have his own blog, since he is clearly up-close-and-personal with the SVC. Not to mention that I think he has a great first name.

So Barry has indeed started his own blog this weekend, entitled An exchange and discussion of Storage Virtualization. I'm proud to be one of the first to shine the spotlight on his efforts. I know I'm probably going to regret having made this suggestion in the first place, so I figured I might as well put as much pressure on him as possible right from the outset.

I sincerely look forward to Barry's engineering and technical perspectives on Storage Virtualization, and I'm not surprised in the least that he has avowed to stay away from the misrepresentations common on the blog of He Hu Shall Not Be Named. I am sure that the two Barrys will get the chance to knock heads every once in a while, and I sincerely hope that we both add value to the discussions.

So, BarryW, here's a hearty welcome to the blogosphere from BarryB (and perhaps your first Technorati Authority points from a non-IBM blogger)!

Welcome!

0.001: kirby's blogging too

The world is odd sometimes.

The very same weekend I've jumped off the blogging ledge, my pal Kirby Wadsworth (from way back at Pr1me Computer) starts his blog too. Except he seems to have actually done it...I've only just gotten my toes wet so far.

Oh, I have 5 or 6 posts in Draft form that I'm working on, but Kirby just dove right in.

Congrats, dude - way to go!

Only slightly odder than starting to blog on the same weekend is that the focus of his first topic is also in my queue. Although I didn't (don't) plan on hoisting Hu Yoshida up on a pillar just yet.

0.000: introducing the storage anarchist

Well, I have finally been convinced to jump into the world of blogging. Oh, I've been thinking about it for months, but somehow I never found the time. Or the motivation. Or my muse.

Whatever - I can't resist any longer. I've gotten a lot of requests to do this from my peers and mentors. And a lot of this has to do with a growing realization that I need a forum to share my insights with a broader audience. I simply can't reach enough people through the usual 1-on-1 briefings and training presentations that I do on the job. I don’t have the time or energy to personally share my insights and perspectives with all of the interested audiences. Nor can I say everything I think needs saying while in the work environment.

But frankly, most of my motivation to start this blog has come from the world of storage blogging itself, along with the more formal industry press, albeit indirectly (and probably unintentionally). See, I just can't sit on the sidelines any longer while meaningless FUD passes for fact. I can no longer watch myopic conventional wisdom go unchallenged. And I feel an obligation to share a perspective that seems absent from the traditional storage & IT discussions - the point of view I have found in the rarified air of some of the world's largest mission-critical enterprise IT organizations.

Please, allow me to introduce myself...