The biggest tech headlines of the past two weeks have reverberated into Redmond and the sound that has echoed back has been that of a whimper, not a battle cry. In the wake of Apple’s historic iPad announcements, Microsoft has countered that the prototype for the world’s first dual-screen Netbook which Steve Ballmer announced at this year’s CES conference, will not be coming to market. Instead the company is pulling the plug on the innovative Courier. Then, in the aftermath of HP’s acquisition of Palm for $1.2 billion, the question of whether the HP tablet, nicknamed Slate, would run under Windows 7 or Palm’s webOS seems to have been decided — and not in Microsoft’s favor. As Todd Bishop recounted for SeattlePI.com, “The key question is, what is a tablet?” according to Michael Cherry, an analyst with the Kirkland-based firm Directions on Microsoft. “And I think the tablet is no longer a laptop replacement, it’s really become a class of its own.” The research firm IDC is no longer calling them “tablet PCs” – it’s now calling them “media tablets,” according to IDC analyst David Daoud. “We’re talking about a completely different market,” he said. Indeed, Windows may be too big, too bulky for the tablet of today. TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington reports, citing an anonymous source, that HP was not satisfied with Windows 7 as a tablet operating system. And during a conference call Thursday about the Palm acquisition, HP was evasive about whether it would release the Windows-based Slate, Silicon Alley Insider reported. [24×7] Government Online – Seattle Netizens Logging In Government agencies have begun to open up their data to the public, and a surprisingly large number of citizens are showing interest. According to a Pew Internet Survey, some 40% of adult internet users have gone online for raw data about government spending and activities. This includes anyone who has done at least one of the following: look online to see how federal stimulus money is being spent (23% of internet users have done this); read or download the text of legislation (22%); visit a site such as data.gov that provides access to government data (16%); or look online to see who is contributing to the campaigns of their elected officials (14%). To keep tabs on government data in Seattle, including crime stats, building permits and even the location of our city’s public toilets, Seattle netizens are surfing to data.seattle.gov. The purpose of data.seattle.gov is to increase public access to high value, machine readable datasets generated by various departments of Seattle City government. In the latest installmewntm, the city dats storee has welcomed the addition of Department of Planning and Development datasets: Active Building Permits, Active Land Use Permits, and Active Code Violation Cases. These new datasets join the initial datasets – those currently shown on “My Neighborhood Map “which has been expanded to include Real Time 911 Fire. “We invite you to participate in this project,” the sirte invites.”Please register and tell us what new datasets you would like to see.” [24×7] Get more info in the Seattle24x7 blog
