I've put up Chapter 7 of the Golden Calf translation, 'The Sweet Yoke Of Fame', in which the protagonists buy some sharp new clothes, meet a pair of Chicago gangsters, and enjoy the best night of their lives while plundering their way south through the Soviet countryside.

With apologies for using the blog as a job board, my four-month contract in Beijing has just ended and I'm looking for work again. There are three things I can do fairly well:

I'm legal to work in the United States, United Kingdom, Poland and (for unfathomable reasons) Sweden. I can work full-time starting in mid-November, and I'm available for freelance jobs starting now. My full resume is here and any email inquiries are welcome.

I need to move big files—much too big for email—across the Internet frequently. Generally, I use my Apple .Mac iDisk or my own web server, but if you don't have access to those sorts of services, Angela Gunn points to a great list of file-transfer services you can try.

In computing and information technology generally, 'more, faster, bigger' (or 'smaller,' depending on the field) is the received wisdom for future development. Yet that often leads to commoditization of products and services, where competitors leapfrog one another incrementally and profits shrink, while customers wonder whether they are actually gaining any value from the process.

That dynamic is particularly acute in video gaming, and this week Ars Technica profiles how Nintendo is changing the rules with its new Wii game console, which eschews bigger, hotter, faster electronics for small size to fit in well with TVs and other AV components, power efficiency, the ability to update itself when it's not in use, and wildly original controllers. Plus it's hugely cheaper than competing consoles from Microsoft and Sony. I think it's going to be a huge hit, and if it is, could be a business lesson for other technology firms.

The first reaction of mine on this piece of news is 'impossible', the second is also 'impossible', and the third is again 'impossible'. Such jokes are spreading over the Internet very often. However when I see it on China Daily, when I was in Jinjiang Tower attending the announcement of Delphi 2005, it turns out to be the truth. Almost in a sudden many members in my MSN friend list started to change their nick to the related topic. So great this world! Impossible is nothing.
Lenovo never leaves me any good impression from the very beginning. It prones scorn on the technical workers and only wants to make short-term money. I have to admit it has been very rich now. But the tax it contributes to the government is very limited. Being the so-called largest computer manufacturer, it is very strange that the only thing that Lenovo benefit the society is represented in term of money. How about the technology? Here is what I saw: The software it provides is obviously not passing any kind of testing process. I can assure that such kind of software will be rejected by the first cycle of testing engineers, if in India. Concerning the hardware, one of my best friends, who is very experienced in this field mentioned to me, 'Lenovo is purchasing the hardware from those manufacturers which we never heard of and binding them into a shape of computer, then labeling each of the computers with its own brand, that is all the story'. And here is what I experienced: 2004 Jul. 8th, I took two Lenovo laptop to the school and neither of them was willing to work, one of them simply refused to boot up, and the other gave up with a blue-screen when the PowerPoint was being launched. If it was not a classmate of mine was bringing an IBM laptop with him, my presentation on my graduation thesis will be a complete failure. What a dramatic scenario! Or can we say it is a total tragedy. Sir Thomas Gresham argues that good notes are driven out of circulation by bad notes, here is another evidence.
After all we have to rethink on the issue again. Of course many Chinese will blindly celebrate this and consider it a victory of 'the great Chinese people', but I never think in that foolish nationalism way. IBM is never making decisions without analysis. It sells its hard disk department to HITACHI. It now sells its whole PC department. In my point of view, it probably means that PC will no longer be a very profitable area. Even IBM thinks that it will be non-profitable when concerning the cost of factory, sales, support services between the all the profits, can Lenovo be cleverer than IBM? I do not think so. Although the leaders of both side claimed that it is a win-win deal, I think it is most possible that it is only another win of IBM.
Lenovo must devote more not on sales and marketing, but on research and development; not on the sponsor project of Olympic game, but on testing and qualification project to ensure the quality of its products; not on the bribing of the officials who is responsible for the purchasing, but on improving the salary of the technical workers. Only by carrying all that out, can it achieve the objects it sets for themselves, which is not a bit possible, at least at present.