I mean sure, for the next 2 days everyone who reads slashdot or apple blogs will know who this guy is. I don't see how this could possibly ruin his career though. In a week his name will be forgotten. Besides, I would bet that 4 out of 5 IT hiring managers will never have any idea who this guy is. Even if you did, the guy was good enough to get a job at Apple, so he's probably fairly skilled. Why wouldn't you hire him? I would just make sure to keep sensitive prototypes out of his hands though....
I guess I don't really understand how Google Gears will alleviate the problem of the "Intar-web" going down. In your example there appears to be some merit, although I would hope that there was some mechanism in place prior to Google Gears to backup Google Calendar data... as anyone that relies solely on a free web calendar app to run a business is surely a fool. In any event, so many web applications rely on internet connectivity to be functional. Just look at webmail clients. Sure, you could still write your email offline, but you couldn't send it until connectivity was restored. You could read your old mail, but couldn't receive any new stuff. Is this useful? Could be, but functionality is still neutered badly. How about weather applications? Sure you could see the old radar data for your area, but without internet connectivity you can't get updated forecasts or radar information. How about traffic web applications? Again, they require constant connectivity to be useful. I guess I'm just missing the usefullness of this technology.
Outlook in my opinion is rubbish so I try to avoid it wherever possible (what is wrong with webmail). Also, why do people seem to need an integrated calendar, email client and word processor? Calendar: Calendar program/piece-of-paper-on-wall. I quit reading after that. I think anyone who's ever worked in a large corporate setting will find the "piece-of-paper-on-wall" calendar to be lacking in certain essential features.
Slashdot Mirror
I mean sure, for the next 2 days everyone who reads slashdot or apple blogs will know who this guy is. I don't see how this could possibly ruin his career though. In a week his name will be forgotten. Besides, I would bet that 4 out of 5 IT hiring managers will never have any idea who this guy is. Even if you did, the guy was good enough to get a job at Apple, so he's probably fairly skilled. Why wouldn't you hire him? I would just make sure to keep sensitive prototypes out of his hands though....
I almost fell out of my chair when I read the above comment. That is the funniest damn thing I've read in awhile.
I guess I don't really understand how Google Gears will alleviate the problem of the "Intar-web" going down. In your example there appears to be some merit, although I would hope that there was some mechanism in place prior to Google Gears to backup Google Calendar data... as anyone that relies solely on a free web calendar app to run a business is surely a fool. In any event, so many web applications rely on internet connectivity to be functional. Just look at webmail clients. Sure, you could still write your email offline, but you couldn't send it until connectivity was restored. You could read your old mail, but couldn't receive any new stuff. Is this useful? Could be, but functionality is still neutered badly. How about weather applications? Sure you could see the old radar data for your area, but without internet connectivity you can't get updated forecasts or radar information. How about traffic web applications? Again, they require constant connectivity to be useful. I guess I'm just missing the usefullness of this technology.