GMail Growing Pains

Note: This article was originally posted on the WisdomGroup blog.

WisdomGroup is both a proponent and a user of GMail. Of course, the service is not perfect, as proven during yesterday’s GMail outage. “It’s only affecting a small number of users” is hardly consolation when you’re one of the affected users.

GMail vs Microsoft Exchange

Note: This article was originally posted on the WisdomGroup blog.

When Arizona State University shifted 65,000 users from their in-house email system to GMail, support calls went down and savings went up. The move saves the University $400,000 per year. Does it still make sense to have an in-house email server?

Four-Minute Video Description

Adrian Sannier, Information Technology Officer at ASU, outlines the problem and solution in this 4-minute video.

Diamonds for Ten Dollars Per Carat

Blogger’s Note from Feb2013: This article was originally posted on the WisdomGroup blog in Jan2007. In hindsight, my predicted timeline was too aggressive. However, the rest of the post remains sound.

If Woolworth’s sold diamond rings, you’d have a million of ‘em baby!
~Fats Waller, Piano composer/performer, circa 1915

Woolworth’s and Fats Waller are long gone, but Waller’s tounge-in-cheek prediction will come to pass in the next few years. Diamonds will sell for $10.00 per carat in the year 2015. Advances in the fabrication of synthetic/cultured diamonds will drive down the price and value of these “precious” gems. At the same time, the needs of computer manufacturers and huge economies of scale will make it worthwhile for diamond fabricators to roll out cheap diamonds by the pound.