Straight from the CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment conference in San Diego, CA

First things first–is there anyone who comes to San Diego at any time of year and doesn’t think, “man, I could totally live here”? Of course not. I’m even originally from Southern California, and I’m still always amazed at just how perfect it is here… then add a few fish tacos and life is muy bien!

The fall CTIA show(http://daily.ctia.org/wirelessit09/) is more focused of the 2 North American wireless conferences, and always the smaller. 2009 is no exception–even smaller than usual I’d say, both because of the general economy and the recent consolidation in the mobile industry. However, the concentration of people doing serious business here is palpable, and none of the time wasters look to have bothered to make the trip. This is serious business, and the industry is moving fast.

Android is everywhere. While Apple seems to shun the wireless events (we’ll see if they keep that up come the fall showin Vegas) Google is everywhere, though mostly via other companies. Motorola has gone “all in” on the Android platform, and their developer conference held at the Hard Rock Hotel across the street from the conference center showcased how their new device line will be taking advantage of Android’s capabilities. Others were in play on Android too throughout the week. The other theme that was front and center was the app-store concept. Everyone wants one to be sure, but it’s not all rosy.  Many are finding that there are TOO MANY apps on the iPhone app store now, and subscribers can’t find what they want anymore. Methods for better app stores are necessary and on the way.

From the divShare perspective, one of the very exciting aspects of the show was the growth in mobile cloud computing players.  The cloud mobility story favored enterprise solutions (as I think cloud computing in general does at this time), but there is still chatter about how Apple and others plan to push hard in this direction during the coming years.  Of course anyone who wants to claim a leadership position there still has a window to do so.

Here is a great article from Fierce Wireless about mobile+cloud.

Start to formulate a mobile strategy for your company if you aren’t already.  The mobile device is going to be as important (if not more) than the PC soon, and almost as powerful.

So, there sure is a lot of buzz around the recent release of netbooks.  And the price certainly is attractive.  You may be asking yourself, “What is a netbook?  And do I want a one?”

First of all, a netbook is laptop that is designed with the Internet in mind.  Basically, it’s designed to wirelessy access the internet and use the resources of the Internet.  So, it’s about browsing, using Web-based applications, and storing your files “in the cloud” (not locally on your hard drive, but on the internet).   The average netbook has the following features/functions as compared to a conventional laptop:

• Less processing power than a laptop
• Less storage (sometimes not even a conventional hard drive, but solid-state storage)
• Smaller size (usually 2 - 3 pounds)
• Smaller keyboard (80 - 95% of normal)
• Lower price tag

So, back to the original question - do I want a netbook?  If you are asking yourself this question, it really all comes down to what you will be doing with your netbook?  Compared to conventional laptops, netbooks are underpowered (read: slower), have smaller screens and a slightly undersized keyboard.  But, it may be enough to do what you need.  With a netbook, you can access the Internet and all its applications.   Applications you can get to and use include software for browsing the Web, word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, music, contact management, calendars, task management, posting to your blogs, sending email and more.  But, because of the smaller, lower resolution screens and decrease in processing power, there are some things that may be better left to your higher-powered laptop or desktop, such as high-end video or photo editing.

One thing’s for sure, if you have a netbook, you will need to access your files in the cloud.     Of course, if you are a divShare user you have that covered, and it may just be a matter of uploading more of the files you’ll want to access from your netbook.  Either way, netbooks are here, and there are more models for us to choose from each day.

Comparison of Netbooks: http://www.netbookgrid.com/
Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netbook
What is a Netbook?  http://news.cnet.com/what-is-a-netbook-computer/?tag=mncol

Google has announced their new Google Wave, an online collaboration tool by the same people that came up with Google Maps.

According to blogger Reuven Cohen at ElasticVapor:

“Busy day for cloud interoperability related news. Google just announced a new service called Google Wave, described as an open communication and collaboration platform & protocol based on hosted XML documents (called waves) supporting concurrent modifications and low-latency updates. In simple terms Google Wave can be thought of like an ajax spreadsheet over XMPP. “

Check out his entire article at: http://www.elasticvapor.com/2009/05/google-jump-into-cloud-wave-ajax-over.html

G.ho.st is a quasi-OS for The Cloud, and it’s been reported they want developers to write apps on top of their technology, using The Cloud instead of desktops.

Read Write Web describes the G.ho.st services as:

A fabulous, ambitious virtual operating system, G.ho.st launched at Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco two years ago. The browser-based computers allow users to leave their desktop, files, and applications in the Amazon-hosted cloud and access them from just about any place or device with an internet connection.

It’s great to see The Cloud as a more useful platform for productivity, and obviously divShare looks to help lead the charge in this.  See the entire story on this at: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/ghost_virtual_computing_adds_api.php