Nodding head with most of these followups. The Posse can't help but be interested in and to discuss the major trends in our industry -- the "word on the street" and all that -- and in all honesty, I think most would agree that at this point in time, Apple and Google have a disproportionately powerful effect (for good and ill) on where the industry is going. There were touch interfaces before the iPhone, just as there was dynamic HTML before Gmail, but their adoption by these "big boys" legitimized them in a way nothing else could or would.
Really, Java was in this disruptive, revolutionary role 10-15 years ago. In the mid 90's, many scoffed at Java's core concepts, like the cross platform runtime, or garbage collection. Its emergence, particularly on the server, influenced many other technologies, most notably other languages. In "Beyond Java", Bruce Tate argued that the JVM solved so many important challenges -- security, portability, performance, etc. -- that any successor language to Java would surely run on the JVM. So what's the new hotness? Go aside, it's JVM languages like Scala and Clojure, or languages that at least have JVM ports, like Ruby/JRuby. But right now, some of the biggest and most important issues aren't about the language, they're about the environment. Do you trust your data to the cloud, and to Google's benevolence? How much freedom are you willing to give up to walk in Apple's carefully-curated walled garden? These are important questions, they're what everyone's talking about, and they're what everyone's copying. Web apps got a lot more ambitious after GMail and Google Maps launched, and the proliferation of App Stores (including the foundering Java Store) speaks volumes about Apple's influence on the industry. Nobody else -- whether company, non-profit, or amorphous "movement" -- comes anywhere close to these two in terms of influence here in 2010. Microsoft seems like an utterly spent force, and the F/OSS types are still crowing about the same successes they were touting 10 years ago. IMHO, neither seems primed to do anything disruptive, or even interesting, anytime soon. (Oh, I know, Google is this great open source company. That's great to hear... so where do I check out the source to run my own GMail instance?). Everyone's going to watch what Apple and Google are doing, and a lot are going to copy them... again, for both good and ill. So it's only sensible that any technology discussion, podcasts included, is going to be keenly aware of what these two are up to. -Chris On Jun 12, 7:30 am, Mikael Grev <mikael.g...@gmail.com> wrote: > The Java Posse has as much obligation to only talk about Java as the > Ponytail Posse would have to only talk about ponytails (and Jonathan > Schwartz). -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. To post to this group, send email to javapo...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to javaposse+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en.
