Here is an excerpt from a recent speech that he gave at Harvard University.  As captured in the article, Mr. Gates seems to very much be living a principle handed down from his mother – “From those to whom much is given, much is expected.”

 Read on

A great little short from Microsoft really hitting the point that the nature of creating bonds with customers has truly changed.  We’ve all been saying this, but it never has been said better before.

I remember “back in the day” when high speed meant 56K, and ads for websites started with “http://” almost falling on the floor laughing at this.  It must have been a tough day.

Here is another demo of a multi-touch interactive screen

I may have gotten carried away with my new Mac and iMovie, but here is a glimpse of my baby boy to be.  The 4d ultrasound just blew me away.  The advance in technology over less than 3 years since our last baby is amazing.  The clarity is shocking and a little surreal.  You can almost see him saying “Hello World”.

The launch of Apple’s iPhone has me interested in multi-touch interfaces.  This demo from Jeff Han shows where this technology is going and illustrates how we humans might interface with technology in the future.  Will it be possible where one day interaction design is so effective that we don’t notice the interface?  I’d like to think so.

 ”Zopa - A Marketplace for Social Lending
People lend and borrow money with each other, sidestepping the banks. Social Lending is a financial category of genuine and increasing importance. It’s been happening on a small-scale in a families and social groups for hundreds of years and the internet has opened it up to everybody. It’s the biggest development in the world of money for decades, as people deal directly with other people, cutting out the banks.”

This is an interesting concept.  It essentially echos the original intentions of those who set up Credit Unions or co-ops earlier in the 20th century.  So, being that most Credit Unions are moving away from their grass roots, small community beginnings to large regional and eventually national footprints,  could this be an offering that potentially takes the place of the original grass roots intension of credit unions?  Or, with a lack of regulation and legislation, will this model degrade to a meeting place for “bottom feeders” – those with bad credit ratings and those trying to make a quick buck?

 Here are some examples of Web Hosts that I have seen:

• Phillips uses a host for their new “body shaver”
• Dell uses a web host for walking a user through the configuration process when ordering a computer
• Coast Capital Savings uses “Julie” to bring personality to banking and attempts to help users with their natural language queries
• Royal Caribean uses multiple web hosts for their Freedom of the Seas website
• Elan uses a host for their ski selector
• CashAdvance.com also uses a web host for an intro.
• And the latest one I have come across is an innovative recruitment site from Accenture called BackStageatAccenture.com which not only uses a “Web Host”, but also uses other “Web Hosts” which are actual Accenture employees providing testimonials.

This list is just a start.  It will be interesting to see how this type of approach will evolve through 2007.