(Fwd) InternetWeek Newsletter - Sept. 25

I got a kick out this. Hope y'all do to. --------------------------------------- No Network, No Demo; Oracle's NC Demo Dies Onstage Oracle chairman and CEO Larry Ellison began his keynote earlier this week at Oracle OpenWorld signing the praises of the Network Computer and Network Computing. The presentation at the second day of the Oracle user conference was a word-for-word repeat of one Ellison delivered at the Oracle8 launch at Radio City in New York in June. As he had done then, Ellison loaded a PC server with the NC server operating system and connected both it and an NC to the network. He then logged on using his NC Card. But things diverged from the script when Ellison tried to write an E-mail note to his mother and clip a flower graphic into the note. The application hung--and Ellison was left hanging on stage. After several minutes of gamely trying to trouble-shoot the NC and making jokes about his engineering staff for five minutes, Ellison reported that the network had gone down, taking with it the NC Server, his NC and his note to mother. "We've been having trouble with the network all week," he said. Indeed, the network for the Oracle's InterOffice application at the conference had similar trouble, and was off line for the opening day of the conference. This rendered nearly 1,000 NCs at the conference useless on Monday, and unavailable to the 18,000 attendees at OpenWorld, each of whom was given an NC card for use with the systems. Ellison moved onto a demo of Oracle Parallel Server and tried to demonstrate how the database application, spread among several servers, would pick up when one of the servers was theatrically disabled by sparking and smoking on stage. Again what had worked fine in New York, failed in Los Angles. "I can't believe this," Ellison said. "It should be restarting. If it's not, I'm leaving. We'll play the demo from New York where everything actually worked," said a flustered Ellison. "Is the Network Live, dare I try this again," Ellison asked his helpers off stage at one point. On a second try, the network connections worked and Ellison continued with his presentation. The demo debacle underscored the single most vulnerable part of the NC: Its reliance on a working network. By Ellis Booker http://techweb.cmp.com/internetwk/news/news0924-2.htm ******************