Their Deceptive Mind, understanding how others non-critical thinking

We all pride ourselves on our critical thinking.  I have been researching Brain Functionality and one of the audio books I picked up is Your Deceptive Mind, a guide to critical thinking.

Your Deceptive Mind: A Scientific Guide to Critical Thinking Skills

No skill is more important in today's world than being able to think about, understand, and act on information in an effective and responsible way. What's more, at no point in human history have we had access to so much information, with such relative ease, as we do in the 21st century. But because misinformation out there has increased as well, critical thinking is more important than ever.

These 24 rewarding lectures equip you with the knowledge and techniques you need to become a savvier, sharper critical thinker in your professional and personal life. By immersing yourself in the science of cognitive biases and critical thinking, and by learning how to think about thinking (a practice known as metacognition), you'll gain concrete lessons for doing so more critically, more intelligently, and more successfully.

The key to successful critical thinking lies in understanding the neuroscience behind how our thinking works - and goes wrong; avoiding common pitfalls and errors in thinking, such as logical fallacies and biases; and knowing how to distinguish good science from pseudoscience. Professor Novella tackles these issues and more, exploring how the (often unfamiliar) ways in which our brains are hardwired can distract and prevent us from getting to the truth of a particular matter.

What I have found most beneficial is thinking about the people I have met , worked with, or tried to have intelligent conversations who have a Deceptive Mind, and think they are critical thinkers.  

Understanding how the mind can be deceived is useful to understand why others may not agree with you.  and, sometimes you are the one who has been deceived. We all make mistakes and some of the mistakes we make is being deceived.  Think you are immune?  If you are, then Magic tricks never work on you.

Critique of the Microsoft-Nokia deal

GigaOm's Om Malik has a post on the Microsoft-Nokia deal that will give you a critical view.  One nugget that Om has dug up is what some of the Nokia insiders think.

In theory, Microsoft is getting a great engineering team, a great product design team and a great brand (well, better than Windows Phone). However in reality what it is not getting are the intangibles. In the course of my seven odd years of reporting on Nokia, I have met many talented people and many of them had a lot of pride in working for the company. It was the shining achievement of Nokia and its engineering culture. Even when things got bad over past few years, many believed that Nokia had the talent to help things around. I made a few phone calls this evening, and all I hear is a sense of quiet despondency and loss of hope. Working for Microsoft isn’t working for Nokia, is a common refrain.

The zinger comment is referencing Google's Vic Gundotra.

Vic Gundotra, Google’s sharp-elbowed senior executive who, like Android co-creator Andy Rubin, wanted to win over Nokia and bring it into the Android camp about two years ago, put it best when he tweeted: “Two turkeys don’t make an Eagle.” And while he might have ruffled some feathers in Microsoft and Nokia offices, his observation wasn’t that off the mark. Microsoft makes a mobile OS, that the market doesn’t seem to want. Nokia smartphones sales make drying paint seem like a John Woo thriller. It doesn’t matter from which angle you look, the combination of these two companies into a single entity doesn’t add up.

Om finishes with an upside to the deal.

If there is one upside, then I do believe that this just might be the best thing to happen to Finland and the Finnish startup scene. A lot of the talent draining out of Nokia will look for new opportunities in their areas of expertise — radio engineering, manipulating sensors and embedded systems. If anything, this is Finland’s big opportunity to become the epicenter of the Internet of Things.

Disclosure: I work part-time as an analyst for GigaOm and have watched Om in action first hand.  He knows what he is talking about.

Whoa, Microsoft follows Google's playbook for mobile, buys Nokia Phone unit

WSJ covers Microsoft's move buying Nokia.

Microsoft in $7.17 Billion Deal for Nokia Cellphone Business

Microsoft Corp., MSFT -0.45% on the heels of announcing the planned retirement of Chief Executive Steve Ballmer, has agreed to buy most of Nokia Corp.'sNOK1V.HE +1.30% devices and services business and bring aboard several executives who could be contenders for Mr. Ballmer's job.

The companies said Monday that Microsoft will pay €3.79 billion ($5 billion) to buy "substantially all" of the Nokia business, which includes its smartphone operations. The Redmond, Wash., company will pay €1.65 billion to license Nokia's patents, the companies said.

Stephen Elop, Nokia's CEO, and several other executives are joining Microsoft as part of the deal. Mr. Elop, a former Microsoft executive, is among the names being circulated as Mr. Ballmer's successor. Microsoft recently announced that Mr. Ballmer will retire from his post within a year, or when the next CEO is chosen.

Google bought Motorola.  Microsoft buys Nokia.  Mobile has changed dramatically with Apple, Google, and Microsoft competing to sell smartphones.

VMware says Enterprises still need Data Centers, D'oh

The Cloud has changed the data center industry, and some people think the cloud means the end of data centers.  I am reminded of the popular wise man Homer Simpson's phrase. D'oh

InformationWeek reports on the revelation that the Cloud is not the end of the enterprise data center.

VMware: Enterprises Still Need Data Centers

Charles Babcock

Editor At Large, InformationWeek

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VMware's Gelsinger tells VMworld that cloud services can't yet handle tough compliance, governance and service level requirements.

The insight is here.

He didn't make this assertion in his keynote address at VMworld Monday or in his press conference on Tuesday. Gelsinger's prediction of legacy data center longevity happened after Marc Andreessen, former Netscape developer and now a venture capitalist, stated in an executive roundtable on the first day of VMworld that Silicon Valley startups shun building their own data centers.

"It's extremely rare to see a capital expense budget in a Silicon Valley startup anymore. It consists of four laptops [and cloud computing]," Andreessen said.

Gelsinger responded, "We disagree. People who say put everything into the cloud have never met a highly regulated customer. A lot of people like Graeme [Graeme Hay, head of infrastructure architecture at Credit Swisse] have real service-level agreements, real governance, real compliance needs that can't be easily met in the cloud."

Those who think the Cloud means the end of the enterprise data center will have a Homer Simpson moment, "D'oh".  Those who think the cloud doesn't create a threat for the enterprise data center will have a "D'oh" moment.  The smart are realizing the Public Cloud breaks the monopoly of enterprise data centers, and it means customers now have a choice. Actually many choices as companies see opportunity to compete against the enterprise IT groups.

Ericsson launches 3 Greener Data Centers, 2 Sweden, 1 Montreal

Here is a video of Ericsson's press release for its new data centers.  This increases the chance of future services from Ericsson to optimize services from data centers to the mobile user.

And another video of the CEO talking about the data centers.

The data center has green features.

The data centers will be coming on line in 2014 and 2015.  Note vendors, it looks like Ericsson is well on the way so they already have made their vendor choices.

Here is the press release for the three data centers.  And the one that is specific for Canada.

An example of a future service from Ericsson is SDN described here.