The Nielsen Company recently released metrics about consumer marketshare by operating system for smartphones in the US. I’m not sure why some people are surprised by these numbers however, I don’t think the division of marketshare is the key story. If you are wondering what they looked like, you can see the report here: Nielsen Report. For the record, the top 3 are Android (29%), Apple (27%) and RIM (27%). Behind these numbers is something bigger, with greater impact on all companies regardless if they are supplying smartphones to their workers or if they allow workers to bring in their personal devices.

It’s been a few days since the RSA Conference and I’ve had time to absorb everything that was there.  With the sessions, keynote addresses, vendor floor and the socializing, the whole conference was definitely something worth experiencing.  The conference had more than 320 companies exhibiting their tools and technologies, over 255 sessions and 540 speakers. 

The morning consisted of keynote addresses, awards and a panel discussion with the biggest names in cryptography. The opening keynote was made by RSA Chairman, Arthur Coviello. It was in part a call to arms. Art announced the Cloud Trust Authority initiative, a series of cloud-based services designed to enable organizations and cloud service providers to work together to design security into cloud initiatives. Art also commented that the cloud and virtualization will dramatically change security. No doubt, it has to. Traditional security technologies cannot scale to or adapt to the fluid nature of the cloud. This notion of change being needed in how security is implemented in a cloud model resonated throughout the rest of the day, and I’m sure will be repeated throughout the rest of the week. Art had VMware Chief Development Officer, Richard McAniff on stage with him talking about developing for a trusted cloud.

First day at the RSA Conference and it’s off to a great start.  As expected, one of the big topics everyone is talking about is cloud computing.  It helps that the conference started with the Cloud Security Alliance Summit, but it was bigger than just that.  The talk in the halls was all about cloud computing, as well.  From data warehouse vendors, to multi-factor authentication vendors, to consumers from all walks of life, cloud computing is on everyone’s mind. 

Imagine this: putting away your handheld and your laptop, for an entire day. (Please remember to breathe.)

When I was in high school I always stared out the window wanting to see and do things in exotic places.  Because world travel was an expensive proposition, I knew employment was a necessary evil.  And to get a job I needed some skills. So I studied foreign languages and learned how international commerce flowed.  My plan worked wonderfully throughout the 1990s.  I got paid to do business trotting the globe seeing different things and meeting new people.  That is until mobility ruined everything.