AOL in December, 1994
AOL competitors in 1994 included CompuServe, Prodigy, GEnie, and Delphi. The population of the USA was 263M people. The World Wide Web was in its infancy. Here is a summary of AOL metrics and features...
View Article1994: “Doing Business at Microsoft” class
With the recent news that Microsoft is permanently closing its retail stores, I recalled the time I was inspired to propose a “Microsoft Store” on 9/2/1994, as I was finishing the 5 day “Doing Business...
View ArticleThe Microsoft Store: 1994, 2009, 2020
Attending the Doing Business at Microsoft class in 1994 inspired me to propose that Microsoft open retail stores. I sent an email (see below), but nothing happened. Microsoft did an experiment with...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Q+A with Ben about Web Browser History and More
My friend Todd Warren is co-teaching a class on Web Development at Ashesi University in Ghana right now (Fall 2020). He invited me and my friend Tim Krauskopf to spend 45 minutes on a Zoom video call...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Before Slack and Teams: The Windows Service (1998)
Slack and Microsoft Teams have both gained prominence (along with Zoom) during this COVID-19 pandemic year of Working From Home. But back in the 20th Century, a small group within Microsoft built a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
My Start-up Portfolio
[Last Updated on Thursday 1/26/2023]My wife Lisa and I are active “angel” investors and advisers. We have invested in 20 different companies since 2003, and we have 13 active investments in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Internet Explorer: A Brief History [6/2022 update]
6/15/2022: Internet Explorer Has Officially Retired In this blog post today, Microsoft confirmed that IE is history. I created the web browser project “O’Hare” within the Windows 95 team in early...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Should Microsoft Spin Out Windows & Office?
On Monday December 27th, I received a message on my Twitter account from Jordan Novet, a reporter at CNBC. He was writing a story on CellarTracker, had figured out that I was a long-time CellarTracker...
View ArticleClik here to view.
ChatGPT Generates Error-Laden Biography
12/10/2023 UPDATE: I tried the new Grok service by X (nee Twitter). Only one error and overall a better answer: @BenSlivka: Who is Ben Slivka? @grok: Ben Slivka is a software engineer and entrepreneur...
View ArticleAmazon.com Key Challenges, slivka@, 1999-10-05
I started work at amazon.com on September 7, 1999, reporting to Chief Information Officer Rick Dalzell, but with no job responsibilities. So, I spent my first three weeks interviewing 45 people at...
View Article