It was just last week that we found out we won a prestigious award from Popular Science. Plus, we’ve been getting lots of coverage from places like the San Francisco Chronicle and the New York Times. Heck, even Howard Stern loves us. Does this make us cool? After all, we’re nerdy technology types.

Thank goodness that we won an award that brings us back to our roots (before we got too Hollywood). We’re proud to announce that Splashtop won the “2008 Open Source Product Innovation Award” at LinuxWorld China. Yep, our very own Shawn Fang, pictured beautifully above, was on hand to receive the award. This award is very dear to our team who has been working incredibly hard to further Open Source Technology and the mainstream distribution of Linux. Congratulations team!

Another notable piece of news from this week is that Wired Magazine wrote an article titled, “Top 10 Products That Helped Us Forget 2008.” The number 7 product was the incredible HP Voodoo Envy (which we still fight about in the office). It’s not a long article but it does mention the Voodoo Instant-On Solution. Here’s what it says,

“An instant-on OS lets you surf the Web or make Skype calls without booting up Windows. It all adds up to one drool-worthy package.”

Yep, Splashtop is getting a lot of attention and why not? It’s an incredible product. Recently, I’ve been using it quite a bit on the new Lenovo S10e. I hope to blog more about my experiences using Splashtop on a Netbook next week. Until then, for those in the US, Happy Thanksgiving!

Here’s an interesting weekend read. According to an article by MIT Technology Review, there are lawsuits being filed over PC Boot Time. Let’s say you’re expected to begin working at 8am. You get in at precisely 8am and the first thing you do is push that power button on your PC. Unless you have Splashtop, you’re going to wait a while to commence your work. So, you head over to get a cup of coffee, say hi to your co-workers and grab that morning doughnut. Well, it’s been about 5 minutes now. I bet your computer is about ready to use.

As you’re walking back to your desk, you notice your boss giving you the stink-eye. “What?” you think, “I’m waiting for my computer to boot up.” Sure enough it comes up in your yearly review. You’re not “getting to work” when you get to work. And that’s the big question - are you “working” as your computer is booting? Or, should workers be required to come in earlier to boot up your computer so that you can commence work on time? From the article…

During the past year, several companies, including AT&T Inc., UnitedHealth Group Inc. and Cigna Corp., have been hit with lawsuits in which employees claimed that they were not paid for the 15- to 30-minute task of booting their computers at the start of each day and logging out at the end. Add those minutes up over a week, and hourly employees are losing some serious pay, argues plaintiffs’ lawyer Mark Thierman, a Las Vegas solo practitioner who has filed a handful of computer-booting lawsuits in recent years. …

The solution is so simple. It makes me sad that so many resources have gone into fighting this workplace lawsuit. Everyone should have Splashtop. There you go. It’s that simple. If employees all had Splashtop enabled computers, they’d barely be able to get their jacket off before they were ready to be productive. Another problem solved. Have a great weekend!

Here’s an interesting weekend read. According to an article by MIT Technology Review, there are lawsuits being filed over PC Boot Time. Let’s say you’re expected to begin working at 8am. You get in at precisely 8am and the first thing you do is push that power button on your PC. Unless you have Splashtop, you’re going to wait a while to commence your work. So, you head over to get a cup of coffee, say hi to your co-workers and grab that morning doughnut. Well, it’s been about 5 minutes now. I bet your computer is about ready to use.

As you’re walking back to your desk, you notice your boss giving you the stink-eye. “What?” you think, “I’m waiting for my computer to boot up.” Sure enough it comes up in your yearly review. You’re not “getting to work” when you get to work. And that’s the big question - are you “working” as your computer is booting? Or, should workers be required to come in earlier to boot up your computer so that you can commence work on time? From the article…

During the past year, several companies, including AT&T Inc., UnitedHealth Group Inc. and Cigna Corp., have been hit with lawsuits in which employees claimed that they were not paid for the 15- to 30-minute task of booting their computers at the start of each day and logging out at the end. Add those minutes up over a week, and hourly employees are losing some serious pay, argues plaintiffs’ lawyer Mark Thierman, a Las Vegas solo practitioner who has filed a handful of computer-booting lawsuits in recent years. …

The solution is so simple. It makes me sad that so many resources have gone into fighting this workplace lawsuit. Everyone should have Splashtop. There you go. It’s that simple. If employees all had Splashtop enabled computers, they’d barely be able to get their jacket off before they were ready to be productive. Another problem solved. Have a great weekend!

It was only a week ago when we were all excited about being in the New York Times (on the cover, on a Sunday - not trying to brag, just stating a fact). Then Howard Stern talked about it on his show! I wish that I could share that audio track but it would be inappropriate and would probably violate some copyright law. Let’s just say that he saw the potential for some instant adult entertainment.

This week we’ve got a couple of other accolades to share. First, we were in the San Francisco Chronicle. From a tactical marketing perspective, we’re starting to see Splashtop covered by more mainstream press all the time. I think this really highlights the shared pain point felt by many consumers. Lengthy boot time is a ubiquitous pain felt by almost everyone. Here’s a great quote from the article:

Michael Gartenberg, vice president of mobile strategy at research firm Jupitermedia, said the instant-on features will be more attractive on netbooks and ultra-portable notebooks, allowing them to be used quickly, like a smart phone. “As more users migrate to laptops and want to be able to use them ubiquitously, waiting for it to boot or come out of hibernation can be frustrating,” Gartenberg said. “That’s why we’re seeing these tactical solutions.”

Next up, we’ve been selected by Popular Science as the Best of What’s New in 2008! This is a very prestigious award and we’re honored to have received it. It appears that we’re in the category of computing and the second product listed (right after Spore). You can see their description of Splashtop here. This is from the press release:

Each year Popular Science reviews thousands of products across a variety of categories from Automotive technology to Computing to Green tech. 100 technology innovations are selected to receive the prestigious Popular Science award and be profiled in the December issue of Popular Science Magazine.

Thanks, Popular Science, for the honor!