ReadWriteEnterprise

Faking a computer science degree cost Scott Thompson his CEO job. But with one notable exception, most observers thought he was doing OK, under lousy circumstances.

Sure, the lying was wrong, but apart from that, would Thompson’s lack of a computer science degree have hurt his career? Does having the right degree - or any degree - really matter that much any more?

Perhaps the greatest single problem afflicting information technology in the enterprise today (outside of this lousy global economy) is how employees using their choice of devices to access corporate network resources impacts security. Although last month's RSA security conference ostensibly devoted its theme to the empowerment of individuals through "the great cipher," the common thread of nearly every discussion and session was the empowerment of individuals through "that pesky iPad."

We write about "the consumerization of IT" the way a surfer gets up in the morning, finds a gnarly wave, and rides it home. It's today's big story. It's also tomorrow's, and we can pretty much set our alarm clocks by its arrival. But as we work ourselves into a daily ritual, we often find ourselves having lost track of the undercurrent. It's not that we're paying no attention to it - in fact, we're seeing it every day: the commoditization of social affairs. We even complain about it, though we often fail to acknowledge it for what it is: an equal and opposite reaction.

While thus far, there's general consensus that Tim Cook is doing, and may continue to do, a fine job at Apple stepping into the shoes of his lauded predecessor, Steve Jobs, there looms a bigger issue. There appears to be, at least in the public conscience, a lack of leadership and direction from the chief executives of corporations, including tech firms. And in fact, 2011 may be characterized as a year of misdirection from the head office.

Is this actually a problem; do Americans and Canadians actually need a CEO they can look up to? Or are CEOs typically glorified by virtue of a lack of deserving leaders in the public space? This American reporter discussed these questions with our favorite Canadian contributor, CTV News Channel analyst Carmi Levy.

It's time for free software to find a new voice. Once again, Free Software Foundation founder Richard Stallman is putting his feet firmly in his mouth. This time, Stallman says that he's glad Steve Jobs is gone.

It's no secret that RMS and Steve Jobs held firmly opposed views when it comes to software freedom. I didn't expect Stallman to hold a vigil at an Apple store for Jobs, or even to say much of anything at all. But his ill-considered response does nothing for the cause of free software, and actually does a lot of damage.

This is not an Apple-bashing piece. It is also not an attempt to cut an American icon down to size at a time when we're remembering the magnificent contributions of its fallen founder. This is about how failure makes us better.

I've lost count of the number of times I've heard, seen, or read comparisons of Steve Jobs to Thomas Edison since early yesterday evening. Jobs did not invent anything - not the personal computer, not the MP3 player, not the tablet. But besides that fact, there are certain other stark similarities. One: Jobs, like Edison, was a fierce competitor who sought to control not only the delivery channel for his products, but the market surrounding those products. Two: Like the finest scientist, Jobs studied his failures and Apple's very carefully, and unlike Microsoft, built his next success upon the smoking ruins of his failures.

I promise I didn't write this in advance, waiting for the appropriate moment to unleash it from the vault of pre-conceived, pre-digested stories about the deceased the way one fills in the Free Space in the middle of "N" on the Bingo card. When people would ask me, what will you write when Steve Jobs dies, I declined to answer because I didn't want to think about it. I sincerely believed if anyone could beat pancreatic cancer, it would be him.

It's not unusual for Apple to dominate the news, but this week it was inescapable. Steve Jobs' decision to step down as CEO sent shockwaves through the industry. Jobs' decision doesn't come as a surprise, exactly, but the timing was unexpected. Scott Fulton looked back at Jobs' history with Apple and lessons learned from that. Fulton's coverage on Jobs' departure was joined with four things entrepreneurs should ignore when examining Jobs' legacy.

In honor of the 20th anniversary of Linux, we also contrasted the Linux community's approach and achievements with those of Jobs. After the jump, you'll find more on this week's top news stories from ReadWriteWeb's Enteprise, Cloud, Mobile, and Hack channels.

Yesterday, Steve Jobs officially stepped down as CEO of Apple. Today, the Linux kernel turns 20. That makes it as good a time as any to look back and assess – which has shaped computing, and the world, more? Linus Torvalds' "hobby OS," or Steve Jobs?

This might seem like an unfair comparison, one man versus an army of programmers and companies. But that's at the core of the question. Is it Jobs, a leader who pays close and particular attention to detail and focuses on a single mission? Or the Linux community's collaborative but uncoordinated approach that gives free reign to companies to do what they will with the operating system?

Those of us who lived and worked in the glorious, adventurous era of computing that was the late 1970s and early '80s have a different perspective. I was a consultant and developer before I became a journalist in 1984. My colleagues from that time and I frame the iPhone and iPad in the broader context of a bigger history. The iPhone, I've seen and heard over the past several hours, has changed people's lives.

Maybe. But what has truly made Apple successful, as a longer-range view of history will reveal, is a set of best practices, not any single gadget or an audio-cassette-ready philosophy on life. Steve Jobs learned these practices and principles through trial-and-error, though he became their most brilliant practitioner. And the fact that he and his company executed on those principles and capitalized upon them, and no other American company in any industry in the past quarter-century has done the same, is the greatest takeaway from the recent history of American business.

The news of Steve Jobs taking a medical leave of absence has rocked the blogosphere and the stock market. First, this shouldn't have come as a surprise to anyone who knows anything about cancer, especially the kind he has. Second, it highlights the risk of hiring or developing a rock star CEO. While any executive of Steve Jobs' stature temporarily or permanently leaving a company is traumatic, I think it could have been different in this case and less "newsworthy".