ShadowRAM: March 29, 2004

Duane Zitzner, executive vice president of HP's Personal Systems Group, used his Monday keynote to introduce HP's new ruggedized notebook PCs. He dropped one on stage (it still worked), and then opened it halfway, stood it on the floor in an inverse "V," and stood on it. "[HP Services Executive Vice President] Ann Livermore wanted me to leave this [notebook] out here [onstage] because she thought it might make her taller," he said.

However, when 5-foot, very-few-inches-tall Livermore took the stage, she opted instead to stand on terra firma. "There are health and safety issues for those of us wearing high heels," she said.

We all know that Gilroy is heading HP's channels. But try explaining that to Drew Carey, who appeared live onstage Monday night with eight colleagues for a special performance of "Who's Line Is It Anyway?" During his monologue, Carey said, "Kevin Gilroy. Nicest guy in the world. Talked to him for a half-hour backstage, exchanged e-mails. I still don't know what he does."

Carey couldn't help but assist HP in a dig at arch-rival Dell. He said he hates to watch the news, but watched it recently one night and then opened the Bible to Revelations. "I started checking things off. Earthquake. Flood. Fire. Dell. It's all there."

Meanwhile, it sounded as though Gilroy should have appeared at the Congressional hearings on terrorism instead of at the partners conference. In a session with solution providers, Gilroy admitted that HP took a roughly $250 million hit to its bottom line in fiscal 2002 because of gray-market activity, according to solution providers who attended the meeting. He then called the gray marketers "economic terrorists" and vowed, "We will stomp them out."

CRN's old pal and former super-VAR Mark Cuban, who's found greener pastures owning the NBA's Dallas Mavericks, is investing in Web search-engine companies and high-definition TV efforts.

What happened to the kinder, gentler Doug Burgum? At his keynote last Monday at Microsoft's Convergence 2004 event in Orlando, Fla., the Microsoft Business Solutions poohbah invited attendees of the standing room-only event to fill in empty seats reserved for the press. "If they're not here by now, screw 'em," he said,maybe in not those exact words, but pretty close. Later on, he conceded he may have "pissed them [the press] off."