Back in the day, I was a big fan of the “Five Questions” segment on The Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn. Check out this segment with admitted Rush fan John Larroquette:

Along these lines, I was reading the very popular AriWriter blog the other day and I saw post that reminded me of “Five Questions.”

At this risk of being completely unoriginal, I’m going to steal his idea. At least I’m giving props, right?

Rules

So, here’s the deal: Ask me five questions in the comments by May 5th at 5 pm EST. They can be work- or technology-related, vaguely personal, completely random, or whatever. I’ll put the best ones out there for a vote and I’ll answer the winning questions on this site.

Two more notes:

• I’ll try to record the entire thing via my webcam.
• You also have my promise that I won’t research any answers in advance to appear smarter than I am.

The winner gets an autographed copy of my first book, Why New Systems Fail.

Go ahead. Ask away.

Answers

Thanks for the comments. All. I’ve posted the answers. At the end of these, I have put a poll. Vote for the best combinations of questions and answers. I’ll announce a winner in about a week.

Brian Morgan
1) Of the new technologies listed in your new book, which one do you feel will have the greatest impact in the corporate world?
Wow. Twist my arm, eh? Very tough call but I’ll go with either open source or cloud computing.
2) Other than yourself, who’s the most interesting person you’d like to meet with two first names (extra credit if you’ve met someone named Simon Phil)?
Ricky Gervais.
3) Which BI vendor do see as the market leader 5 years from now – Cognos (IBM), Business Objects (SAP), Hyperion (Oracle), Micro Strategies, or someone else?
You really want to make me look silly. I’ll take “the field.” Perhaps an OS vendor will get huge.
4) 3D TV – is this really going to catch on or is it just a fad?
Not for a while. I don’t think that people will want to replace expensive LCDs and plasmas with new TVs that require 1950s-sytle glasses.
5) Trapped on an island, which artists’ music would you rather have to listen to: the Cars or Journey?
The Cars are overrated. Journey’s staying power is impressive.
Robert Lavigne
1) Name the original drummer of the band Rush. That’s a gimme.
John Rutsey. Don’t waste my time. J
2) Is the GenY 50% of workforce by 2015 statistic a lever for change or just another fear tactic by consultants seeking new social licenses?
Well, 50 percent seems high but, if social media becomes as huge as many think, GenXers and baby boomers need to get with the program. GenY has mad social media skillz.
3) What are the odds that 2112 will be Dream Theatre’s next live cover album?
1%. A few years ago, I asked Mike Portnoy once if they planned to cover a Rush album. Not going to happen.
4) By April 5th? – Do you mean May 5th?
Yes.
5) In your opinion, what is the real market potential for wifi touch devices within the enterprise?
Somewhere between nothing and huge. On April 20th, Oracle made its Siebel CRM app iPad-friendly.
Robert Brands
1. What do you foresee as Next after the Next Wave?
The semantic web. It’s going to be huge.
2. SAP is overrated and very costly to those that implemented the fad. Who will be the next SAP adding true value added and ultimate cost savings? (SAP never did).
I’ve only worked with SAP peripherally but I’ve heard stories. I personally thing that the days of Big ERP are coming to a close.
3. In the Cloud is part of next, what is after that?
Super clouds.
Dougal Campbell
1. What do you think the next big disruptive technology is going to be?
The semantic web. It’s going to be huge.
2. Which good friend of Sam Raimi appears in different cameo roles in each of the three Spider Man films?
Absolutely no idea and I refuse to Google it.
3. Donuts: Jelly or plain?
Jelly.
4. Who’s a semi-aquatic, egg-laying mammal of action?
Aquaman? I have no idea.
5. Which do you agree with more, Shakespeare’s claim that is “better to have loved and lost than ne’re loved at all”, or Rush’s “sadder still to watch it die than never to have known it”?
Rush’s “Losing It” is just a beautiful song. I’ll take Neil Peart over William Shakespeare.
Terri Rylander
1. How do you see the role of BI in corporate sustainability?
Big question right off the bat, eh? It’s important but not a silver bullet. If I were king, I’d have the following in my kingdom:

• effective BI tools
• good data
• people who can interpret the results
• a culture that allows people to make decisions based on those results.

As important as these are to corporate sustainability, it’s hard for me to claim that each (and BI as a whole) can guarantee it. There are too many other things that can go wrong. What’s more, there are probably organizations whose senior leaders have never even heard of BI that are doing quite nicely.
2. What do you think is the next social media tool, possibly replacing Twitter?
Yammer is already here and it’s essentially Twitter for the enterprise. Chatter from salesforce.com is already making inroads. I can’t see anything replacing Twitter at this point but, to be fair, I wouldn’t have predicted MySpace’s de facto demise at its height either.
3. Now that anyone can publish content, how will we distinguish quality from noise?
I’m not sure that we can. Andrew Keen’s Cult of the Amateur asks that very question.
4. If you could wave your magic wand and fix one thing in the world, what would it be?
Right now, I find the oil spill near Louisiana to be just awful.
5. If you could turn your hobby into a business, what business would you be in?
The Rush business.

Vote

OK, folks. Who wins?

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