Best of the Blogs: Ed Foster, in his GRIPE LINE WEBLOG, addresses the inevitable questions that arise from IBM ThinkPad users who have questions about support, now that Chinese vendor Lenovo is in charge. Foster responds to a reader who encountered problems getting help for problems with his ThinkPad. “What will become of IBM’s legendary support now that its PC business is owned by Chinese computer manufacturer Lenovo?” Foster writes. “IBM and Lenovo insist that nothing’s changed, of course. But now whenever a ThinkPad customer has a problem as in today’s tale, it’s going to be impossible not to at least wonder if it’s because of Lenovo.” Are vendors setting a canned agenda by creating their own maturity models for SOAs? In REAL WORLD SOA, Dave Linthicum sets up his own model.“So, what do I have to offer?” he asks. “I proposed my own SOA maturity levels as well, and did so over a year ago. I think it’s more representative of real maturity patterns we’re seeing out there, and my levels are product independent. Check out his six-level model.Columnists’ Corner: Cellular data services are set to soar, says Ephraim Schwartz in Reality Check. With saturation for voice services approaching, the only way to increase profitability and halt declining average revenue per unit is through new data services. “How about specialized cell phones, customized out of the box for each enterprise customer, including access to corporate applications?” Schwartz writes. “For example, if your company data is neatly nestled inside an Oracle 10g database, Symbian offers a plug-in to 10g that will allow the carriers, working with the handset manufacturers and ISVs, to offer handsets with applications built on top of the database,” he writes. “Symbian is also ramping up connectivity to all of IBM’s WebSphere middleware, another gateway to enterprise applications.”More nightmare scenarios from Off the Record: Tales From the Front Lines. An anonymous quality assurance manager with an app dev company outlines the heartburn created when his boos sets crazy deadlines and gets mad at resulting problems. “At this point, I’m spending all my time looking as busy as I can, smiling a lot, and faxing my resume to as many headhunters as I can find,” Anonymous writes. “There’s only so much institutionalized stupidity a person can take in one week, and this place hits that limit by noon on Mondays.” Technology Industry