Mortgagenewswatch.com was kind enough to send me a newsletter that I never subscribed to. Since it is not relevant to me and I was lazy to setup a rule to send future newsletters to “trash”, I thought I will unsubscribe. Of course, as most email newsletters, unsubscribe really does not work. The failure notice provided further instructions on how to reach the customer service – you have to fill a form or call them.
The idea is simple. You make it hard for someone to unsubscribe to your newsletter so that they may continue to be subscribers, albeit reluctantly. Then you can show advertisers that you have thousands of subscribers and charge a premium to advertise.
What they forget is that it leaves a bad taste with people as you introduced a new cost to deal with this. Time is the biggest scarcity in people’s lives. So if you are taking time away from them, you are an opportunity cost. It is hard to be liked by someone when you are a cost for them.
Fine. You got a great deal on the computer last week. For $1000, you got a bargain. But what is the “real” cost of your computer?
Got something on your PC but you can’t take your computer everywhere so move things to the web.
Since you can’t keep everything on the web, keep a copy on your PC.
Sorry. Since you can’t take your PC and you may not have web access everywhere, sync the data to your mobile device.
Since there is no guarantee anywhere, backup your data online somewhere.
Since mobile devices can’t carry a lot of data, use a Flash drive
Flash drives are dumb so use an U3 smart flash drive.
Since you need fast access to the internet, get a broadband connection.
Broadband was for the home computer but you need to access the net via your laptop. So get a wireless router.
You can do a lot with broadband and suddenly you realize that your computer needs more power – upgrade memory.
You realize that it is not just memory, you need other graphics cards – upgrade them
You realize that instead of upgrading in bits and pieces, you can just buy a new computer – there is a deal going on there so you buy a new computer
With that, ensure that you buy 1. Firewall 2. Anti Virus 3. Anti spam 4. Anti phishing 5. Access control
and several other “necessary” softwares
By the time you do this, there are new versions of software products that are available – so upgrade your computer.
When you upgrade some software, some other software on your computer may not work. So ensure that you have enough help or enough time to fix this.
I can go on. But here is my point. You can manage the technology or the technology can manage you. Most of the times, it looks like you are spending just $1000 on your computer and it is a steal. That is just the hard cost. The time you spend on the computer is the “real” investment and it is your job to get a “good return” on that investment. If you get carried away by the technology just because someone else is doing it, you may be losing more than gaining.
The last few years there have been many protests in the US about outsourcing and the loss of jobs. I was a bit confused on that but this trip to India it made it clear.
I spent most of my time in Bangalore and Chennai and saw what the consumers were fascinated with. Here are a few examples
* Bharti has signed up with AXA Insurance to roll-out their offers natinowide
* Talk about anything from perfumes to handbags to computers and servers – they are buying American brands.
There are going to be 1.6 million technology professionals in FY2007 and there are 1 Billion consumers. You do the math. And, if you apply pure logic, outsourcing should only increase because it will make the foundation stronger for American brands to sell to Indian consumers.
Disclaimer: I am one of the Board Members of Compassites. However, I am not writing this post in that capacity.
I am thinking that Compassites is M.A.D. (Making a Difference) not only in terms of building cool software products (two of my new startups have their products developed through them) but more importantly via their employee social responsibility program
Last Saturday (20th January 2007) Compassites celebrated its one year anniversary and it was a special day. Among all the activities on that day, what touched my heart was a short video that was created by Vivekananda Sahoo (one of Compassites’ Brand Ambassador) on their employee social responsibility program called COACH (Compassites on a Cause for Help)
Rather than writing about it in detail, I asked Vivek to post the video on YouTube. Here is the video for your quick reference.
I am in Bangalore (called Silicon Valley of India which I totally disagree – more about that topic later) for the last few days. I have learnt a lot in the last few days.
First, while the IT boom has helped a small percentage of people directly and a larger percentage of people indirectly, it has created a bunch of problems for all the people. Let me just focus on the dilemma for the software industry here, in this short note.
1. Small and mid-size companies typically are having a hard time attracting top talent to their companies. How can a small company match all the perks and resort-style living offered by big companies anyway?
2. The big companies are able to attract top talent. However, they are focused on getting bigger projects. Majority of bigger projects are focused on commodity work.
3. The big companies are not interested in working with smaller clients as the deal sizes are small. These smaller projects may be “really cool” but it may not make business sense for larger companies to chase them. Margins may just not justify the effort.
4. Smaller companies won’t get projects from bigger clients (size does matter) so they get the cool projects for small and mid-size clients. Unfortunately, since they can’t get top talent to work on these cool projects, they have to work “extra hard” to satisfy the clients.
5. The big companies are thriving on big commodity projects staffed by top talent. I think top talent who are working on commodity projects are held as prisoners as obviously they are being “overpaid for commodity work” but they can’t exit as they have to make a “big sacrifice” to make the switch.
In summary, small companies are “struggling” to deliver on “cool projects” as they have to deliver them using “average” people. Big companies are “thriving” on “mediocre work” (also called mega projects) and staffing them using top talent. Who is really winning here?
I watched the video of Steve Jobs keynote at MacWorld. Steve announced the new remarkable innovation from Apple – iPhone. It was fantastic. For the first time in my life, I felt like switching from Verizon to Cingular (iPhone will be available only with Cingular service)
I urge that everyone of you take the time (about 90 minutes) to watch the video whether you are interested in iPhone or not.
The video is available at the Apple website.
Here is what was fascinating:
* iPhone was developed over 2 years
* 200 patents have been applied for technologies used
* Apple partnered with Yahoo! for delivering IMAP “push” emails
* Apple partnered with Google for Google Maps and a host of other services
* Apple partnered with Cingular for developing Visual Voicemail – you can search and listen to the voicemail you want to listen to.
* There is no pointing device. Your fingers are the pointing device. They are introducing a technology called Multi-touch.
* iPod, Phone and Internet communication device – fully integrated
* Foundation software – OS X – the power of Unix on a mobile phone.
* Conference calls on cell phone in a snap
* In a sign of where the company is moving, last but not the last, Steve mentioned that Apple Computer Inc will be renamed to Apple Inc.
I can go on but you have to watch the full keynote after fastening your seat belts.
Not only will you be amazed by the technological revolution, the keynote itself has several lessons for young entrepreneurs.
Here are some:
* Presentation and user experience are key
* Breakthrough innovations take time, energy, effort and innovation
* There is hard work involved – 2 years
* Alone you can’t do much. Together, you can create miracles. Partnerships with Google, Yahoo and Cingular were developed over years and are being leveraged now.
* Steve thanked the whole team in the end and what was touching was that he thanked the families of all the team members for their support. That was nice.
Watch the video whether you like Apple or not. It will be worth your time.
Should a company continue to charge for a service that they are now offering for free?
Let me explain my experience with Xdrive.
I had signed up for an Xdrive (provides storage space for a fee) account late last year as one or our projects had a need to constantly exchange large files with several vendors. After the project, I forgot about the account. Of course, I did remember it again when AOL (AOL acquired Xdrive) charged me $99++ for renewal of the service. This would seem fine but the problem was that the service that I had signed up for was almost offered for free. So, I called a representative and asked me to cancel the account and give me a refund. Not only was the representative very confused, she offered me only a partial refund. When I asked her for the logic, she would only say something that would start with “If you were an AOL member…”
There was no point in talking to her further as it would cost me more money (time) and chances were that I wouldn’t have succeeded anyway.
My $.02 for XDrive: Doing something “contractually right” at the expense of losing customer trust may provide some short-term profits but will cost you more in the long-run.
I have always been amazed looking at the “10 items or less” checkout counters in the supermarkets. At the outset, it looks like a great idea as people with less than ten items should not wait longer because they have only a few items. But it does not make sense just for the same reason. Why treat them as special when they are not your best customers? If people with less than 10 items should not wait longer, how about people with 25 items or more? Since there are only a finite number of checkout counters in a supermarket, for every “10 items or less” counter opened, people with more than 10 items will have to wait longer.
It’s odd that providing this convenience to some customers comes at the cost of increasing inconvenience for the best customers.
My $.02 – this arrangement is great as long as they also take care of doing something to people buying a lot of items. May be provide them with exclusive discount coupons or carry their bags to the cars or something that will show appreciation for their best customers.
So, here is the real question: How about in your business? Are you providing some conveniences for some of your customers at the expense of your best customers?
The idea is pretty simple. You can buy a lot of land, why not a lot of sand? This Caribbean beach is divided in 1000 lots of approximately 0.945 square meters. Each lot of sand is transferred on prime stretched linen canvas and duly numbered. I ship your lot of sand worldwide.
The value and personal satisfaction of owning this conversation piece that you’ll soon hang on your wall is just unbelievable. And the best of all is: not everyone can own his desired lot of sand, but you can, if your order your lot number right now. That is, if someone hasn’t already. Check the ‘availability link’
The way I look at it is simpler than that. You create artificial exclusivity (why – first of all, there is no demand for these lots, Dimitrios just created the concept and unless patented, someone else will copy) and artificial scarcity (as the lots start getting sold, you may have to pay higher so why not buy now) in your offer to the marketplace.
Dimitrios may very well win. If he does, he will earn close to $800,000 for his work.
My $.02
Whatever money Dimitrios makes on the sand lots is a really not for the sand lots but for his creativity. We can debate on whether the idea was worth $800K but the marketplace will determine that. For me, though, the artwork on Dimitrios site is far more valuable than these lots of sand. One option for Dimitrios is to use the attention that this site generates to get some traffic for his own artwork and sell his work (which I think is exclusive and scarce) and actually give away part of the proceeds from the sale of “lots of sand” to his favorite chairty. In summary, use this creative concept as a fundraiser for his charity and use the attention that his creativity has generated to sell his artwork.
I think an easy way to kill a software engineer is by overcompensating him or her for doing commodity work. With globalization in full force, this has become very common. Large scale software projects with a ton of commodity work are being shipped overseas and boatloads of software engineers are being paid ridiculous amounts of money to participate in them. This is excellent situation for both – the clients (who are still reaping the benefits of wage arbitrage) and the vendors (who are making hefty profits) but in the middle, the people engaged in this work (software engineers) are becoming vegetables.
The young software engineers of today have not seen a downturn and may not even understand what it means when there is a correction. It is almost like they are on drugs. They feel light (very little brain work needed to do commodity work) and are almost floating as they get paid heavily for work that requires very little use of brain. Experienced folks can clearly see that the youngsters are on drugs but they fail to make them understand that. Young software engineers won’t see it because 90% of the other software engineers are on drugs They think – “How can everyone be on drugs…it is impossible”)
Here is a simple scenario. When a correction does happen, there won’t be jobs for some seemingly specialized skills (eg: team member of load testing) as people will start wearing multiple hats.
Look around and see if you find any software engineer on drugs. It is your responsbility to at least alert them of the impending danger. After that, it is upto them. After all, if everyone wakes up and wants to use more of their brain, where will the companies go to find people for commodity work?
They think – “How can everyone be on drugs…it is impossible”)
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