The Data behind why DRM sucks

Oliver posted to his blog recently that his friend Damian (from OKGO) had written a guest blog post on why DRM sucks. I thought that Damian's points were well taken, and it certainly carries additional weight coming from an artist, but is it just another emotional rant?

Last semester I had Professor Oberholzer-Gee, a veritable Strategy ninja, as far as I'm concerned. I had the pleasure of talking with him one afternoon about the Grokster Supreme Court case (before they had issued a ruling). It turned out to be a very enlightening conversation: Professor Oberholzer-Gee (along with a colleague at UNC) had published the first academic paper on the effect of P2P File Sharing on the Music Industry that had used actual download data, a paper which was later filed as a Friend of the Court Brief for Grokster Supreme Court case.

I want to emphasize that they use actual data in their analysis: they "match 0.01% of the world’s downloads to U.S. sales data for a large number of albums. To establish causality, [they] instrumented for downloads using data on international school holidays and technical features related to file sharing."

The result? "Downloads have an effect on sales which is statistically indistinguishable from zero. Moreover, [the] estimates are of moderate economic significance and are inconsistent with claims that file sharing can explain the decline in music sales during our study period."

The actual study is interesting, but long and dense. Fortunately, the Friend of the Court Brief is short and readable.

So Damian's gut instinct, that "before a million people can buy our record, a million people have to hear our music and like it enough to go looking for it. That ain’t gonna happen without a lot of people playing us for their friends, which, in turn, ain’t gonna happen without a fair amount of file sharing" is 100% correct and backed up by real quantifiable evidence.

Smart Rock Star.

joel

Will TiVo survive?

Earlier this week, Tom Rogers, the new TiVo CEO (4 months old, I think) came to my Strategy and Technology class. (We've had a ton of fascinating visitors and i've totally dropped the ball not blogging about them)

Mr. Rogers is much quieter, much more reserved than Mike Ramsey (the creative and energetic Founder and CEO until this past summer), whom I saw speak last year. While Mr. Ramsey was more "fun" to listen to, I left his talk last year thinking that TiVo had no hope: that they had no sustainable advantage, that DVRs would become commoditized, and that Mr. Ramsey was all over the map in terms of great ideas, but lacked some focus.

Let me first back up and say that I LOVE TiVo. Really, I do. I had TiVo/DirecTV until this fall. I moved and went with Comcast, who offered me a huge incentive to leave the ditch. I've been using the Comcast DVR for a few months and it's crap. Total, complete, and utter crap. When you turn the cable box off, it stops recording. Need I say more?

Back to TiVo. Here's where they stand today: DirecTV's parent (News Corp) recently sold its 4% stake in TiVo and is a significant shareholder in a TiVo competitor called NDS. Why? My bet is that they feared TiVo becoming too powerful: it turns out that there is high churn in satellite and cable customers (upwards of 20%) but very low churn in TiVo customers (like me, most TiVo customers love the service). DirecTV saw this: the only customers who didn't churn were the combo DirecTV/TiVo customers. Furthermore, the DirecTV contract was huge for TiVo: responsible for over half of their customer base (1.86M out of 3M total, as of 1/31/05). There couldn't really have been a short term monetary reason for this move: TiVo's current situation allowed DirecTV to negotiate very steep price discounts (paying TiVo slightly more than $1 per customer per month). Interestingly, DirecTV still advertises TiVo (only promising to push customers to NDS in the future). Further, it seems very unlikely that News Corp will incur the cost of going into the houses of all 1.86M DirecTV/TiVo subscribers and replace the box. I think it's a safe bet to assume, at least, that those 1.86M folks will stay TiVo subscribers for the near future.

Once this happened, Comcast signed a deal with TiVo--hoping, I assume to lower their churn (and maybe snag some of the DirecTV/TiVo devotees). Again, the "deal" is a good one for Comcast (about $1 per sub per month). For Comcast subscribers (like me) eagerly awaiting the arrival of such a box--I think that they're saying 2007 (though I'm not sure about that, so don't quote me). It will be interesting to see if this lasts or if Comcast starts to fear the same thing that DirecTV did: that TiVo would become the valuable service and relegate them to a "dumb pipe" (therefore allowing TiVo to command a larger revenue share).

So what's to become of TiVo? What's their strategy?

First, let's look at how TiVo makes money. Currently, the lion share of revenues come from hardware sales of boxes (fairly low margin) and service revenue (ARPU has been falling thanks to DirecTV and Comcast deals). It earns some revenue selling data (the information that they collect is incredibly rich, and therefore more valuable than Nielson, but currently only collects for a skewed population--TiVo owners). TiVo has been experimenting with an advertising platform that allows richer, more targeted, possibly opt-in, advertisements (mini infomercials or richer, in-program advertising). Finally, TiVo could offer content distribution (see recent talks about a deal with Netflix). Currently, these are all small businesses.

If you look at the players in the industry, you quickly realize that TiVo has the possibility to make an enemy of them all--which, as a startup, is a bad move (since the giants will take steps to protect their revenue streams). At the same time, though, the industry has recently realized that DVR penetration is inevitable--Forrester is predicting some sort of DVRs in 50M US households by 2009 (current penetration is about 10M households). This means that, with or without TiVo, the advertising industry is about to change radically (since the primary function of a DVR is skipping the spam-like 30 second commercials).

My bet, therefore, is that the future cash cow for TiVo is an advertising platform. There will likely be supply-side network effects in this industry: advertisers will want to write sophisticated, targeted ads for one platform, not many. The way to win here, therefore, is own significant market share, fast. (Additionally, the cash-strapped company needs to grow the user base, badly).

Hence, the recent moves to discount the box. You can get a 40GB TiVo series 2 for $50 these days. Additional moves are designed to distinguish TiVo from the generic DVRs that are now ubiquitous: the recently announced deal with Yahoo! means that you will be able to program your TiVo from the Yahoo website and even view pictures from the Yahoo website on your TV.

The game is surely not won. Customers generally can't distinguish between TiVo and generic DVRs, which is bad for TiVo (since it's generally more expensive). The better technology does not always win: BetaMax lost to VHS, Mac OS and OS/2 to Windows. TiVo is so much better that I'm rooting for them. I feel like TiVo is a sick relative in the hospital. I'm hoping they'll pull through...

In the meantime, I need to go make sure I didn't accidentally turn my Comcast box off again. There's a West Wing episode on tonight that I don't want to miss.

Disclaimer: I believe that all information herein is public. Most of it comes from the HBS case and Mr. Rogers (like all guests) was very careful about what he says due to SEC regulations (and good business sense). You can buy the HBS case online (it's N9-706-421, a recently updated version of a 2003 case, so it's not yet available).

I can't believe MicroCenter is still in business

I seem to have made some traction by blogging about bad experiences in the past, so here's another:

Don't buy anything at MicroCenter. They sell two types of computer products: those from brand-name manufacturers that you can get online for much less money, and generic white-label items that they brand.

Last month, I made the mistake of heading to MicroCenter to buy the latter. In spite of the fact that major manufacturers sell PCs for $500 or so (I didn't need a monitor or any fancy specs), I headed to MicroCenter in search of a deal. Sure enough, I found a "PowerSpec" (MicroCenter brand) tower for about $420, with "good enough" specs (2 GHz Athelon, 500 MR Ram, 150 GB HD).

I was content with my purchase until, 5 weeks later, the system clock started acting up. Whenever I turned the computer back on, the clock would be wrong (usually, the date as well as the time was totally off). Sure that the PC was still under warranty, I brought it into the Cambridge MicroCenter, where I purchased it five weeks earlier.

The service was absolutely horrific:

1. Although they knew that they couldn't even look at my computer for 3 days, they would not schedule me for a service appointment then. They insisted that I drop my computer off NOW so it could sit on their bench for 3 days until they got around to it. Mind you, my computer was mostly fine, so I'd be losing it for NO reason--they just didn't have their act together to draw up a service schedule. When pressed, the woman on the phone explained that "it just couldn't work that way." Apparently, MicroCenter doesn't hire employees with enough competence to use a calendar. Good thing that Dr offices, automotive service repair shops, and restaurants have managed to crack this very complicated problem.
2. Even though I had purchased THEIR brand of computer from THEIR store a mere 5 weeks earlier, they charged me $85 JUST TO LOOK AT IT! I was horrified.
   
3. They somehow managed to break my computer and "fix it", thereby keeping the $85. That is, they called me and told me that they couldn't get it to boot (the ONLY problem I had was the clock when I had brought it in). Magically, though, when they tried to boot it, they claimed that they couldn't--that they had to "safe boot" it and reinstall a video driver.

These are just the facts. I leave out the fact that the actual customer service was frustratingly slow, that the salespeople were pushy (like used car salesmen) when I was considering a purchase, and that the service reps were disinterested with me, their jobs, or the quality of their service.

There is absolutely no reason for you to go to MicroCenter. Just skip it. The stuff that they sale is junk (and they know it because they don't offer free repair for even 35 days) and the name-brand products are cheaper elsewhere. Do yourself a favor and stay away.

Cheers,
joel

Wow! More "health" scams... Anti-bacterial soap is no more effective than regular soap

This isn't as eggregious as my earlier post (Echinacea doesn't do anything), but it turns out that there are many more "mainstream" scams out there. Here's one I found today:

Anti-Bacterial Soap is no more effective than plain soap, just more expensive

Sheesh. Y'know, when I was 5, I was pretty convinced that a quick soapless splash under the faucet was plenty. I'll bet I was right.

joel

Help Needed: Wireless NIC incorrectly reporting "Media Disconnected"

I hate to do this on my blog, but I'm desparate, so I've resorted to an open plea for help.

Two nights ago, I installed AdAware SE Personal (1.06) and ran it. After that, my Wireless NIC started misbehaving in really strange ways.

Using Windows XP SP2 Pro. Via the UI, I can see (refresh, etc.) all local WiFi networks. Even tells me signal strength. When I try to connect, it fails. Here's the strange part: IPCONFIG reports "Media Disconnected". How can that be, if I can see the networks??

I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling the driver. No dice.

I found a guy who said he had a similar problem and fixed it by installing a "WinsockFix" freeware app. I tried that, but it didn't help.

Any ideas?

joel

Why I'm not a Cat Person

I just don't trust them.

Now you can't blame me. Isn't Pinky such a Loving Cat?

joel

Echinacea doesn't actually do anything

Well, this is going to be one of the few arguments I've won with my girlfriend. It turns out that Echinacea really doesn't do anything.

Does this scare anyone else? Any idea how big the market for Echinacea is? I couldn't find it on the web--research firms wanted to charge me for that kind of data. But it's big. The best I could do was $7.1B for "nutraceuticals," of which Echinacea, I believe, is just one. Also, way back in 1997, the Echinacea market was $4M.

In the US, neither the FDA nor any other government body regulates Echinacea or any other dietary supplement for content, quality, or efficacy. That apparently means that I could go into my back yard, pick a few dandelions, grind them up and make a pill that I could claim cures Bad Job Doldrums. And I'd just need to buy an ad spot on TV and charge $25 per bottle and I'd have a great business.

Or, I could just sell Echinacea. Probably wouldn't even need to advertise, then.

It's ridiculous. As long as consumers will believe anything that they see on TV or read in an ad, the government has a responsibility to protect them. How many people will see this scientific study debunking Echinacea? Who has the motivation to publicize it (and where will the money come from)? Now who has the motivation to HIDE it?

One of these days, it will turn out that one of these dietary supplements is actually HARMFUL--something which would have been discovered if the FDA had done testing. Then we'll see some change. In the meantime, I'm going to go work on my own ripoff pills, I mean my "All Natural Anti-Doldrum Herbal Dandelion Supplement."

joel

Why My Cell Phone Reception sucked in Seattle

Apparently, there were no towers near me...

Cell Phone Towers on Google Maps (Seattle)
You can change the city to see how intensely you are being irradiated.

joel

A Vote for Pedro is a Wasted Vote

I was in Seattle a couple of weeks ago and during my three days there, I saw six different people wearing "Vote for Pedro" shirts. Now I love Napoleon Dynamite as much as the next guy (maybe a little less), and I'm a big fan of those types of pithy, smart, sarcastic shirts worn by San Francisco counterculture (a bigger fan than most--I own a few).

I had thought that I was so cool when I grabbed a couple of these types of shirts a while back thinking, for once, that I might be fashion forward. But then y'all go and kill my dream--all these damn shirts everywhere! We can't ALL be unique and funny and cool. So now i'm just back to being a tech nerd who wears jeans and buttondowns. Damn you all.

You can only imagine my delight when I saw this one out and about:
Pedro Lacks Political Experience

Take THAT! Counter-counterculture t-shirts. It's about time. Your whole smarmy t-shirt trend can go self-combust. See if I care.

joel

Finally, a great use for the Google Maps API

Am I Hot Or Not, Local.

Finally we can answer that age old question: which city has the most beautiful "average people"?

I'm disappointed that I can't rate the photos from the map--that's the most addictive part of Hot or Not. If they add that, I'd bet that this would put Hot or Not back on the map, so to speak.

I'm also a bit surprised that Hot Or Not is hosting this on their servers, and more surprised that Google hasn't taken it down yet (seeing as it's a commercial site that makes money off of the ads).

Nevertheless, I applaud the creativity!

joel

When you think you're having a bad day

Remember these poor guys... Their day was worse.

Holly and I were driving around San Francisco when we happened upon this moving truck, STUCK, on the crest of a hill. The 18-wheeler was too long and the middle of the truck bottomed out! They're stuck--you can see the front of the trailor coming off the hitch.

I laughed, then I cried when I saw these poor movers realizing that they were having the worst day on earth. Then I made Holly drive back so we could take a photo. It was so funny that I posted it to my Section Blog as well.

Hope everyone is doing well!

joel

Tom Cruise is so nuts that the site that documents it is down

Over the weekend, a couple of friends were bemoaning the fact that Tom Cruise has gone nuts. I don't follow pop culture all that much, so I didn't have much to contribute to the conversation (in my world, most of Hollywood is nuts).

So, I decided to ask the web if Tom was really nuts, or if my friends were just ranting.

Well, it's verified: http://www.tomcruiseisnuts.com
The site is apparently so popular that it can't keep up with the traffic. There are pages on "Freaky Tom Facts", "Tom on Scientology", "Tom on Women" and more...

Seattle Busmonster: Google Maps API now public

Google has officially blessed their Maps API (in classic Google style, as a Beta) for public use by any non-profit website. They also reserve the right to include advertising on the map at any point. I'll say it again: those are smart folks.
As soon as they can figure out how to sell it, Local text search + Adsense is going to be a huge revenue generator for Google. But wait until there are dozens of cool apps/sites out there built on the Google Maps API, all now serving up local ads on the maps! Cool app, relevant, and VERY valuable. Everyone wins--Google, the developers, the advertisers. Just brilliant from a business perspective. The hard part, methinks, is teaching the local plummer or mom-and-pop bakery shop to use AdSense.

And today I discovered a new killer local app built on Google maps: Bus Monster. This Seattle site will tell you the closest bus stop, all of the routes, and how far away (in minutes!) the bus is to that stop. Love it.

I may be late to the game, but I think I'm buying google stock.

This might be my last burrito post, ever

It might also be my first, i can't remember. It had been a goal of mine to review as many burrito shops as possible while I was living in San Francisco. I made good headway my first few weeks here, but have slowed down considerably. I was encouraged the other day, though, when I was walking through the mission and realizing that I had made impressive progress.

In fact, my friend Oliver (a former mission inhabitant), asked me to contribute/update his burrito reviews. I remembered that I owed him some contributions.

But today, I stood face to (cartoon) face with one who is much much much more devoted to this cause than I am. I therefore tip my hat to the Burrito Eater. I shall continue to enjoy my burritos, but without the added pressure of writing reviews.

The best hidden feature of GMail?

In great design, it's often the tiny features that count--the ones that make users really love the product.

Today, when I was replying to a GMail message I realized (while I was stilly typing my reply) that I had accidentally replied just to the sender instead of to everyone (as I had intended). I highlighted my reponse, copied it, and clicked on "Reply All" (instead of just "Reply").

But I didn't need to paste. The pane changed to Reply All and my reply text was all still there! (warning: don't try that in Hotmail). Seriously, go try it. Intead of making me feel dumb, GMail just does the right thing. Beautiful. Smart. Those Google folks are good.

I am delighted. Like I said, it's the little things.

joel

My Friend Maya Rocks!

I just picked up the WSJ and read a Walt Mossberg review that confirmed what Maya has been saying all along: MSN Spaces rocks. Rocks better than Blogger or the soon-to-be-released Yahoo service.

And, in case you didn't know, I'm pals with Maya, one of the smarties who works hard every day making MSN Spaces rock. Maya tells me that lots of other smart folks are working on it, too, but I don't know them. So I give all props to Maya.

Having been on the wrong end of a Walt Mossberg review, I know that securing his stamp of approval is no small feat--congrats to Maya and the MSN Spaces team!

joel

I wish I had Photoshop talent

I would have loved to participate in this contest, which challenged Photoshoppers to dress up animals in human clothing.

Personally, I would have dressed a fish in a raincoat.

Too bad I don't have Photoshop talent.

joel

What kind of service collects a tip before actually performing the service?

Answer: a crappy one. It probably should have raised a red flag for me last night when the Super Shuttle (apparently a nationwide conglomerate of local airport shuttle services) tricked me into including the tip when, online, I reserved (and pre-paid for) a shuttle to the airport. They even had a button that said "15% tip" that was the same size and shape as a "Done" button. Like a putz, I pressed it. There was no "undo" button.

I had a 6 AM flight. The magic Shuttle Express algorithm online told me that they'd be here between 3:30 and 3:45 AM. Sucks, but I guess they know best. After all, they're a nationwide conglomerate with a fancy online reservation system.

At 3:35 AM (yes, in the morning) this morning, I got a phone call from a nice woman telling me that the driver was rejiggering the order of pickups and he'd be at my place towards the end of my window or, at worst, maybe 3:50 AM. Not a huge deal, still in the window.

Now I have no idea what on earth their fancy algorithm missed that led the human driver to reroute his plans. But I'm annoyed because the guy didn't get to me until 4:15. That means that I was awake a good 45 minutes before I needed to be and, at 3 AM, that matters! Does the fancy algorithm not actually do anything "smart"? Or does it just not account for the fact that there is NO traffic at 3 AM? Most importantly, can I get my tip back??

And I haven't quite gone to sleep yet, so I'm tired now and feel fully justified in complaining.

Morale of the story: beware services that collect tips before rendering service. It screws with incentives and you're more likely to get screwed.

Good night, I'm going to sleep and not setting the alarm,
joel

The Apple Store. Wow.

I headed over to the flagship Apple store today on Market St., eager to catch a presentation of the Bay Area Photobloggers. After 5 minutes of confusion upon my arrival, I realized what you probably noticed if you followed any of these links--I was two weeks early.

The strange part was that I couldn't leave the store. It is brilliantly designed to tempt you to touch and play with all of their products (and people were--in some cases, lining up to try them!) There is no ugly inventory in view nor security gates and cash registers blocking the exits--just products (computers, laptops, iPods, iPod speakers, printers, etc) and Apple "geniuses" (in addition to those roaming the floor downstairs, upstairs is a "genius bar", where people line up to talk to a dozen or more friendly Apple experts, and a small open theater--complete with theater-style seats--where they were giving a free class).

And the products weren't just there in their stupid "fresh out of the box" (useless) state. They were neatly organized around activities (movies, music, work, etc.) and filled with content: the iPods had songs and pictures, the laptop address books had names, iMovie had video clips in it. I was editing movies, flipping through pictures, comparing the sound from iPod speaker docks. A friendly Apple Genius even set up a video chat for me with a laptop across the room so I could see if looked as good as it did when Jobs demo'ed it (it did, though it was just the local network).

It's really a minor miracle that I didn't walk out of there with anything. Truth be told, the only reason I didn't was because I had read earlier today a rumor that we would soon see 2GB iPod shuffles, so I decided to wait. I'm not sure that I'll last, though, if I stumble into that store again.

I hope other retailers are learning from Apple (I hear that Sony has a similar style store, too, so I'll have to check that out). The Apple stores have been a huge success where others (e.g. the Gateway stores) have failed. As with everything else they do, Apple really thought about the entire experience for "users" of the store and brilliantly designed every aspect of it. It's a toy store for yuppies (and I learned at an Apple presentation in Cupertino in January that the numbers verify that the stores have offered phenomenal ROI). I wonder how much better a Best Buy or Circuit City would perform if they were a bit smarter about their retail experience.

Kudos to Apple for this great business move.

joel

Who are 8 white guys who have more rhythm than I do?

GLC. aka Goldie Lookin' Chain. Check out their website here.

These guys are NOT a boy band. 8 white dudes, a little dorky for image, but they put on a great show tonight at the Independent in San Francisco. High energy in addidas jumpsuits, headbands, and the trademark gold chains, GLC got folks jumping around with their hip hop style original mixes (all on mics with pre-recorded soundtracks, they call it "kareoke"). Most of GLC reminded me of Sean Purcell, without the worm (though there were a number of times I thought they were going to bust it out).

The accents on these blokes made them difficult to understand (with the exception with some "clear as fuck" jabs at more renown pop stars) but my head was bobbing nonetheless. If you're in Chicago or NYC (their two remaining "state side" shows), do yourself a favor and check these guys out.

joel
(posted from my cell phone)

Dancing what?

Last week, a friend from Seattle (Oliver, who always seems to find the gems on the web) located this dancing trombone player (and somehow worked it into the same blog posting as a pointer to the 1986 Chicago Bears Superbowl Shuffle).
Once again, I was impressed with his find.

I think I might have one-upped him: check out this Body Builder doing The Robot.

Enjoy. I wonder if the good folks at DARPA had this in mind when they were inventing the internet...

joel

Group Blogs = "Personal" Newsgroups?

As the school year winds down and my sectionmates disperse for the summer, we're experimenting with a Section Blog. The idea is that it's a way for everyone to keep in touch with each other over the summer and after we graduate.

It will be interesting to see what becomes of this blog: it sort of flips the blog model on its head (in the blogs I read, one person has the conch and everyone else can only comment). This new model is more of a "blog as a newsgroup." We can still comment, but we might also just talk past each other.

We'll see.

joel

Microsoft Reverses Descision thanks to my blog

OK, I can't prove that it was because I blogged about it, but you can't prove that it didn't have to do with my blog...

Microsoft has officially reversed its decision and now publicly supports the WA state Gay Rights Bill.

Now I can wear all those morale t-shirts again. A small step forward for Microsoft, a giant leap backwards for my sense of fashion.

joel

The Social Responsibilitiy of a Corporation

Steve Ballmer's recent memo to Microsoft employees explaining the policy reversal on support of the antidiscrimination bill for gay people is a failure of corporate leadership and accountability.
(If you're not familiar with the issue, here's an NYTimes article.)

This is not a black and white issue. Every CEO has a very real obligation to stockholders to maximize firm value in a responsible way. And admittedly, there are likely to be Microsoft employees among the 35,000 rank and file who oppose the passage of this bill. However, there are plenty more who are in favor of its passage. Furthermore, it seems unlikely that the proposed boycott of software by the Christian Right would have a huge economic impact on Microsoft.

It is absolutely the responsibility of business to promote the social progress of the society in which it does business. To hide your head in the sand and say "Not My Problem" is morally reprehensible on a corporate level as much as it is on a personal level. Maybe more. How are we to feel about the businesses that leveraged the Nazi machine to remove Jewish business leaders from Boards or Executive positions? Or those that happily watched as Jewish competitors were closed down? Today, do we consider it acceptable that those social issues were "not the problem of businesses"?

Let's be clear here. This proposed law simply extends protection against discrimination in employment, housing, etc, based on sexual orientation. As a society, we have accepted that it is illegal to discriminate based on race, color, religion, sex, familial status, handicap or national origin. Be refusing to support this bill, we are saying that it's OK to discriminate based on sexual orientation. Steve Ballmer and Microsoft are saying that they can't support a law which would forbid discrimination.

Microsoft is a world leader in business and with that leadership position comes responsibility. It IS Microsoft's responsibility to take a stand on social issues and to speak out against injustice. As a Microsoft employee, I was reviewed against my "confidence", my willingness to take a stand in difficult issues. Seems hypocritical, to say the least.

Leaders take stands in difficult times (Peter Drucker famously said that Leadership WAS Responsibility). They look within themselves and do the right thing for their company, for the people who work for them, and for society. Management must take a long-term when assessing their strategies (something Microsoft is historically good at). For Ballmer and Bill Gates to say that they personally support the bill but won't do it on behalf of the company is a feeble inaction for which they will someday be ashamed.

As a once-proud employee, I know I am.

joel

Outlook and Hotmail are reunited!

Just a quick one tonight: my Hotmail is talking to my Outlook again. It's really a beautiful thing.

Apparently Microsoft's new policy was supposed to prevent NEW accounts from using Outlook to access Hotmail. My account should have been "grandfathered" in but was erroneously misconfigured. The folks at Microsoft have fixed it. See? I told you that they were good people.

Special thanks to Omar and Oliver for helping me out on this one.

joel

Craigslist and Google Maps

This is the coolest use of free Web Services that I have seen in a while. Check out Paul Rademacher's combination of Craigslist and Google Maps. I'm looking for a new apartment and this is just a killer app.

I'm not sure if he's taking requests, but I'd love to filter at the neighborood level :-)

Discussion point: when does an app become so compelling that people can charge for it? And who claims value? Google and Craigslist? Paul Rademacher?

joel

Post a Secret, Read a Secret

An artist in Maryland started a project that he calls "Post Secret" in which he invites anyone to mail in a 4"x6" postcard with an anonymous private secret. He scans in the secrets and posts them online.

I started reading some and I couldn't stop. Some are frightening, some depressing, some adorable, others beautiful. What is it about secrets that we find so fascinating, even when they are no longer secrets?

It's that break from norms. They let our minds wander about lives and situations unlike our own. On the surface, we're too much the same. It's in the secrets that we're different...

Maybe that's too bad.

Or maybe the secrets help us feel more normal.

joel

Hotmail turned off Outlook access. Defeaturing software AFTER I've paid for it should be illegal

I was appalled when I returned from a trip this weekend and found out the hard way that Microsoft had turned off access to MSN Hotmail via Outlook. When I tried to sync my Hotmail in Outlook, I got an error encouraging me to upgrade (i.e. pay MSN a yearly fee).

Why would Microsoft turn off Outlook/OE access to free Hotmail users?
It costs money for Hotmail to support Outlook and Outlook Express users. In addition to large development costs (there are different code paths for web access and POP access), Outlook/OE users make a significantly higher number of connections to the servers than web users do. This translates into real dollars.

After the bubble burst, most companies learned that "Free" isn't a great business model. Indeed, when I was working on Windows XP there was discussion about turning off Outlook Express access to Hotmail (Outlook Express is the free mail client that comes with Windows). At that time, upper management refused to allow this because it would cause a bad user experience and they needed a "free" email solution in the box for new Windows users (a perceived requirement). There are literally tens of millions of OE users and MSFT didn't have a good way to charge them for Hotmail access.

What has changed since then?
A few things:
1) Hotmail now offers a premium service. There is a way to charge users.
2) There has been an explosion of other free email services.
3) In my opinion, Hotmail has gone from being the gem of Microsoft's internet strategy to being a thorn in its side that is only a cost center (and quickly becoming an unnecessary one at that).

So what's my beef? Is this legal?
I paid for Outlook. Sure, I got the student version, but I still paid for it. As part of the deal, I understood that I got Hotmail access via POP. Microsoft has taken my money and then DEFEATURED the software that I purchased from them. I'm irate. This should absolutely be illegal (if it isn't already). In fact, I think I'm going to file with the Better Business Bureau and I've already filled out the MSN Hotmail feedback form. You should do the same.

I'm further annoyed that this is just a bookkeeping problem for Microsoft: the Office P/L should pay the Hotmail P/L for my access if that's the problem. This is a horrible example of a giant company taking advantage of consumers.

To be honest, the user experience is awful. If they wanted to scale back, Microsoft could have stopped allowing NEW users to move to OE + Hotmail or Outlook + Hotmail. With this implementation, they are alienating faithful customers (and former employees!) and further sullying their already-dirty image.

GMail: my new lead dog.
I have a GMail account that I was using mostly for fun (to see how it worked, etc). However, GMail has full POP access. I was a faithful Hotmail user until yesterday. From now on, it will become my SPAM account and GMail is my new lead dog. If we assume, though, that GMail will eventually support itself via the relevant-ad model (as Google does), I wonder if it will continue to accept Outlook access in the long term (since ads won't show in the Outlook user interface and so the revenue model disappears).

Implications for Hotmail?
At this point, I can only assume that Hotmail is dying a slow death. I can't imagine that anyone would pony up a yearly fee to continue to get what she used to get for free (especially considering other options still exist--see below). I have no idea how many people pay for Hotmail Premium, but I can't imagine that it's very many. Remember that the Hotmail acquisition was primarily a way to bootstrap the now-dying Passport service.

Anything else you want to say?
Yah, a disclaimer: I don't work at Microsoft any more and even when I did, I was not privy to executive discussions. My statements here are purely based on my own reasoning and information that is publicly available. :-)

joel

Star Wars Kid on Arrested Development

I caught last week's Arrested Development on my TiVo yesterday and was rolling on the floor when Gob accidentally showed a student-government campaign video to the school of George Michael clearly impersonating the Star Wars Kid (episode 214: Immaculate Election).

Kudos to the writers of this brilliant show for working this storyline into their plot in an understated but riotously funny way. It continues to be a favorite of mine.

joel

Star Wars Kid in Tony Hawk

All of the recent publicity about the Numa Numa dancer (including a recent article in the New York Times) has drudged up memories of the infamous Star Wars Kid.

That's all fine and good and other people can debate the impact that the Internet is having on "fame", "talent", and "privacy". I want spend a single moment decrying the lame attempt to commercialize the grassroots "fame" of the Star Wars Kid: apparently, the new Tony Hawk game has a Star Wars Kid easter egg. Check out the video on the Waxy blog.

My beef? It's poorly done. In theory, it could have worked, but it's too late and poorly done. Shame on the Tony Hawk team. The Star Wars Kid deserves better.

joel

Diversify life so that everyone is better off?

In the stock market, you can prove, mathematically, that you are always better off diversifying your portfolio of stocks than picking one: you can earn the same return with much lower risk (to optimize, you pick stocks that have as little correlation as possible).

Could the same thing work in life? That is, I THINK that I want to be an entrepreneur after I graduate. Of course, though, there are real risks: I could earn a comfortable living working for someone else as part of a large corporation. The entrepreneur lifestyle choice is potentially one of high risk and high reward.

Let's say I have a friend who is very happy working for someone else and earning a comfortable living, but he/she has a little bit of risk tolerance and likes the idea of a gamble, to some extent.

Wouldn't we both be better off if we teamed up? We could agree to split our salaries forever, for richer or poorer, 'til death do us part. We would both share in the gains and losses of the other. If I fall on my face, (s)he carries me a bit. If I start a company that is wildly successful, (s)he shares in the rewards.

Would you do it? With whom? What are the implications to capitalism? Government?

joel

Good Idea, Poorly Executed

Last week I came across Amazon's A9's Yellow Pages. They recently launched a new feature: when you search the yellow pages for a business, you get the address and phone number, as well as a picture of the store front. The idea is very cool: if I'm going to a business I've never been to, a photograph of the front of the store would be very useful. You can even pan the pictures to "walk" up and down the block.

Which got me thinking, Mapquest should do the same thing with turn-by-turn directions: photographs of landmarks and turns would be incredibly helpful.

And, in some cases, it works quite well. Check out the Deluxe Bar and Grille, near where I used to live in Seattle...

Apparently, A9 did this by driving around major cities with a GPS system and video camera. Then, in automated fashion, they pulled stills out of the video based on GPS location, which they matched to addresses. They're really quite proud--they have even posted a page "explaining" how they did it (it's light on details and heavy on marketing).

The implementation is pretty poor, though. I had to search long and hard before I found the good example I cited above. Here are what I tried first:

• Dick's Drive-In, on Broadway in Seattle. Seattle landmark burger joint.
• Palm Restaurant in Boston
• Capital Grille in Chestnut Hill, MA that looks a lot like Borders
• La Rosita Restaurant in Manhattan (this one is my favorite)

In general, I found this to miss much more often than it hit (though they do get credit for nailing Taqueria Cancun in the Mission). I wonder if they tested this feature before releasing it. If they did, I wonder what their acceptable quality bar was.

Granted, it's a hard problem. What happens when Deluxe moves out and Joel's Bar and Grille moves in? I'm guessing that the address is the primary key for the picture (as opposed to the name of the business), so when you look up Joel's Bar and Grille, you'll see a picture of the Deluxe. Unless they plan on updating the entire set of pictures every few months, which is probably too expensive...

Technology is difficult to get right and I certainly forgive companies for giving it their "best shot" in the first version (after all, I worked at Microsoft). Until it catches up, just take my word for it that there's a great Cuban restaurant behind that truck in Manhattan.

joel

Cyberposium Scheduling

Quick rant: there are about 25+ breakouts split over 3 periods. That means that I have to miss a bunch of panels because of conflict. In some sense, that can't be helped. But the organizers also scheduled 3 other "visionary" panels which have exclusive slots.

This is bad schedule design that assumes EVERYONE wants to see these "Visionary Panels" instead of giving us the opportunity to choose for ourselves... Why? Why? Why?

joel

HBS Cyberposium 2005

This weekend is the 10th Annual Harvard Business School Cyberposium--a conference focusing on business and technology. I figured if people read blogs from the DNC...

First, let me say that I'm really impressed with the size and scope. Kudos to the student organizers: i've been to professionally-run conferences that were less well-done. This conference has big name keynotes, sponsorship from major industry players, and attendees from many schools, press, and industry (I'm pretty sure that tickets were available to the public).

Last night's Keynote was given by Tom Leighton, Co-Founder and Chief Scientist of Akamai. He discussed the inherent instability and insecurity on the Internet. Sadly, the keynote turned into a sales pitch for Akamai: first, he alarmed us with the threat of network traffic jams, DOS attacks, spoofing, IP hijacking, etc. and then explained how Akamai's distributed architecture addresses these security threats and relieved network congestion inherent in the centralized webserver model.

It left me with two thoughts. First, it IS a bit alarming that there really is NO security built into this foundation that we're all relying on. And, beyond the security, low level protocols like BGP are "dumb" (they ignore congestion). Beyond that, the business model of the backbone hasn't been settled yet: that's why there are thousands of miles of dark fiber--people who own backbone (and smaller) networks can't figure out how to get paid for the data traveling over their pipes. This is a real problem that, in my opinion, might require government regulation. Or, maybe Demand will drive businesses agreements... (not to mention that the technology is subject to human error, which apparently caused the hour-long large-scale outage last year--in spite of the rumors that a tractor hit a pipe in chicago)

Secondly, I'm unclear about how Akamai's technology works: they make websites faster by eliminating the single server: they replicate your site on their servers all over the world so the bits are closer to the user, wherever the user is. This avoids network delays and contains DOS attacks (since there's no central point of failure). But I'm unclear how this works: as far as I know, DNS entries point to a single IP. So how does Akamai "distribute" this site to their server that is closest to you? I suppose that there is still a single server that the DNS points to that then refers you back to your closest server. Anyone know for sure?

Off to the next panel...

joel

When Did You Keeping Track of Me Become MY Problem?

Every day, without fail, I get an automated email from someone who wants me to update my contact information in their system (which is really astounding since I'm not that popular). There must be a dozen different services out there (the biggest is probably Plaxo) that hook into your addressbook and "automatically" update my contact information.

In case you're mystified by how that works, let me tell you: they SPAM me--as often as once every 90 days for each person who has me as a contact. It's driving me bonkers. Some of these services are even bold enough to force ME to register so that YOU can keep track of me.

To me, these automated contact services are the new ring tones of 2005--they may be entertaining and convenient for you but they're incredibly annoying for everyone else (and this is worse because you're annoying your friends instead of just the strangers around you).

If my friends are listening, i love you all. If I move, I'll tell you. I promise. Next time your service spams me with an email to update my contact info, I'm going to put in the wrong address so they never reach me again. Actually, I'm going to try to go find the email address of the CEO of Plaxo...

So I hope you have my phone number in your cell phone. And, I'd appreciate a distinctive ring tone.

joel

When Should I Start to Be Scared of Google?

On a recruiting tour earlier this month, I visited Google for an "information session." Eric Schmidt, Google's CEO, said that the company mission was to make "all of the world's information" accessible. He emphasized that the web was only a tiny fraction.

[Note for my safety: Google is SUPER secretive and made me sign an NDA and leave blood and hair sample, so if I stop blogging, please send the cops there]

So I poked around. They're not kidding. Beyond the now-well-known Desktop Search, Google also has quietly launched Beta versions of Google Video (search videos from TV), Google Catalog (search print catalogs that aren't in your mailbox), Google Scholar (search academic papers), and is in the process of scanning university libraries. Not to mention their recent acquisitions of Keyhole and Picasa (and Blogger, the software that powers THIS blog!).

I think that the rule of thumb for me is that anything that is publicly broadcast is great to archive for the public to search. The more I think about it though, the less excited I am about having Google (whose mission is to archive all of the world's information) on my computer. I'm going to go uninstall the Desktop Search and I'm keeping Google (Picasa) away from my personal pictures...

joel

Why Do Email Programs (like Outlook, Gmail, and Hotmail) Hide Pictures?

Since the advent of HTML email, people who write emails, particularly those with pictures, have "saved space" in the email by NOT including the picture in the email but instead by including an HTML tag that tells the email program where to find the picture. That is, when you open the email, it just says to the email program "Go get the picture from this website and add it to this email"--the exact same way that the web works. This makes the email smaller because the image file isn't actually included in the email, just instructions on where to go get it.

The problem is that tricky spammers use this mechanism to verify that your email address is a valid one to keep spamming. Instead of just putting a URL to a picture in the email, they alter the URL to simultaneously indicate who is asking for it. That is, instead of saying:
"Go get the picture at http://www.goodWebServer.com/emails/picturefile.gif" they say
"Go get the picture at http://www.bad.WebServer.com/emails/picturefile.gif?email='yourEmail@email.com'"

This way, a program on their server returns the picture file AND records that your email address is a valid one that they should continue to spam. These spammers send millions of emails arbitrarily (often just guessing at valid email addresses), so it's important for them to verify which ones are real and which ones are not.

If, on the other hand, your email program does NOT get the picture from the webserver, then the spammer never hears from you and assumes that you don't exist.

Of course, this is all very sloppy on both sides. Bring on email authentication!

joel

Great Customer Service: RopeyLadder.com

You know, everyone screws up. I have a real pet peeve about people who won't admit it and, conversely, a soft spot for those who fess up and fix it.

Today, I experienced the latter and I think that they deserve a shout-out. RopeyLadder.com is a website that helps you manage ladders: that is, if a dozen of you have a ping-pong group and you want to keep rankings, allow people to challenge each other, etc, they help. Actually, I haven't used the service yet, but that's what I expect it will do. :-)

Five minutes after I registered, they confirmed my registration via email. In that email, they sent me my username and password. Cleartext (for those of you who don't know, there is nothing secure about email: don't ever send any info in an email that is private). I don't actally care if anyone sees my RopeyLadder password, but what if I has used the same password that I use for my bank account? Many people use the same password for everything...

So I wrote them to complain. 15 minutes later Dave Fletcher (from RopeyLadder) responded to me, from the UK, to tell me that they had changed (not WOULD change, but HAD changed) the code and no longer be sent passwords via email. Wow. Kudos to them. I went from having no faith in the competence of their company to being a real fan in 15 minutes. People who listen to feedback and respond only get better with time. Brilliant.

Now to challenge my friends for that #1 spot on the ping-pong ladder...

joel

A Brain Teaser: 100 lockers

I have an affinity for these. And since it's starting to be recruiting season for me, I think back to the interviews I had when I was a wee little undergrad. Trilogy Software in Austin asked me this one:

You have 100 people lined up in a row next to 100 closed lockers. The row of people will walk by all of the lockers. When they do, they behave like this:
Person 1 will toggle every locker ("toggle" means that if it is closed, she opens it, but if it is open, she closes it).
Person two will toggle every other locker.
Person three will toggle every third locker.
Person four will toggle every fourth locker.
Etc.

Question: when all 100 people have finished walking by all 100 lockers, how many lockers are open? Which ones are they?

joel

My Favorite MSN Direct Feature

I worked on the SPOT watch for a year and half. I worked on the team that designed and coded the Sports, Movies, Daily Diversions, Horoscopes, and Lottery Channels. The technology was interesting and the possibilities were endless.

My favorite feature? Downloadable watch faces. Maybe I'm nuts, but it was the feature that was really personal, relevant, and fun. Watch Faces was the ring tones of watches. It was pretty easy to implment new ones and the results always made people smile. I think I'd probably buy a watch that just offered me the opportunity to change the face every month to one I selected from a set (the personalization and choice are really key--which is why we changed the model). Imagine the possiblities if the watch ever goes color or if Microsoft opens up the platform...

Sure, I liked the other channels. Hey, I'm a huge Sports fan (and when I was in Seattle, I was an out-of-towner sports fan). And the rumored traffic channel would be a killer app (you won't find this guy leaking any inside info). But the beauty of the Downloadable Watch Faces are the simplicity and relevance that you just can't argue with.

Oh, and while I'm thinking about it, i want to give a shoutout to Mick (SplaTT) Stanic, since he showed some love many months ago in his blog for our efforts.

joel

"Intermission" at the George Clinton Concert

I'm not feeling great, so you get a moaner:

Last night I want to the George Clinton and the P-Funk concert in Providence. Great show, great venue (Lupos). I wouldn't claim to be a huge fan, but that band just makes you want to move. I hear that George Clinton is 63. Amen to him. Also, love the guy in the diaper.

Highlight: For one song, they brought out George Clinton's granddaughter, Sativa (look up that word on Google), to rap. She was certainly entertaining and quick lipped. I actually prefer the classic fun, but this was a welcome surprise for me.

Lowlight: Those two guys tearing up their electric guitars on stage for a 20+ minute "intermission." I've been to one other George Clinton concert before and they did the same thing, so I guess that's the schtick. I hate it. It drains me and kills what little funk I had.

The Most Annoying Bug in Windows XP: The Picture and Fax Viewer

Tonight, a friend sent me a few bmp screenshots of a project that she was working on and Windows XP dutifully opened them up in the Windows Picture and Fax Viewer. I checked out the first picture and clicked the Next button to see...
A FAX THAT I HAD RECEIVED SIX MONTHS AGO. Next Again...
A pal riding the mechanical bull at a Boston bar from October. Next Again...
Me, dressed as a woman (costume ball, I swear). Next Again...
The second screenshoot my friend sent (finally)

To get to the final screenshot, I had to hit Next seven more times.

This is exactly the kind of annoying bug that Microsoft drops on the floor because of a surprising lack of organization and because attention to detail like this isn't in the air. There is nobody responible for a large portion of the code in Windows. I was there during the "security stand down", during which we went through security training and went back and examined every feature. It was shocking how many features had had no owners.

But this post isn't about security. It's about attention to detail and the ethos of just getting things right. I can imagine Steve Jobs going bonkers if Apple shipped a bug like that. I can't see Bill Gates caring. Yet it's the little things, the subtleties, that really make for a beautiful final product that delights the users. Or drives them mad. In its defense, the Windows Shell team is really trying. There isn't the ethos, though, of the attention to detail that you see in other operating systems and so I'm betting that I'll have to continue to deal with this one through Longhorn and beyond.

How do you create that ethos? Is it nature, or nurture?

joel

The Price of Harvard Business School

One other thing, while I'm on the topic. Is it worth it?

Well, Costs:
Roughly $64,000 per year, all in (of which $35k+ is tuition). No, I'm not kidding. Those are their numbers. I'd actually argue it's more expensive since I couldn't find an off-campus 9 month lease and my social habits, pitiful cooking skills, and trips I want to take with classmates have me spending more than $1224/mo on food, travel, social events, etc.
Fortunately, there are all kinds of loans available. I guess we are a good credit risk.

Just for kicks, if you invested in $64,000 each year for two years and then left those investments in the stock market (where get 10% annual returns over the long term) for 30 years total, you'd have over $2 Million!!

OK, that was a little ridiculous (you'd still have to pay living expenses, etc, if you didn't attend), but it was also fun. And it makes me wonder... We can discuss what that $64k gets you in a future post.

joel

How to Get Into Harvard Business School

I'm posting this to save time. Of late, a few different friends have asked me how to get into this school. I guess the applicaiton deadline is approaching.
The answer is: (wait for it..........) I don't know. Either that, or "there's no secret."
Here are a few thoughts though:

• When I was applying, i saw a bunch of folks on the web trying to sell "the secrets" to get in. Don't buy them. It's a scam. Just think a bit...
• There are no "templates" for accepted applicants. yah, there are a lot of bankers and consultants, but in my section we also have a half dozen folks from the military, one guy who worked at UPS, a couple entrepreneurs, a marketer from a consumer products company, a number of folks who worked for non-profits, etc.
• In the essays, don't waste your time trying to prove that you've played with the most amount of money. It's not interesting, and you're probably wrong. Instead, focus on telling them who you are.
• Before you write your essays, make a list of character attributes that you want the person who reads your essays to attribute to you. Then pick essay topics and focus your writing on conveying those attibutes. Hint: HBS sells itself as a school that's interested in "educating leaders." These attributes are good things to coordinate with your recommenders.
• Bill Gates did not write a recommendation for me. Neither did Steve Ballmer. Neither did anyone with a VP (or even General Manager) title. I picked folks who knew me well. Peers and my manager.

Anyway, I'm now pointing my friends to this post instead of writing them all emails. It's going to save me from carpal tunnel. I love technology.

joel

Welcome to Me

It's lame, but I'm starting with a quick recap of my travels so you can tell when I'm talking with authority vs when i'm just faking it.

Currently, Harvard Business School in order to figure out what to do next. Also, the cases make for really interesting discussion and blog topics.

Before that, 5 years as a Program Manager (for part of it they called me a "Lead Program Manager") at Microsoft in Seattle. Yah, it gets bolded. While there, I worked on:

• Windows XP Shell
• Longhorn, including a presentation for BillG
• the MSN Client
• The MSN Direct Smart Watches (aka "SPOT"). While there, I spent some time on public newsgroups like SpotStop.

Before that, I was at Brown University in Providence. BS in CS. Before that, the Roxbury Latin School in West Roxbury, MA.

Everything there is fair game for posts, questions, and comments. We'll see where it goes.

Welcome. I look forward to learning from you.

joel