Who waits in line at midnight for an operating system?

It has been some time since I've blogged. I won't waste your time trying to think of an excuse.

This afternoon, I was watching a video on CNet about the San Francisco release of Windows Vista. They said that they were expecting 500 - 1,000 people to wait outside.

Who on earth would wait in line outside of a store (CompUSA) at midnight for an Operating System?

• It's not going sell out like the XBox (since the OS is just software, it's easy to make more)
• It's not that much "fun" (I apologize to my 'softie friends, but c'mon, it's an OS--what are you going to do, watch your disk defrag?)
• It probably takes upwards of an hour to install, so if you get home at 1 AM... I honestly don't get it.

Then I watched the video. The applesauce explanation does clarify most of it...

Yahoo Music Jukebox

It's been nearly 6 months since I've written here because, well, I haven't really had the time. Today, though, I do... AND I have something to write about.

I'm a recent subescriber to the Yahoo Music Jukebox with Yahoo! Unlimited To Go: a subscription service (roughly $10/mo) that allows me to download an unlimited number of songs for playing on my PCs (up to 3) and my Creative Rio MP3 player (the songs stick around as long as I keep paying Yahoo!). I'll start by saying that, ultimately, I can't deny that it works as advertised. I had to endure typical early-adopter challenges (I had to do a firmware upgrade on my MP3 player and deal with a larger-than-usual number of bugs in the YME), but when everything works, it's neat and super valuable for the gym, office, road trips, etc.

The Good

• I can download other people's playlists (mostly), move them to my MP3 player (generally), and download all the songs I want (often).
• It offers some decent recommendations based on my preferences. I'm going to watch this closely--I'm not a music expert nor have a ton a ton of rating music yet. So far, though, it seems to work pretty well.
• 
  

Now, having said that, there is plenty that works less well than it should:

• My PC has 500 MB of RAM, which (as far as I can tell) is nowhere near enough for Yahoo Music Jukebox--running it absolutely cripples my machine. I've just bought another gig of memory on eBay, so I'm hoping that solves my problem. I'll post an update here.
• This really impacts a number of other experiences--the worst being syncing with my MP3 player. The user interface here is not good and made significantly worse by the fact that the UI is sluggish (at best). I'm hoping that this is improved in the new 2.0 Jukebox. Even if it wasn't sluggish, though, there's no good way to say "of my 20 gigs of music, put these 5 on my MP3 player" or, better yet, "cycle fresh tracks through my MP3 player based on my updated ratings."
  
• Downloads often fail with no real explanation. If I "retry", it often works (but not always).
• For some reason, I can download playlists that have songs I can't access. I really don't understand this.

That's all for now. I need to get back to work. In my next issue, I'll talk about my new purchase: the Roku, and how it works with Yahoo! Music Subscription (hint: more of the same)...

joel

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