Shel outlines four recent incidents in top level blogs that illustrate the coming of age of blogging.  At first its all idealistic, and deservedly so.  But then with maturity comes complacence, and worse, a sense of divine right.  In three of these new cases, my perception is that bloggers were trying to use their voice to intimidate other parties. In the fourth case, a potential employer was afraid that not hiring the blogger would give her cause to further embarrass the company by future postings. I’m sad to say their is legitimacy in the concern. Source: Global Neighbourhoods: Blogging Blackmailers & Death … Continue reading Global Neighbourhoods: Blogging Blackmailers & Death wishers

Microsoft reduced their forecast for their Internet business. Good grief … this is tantamount to corporate suicide.  Time to fire people, and get back to the drawing board.  Several months ago we expressed disappointment here in Ray Ozzie’s progress …. nuff said.  I feel strongly about Microsoft … they brought us IE when all there was, was Netscape.  They seemed to get it in the 90’s. “Microsoft’s Live branding has been tremendously confusing and has hurt the company, and it is very likely contributing to the situation they are in right now. They’ve created another brand and have not differentiated it.” –David Smith, analyst … Continue reading Message to Microsoft

We talked before about push to talk/ click to call.  This is the capability of your customer entering a phone conversation with the Bank, right from a web page.  Dan over at eStara pinged me with their latest white paper on the topic.  This chart struck me as useful, in determining which method to associate with what kind of customer activity.  Click to call is moire expensive because of the synchronous engagement of people, but its more focused, because it presents the employee with the web page that the customer is on, and the customer and employee can work through … Continue reading Strategic customer engagement – ‘click to call’ for the right reasons

 There are so many provocative thoughts arising from this few seconds of video, capturing Chad Hurley (Youtube) at Davos. Source: Youtube Who the hell is Chad Hurley? Who invited him to Davos? I thought Davos was for world leaders? Oops … the world has changed.  Within 24 months of launching a video platform, some geek is sitting in Davos.  Davos for the uninitiated is the place business and political leaders gather annually in January to discuss world progress.  I recall being amazed that Bill Gates was there a few years ago, but if you haven’t figured out that the world has … Continue reading Davos07: thoughts on the importance of video

Yes, its election time in Canada again.  Ordinary Canadians have seen an explosion of punishing fees at a time when Canadian banks are basking in record profits, Source: Canadian Banks & Insurance Putting aside the obviously political motivations of the Canadian NDP, the more basic matter is that Bank fees are a motivating issue for people.  The concept with this particular one is that ATM’s are a utility, available for all to use just like a water tap.  While this ignores the multi million dollar investments of the Banks’ in their ATM networks and associated infrastructure, that means nothing.  Telco’s … Continue reading Banks fees are not sustainable

 I have been resisting commenting on Charlene’s ROI of blogging because I sense a trend there that I fundamentally see as wrong.  I am becoming increasingly disappointed in the perspective from Forrester as it relates to blogs.  I say this having the greatest admiration for their research for 11 years.  But the drive to treat blogs as a channel, (my take on their view) is fundamentally wrong. Customer World published this extract from that report, and here are some thoughts to follow Forrester has released a research report.  The ROI Of Blogging: The Why and How Of External Blog Accountability. Source: Customer … Continue reading Forrester’s take on ROI of blogs is flawed

 In the Banks’ I worked at, the one thing that stuck out, and we all complained about was inefficiency and ineffectiveness.  Microsoft gave us the best and the worst with Office.  Its capabilities for the individual are beyond belief. But that same capability produces an enormous amount of detailed work.  That detailed work is not simply shareable, so everyone creates their own version.  JP sums it up … People spent incredible amounts of time producing the spreadsheets and presentations. People spent even more incredible amounts of time changing these things, arguing about what was in them, comparing the content with other … Continue reading Wasted time

Hugh has a post here, that is quite hilarious and deep at the same time, in so many ways, that you just have to read it.  In a strange way and as an added bonus, it actually explains many of today’s misunderstood concepts, such as Long Tail, and Intention Economy. Believe it or not, back in the bad old days you actually had to make something, and then find a “buyer”, and “sell” it at a “profit”. No longer. Thanks to the “Long Tail”, paying customers now magically spring out of nowhere and give you money, even if you don’t have a … Continue reading Web 8.0 – Gapingvoid

This is just a fantastic post from Matt (WordPress) that is a clarion call to the Sun, Microsoft, Oracle, group of old guys who really need to get with the programme, or they will be gone. I’ve given up, I’ve lost hope, and our business has moved on. We’re growing fast and adding infrastructure faster, all on a tight budget, and I’m less inclined to depart from the LAMP-based architecture that Digg, Flickr, Wikipedia, and dozens of other sites I respect use. Personally I’m far more excited about what Amazon is doing these days. Source: Photo Matt » Sun Isn’t … Continue reading Photo Matt » Sun Isn’t Relevant to Startups

Poor old CIBC just keeps getting nailed with this stuff.  A couple of years ago it was a long stream of faxes containing customer data going consistently to a private company, and now this. CIBC is the latest major company to lose sensitive customer data, making 470,000 clients vulnerable to dreaded identity theft. The bank announced Thursday that a file being transported between Montreal and Toronto went missing while in transit. Source: CIBC Loses 470,000 Private Client Files :: Hack In The Box :: Keeping Knowledge Free One has to ask why one company is consistently hit with this stuff, courtesy … Continue reading CIBC Loses 470,000 Private Client Files