There’s a lot of talk in the industry about the fore coming Google Phone, but there really hasn’t been any proof. People have stated that Google wants to compete with Apple, and others even swear to have seen a prototype.
So is the Google phone coming? Who knows. Here’s what I think:
I don’t think Google wants to get into the hardware business. They’ve had plenty of opportunities to do so with various other things, and they haven’t. Likewise, they aren’t trying to get into the offline software business.
Google is in the services business. Things like Maps, Mail, Search, etc.
Services like the above on cell phones typically suck really bad right now. Even the iPhone still has tons of room for improvement.
It seems like it’d be a natural move for Google to sell it’s services to the current cell phone providers. The providers could benefit from the cool features, and Google benefits from the advertising. Remember, advertising is Google’s main business model.
That’s where the Google phone prototype many of you talked about comes in. If you’re going to sell services to a company, you have to demonstrate the possibilities. It would make sense to see Google develop it’s own phones so they can show off their latest and greatest mobile services. Remember, the article just mentions that they have a prototype phone – not that they’re going to try to sell it.
Sure, there could be a Google phone coming, but I don’t think there will be. I don’t think it’s a market that Google wants to get into. With that said, it is a possible direction they could go if adaptation of Google services among current providers turns out light. One way or another though, Google has got to get their services (and ads) on mobile devices if they want to remain on top of the digital advertising industry.
I put my 2 weeks notice in today at my current job, and as of October 22nd I’ll be joining the team at Demoxi. My official title will be Senior Manager, Product Marketing which is basically a fancy title for “doing some really cool stuff in a really cool area.”
I wasn’t really looking for a career change at this time, however certain opportunities presented themselves after my trip to Seattle and I couldn’t say no.
Demoxi is a rather new company focusing on online identity and privacy – two areas that are constantly becoming concerns for many individuals. It’s all about “connecting with confidence.” There’s a lot of potential here, and I’m excited to be part of it.
I’m going to miss working with all the people at Brand Labs. It’s been a lot of fun over the past 6 months or so, and I’m really sad to leave. I feel bad about leaving Brand Labs, but joining Demoxi is the right career move for me, and I hope to benefit from the countless opportunities it will provide.
I’ll post some more updates later, and no I’m not moving to Bellevue (yet!) For now, I urge you to check out the Demoxi homepage.
I was interrupted during the Lions game today by a kid selling candy at my door. Ordinarily I’m a sucker for helping kids fund raise (ok, you got me I’m just a sucker for candy!)
Anyway, before I could say “Gimmie some Reeses cups” he went into his spiel about what he was fund raising for. After listening to the kid talk, I decided NOT to buy any candy from him.
This little brat was selling candy to finance a trip to cedar point for him and his brother. It wasn’t even part of a school or a club! To make matters worse, he was from a city about 20 miles away from me!!
I know times are rough in Michigan right now, but that’s no reason to send your kid around trying to sell candy so you can make money. If he was selling for charity, a sports team, church, school, or anything else that somehow provides value it would have been a different story. But an amusement park for you and your family? You’ve got to be kidding me! If you can’t afford Cedar Point, don’t go, but don’t drive your kid 20 miles away to a more upscale part of town to re-sell your store bought candy. That’s just not right.
A long time ago I did a post about the best job search sites as well as a post on HotJobs Spam. I was really impressed when Craigslist CEO Craig Newmark came in to comment and share his thoughts.
More recently I did a post talking about how cool the techcrunch winner Mint.com looked, and how frustrated I was because I couldn’t use it. Lo and behold, Mint CEO Aaron Patzer stopped in to offer his apologies.
Today, at the bottom of a post venting about my bank I mentioned that Mint was working fine for me, and that I wish they’d combine with Cake Financial to form one uber financial system. And guess what? Cake’s CEO, Steven Carpenter, stopped by to offer his take.
Now, I’m not trying to stroke my ego when it comes to this blog. I barely get a few hundred readers each day. If you’ve heard of the A list, I’m probably a member of the D list. That’s what impresses me so much about these CEO’s stopping by to comment on my blog.
These guys clearly understand the importance of blogging and having a visible presence (or, as Robert Scoble calls it: Naked Conversation) out there for your customers. They’re taking time out of their day to not only read what people think of their services, but to respond to it as well. And that’s important as hell!
In today’s web2.0 world customers don’t want to see just a big ugly corporation. They want to associate a face, a voice, and a person with that company. It’s amazing how many companies fail in this regard. We’ve already seen how bad it can blow up when you fake it. Just look at the MagsForLess.com bot that posts the same text on every blog complaining about getting ripped off. That just makes things worse!
Nowadays most companies have blogs but they only use them to hock more product; and rarely comment back (if they even allow comments.) These same companies would never even think to interact with somebody on a different website, and that’s sad.
It’s great to see that many CEO’s are starting to understand the power of blogging. These guys are going to go places.
If you’ve ever done any online banking, you’re probably familiar with the whole concept of wish it was 2 factor authentication. Basically it’s their attempt to implement the “something you have (atm card) plus something you know (pin #)” idea on the internet. The only problem is, it uses something you know (password) and something you most likely will forget (grandpa’s nickname, pet’s name, business street name, or favorite mersenne prime)
Well my bank did something similar. They asked me for questions a very long time ago. Unfortunately they didn’t let me pick the questions, so I was forced to make up a pet name at a time I didn’t have a pet (among other things.)
Last Wednesday they finally presented me with one of these questions. It was the company street name one. Of course I have no idea when I filled this out, and haven’t used it for a LONG time so I couldn’t remember if it was Troy Center, General Drive, South Street, or Meyer.
I tried Troy Center. That wasn’t it. Restart… Oh shit I’m locked out.
Not only was I locked out, there’s no number to call, address to email, or automated form to get me unlocked.
Here it is 5 days later and I’m still locked out of my account. I just called the bank and to get unlocked it requires me to go in to the bank in person, and then for them to call another company to unlock my account. Ridiculous!
I also just noticed that everybody can login with their account #, and account numbers are sequential. Given that it only takes one improper try to lock an account, it would be very trivial to write a program that locks out every user simultaneously. It’s a good thing for them I’m not feeling mischievous today.
On a side note, mint is working fine now and it’s a great program. Try it out! I’m also liking another techcrunch runner up called Cake Financial. It’s like mint but for investment accounts. Those 2 should really combine.
By now we’re all familiar with the crazy interview questions given potential Google and Microsoft employees (and anybody who’s ever interviewed with me.) Often times they’re not even closely related to the job, but they’re good at seeing somebody’s thought process.
By now every programmer should know how to solve the lightbulb problem or the bridge problem by memory, and we’re pretty good at estimating the height of the empire state building in quarters (and how many sodas that would buy.) A few of us have even estimated the number of gas stations in the US and then looked it up to see we were close – it’s over 200,000.
But there’s one that I just can’t prove either way… and I don’t remember enough college physics to prove it.
Here’s the question: You’re on a boat in the ocean and you throw a very heavy suitcase overboard. Does the boat rise in the water?
I can make a compelling argument for either side, but I want to know what side is correct.
Can anybody prove this using math and physics? I’d be interested to see how.
I’m leaving up north today for a wedding, and then I’m in Seattle next week.. but I’ll check in to see if anybody has an answer for me.
Like millions of other people right now I’ve been trying out Mint – the online finance manager. It looks like it has lots of cool features, but so far I’ve been unable to get it to add any of my accounts. They all just time out and say “try again.” I’m sure it has to do with their traffic.
On a side note, I managed to lock myself out of my credit union account because I can’t remember what street my business was on years ago when I set up my account, nor if I entered James or Jimmy for my sibling’s name.
Not only does my bank not work with quicken, money, or mint – they don’t offer me a way to unlock myself out of their online banking. After calling the office they told me “we’re not sure, we think it unlocks after a few hours.” To me, that’s just not acceptable. If you need some help to ease your mind about your finances, you must want to check out this new post to learn the secrets of bookkeeping management.
Needless to say I’ll be writing myself a check for the entire contents of my account… the question is where should I put it?
I have an ING account, but I like having an actual branch account for all of it’s other benefits. Is anyone offering free ipods or $50 or what not? Where do you bank? Why?
It seems I’ve found my motivation. I managed to get a bunch of small changes done tonight that I’ve been wanting to get done to some of my websites for a while. The good news is that I got about 5 or 6 things done. The bad news is, I’ve got about 20 or 30 more to do.
So here’s what I did:
Added a cool new feed scroller to the bottom of feedbutton
Added links to my Shoutwire editorials on the right side of dotCULT
This video is a little old, but it’s been making it’s way around the internet lately. If you’re a national geographic or discovery channel aficionado like I am, it’s definitely a must see.
Basically Mr Lion decides to make lunch out of Little Baby Buffalo. Upon tackling Little Baby Buffalo into the water, Mr Lion begins trying to pull his prey back up onto dry land (I guess Baby Buffalo soup isn’t as good as plain old Baby Buffalo.)
Meanwhile, Mr Crocodile thought that Baby Buffalo soup sounded plenty fine to him, and a baby buffalo tug of war erupts between Mr Lion and Mr Crocodile. Mr Lion eventually hauls his prey back onto dry land.
That’s when Little Baby Buffalo’s family gets involved and starts kicking some Lion ass.
Check it out:
I just had to share that.
Oh yeah.. Expect some light posting from me over the next 2 weeks both here and on shoutwire. I’ve got a lot of work to catch up on this week (not to mention 2 softball games and a hockey game.) Then I’m going out of town this weekend for a wedding, and when I get back I’ll be in the Seattle area (Bellevue) on the 26th and 27th. Hopefully I’ll have some good news to announce after I return.
