What about better articles?

In all the discussion about the Detroit papers suspending home delivery except for the three most profitable days of the week (Thursday, Friday, Sunday) there seems to be little discussion about the c-word -- content.

This quote from Jim Schaefer of the Free Press is typical. (Click for full article.)

This is something that would be hard to reverse. This is not like a magazine or neighborhood news sections, those tricks we have tried for years and then reversed them. This is viewed as something you live or die with.

As I've long contended, this erosion has only been sped up by the Internet. At the core of the problem is a product people don't want to read. If perhaps they thought about something compelling to readers that they could only get in the print edition then perhaps they could resume home delivery the other five days of the week.

This is not new. I recall conversations 15 years ago with the circulation department of a magazine I worked at. We spent an hour reviewing premiums that readers would receive if they subscribed. I wondered aloud if we shouldn't just worry about writing better articles to see if that would attract more readers. I was told it was more complicated than that. Perhaps so.

Anyone care?

I have never understood the logic behind a byline strike. Never have, never will. Do people really care?

Apparently AP is in the midst of one now. (Click here.)

I defy anyone to find me anyone who cares or even knows about this.

Cheap gas

Gas at $1.75/gallon. I wish it was this way this past summer when we spent three weeks on the road suffering through $4/gallon gas. My emotional side is glad gas is cheaper. My intellectual side fears it means our country will revert to its usual lazy mode and not work hard enough to find alternative sources of energy.

Lake George, NY, Thanksgiving

Why adult supervision is still needed

Here's a great lesson in why "citizen journalism" isn't all it's cracked up to be.

From Silicon Alley Insider:

"Citizen journalism" apparently just failed its first significant test.  A CNN iReport poster reported this morning that Steve Jobs had been rushed to the ER after a severe heart attack.  Fortunately, it appears the story was false. We contacted an Apple spokeswoman, who categorically denies this.

Here's a link to the full post. (Click here.)

In one sense I admire CNN for its iReport effort. But this for sure demonstrates the value "old media" still holds. Another good example -- many outlets have taken it upon themselved to verifty claims made by the candidates. Here's a good example from CNN. (Click here.)

Olin Stephens (1908-2008)

When I heard about Olin Stephens' death yesterday I remembered all that he had done for sailing and, most important, how he took a love for the sport and not only made it a career but changed the world of yachting forever.

I met Olin many times over the years but had the chance to sit with him at a luncheon about 12 years ago in Newport. At that time the marine industry was going through a transformation -- sailboats no longer ruled. Powerboats had long outsold sailboats but in the 80s and 90s the powerboat portion of the industry was becoming even more dominant. Thus, I was expecting a lecture from Olin because the magazine I was running then was covering more power than sail. It was a lecture I was used to from men of his era, men who reminded me of the past. Surprisingly, Olin understood and was supportive of the changes. At the end of the conversation, he said "The world changes."

It does and I am thrilled to know that I had the chance to meet a man who was responsible for so much of that change.

A few good articles on his life and career:

New York Yacht Club. (Click here.)

Sail-World.com (Click here.)

Rex Grossman

Chicago Bears training camp 2008
Originally uploaded by charlesbarthold

Why this? Because I can, I guess. I managed to upgrade to a Nikon SLR in July which managed to annoy my kids to no end since all I did was take pictures of them on vacation. But they did find it cool that I could take action shots of the Bears when we visited their summer training camp a few weeks ago.

Here we have Rex Grossman which is kind of cool. Except a few days ago Kyle Orton was named the starter. So much for my career in sports journalism.

The ways of old media

A quote by Gary Zenkel, president of NBC Olympics, is a great summary of the networks' view of the new media world and how off base they can be at times.

On Friday morning NBC decided not to telecast the Olympic Opening Ceremonies live. That led to a bunch of online carping. I managed to do a bit of whining myself on Twitter (click here) which led to a mention on Brian Stelter's blog on the New York Times. (Click here.)

In short, many people wondered why there wasn't live coverage of the Opening Ceremonies. Zenkel, defending the decision to show the ceremonies 12 hours after they happened said this:

“We have a billion dollars worth of revenue at stake here, so that means we’re not public television, for better or worse.”

Aside from coming across as a bit snippy, it also shows how NBC can't recognize an opportunity when it presents itself. Here we have demand and networks restricting supply. So instead of figuring out a way to broadcast the ceremonies live online or on TV, either in its entirety or in snippets, they pursue a policy that encourages avid fans to search elsewhere. And because there is this thing called the Internet, they find it elsewhere. (Click here for a great article by Brian Stelter on how it was done.)

Seems NBC would have been smarter to do a limited broadcast (sponsored, of course) in the morning which which have given all us a flavor of what to expect 12 hours later and allowed us, by word of mouth, to promote what ended up being a spectacular event.

The long tail in action

I recently finished reaching Chris Anderson's book, The Long Tail, which has caused me to look at some things a little differently.

The most recent examples were radio channels on XM Radio. Last week I stumbled across Channel 51, all Coldplay all the time, at least through August 15. (I also discovered Channel 18, Kenny Chesney all the time.)

My nephew wondered aloud how such channels could possibly make money. Fortunately, I had the answer and even looked smart. Because there's no real incremental cost of changing a channel's format, the Coldplay and Kenny Chesney ideas are brilliant ones. I was particularly taken by the Coldplay channel which coincides with their tour and is a great way to increase exposure for the band as well as XM.

Where am I?

Here's a story about the limitations of efficiencies. During the recent family vacation I tried to find a hotel near the highway. Holiday Inn Express seemed like a reasonable choice. I called their central booking number and booked a room based on the information they gave me -- the hotel was near the highway.

Turns out the hotel was near the highway, just not the one we were traveling on that evening. We finally found the hotel around 1230 am and discovered there were two highways with the same number, hence the confusion.

Lesson learned -- never deal with central booking and always try to book through the local hotel.

Customer loyalty

During a recent family trip we stopped by the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. The day we were there, preparations were being made for the induction of five new members the next day. Two, Art Monk and Darrell Green, played for the Redskins. During our day-long visit I noticed the huge number of Redskin fans. I wondered aloud if this was usual -- such a strong outpouring of fan support for one or two players. Turns out it wasn't. (Click here for article by Michael Wilbon of the Washington Post on the induction ceremony and large number of Redskin fans.)

I wonder how many sports teams or companies can claim to have this much loyalty. There had to be several thousand Redskin fans floating around Canton the day I was there. All either drove the 350 miles or flew to Cleveland. And in this day of $4 per gallon gas that's saying a lot.

This came a week after visiting the Chicago Bears training camp in Bourbonnais, Ill., on the campus of Olivet Nazarene University where we witnessed something similar. Admission was free, so was parking. We had great seats right near the practice field. We got to roam around during the practice and afterwards many of the players came over to the sidelines and offered up autographs. (That's Devin Hester in the photo at left.) My kids were already Bears fans before we went down to camp but the rich experience made them even stronger ones.

Of course they forced you to walk through the gift shop to get to the field but you didn't have to buy anything (we resisted).

In both instances I marveled at how two pro teams had managed to keep their fans so happy.

History of rock 'n roll, sort of

This is a bit off topic but I feel compelled to give a mention of a new book: Clark Weber's Rock and Roll Radio: The Fun Years, 1955-1975. (Click here for link to the book.)

I mention this not just because I was cited in the preface (although that was certainly nice) but also because Clark is my father in law. Every time I visit him I learn something new about the early years of rock and roll as well as Chicago radio. During my annual visits I also enjoy rummaging around the basement looking at photos of him with countless famous acts including the Monkees, Beatles and Sonny and Cher.

(My children's favorite story is about the detective from Gary, Indiana who came to Chicago one day with his boys in tow and asked Clark, then a DJ, to hear his boys sing. Clark wasn't too impressed but apparently the rest of the world saw things differently and the Jackson Five did just fine without my father in law's endorsement.)

It's also fascinating to talk to Clark about the changing landscape of radio. You would expect someone of his age to rue all the changes of late. Not so. Clark is endlessly fascinated by the world of Ipods, Internet and a world where media companies no longer control the pipeline. (I just handed Clark a copy of Chris Anderson's book, The Long Tail, which he is devouring.) He's even entered the world of blogs. (If you have any complaints about the blog, blame me. I talked him into it.)

If you get a chance, read the book. I think you will enjoy it.

Tracking Twitter and FriendFeed

For the past few months I have been trying to find a Twitter/FriendFeed client that allows me to monitor both feeds, send updates and eliminate duplicates. AlertThingy is my latest attempt and so far so good.

It's still a bit erratic but not sure if that's Twitter (a distinct possibility) or the client. It's also not very rich in features (or help files) but since it serves its primary purpose I am reasonably happy.

Getting others to do the work

Steve Hamm, a senior writer for BusinessWeek, is writing a book and he wants your help. Much has been written about collaboration so it's nice to see it in action.

The book, The Race for Perfect, is about the quest to design the perfect portable computer. Steve has put Chapters 2 and 10 online for others to help with.

Here's Steve's overview of the book:

My book, The Race for Perfect: Inside the Quest to Design the Ultimate Portable Computer, is in part a popular history of portable computing. (The other element is a blow-by-blow chronicle of designers, engineers, and marketers at Lenovo conceiving and designing the ThinkPad X300 and bringing it to market.) The saga begins with Alan Kay's original concept of portable computing, in the fall of 1968, and continues through the luggables, the laptops, the handhelds, the smartphones, and the latest concepts for mobile computing devices in mid-2008, when the book will be published by McGraw-Hill. I interviewed dozens of portable computing pioneers when I was researching the book, and I packed many of their stories into its pages. But there were many people who played roles in this history that I didn't speak to and many threads of the story that I didn't have time to explore. With this wiki I aim to do two things. First, I'm offering up two of the key chapters of the book for people to read. Hopefully, you'll find them entertaining or instructive, or both. Second, I want to invite others to submit their own recollections and observations. Hopefully, if others participate, this can become a living word organism. So, please, if you want to comment, start a thread. If you want to submit pieces of history (or photos) please send me an e-mail (to stevehamm31@hotmail.com) and I'll post your contributions. Please tell me who you are, and how you know what you know, and make sure I get a working e-mail address.

(Click here to access the chapters. You will need to request permission to edit.)

Who's watching the watchdogs?

Recently, at work, a group of us had an interesting discussion about the Internet, the demise of newspapers and the future of democracy.

Sounds like a lot but the discussion focused on the future of newspapers. If they are to die, and we all agreed they are dying quickly, who will be the watchdogs?

One group argued that newspapers protect us against corruption, evil, etc. The other group (myself included) argued that it didn't matter. The world has changed, we argued, and it's easier for average citizens to broadcast and uncover corruption.

In the end we agreed to disagree. Afterwards I came across a column by Jon Fine of BusinessWeek. (Click here for full column.)

The column is mostly about the Newseum in Washington, D.C. However, Jon makes a good point, relevant to my work discussion:

Its placement on such an august stretch of D.C. real estate implicitly puts the news biz in league with the powers it's supposed to remain skeptical of, though anyone who has suffered through government-journalist group gropes such as the White House Correspondents' Dinner knows how uncomfortably close those teams are in real life.

Good point. Seems that the institutions we hold up to be the watchdogs aren't always as pure as we'd like them to be. It's always struck me that the most prominent journalists we supposedly look up to are also part of the group we're trying to keep an eye on.

Chicago Mac -- 100th running

I can't let today go by without acknowledging tomorrow's start of the 100th running of the Chicago Mac. A lot has been written about this but suffice to say it is truly unique. Unlike many other distance races this is one people do not miss. The entire sailing season in the Midwest revolves around this 333-mile race and for good reason.

There some great stuff out there on the race but I suggest the videos recounting past races. Some rich history there. (Click here.)

Caution: Lawyers involved

Recently I received, as a birthday present, a nice t shirt which included the lat/lon of the town I live in. It's a nice gift with a nautical theme that I like a lot.

The best part was the "disclaimer" that was stuck on the shirt, obviously a pointed poke at companies run by lawyers who insist on putting warnings, no matter how absurd, on anything they sell.

Why newspapers are where they are today

Bob Lefsetz, a former music industry executive who rants on about his former industry and its inability to accept change, recently commented on the newspaper industry. (Click here for full post. Thanks to Mark Potts for the link.)

Bob is a fan of Sam Zell and Lee Abrams and many of his points have been repeated elsewhere. But the great line of his post in response to newspaper executives tired of the new regime:

If those running the newspapers were so damn smart, they wouldn’t be in this predicament.

Other newspapers are no longer the competition

Good post by Jeff Jarvis on the recent layoffs at the Tampa Tribune. (Click here for full post.)

Two interesting comments:

1. Janet Coats, editor, pointed out that the importance of the paper's Web site has changed. “People need to stop looking at TBO.com [the newspaper's affiliated web site] as an add on to The Tampa Tribune. The truth is that The Tampa Tribune is an add on to TBO.”
2. Coats also urged her staffers to stop copying the competition. "She told the staff to get over the idea that they should operate and judge themselves by doing the same stories as The St. Petersburg Times. Can’t afford that anymore."

Office jargon -- words not to use

A great article from the BBC on over-used phrases found in today's offices. (Click here for full article.)

A few gems:

1. Going forward

2. Incentivise

3. Low-hanging fruit

It gets better.

When readers don't care

Jeff Jarvis recently had an interesting post about newspapers getting rid of sections and finding out readers don't care. (Click here for Jeff's post. Click here for the original post by Amy Webb.)

Both Jeff and Amy make great points:

• Newspapers should think about cutting more sections or figuring out what sections really resonate with readers.
• Newspapers need to think like businesses. Don't create products that people don't want just because management thinks they need it. (The eat your vegetables mentality.)
• No more commodity news. Only news readers can't get anywhere else.

One of the greatest lesson I learned when I was in newspapers was the day we put in the wrong crossword puzzle. The phone never stopped ringing. A close second was the day we cut a recipe in half and had countless people call upset that the recipe didn't work. I pointed out to the editor that I didn't notice anyone calling because we left out an international story or didn't have the Vancouver Canucks score.

Watch people like Sam Zell. They understand this.

A dollar on the floor in FriendFeed's headquarters

A dollar on the floor in FriendFeed's headquarters
Originally uploaded by Robert Scoble

This is funny. Here's how one company makes people pay attention to a cord running across the floor. Not sure how many people not only notice this but then try to pick it up.

The new way to do PR

Jason Kintzler makes some good points on Socialmediatoday.com about how PR firms (and people) should work in the world of social media. (Click here for full article.) One paragraph stands out:

As more media members begin to use and experience social media
communication tools like Twitter and FriendFeed, the disconnect between media
and PR pros will weaken. Journalists interested in receiving updates from a
credible PR agency will choose to 'follow' them, and PR pros will be forced to
(once again) engage with media, not just push content at them.

Jason is reacting to a New York Times article that talked about how PR professionals are learning to use key words in their pitches (green, sex, cancer, etc.) to get the attention of journalists. Jason's response is right. Shoving content at people is the wrong way to go by a long shot.

Being genuine about monitoring social media

BusinessWeek recently ran an interesting piece on how multinationals are hiring others to monitor social media to see what people are saying about their company. (Click here for full article.)

The article, by Dexter Roberts, focuses on Daqi.com. Specifically, Daqi.com helps multinationals monitor their reputation online in China. The article has a few good examples and is a great example of how companies recognize the impact of social media.

But two things stood out:

• The article points out a case of a Toyota customer upset that his car wasn't delivered and venting about it on a blog. The customer was finally taken care of but the Toyota's PR agency then refused to comment on the complaint or provide details.
• Some of these agencies hire people to post positive things about clients on various blogs.

Seems to me if you're going to play in these arena you should be open about it. In the first instance, a golden opportunity was missed. It was a chance to talk about a problem and how it was solved. That, in turn, builds trust. In this case, Toyota dealt with this the old fashioned way -- doing what it could to make the customer happy and then saying nothing about it for fear, I presume, it would make the company look bad.

In the second instance there's a pretty good chance such actions will be found out pretty quickly. And then the world knows you are not being genuine. And then you have a real problem.

Conclusion -- if you're going to go this route you probably better off going the whole way.

The future of newspapers

Jon Fine, columnist for BusinessWeek, has a great post on how newspaper executives feel about the current state of affairs. (Click here for full article.)

LA Times Sunday magazine

A lot of energy is being exerted over the decision by the Los Angeles Times to have the Sunday magazine run by the business side, not the editorial. (Click here for one such example.)

There's no point in summarizing or rehashing any of this except to say -- I am willing to bet a ton of money that the readers won't even notice the difference. Not one iota. And when that happens the editorial department, which is ranting on endlessly about this, will have even less credibility.

8 reasons magazines are in trouble

Jon Friedman writes a regular column for CBS Marketwatch. His thoughts aren't always leading edge but he seems to have a few good ideas here and there.

This week Jon posted a column on how magazines can embrace the web. (In typical magazine cover line fashion he lists "8 simple rules for succeeding on the Web.") (Click here for full article.)

I won't go into too much detail here on his points but it strikes me as sad that he made these points to a gathering of media executives. The fact that magazine executives still fear the Web or can't find ways to exploit it says tons about the state of the industry.

Nothing new in the WSJ

Is it just me or is there less to read in the Wall Street Journal these days?

Every day, when I read the paper, about half of what's in there has either been online for a while or already appeared in the New York Times. I recognize that News Corp., is trying hard to compete with the New York Times but publishing articles about subjects the reader has already heard about does not seem to be the answer.

Examples from today's front page:

-- Lead article about inflation growing around the world. (I have seen that and similar pieces in countless places.)

-- Manhunt for convicted hedge fund manager. (Seen that all over the New York Times and the local Connecticut paper.)

-- Secretive associate of Putin emerges as oil czar. (Finally, something new. But it's below the fold.)

-- Robotic vacuum cleaner fights for territory from family dog. (There we go. Something new and interesting. Again, at the bottom of the page.)

I am certainly not suggesting a heavy emphasis on robotic vacuum cleaner articles but I am suggesting they either cover more business or find a unique twist on these stories, twists you can't get anywhere else. Right now, most of what I see on there is old news.

Don't just listen, include others

Sprint Nextel's CEO, Dan Hesse, recently posted his email address in a series of TV commercials. It's part of his effort to improve their well-deserved reputation for poor customer service. (They also have a well-deserved reputation for lousy coverage but that's another story.) This effort was reported in this morning's New York Times.

It all strikes me as a well-intentioned, but flawed, attempt at reconciliation with its customers. Right now it's a one-way conversation. Granted, it's from the customers to the top executive. That's a start. But for this to really work, and to gain trust with clients, the conversation needs to be a lot more transparent. Starbucks (http://www.mystarbucksidea.com/) and Salesforce.com have set up site where customers can not only suggest ideas, but other customers can see it and, even more impressive, vote on the ideas. I don't know if Sprint Nextel needs to include voting but if a customer sees other comments from other customers and, most important, sees them acted upon then you have something to talk about.

Now there's nothing to talk about since there is no clear indication anything is being done about these problems.

Never forget -- newspapers are a business, part 432

If ever you need to be reminded that newspapers are a business, read about Sam Zell's planned cuts at the LA Times, Chicago Tribune and others. In short, they plan to print fewer pages and reduce head count. What's interesting is how they are approaching this: by figuring out the number of column inches created by each journalist. Randy Michaels, COO of Tribune, has concluded they need fewer journalists because some are not producing as much as others.

From the New York Times:

Mr. Michaels said that, after measuring journalists’ output, “when you get into the individuals, you find out that you can eliminate a fair number of people while eliminating not very much content.” He added that he understood that some reporting jobs naturally produce less output than others.

Later on in the Times article is another interesting tidbit:

... Mr. Zell wrote that Tribune papers would be redesigned, beginning with The Orlando Sentinel, on June 22. Surveys show readers want “maps, graphics, lists, ranking and stats,” he wrote. “We’re in the business of satisfying customers, and we will respond to what they say they want.”

A few comments:

• You're going to see more of this approach, not less.
• This is how most businesses behave. However, newspapers and some magazines have not caught up with the times.
• Everyone is blaming the Internet for the demise of newspapers. That's only hastened their demise. At the core is an inability by many to understand that they need to produce useful content. If you don't give your readers what they want, you're out of business.

Some are sure to disagree. Jeffrey Weiss of the Dallas Morning News is one. (Click here.) But it ignores the basic problem facing newspapers -- fewer people are reading them because there's less content that interests them.

Something new

We're trying something new at the home office this week. A bit radical for us risk-adverse types but there's a new day dawning.

We recently completed some research on data centers. In short, they consume a mammoth amount of power and that has two significant implications -- large carbon footprint and the cost to the business.

To date it's received a fair degree of interest not just from the usual suspects but from many top business publications as well. We're doing the usual dog and pony stuff but today we're posting the report on Slideshare. (Click here to see the presentation.) You can review it and you can comment on it. About the only limitation we've placed on it -- you can't download it. So off we go into the uncharted waters of social media. Nothing radical but an important first step into the new era.

Eight things I learned at the MIT CIO Symposium

1. Ron Williams, CEO of Aetna, gets IT. His quote: "If you want to succeed in this firm you need to understand IT." Another: "IT isn't viewed as a cost, it's a way to achieve competitive advantage." His philosophy -- use IT to share information among products and also cut costs by using preventative medicine.

2. Consumers will better understand healthcare costs. Why, because they have to and because they can. New technology will allow costs to be more transparent for insurers and insured. For insurers, a way to control costs. For consumers, a way to make choices.

3. Google and Wikipedia are only the tip of the iceberg. Tom Malone, professor of management at MIT Sloan, views them as only the beginning of software that harnesses and organizes intelligence.

4. The number of software companies will decline. It's only natural with consolidation and a lot of software migrating to the Web, said Michael Cusumano, professor at MIT Sloan.

5. "SaaSified" and "SaaSifaction" are words. At least they were used by Gerri Martin-Flickinger, SVP + CIO at Adobe.

6. Centralized vs. decentralized. It depends. Stuart McGuigan, SVP and CIO of Liberty Mutual, talked about how much is decentralized simply because the business works that way and that's his company's strength. "The fact that we haven't centralized some things is not a sign of weakness."

7. As the value of business intelligence grows, the role if the IT shop will diminish. Why? Because business units can access data on their own and use SaaS to access and manipulate it. "This leaves IT out of the picture," said Dr. Claudia Imhoff, president and founder, Intelligent Solutions.

8. If a company is interested in data analytics the IT department can't stop or control it. Doug Tracy, CTO, Rolls Royce, says the best the IT department can do is help explain its value.

www.mitcio.com

Journalism as a business -- quote of the day

"Journalists need to remember that before push can come to shove on high ethical issues, the newspaper has to survive as a business"

That's Howell Raines in his May profile of Brian Tierney. (Click here for full article.)

Reporting on the China earthquake

There's been a lot of discussion lately about the China earthquake and the speed of coverage through Twitter and other online services. Robert Scoble seems to be crowing the most about how impressive this was. (Read his post here.)

Here's an example of his breathless excitement:

I reported the major quake to my followers on Twitter before the USGS Website had a report up and about an hour before CNN or major press started talking about it. Now there’s lots of info over on Google News.

How did I do that? Well, I was watching Twitter on Google Talk. Several people in China reported to me they felt the quake WHILE IT WAS GOING ON!!!

It's no doubt impressive live updates were coming out of China but to what end? Most of the "instant" news and feeds were either inaccurate or totally out of context. In fact, I found myself searching for news on the earthquake through the traditional media I follow - CNN and The New York Times. Sometimes news can be reported too fast.

John Murrell at SiliconValley.com's Good Morning Silicon Valley makes some good points. (Read full post here.)

An important tipping point in news dissemination during a disaster? In timeliness, maybe by increments over phones, blogs, text messages, e-mail, forum posts and the news wires (assuming that you’re an active Twitter user and happen to follow the right people). In reliability, certainly not. By any of the aforementioned means, initial information is going to be scattered, anecdotal and often flat-out wrong.

Twitter, and SMS, serve a great purpose in keeping people in touch and sharing information. But it doesn't mean the information is any more reliable.

What I don't understand about cell phone laws

California is about to join a number of other states in requiring drivers to use hands-free devices (aka a headset) when talking on a cell phone while driving.

As the resident of a state that requires such behavior -- and will fine you $100 for not doing so -- I've never understood the logic of this.

First off, yesterday's Wall Street Journal (story is accessible to subscribers only) casts doubt on whether this law it really makes drivers safer.

An excerpt from the article:

The study, from the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California, predicts that the state's hands-free requirement, which goes into effect July 1, will reduce traffic deaths in the state by 300 a year. But the institute -- which reached its conclusion by studying state-by-state traffic-fatality data, including data from a handful of states that already restrict cellphones on the road -- found a decrease in deaths only when people drove in adverse conditions, such as in rain, or on wet or icy roads.

But here's the real flaw in this law: The real distraction of a cell phone isn't the act of holding it to your ear. Instead, it's the dialing of the number and simply talking. The latter requires a fair degree of concentration and takes away from what you're supposed to be doing while driving which is paying attention. I can't tell you how many times I've been on calls and been in near accidents or driven past my exit simply because I wasn't paying attention.

So pass all the laws you want. It still won't make the roads safer until people focus on the task at hand.

Companies that use Twitter

One thing I've noticed lately is the number of companies that have Twitter accounts. JetBlue, Zappos, Plaxo, Southwest Airlines are ones I've noticed. I'm sure I've missed a lot more.

I monitor all of the ones mentioned above not because I am interested in them as companies but because I'm interested in the way they communicate with customers. I've already spoken about Plaxo but it seems these companies are using Twitter for several purposes:

1. Track complaints and respond. And the response is usually public.
   
2. Set the corporate tone.  Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, seems to have about 20 tweets a day about everything from contests to observations about his company. It makes a customer feel like he knows the company better.
   
3. Recruiting tool. I am going to guess that some will find these companies appealing simply because they appear to have open, engaging cultures.
   

And they don't use the medium to blast people with stupid promotional messages which I know a bunch of folks in marketing are hungry to do. Instead, it's interesting, useful content.

At a time where it's harder and harder for large companies to "control" the message these companies are realizing that by being part of the conversation they are gaining control.

Twitter IDs:

JetBlue

Zappos

Southwestair

john Mccrea (John McCrea, head of marketing for Plaxo)

What to do when you are sued

DSW, a specialty retailer, files suit against Zappos, the online seller of shoes. Nothing new there. What's new is how the CEO, Tony Hsieh, has chosen to handle this. His reactions are posted on Twitter. (Click here to follow Tony.)

I have no idea of there's any merit to DSW's suit which claims illegal use of DSW's name on Zappos' site. But I am impressed by Tony's openness. Nearly every other CEO which either not comment or issue a denial. Granted, Tony has mainly said in his Twitter posts that he's upset that he found out about this through a press release but I think any customer or fan of Zappos would sense Tony's authenticity and genuine concern about this. I like this post in particular:

Press release claims we were using DSW store photographs to mislead people. Obviously Zappos would never intentionally do that.

Click here for a copy of the press release Tony is talking about.

Plaxo listens. But is that enough?

So I am dabbling in Twitter and notice Andrew Spender comment about Plaxo. He had joined and felt "tricked" into joining. I respond by saying much the same thing. The 140-character limit on Twitter didn't allow me to say much more but I basically meant that when I joined, Plaxo ended up sending emails to all my contacts asking them to join. This was several years ago and I remember feeling that I had either been duped or at the very least I was pretty stupid for not fully understanding what was doing.

This morning I find a response on Twitter from John McCrea, head of marketing, asking me why. (Link to John's Twitter feed. Link to his blog.)

I have to say, I was impressed. He not only responded but did so in an open forum. Not sure if that's going to solve all their problems but it tells me they're at least paying attention and I give them credit for that.

The only problem with Twitter is that I wasn't able to provide John with a more thoughtful response. My issue with Plaxo now isn't the email blast they do -- for all I know that doesn't happen now although based on what Andrew said that's still the case. My issue is that it seems like a laggard. The few times a month I logged on it pretty much has all the material and feeds that Facebook, FriendFeed, Twitter, LinkedIn have. It doesn't seem to offer anything new.

What it did offer when I first joined -- automatic update of my address book -- is still valuable but all the other features offered by other sites make it less of a priority than it used to be.

Here's what I would do. Figure out a way to not only be an aggregator, which is what it is, but become the best. Friendfeed is close but it has flaws. (For example, it won't let me follow people who haven't joined Friendfeed.) Fix that and you've got a winner.

What customer service really means

Recently the Wall Street Journal published a review of Bill Price and David Jaffe's new book, "The Best Service is No Service." (Link here to book on Amazon.com.) In short, the book argues that most conventional thinking on how to run customer service departments falls short. It mentions some of the flawed metrics and incentives used by companies. (One of the best, and most commonly heard, example is the one about call center employees hurrying up calls or hanging up on customers because the customer service rep is about to run over the recommended time for an average call.)

I am no expert on customer service metrics and incentives but my sense has always been that the companies that truly excel are ones that really believe it's important. Weber Grills and JetBlue are two that come to mind. In both cases I've had extraordinary experiences that were based on several simple premises:

• The company representative cared or at least they seemed to care.



• They took the time needed to solve the problem.



• They followed up.

None of these are hard to do but if you've set up a system that measures you against the clock it's bound to fail. Of if you have a process in place that is merely that, a process, then the company is bound to fail in understanding the customer's needs. I've seen some of the work done behind call centers and it is incredibly fascinating and scary. There's a lot of smart minds involved in setting up call centers and decision trees and what not. But I contend that it's pointless until there's a desire to help the customer, not get rid of him. (I've always believed the main purpose of most call centers is to get rid of bothersome customers, not help them.)

In addition, I think in companies with bad customer service there's a huge disconnect between what the executives think and what the customers experience. Do all the focus groups and testing you want. Until the executives use the company's product or service, nothing will change.

When companies no longer control the story

An article in the Wall Street Journal today is a fascinating example of how companies have less and less control over how they are perceived. The front page article is about a blog that reveals developments at Anheuser-Busch before the company's PR machine can get its act together. (Article is online but behind a firewall.)

That's not that unusual in and of itself although it's surprising is how many companies seem incapable of dealing with this new world. The unusual part -- the blogger is an employee of Anheuser-Busch's main competitor, Miller Brewing.

So now we have a situation where companies need to monitor more than the media and their customers. They need to monitor their competitors. And a situation where one company is attacking another through its own media.

I am not sure how I would handle this if I were Anheuser-Busch but I would be thinking long and hard about the impact social media has on one's business and figuring out ways to make sure they can be involved in the conversation.

When machines take over

There's been a lot of discussion about the diminishing roles of newspapers and magazines. Let's not forget the journalist.

The latest is from Charles Cooper of CNet.

Charles points out how many PR people are bypassing news outlets to distribute news directly to the Web and news aggregators. Charles also noted that press releases sometimes rank higher on news aggregation pages (Techmeme, for example) than articles written by journalists. (Full post here.)

Here's an excerpt:

"The truth is that there are fewer and fewer of you guys," said a veteran PR-meister I know who works for one of the bigger technology companies. "You can't call the same reporter and expect him to do five stories on your company in the same month. So we have to have other ways to get out that information."

"Search engine optimization and other tools we have are better than they used to be and we're just taking advantage of the technology," this person continued. "We can go direct to audiences and bypass the filters--like the media--and have it picked up."

At some point journalists need to think hard about what their real role is. Companies bypassing journalists is not news. What's new is that users/readers seem to find value in the material. That's when you really need to rethink things.

When is it just too much?

Hutch Carpenter has a good overview of how to use social media so it doesn't overwhelm you. (Full post here.)

It was prompted by Erick Schonfeld who complained about information overload. (Full post here.)

There seems to be several stages of social media:

1. Lack of understanding. This is when you don't understand something and choose either to ignore it or criticize it.
2. Trial period. This is when you try it for a while either because you're genuinely curious or you don't want your teenage children to learn about this faster than you did. (Both reasons apply to me.)
3. Fascination. Those who find it useful then dive in and find out they've tapped into a new source of information and community.
4. Stop the fire hose. This is when it gets to be too much and you have feeds everywhere and information coming at you way too fast. This is what's happened to me at times. Each time I've sat back and carefully cut back various feeds to only the ones that truly provide me with new information or a perspective. I have found the most thoughtful people out there only post a few times a day. If you sub to a site run by an individual that is posting 30 times a day, unsubscribe. There is no way a single human can provide you with that many insights in a day. At least for free.
5. Recovery. This is when you've learned that social media is good. You just need to be selective.

And this final point is where Erick and Hutch seem to be today.

Magazines meet social media

Finally -- here's something that makes sense. Hearst Magazines will start distributing some of its content through several social media sites including Facebook.

It's about time. (Click here for full story in Folio.)

If you're going to blog, do it right

Good for American Airlines. They've created a blog. The only problem -- it says nothing. And Gawker has called them out on it. (Full post here.)

First, they only have three posts.

Second, they answer one of the questions without giving an answer.

Why would you even create something like a blog if you're not planning to communicate in an open and honest fashion? At the very least, communicate on a more regular basis.

The real measure of magazines

The online world has received a fair amount of grief lately for being hard to measure. (David Churbuck points out one such study that makes this point and he in turn makes an appropriate criticism of this attitude. Click here.) And some of the criticism is fair. (Here's an interesting criticism of how "views" are measure online from Silicon Valley Insider. Click here.)

However, none of what the online world is going through comes close to what magazines go through. (And I am not even going to touch newspapers and TV/radio.)

Today paidContent.org points out that magazine "rate card reported ad revenue" is down for Q1 by 1.2 percent from the same period last year. The fact that it's down is not a surprise. But I am certain this stat is way off. That's simply because no one pays rate card. And nobody's done that for 10 to 15 years. For the longest time the health of the magazine industry has been measured by ad pages. The New York Times measures (celebrates?) this every Monday morning in its business pages. While it's hard to measure true revenue the measurement of ad pages is absolutely meaningless since each publication charges different rates year to year (mostly less) and the rates vary from publication to publication.

I am not sure I know of a better way to measure this since no one is every going to fess up to what their real rates are but it does point out that using page count only masks an even bigger problem.

Use of SMS for local media

I stumbled across two stories this week that made me realize that newspapers, at least local ones, still have a great opportunity to utilize technology.

First, from Julie Starr in New Zealand, comes the observation that while larger papers have pretty much missed the boat on conversion to a strong online business plan, regionals and locals still have an opportunity. (Full post here.)

There's no question that ink on paper remains strong in rural and small-town New Zealand. But most of those newspaper readers either don't have internet connections or have dial-up or low-speed broadband. Eventually that will change, and people's reading habits will change along with it - with a clear impact on local papers. Unless, of course, those local papers start working towards developing useful websites. Not much sign of that yet.

So, they're behind the times but not by too much and still have a chance. Plus, I've always contended that local newspapers have the strongest chance of surviving simply because they cover something nobody else does -- local news.

After reading that piece I then stumbled across this piece from The New York Times about the recent protests of the Olympic flame in San Francisco and the rampant use of SMS (text messaging) to mobilize people. (Read full post here.)

The protesters had deployed people across San Francisco who were tracking the torch’s whereabouts — from the waterfront warehouse where it first appeared, to the diverted path it took away from the biggest protest gatherings. Every few minutes, the pro-Tibet sympathizers were sending updates on where they believed the torch and a busload of its bearers were being redirected. Most text-enabled demonstrators were apparently subscribed to a distribution list set up by Students for a Free Tibet, using the commercial service TextMarks.

After reading the two it struck me that local news organizations have a great opportunity to take the lead here. Granted, SMS is used primarily by younger people but isn't that the audience local newspapers desire to reach? In addition, nearly everyone now has a cellphone. Many older people don't have text plans but that will change over time.

What if local news organizations could broadcast events, alerts, traffice updates, weather alerts, scores, gas prices etc by SMS? Basically, anything local that the reader can't get anywhere else. (Hey -- go one step further and do it by Twitter too.)

I've written about this before. (See post here.) But that was basically about harnessing the power of users to share news regarding a train accident. Here the local media can finally take charge and be the reliable and up to date source of news it has wanted to be for so many years.

Explaining Twitter

Twitter, like Facebook before it, was something I had a hard time understanding. Until I started using it. That's fine. Until I try to explain to someone the value of Twitter. Telling them it's "IM on steroids" or "IM and a blog all rolled into one" doesn't seem to cut it. (My username is "cbarthold" by the way.)

Thus, I've tried to find people who are not only enthusiastic about Twitter but can also explain its usefulness.

Let's start with Robert Scoble, who recently caught the bug, explains one benefit. (Full post is here.)

But there "is" value in having a great group of people you’re following. Follow @craignewmark and you’ll see what Craig is seeing or thinking (he’s the founder of Craigs’ List). Follow @pierre and you’ll see what he’s thinking (he’s the founder of eBay). Follow HRBlock and you’ll see what the team at H&R Block is thinking about taxes and such. Follow @newmediajim and you’ll see what Jim Long, who is a camera guy in the press pool at the White House, is thinking about.

Now, do you start to get it? If you define yourself by who is following you you’ll always feel inadequate. After all, you can’t control your followers and any idiot can follow people. But, define yourself by who you are following and you can really build something of high value.

People still aren’t getting this. They didn’t get how I was using Twitter and still don’t. I follow the world’s best early adopters, business executives, and entrepreneurs. I really don’t care if I have a single follower. If I defined myself by my followers I’d always feel inadequate. If I define myself by the people who I follow, well, I follow the smartest, richest, coolest, funniest people in the world. That makes me smarter, richer, cooler, and funnier.

BL Ochman does a good job as well. (Full post is here.)

For me, and the extraordinary group of smart people with whom I interact daily, Twitter has become:

o a major source of business news
o a quicker way to find out what's important today than my feed reader
o a place to find out what the people I'm interested in are finding interesting
o a source of live blogging from conferences and other events
o an excellent source of experts on various technical topics
o a place to build relationships through common interests
o direct access to many of my business heroes
o a place to (selectively) pimp my blog posts
o an international IM platform
o a place to take a break around the virtual water cooler
o a lot of fun

I am still not sure this adequately explains its value and appeal so I will continue to scour for those who do a better job than I explaining such things.

Update (4/18): Here's a good overview from Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos. (Click here.) Actually, the more interesting thing here is that Zappos is using Twitter to track customer comments.

How to really reach people

Seth Goldin has a great post that I'm sure will make the folks at Forbes.com squirm. (Read full post here.)

In short, he got a rather impersonal message to join a supposedly special group of people. He wrote back to Forbes.com and got what he believes to be, and I agree, was a rather snippy response to the effect -- are you in or not? Seth rightfully points out the absurdity of this all and this goes on to make this point:

You can contact just about anyone you want. The only rule is you need to contact them personally, with respect, and do it months before you need their help! Contact them about them, not about you. Engage. Contribute. Question. Pay attention. Read. Interact.

I seem to deal with issue every day. "How do we reach these people?" And it's normally about reaching a relatively small number, usually in the hundreds. What they're asking for is a magical formula. What I tell them is this -- call them and tell them. And give them information they will find useful. And if you don't have such information, ask. Most civil human beings don't mind being asked questions. Just don't ask too many times.

And don't do what Forbes.com did here.

Who owns the content and its comments?

There is something deliciously ironic about the current discussion over Shyftr, a new content aggregator.

The issue -- who owns the content on various blogs. The way Shyftr works is that the content on many blogs resides on Shyftr as do the comments about that blog. Other readers, instead, only publish a portion of a blog posting and refer to the entire post on its original platform.

At issue are two matters -- the original posting; the comments surrounding them.

Tony Hung goes on a bit of rant about how unfair this is:

Anyway, its not the conversations being hosted somewhere else that bothers me, its that there are a new crop of services which would not otherwise exist without republishing someone else’s content without the original author’s explicit permission. Well, lots of people’s content. And you can dress it up and all kinds of clothing and all kinds of nifty wrappers, but ultimately that’s what this is about. (Click here for full post.)

There must be a few folks in mainstream media chuckling at all this. After all, the knock on many blogs is that they don't spend any resources on original content instead feeding off of others. (Where would Drudge be without The New York Times, Wall Street Journal etc.?) Now some bloggers are upset their original content is being taken over by others.

I do understand the concern over the first issue. Taking over the content is wrong, even if it doesn't involve money. However, the issue over where the comments belong is, in my view, not worth fighting. As bloggers should know, it's really hard to control comments and where they live and in many cases the users of the content, not the content creators, determine its value.

Louis Gray points out:

As a blogger, I am a content creator. I don't want my content stolen, or reposted without attribution or under somebody else's name. But I am also a huge advocate of RSS and continuing to adapt where the conversation is being held. Just as my blog's RSS views have undoubtedly eclipsed my blog page views, I would not be surprised to see that more comments on my posts might eventually live outside of my blog. It would behoove me and other bloggers to be aware of the other places the conversation will be taking place, and to engage there, in my opinion, rather than railing against the continued evolution of how we're consuming content and engaging online. (Click here for full post.)

Update (4/14): Since I posted this, Shyftr has changed its position a bit. (Louis Gray talks about it here.)

"All of you are overhead"

The above quote from Sam Zell to a bunch of journalists is sure to prompt a lot of negative comments from journalists.

But the smart ones will realize that he's right.

Zell, owner of the Tribune Company, said this and a few other choice things at a meeting with the Tribune's Washington bureau in February. (Click here for a link to a write up of the meeting and audio.)

The full quote from Zell:

"This is the first unit of Tribune that I've talked to that doesn't generate any revenue. So all of you are overhead."

Another gem:

"Three guys in a garage create YouTube, and we've got 800 people in Chicago who don't know their ass from a hole in the ground!"

You can go on all day explaining how Sam Zell doesn't know what he's talking about. But at the heart of the matter is the simple fact that newspapers (and magazines) are businesses designed to generate revenue, part of which pays the salaries of reporters. And under the current business model advertising pays the bills. Yes, content attracts readers but journalists are overhead, just as are truck drivers, deliverymen, painters, etc.

And to Zell's credit, he understands that and he's challenged journalists to think about creating content that readers will want to read. Radical idea but spot on. Until now most newspaper executives were afraid to say this for fear of being seen as turncoats. Zell doesn't care. And Zell is right:

The recording of the Washington meeting gives fresh insight into Zell's annoyance at what he sees as the self-importance of conventional journalists. He says they're peddling goods the public just doesn't want to read: too much insider politics and Iraq, not enough local news.

It's about time.

Stick with spam

It's always hard to argue with research but this latest bit makes me scratch my head.

The research is regarding social networks and the belief that they have less impact on sales than, say, email campaigns.

Mylene Mangalindan of the Wall Street Journal posted on the Wall Street Journal's Business Technology blog results of a recent survey by the National Retail Federation's Shop.org. (Click here for the full post in the Wall Street Journal.)

According to the survey:

About 65% percent of retailers say that social-network advertisements would be an area of increased focus this year, while 55% of retailers say widgets, small, targeted software applications, will be a great focus, according to the study.

But Shop.org issues a warning:

Social Computing efforts continue to be largely experimental with little direct correlation to sales,” warns Shop.org. It says that ads on social networks have “notoriously low click-through rates, far below traditional banner ads and much lower than paid search ads.” It recommends more-proven marketing investments like email.

I shouldn't be one to argue with stats but I find it hard to believe that email campaigns can be any more effective than a campaign on a social network site. Furthermore, the problem here seems to be they're measuring impact by comparing email campaigns to banner ads (proven failures) and paid search ads which are declining in impact. The ad industry seems to want to measure everything the old way, through ways they've done with TV and print. Instead, they should recognize that users see social networks as a great gathering spot and figure out ways to provide compelling interesting messages. Advertising isn't about reaching people sitting on their couch too lazy to turn the channel. It's about engaging people and social networks do just that.

Why Facebook thinks I'm a spammer

So I send a Facebook message to another Facebook user. He's with MySpace. After I send it I get the ominous message you see here. I've never received this before and I send about three messages a week.

I can only conclude that whatever software they use, it's a bit too sensitive to MySpace. Or management is a bit too sensitive about MySpace. Either way, not a good thing.

How a newspaper works online

Nick Carr, best known for his IT Doesn't Matter Article in HBR five years ago, recently wrote about how newspapers should behave in the digital age. (Click here for his full post on Britannica.com.)

In short, Nick argues that users behave differently when reading a paper online.

In print, the appeal is the whole package, the journey from front to back (or the other way around) and the surprises one finds along the way. Online, the reader has a clear mission -- she knows what she wants to read and clicks on that link, ignoring much of the other material.

When a newspaper moves online, the bundle falls apart. Readers don’t flip through a mix of stories, advertisements, and other bits of content. They go directly to a particular story that interests them, often ignoring everything else. In many cases, they bypass the newspaper’s “front page” altogether, using search engines, feed readers, or headline aggregators like Google News, Digg, and Daylife to leap directly to an individual story. They may not even be aware of which newspaper’s site they’ve arrived at. For the publisher, the newspaper as a whole becomes far less important. What matters are the parts. Each story becomes a separate product standing naked in the maketplace. It lives or dies on its own economic merits.

And because of that changed behavior newspapers need to think about content differently. And they need to think about which stories will draw the most ads, and by implication that means the most traffic. In short, each story needs to stand on its own. Expensive, investigative pieces will suffer online simply because they cost much more to produce than service pieces and they will probably not draw many ads.

Each piece of content has to compete separately, consuming costs and generating revenues in isolation. So if you’re a beleaguered publisher, losing readers and money and facing Wall Street’s wrath, what are you going do as you shift your content online? Hire more investigative journalists? Or publish more articles about consumer electronics? It seems clear that as newspapers adapt to the economics of the Web, they are far more likely to continue to fire reporters than hire new ones.

As I've said before, it was inevitable newspapers (and magazines) would face this challenge. For too long they didn't consider what the reader wanted to read instead relying on they thought was best for the reader. The online world has only hastened this transformation.

Another one bites the dust

For the second time this week I learned of a former ink-stained wretch abandoning a print sub to read online only.

From Jimmy Guterman:

But, after years of wavering, I'm done. The environmental argument alone should have been enough for me, but the simple fact is that I do more and more of my reading on a screen (the only holdouts: fiction and poetry). And plenty of that reading has been from the Times. What finally made me give in to the inevitable was realizing, one barely-dawn morning last week when I was reading the paper at our kitchen table, that I had already read much (most?) of it online. For all the pleasure of holding and print, the Times on paper is just too late. In 2008, today's paper is yesterday's news.

Read full post here.

Impending doom

From today's NY Times: The Journal Register has hired Lazard as an adviser as it weighs a restructuring.

If the company were to seek bankruptcy protection, as analysts said was possible, it would be a first in recent memory for a publicly traded newspaper company, John Morton, a longtime newspaper analyst, said.

Two tidbits I find most interesting:

• The company, according to the Times, is carrying $625 million in debt. Not good when the economy is slipping and newspapers are no longer the medium of choice for advertisers.
• Four years ago the company spent $415 million on several Michigan dailies. And we all know how the car industry is doing these days.

Talk about the perfect storm: a recession, heavy debt load, a bad acquisition and, oh by the way, a sector that is fast in decline.

Update (4/12): I just came across this interesting perspective from Louis Hau at Forbes.com. He points out that newspapers, if run properly, can be quite profitable. The problem is when they're saddled with debt or a recession hits. (Click here for full article.)

Understanding Twitter

The hardest part of Twitter is explaining it to people. IM on steroids is the best I've heard to date. But it doesn't do Twitter justice.

Abbie Lundberg, editor of CIO magazine, does one of the better jobs describing her fascination with it and how it works with a demo of how she was able to reach out to a small community and gather info. (See her blog posting here.)

A few tidbits:

If you're into fully articulated thoughts, Twitter may not be for you. But if you're a CIO or any other busy professional, having a tool that quickly and simply aggregates immediate information is a wonderful thing.

Abbie also points to this post from Harry McCracken at PC World which describes Twitter's practicality pretty well. Harry points out some useful tips as well. (Click here for full article.)

Making Web sites easier to read

Jack Shafer goes on a rant against the Washington Post's Web site. He has several points, two of which stand out: (Here's the link to his full article.)

First -- Web sites that don't send links to their competitors. His specific beef with with the Washington Post not linking to the NY Times and vice versa. Jack's right. If your goal is to be the one place people come for news/opinion why wouldn't you point to your competition? Doing so only increases your credibility and makes readers realize that by going to your site they will get as complete a view of the world as possible. At a dot com I worked at I was pulled aside and told to view the Web site like a TV channel. "You don't want anyone changing the channel." How wrong that was and is.

Second -- Link infestation. Jack has beefs about all the links in so many of the articles. I am not sure it's the volume of links but instead the lack of description of where they are taking you. For example, "Google" with a hyperlink. Is that going to the Google home page, to latest stock prices, company profile, article about Google? I think much of the junk we see today would be solved if the author of a posting explained clearly and concisely where the link is going to take people.

Counting by hand

This just came across from AP:

WASHINGTON (AP) The Census Bureau is abandoning plans for the first high-tech census in 2010 and returning to using paper and pencil to count the nation's 300 million residents.

How is it that the United States, one of the technically advanced countries in the world, can't figure out a way to use technology to ensure our census is more accurate?

Update (4/4/08): From today's NY Times more details. It's worse than I thought. So now the federal government will hire 600,000 people to help with the count. The cost of conducting the census will now be $14 billion, $3 billion more than expected. Here's the money quotes with references to Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez:

Mr. Gutierrez, whose department oversees the Census Bureau, said many of the problems were a result of “a lack of effective communication with one of our key contractors.”

Congressional testimony and government reports indicate that the agency was unprepared to manage the contract for the computers. Census officials have been faulted for poorly spelling out technical requirements to the contractor, the Harris Corporation, based in Florida.

John Murrell of All Things Digital agrees.

Opening Day -- Yankee Stadium

The weakest link in data security

There's lots of discussion these days on the security of data. And most people think that hackers, poking their way into corporate systems, are the primary culprits. I haven't seen any stats but my sense is that the weakest link are individuals who lose their laptops.

Here's the latest incident from FierceCIO: (Click here for full story.)

Another week, yet another data theft. This time a laptop PC was stolen containing unencrypted, confidential data on March 4 and the event was disclosed after the company began notifying employees that their data had been snatched. Agilent Technologies, a Santa Clara, Calif.-based maker of test and measurement equipment, sent letters to 51,000 current and former employees telling then that some of their personal and financial data had been stolen. The breach occurred when a laptop was stolen from the car of a Stock & Option Solutions employee, a stock-plan management services firm that works for Agilent as a third-party contractor.

If you want good stuff, visit the blogs

Mark Potts recently weighed in something I've noticed for a while -- the interesting content on newspaper Web sites is on their blogs, not their news pages. (Click here for link to Mark's post.)

I've commented on this before (click here for link) but it raises another issue -- why do newspapers insist on placing blogs in a separate section? Why, if you're publishing a blog covering sports wouldn't you find it in the sports section of the Web site?

The New York Times Web site, which is one of the better ones out there, is a prime example. (See screen shot to the left.)

One of life's mysteries, I suppose.

Dealing with Linksys

Since I am the first to complain about rotten customer experiences I feel morally obligated to say nothing but good things about Linksys.

The past four months have been nothing but a heap of frustrations with my wireless router going out every few weeks. Couple that with the Linksys range expander going out as well as dealing with the help desk and, well you can imagine.

The final straw was the announcement a few weeks ago that I couldn't get any support since the warranty ran out end of December. What followed was a carpet bombing of corporate headquarters with letters complaining.

Since then I have received countless calls offering help and, as of yesterday, a replacement wireless router. So far, so good. Everything seems to be in working order.

Update (4/12): Not a problem yet. Not one crash. Not one reboot. Works like a charm. Fingers crossed.

Get over yourselves

Finalists for the National Magazine Awards have been announced prompting Dylan Stableford to rightly point out how New York centric they've become. (Full post here.)

Actually, nothing new there. And in fact the awards point out a number of flaws in today's magazine industry:

• Instead of worrying about how to attract more readers and to become more relevant the industry is instead patting itself on the back once a year.
• The awards tend to given to those magazines and subject matter that mean something to editors in New York. The reality is that the rest of America's interests rarely match those living in New York.
• Readers don't care about awards. They care about good content. I am willing to bet that winning this award has NEVER resulted in a magazine making more money or increasing circulation.

It's time to get over yourselves.

Reason to not follow the America's Cup No. 474

I honestly have lost track of all the back and forth and couldn't care less anymore. (Article on latest two lawsuits.)

I am starting to think that while it's good for most things to change and for sailing to become more popular, this is not the case for the America's Cup. In the quest to making sailing and the Cup more popular it's just turned into a circus. And those who didn't understand it before now just find the whole thing plain silly.

It's all kind of sad. I used to follow this event with great glee when I was younger. I even convinced my mother to drive me to Newport for a day to view Intrepid and Courageous sitting at the dock.

The quaint days when it was raced in September by amateurs (or mostly amateurs) on Rhode Island Sound look very appealing to me.

Where's the wind?

This is a bit off topic but I was struck by an article in yesterday's Wall Street Journal. (Article is behind a pay firewall.)

In short, it's about wind energy which I think has great possibilities. Lo and behold, power companies that use wind energy are faced with a problem those of us who sail have known forever -- it's hard to predict when it will be windy.

A cold front blew through West Texas on Feb. 26, temporarily lifting wind production. When it subsided, wind speeds dropped, turbines slowed and productivity dropped by 80% to 300 megawatts from about 1,700.

The situation was exacerbated by greater-than-expected energy demand and by lower availability of some fossil-fuel units. To get the system back in balance, the grid operator declared an emergency and tapped big customers who had agreed to be cut in exchange for cash payments.

The problem "showed us we need much better wind forecasting tools," said Kent Saathoff, vice president of system operations at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, a quasipublic, nonprofit corporation that operates most of the state's high-voltage transmission system.

It's good to know there are others who face this same problem although it's probably a more important problem for power companies than it is for sailors.

Broccoli and french fries

I've always been a huge fan of Rob Curley's ever since I read a Fast Company feature on him about how he's helped enlighten newspapers in Kansas, Florida and now Washington about how to improve their products. (Read full article here.)

And while Rob is viewed as an Internet geek (which is good) his real value is that he points out some obvious truths that many people just don't want to hear. In other words, print what people want to read. This made me realize the main challenge facing newspapers and magazines today isn't technology but the fact that many just don't give the readers what they want. The only thing technology has done is speed up the process and point out the flaws.

I bring this up because Rob has a recent post using food as an analogy about how newspapers should think about news. (Read post here.)

He also agrees with my point of view -- that Sam Zell actually makes a lot of sense and people better start listening.

I know this is probably going to make me a little unpopular — or maybe that’s more unpopular — with some of the traditional journalism folks out there, but I actually agree with a lot of the things that Sam Zell has been saying lately.

We need to become more relevant to our audience. We have to make ourselves indispensable to our readers. We shouldn’t let a false sense of self-importance get in the way of trying to make news organizations matter to most folks again. Zell is absolutely correct on these points.