Showing posts with label e-Commerce. Show all posts
Showing posts with label e-Commerce. Show all posts

February 7, 2021

Did You Sell Your GameStop?


Well, I couldn't resist. 

Around midday today, I peaked my head into the local GameStop.

There wasn't 1 single customer in the store. 

Not 1!

There were two workers.

When I asked if they had any GameStop stock. 

The manager said he had been offered some when he got promoted, but unfortunately turned it down. 

Well the stock was a manic bubble for a short time these last few weeks, and it could've made him a bundle. 

Based on what you see today, do you think you should own GameStop?  ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)


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January 31, 2021

GameStop Is What I Call A Sh*t Store

For those of you who have been in GameStop, you know what I mean. 

Let's face it, it's a sh*t store!

They have videogames (some that I like) that you can buy online for half the price and crappy toys and collectables (i.e. "made in China" trinkets)!

Hey, I think you can get some action hero socks on sale for $5. 

The company makes nothing!

Their intellectual property is virtually nill!

Their assets are some leases in strip malls and shopping centers that have less and less traffic due to e-Commerce and Covid!

For those who drove the stock up from a year-low of $2.57 to a high this week of $483.98, congrats on showing that the market can be completely irrational and manipulated by the social media masses. 

Like right before the dot.com bubble of 2000, showoff your brokerage statements and brag about your beefy balances, I remember the local yocals from the barber shop doing the same back then--when everyone was a stock maven and becoming a multimillion from the likes of Pets.com.

But GameStop and AMC (another almost dead company unable to face Netflix, Amazon Prime movies, and all the other streaming plus Covid) are probably worth in concept less than good 'ol Pets.com or the Tulip Mania of the 17th century (at least flowers are beautiful). 

This will end in tears for the ever "greater fool" who's following the herd.  

Let's hope they and the spiraling, out of control national debt don't take down all of us with them!  ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

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August 10, 2020

Beautiful Cookware

Thought this was beautiful cookware at the Amazon 4-Star Store.

BTW, can't believe Amazon is now getting into bricks and mortar too!

These enameled cast iron dutch oven pots are colorful and useful. 

In a way, they are too good-looking to use.  

Maybe just put them on the stovetop and let them look pretty. 

There is always the microwave for the real food. ;-)

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
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August 21, 2013

Post Office And Ice Cream

I took this photo this week in downtown Washington, D.C.

A U.S. Postal Service priority mail sticker stuck onto a pole with a picture of ice cream--2 scoops--with dollar signs on them. And an eye in a pyramid on the lower left. 

I am not sure whether the mail sticker was just a part of the grafitti here or whether someone was trying to make a statement about the financial state-of-affairs of the Postal Service--losing money--and the loses stacking up over time, as the watchful eye of Government looks on. 

I love getting mail like everyone else--except bills and junk mail.

But with a multitude of technology (email, texts, and so on) replacing traditional paper mail--the Post Office needs a new business model.  

How about a serious focus on package delivery (for all the e-Commerce ordering we are doing)? 

Or then again, would anyone mind an ice cream counter in every post office to make some happy faces and real money? ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

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April 27, 2011

Smartphone Apps For Shopaholics

Shopping

In the old Ginsu commercials, they used to say "In Japan, the hand can be used like a knife...but this method doesn't work with a tomato."

Now, in the the United States and elsewhere, the smartphone can soon be used like a wallet, and this does work with tomatos or anything else you want to purchase!

Electronic payments are taking on new meaning as we go from paying with traditional credit and debit cards or even payment services like Paypal to actually using our smartphones to make those payments.

Wired Magazine (November 2010) reports that "Google's newest iteration of its Android phone OS will include a wallet that lets you use your phone to make payments by tapping it against a cash register."

According to Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google, he envisions that "This could eventually replace credit cards."

"Like the technology built into debit cards that can be used to make a payment by bumping against a reader at a store or gas pump, Android 2.3 devices that have the right on-board chip will be able to make payments using stored credit card numbers or other payments systems such as Paypal."

Payment technologies coupled with context-aware computing (such as location awareness) will enable your local merchants to send shopping suggestions, reminders, coupons, loyalty programs rewards, and targeted deals to customers--all over their smartphones.

Aside from e-Payments, retailers are looking to up the ante in their competition with online merchants.

According to the Wall Street Journal today (26 April 2011), stores and malls are "threatened by the rapid growth of online retailing", where merchants are able to offer everything from product search, free shipping, easy returns, often no sales tax (like Amazon) and broadcast deals over the social networks like through Groupon. And while "online sales still account for a just a fraction of overall retail sales, they are growing rapidly gaining 12.6% last year to $176.2 billion."

Therefore, brick and mortar retailers are looking to offer a host of app functions for everything from creating online shopping lists, in store product search, you-are-here location functions, mall directories, parking-spot markers, reward programs, and display promotions.

So aside from iPhone plug-in for taking credit card payments on the smartphone (the topic of a prior blog), there are a lot of smartphones Apps and OS features coming that will make shopping easier, friendlier, and generally more convenient.

So in case you needed another excuse to go shopping and indulge...try out some of the new smartphone apps that will make your experience even that much more decadent. ;-)

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March 5, 2011

iPhone Plug Ins: The Possibilites Are Endless




I just love all the new plug ins for the iPhone--maximizing it's use as a powerful handheld computer.
Whether it's attachments for talking fingerprints and iris scans (from MORIS--that I wrote about in a prior blog) to running credit card payments (from Square), the iPhone has amazing versatility and almost endless practical use--as we are all coming to learn and enjoy.
With Square, the simple credit card reader plugs right in to the headphone jack.
Then by simply launching the app, users are ables to run payments through just as any professional business would.
Simply type in the dollar amount, sign with a finger, send a receipt via email, and even display the GPS of where the charge was made--all done by mobile device and wirelessly.
According to BusinessWeek (10 Feb 2011), smart-phone card readers will process $11 billion in payments this year and this is projected to rise to $55 billion by 2015.
"Square charges merchants 2.75 percent of sales plus 15 cents per card swipe," but in turn creates new opportunities to sell remotely and transact business seamlessly.
It is only a matter of time before hard currency becomes obsolete as electronic payments becomes easier and matter of course.
My pockets are already empty and I do not miss the greenbacks--bits and bytes registering securely in the bank are more than fine by me.
Next up as for attachments to the iPhone--medical scanners (the possibilities are endless, but some examples could be for diabetes metering, X-rays, and much more.)

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November 5, 2010

Turning Consumerism Into Collaboration

I’m sure you’ve noticed that we are historically and fundamentally a consumerist society.

We spend a lot of time and money shopping and buying things—many of the things that we buy, we acknowledge that we don’t even need—just check your attic lately? :-)

Many compulsive buyers have even self-proclaimed themselves “shopaholics.”

Aside from being somewhat obsessive compulsive in the way we treat buying and owning things, we tend to be pretty wasteful in buying and throwing out things, often from individualized, single use servings—think fast food, as one example.

The result, according the Environmental Protection Agency (per WiseGeek), the average American produces 4.4 pounds of garbage a day or 1,600 pounds a year (and that doesn’t include industrial waste or commercial trash).

On the flip side of all the tossing out we do, are “hoarders” or those with the tendency to keep lots of things, often piled high in every corner of their homes and offices; there is even a show called by the same on A&E television dedicated to this.

So we shop a lot, spend a lot, buy a lot, and then consume it, hoard it, or toss it. And we do this with enormous volumes of things and in ridiculously rapid cycle times—for example, how many times a week do you find yourself in the stores buying things or then taking out the trash generated from it? (I can practically hear the lyrics of the Hefty commercial playing: ”Hefty, Hefty, Hefty—Stinky, Stinky, Stinky…”)

Overall, it’s a crazy system of conspicuous consumption driven by perceived needs for materialism, highly refined and effective marketing and advertising techniques, and people’s feelings of relative deprivation.

Yet despite these, there is movement underway to change from a society obscured by habits of personal ownership and consumption to a more healthy and balanced approach based on sharing and reuse.

And this is approach for sharing is happening not just in terms of personal consumption, but also in terms of our organizational use of technology, such as in service-oriented architectures, common and enterprise solutions, virtualization, and cloud computing.

We see change happening as a result of the huge financial deficits we have piled on individually, organizationally, and as a nation; the depletion of our vital natural resources (including concerns about our future energy supplies and other limited raw materials like precious metals etc.); and the fear of pollution and the poisoning our planet for future generations.

An interesting article in Wired called “Other Peoples Property” (Sept. 2010) talks about how we are moving finally toward a model of sharing through peer-to-peer renting sites like at www.zilok.com (with 150,000 items listed including cars, vacations, tools, electronics, cloths, and more) and other swapping sites for books, CDs, video games, etc. like www.swaptree.com. Of course, Zipcars and property timeshares are other fashionable examples of this new way of thinking!

Further, the article references a new book by Rachel Botsman called “What’s Mine is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption,” about how we are moving to a new consumption model that emphasizes “usefulness over ownership, community over selfishness, and sustainability over novelty.”

With new technologies and tools there is more opportunity than ever to share and reuse, for example:

  • Online repositories of goods and advanced search capabilities provides the ability to find exactly what we are looking for.
  • Embedding everyday items with microprocessors, networking them, and aiding them with geolocation, enables us to get self-status on their presence, health and availability for use.
  • E-commerce, electronic payment, and overnight shipping, gives us the ability to have the items available when and where we need them, and we can then return them for someone else to take their turn to use them.

If we can get over the stigma of sharing and reuse, perhaps, the day is coming when we can think of many non-personal items more in terms of community use and less in terms of mine and yours, and we’ll all be the richer for it.


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October 16, 2009

Paper Catalogs Have Seen Their Day

Every day in the mail comes oodles of consumer catalogs: printed on quality stock paper, glossy, and many almost as thick as the community phone book.

Often, right in the mailroom, there is a huge recycle bin and there just about everybody drops the catalogues from their mailbox straight into the “trash.”

Who needs these expensive and wasteful printed catalogues that typically go from mailbox to recycle bin or garbage can without anyone even breaking the binding on them? With the Internet, the same information—and more—is available online. Moreover, online, you can comparison shop between stores for the best prices, shipping, and return policies, and you can typically get product and vendor ratings too to make sure that you are not buying a dud from a dud!

Despite this, according to the Wall Street Journal, 16 October 2009, “more than 17 billion catalogs were mailed in the U.S. last year--about 56 for every American.”

Read again—56 for every American! This is obscene.

Here are some basic statistics on the wastefulness of these catalogs:

“Catalogs account for 3% of the roughly 80 million tons of paper products.”

“Making paper accounted for 2.4% of U.S. energy use in 2006.”

“The paper typically used in catalogs contains about 10% recycled content…far less than paper in general, which typically contains about 30%...[and] for newspapers, the amount of recycled content is roughly 40%.”

“The average U.S catalog retailer reported mailing about 21 million catalogs in 2007.”

“The National Directory of Catalogs…lists 12,524 catalogs.”

YET…

“Only 1.3% of those catalogs generated a sale.”

So why do printed paper catalogs persist?

Apparently, “because glossy catalog pages still entice buyers in a way that computer images don’t.” Moreover, marketers say that catalogs at an average cost of slightly over a $1.20 each “drive sales at web sites.”

And of course, the U.S. Postal Service “depends on catalogs as an important source of revenue.”

However, in the digital era, it is time for us to see these paper catalogs get converted en-mass into e-catalogs. Perhaps, a paper copy can still be made available to consumers upon request, so those who really want them and will use them, can still get them, but on a significantly more limited basis.

Sure, catalogs are nice to leaf through, especially around the holiday time. But overall, they are a profligate waste of money and a drain on our natural resources. They fill our mailboxes with mostly “junk” and typically are completely unsolicited. With the advent of the Internet, paper catalogs are “overcome by events” (OBE), now that we have vast information rich, e-commerce resources available online, all the time.

Normally, I believe in taking a balanced approach to issues, and moderating strong opinions. However, in this case, we are talking about pure waste and harm to our planet, just because we don’t have the capacity to change.

We need to stop persisting in the old ways of doing business when they are no longer useful. This is just one example of those, and business that don’t transition to digital modernity in a timely fashion risk becoming obsolete along with their catalogs that go from the mailbox right into the trash.


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September 18, 2009

What Stops Us From Going Cashless

How many of you ever wondered why we continue to use dollar bills and coins when we have credit and debit cards that make cash virtually obsolete?

I for one have long abandoned cash in lieu of the ease of use, convenience, orderliness of receiving monthly statements and paying electronically, and the cleanliness of not having to carry and handle the cold hard stuff.

Not that I am complaining about money at a time of recession, but seriously why do we not go dollar-digital in the “digital age”?

Before debit cards, I understood that some people unfortunately have difficulty getting the plastic because of credit issues. But now with debit cards, everyone can shop and pay digitally.

Even government run programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP aka food stamps) now uses an electronic card for purchasing no money paper stamps.

It seems that credit/debit card readers are pretty much ubiquitous—stores of course, online—it’s the way to go, even on the trains/buses and candy machines.

From the taxman perspective, I would imagine it is also better and more equitable to track genuine sales transactions in a documented digital fashion than enabling funny “cash business.”

So why don’t we go paperless and coinless and fully adopt e-Commerce?

An interesting article in the Wall Street Journal, 11 Sept. 2009, described a trendy NYC restaurant that was doing just that.

“The high-end New York City restaurant said goodbye to dollars: Tip in cash if you like but otherwise, your money is no good here.”

Others have been going cashless for some time now.

“In the world of online and catalog retailing, credit and debit cards have long been king. And in recent years, a handful of airlines have adopted ‘cashless cabins.’”

As the NYC restaurant owner said, “Suddenly, it struck me how unnecessary cash was…[moreover,] the convenience and security of going cashless are well worth the added cost.”

Further, from the customer perspective, using a debit or credit card lets users optimize their cash flow and earn reward points.

I believe that the day is coming when bites and bytes are going to win over paper and coins.

This is going to happen, when the IRS requires it, the government stops printing it because it always has (i.e. inertia), when retailers recognize that the benefits of digital money outweigh the fees, and when resistance to change is defeated by common sense of modernization.


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September 15, 2009

Happy Birthday Internet

On September 2, 2009, the Internet celebrated its fortieth birthday.

ComputerWorld (14 Sept. 2009) reports that 40 years ago “computer scientists created the first network connection, a link between two computers at the University of California, Los Angeles.” This was the culmination of research funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) in the 1960s.

This information technology milestone was followed by another, less than two months later, on October 29 1969, when Leonard Kleinrock "sent a message from UCLA to a node at the Sanford Research Institute in Palo Alto, California."

While the Internet conceptually become a reality four decades ago, it didn’t really go mainstream until almost the 1990’s—with the founding of the World Wide Web project in 1989, AOL for DOS in 1991, and the Mosaic browser in 1993.

Now, I can barely remember what life was like before the Internet. Like the black and white pictures of yester-year: life was simple and composed, but also sort of lifeless, more boring indeed, and less colorful for sure. In other words, I wouldn’t want to go back.

Also, before the Internet, the world was a lot smaller. Even with connections to others far away—by phone and by plane—people’s day-to-day connections were more limited to those in close proximity—on their block, down on Main Street, or in and around town. It took an extra effort to communicate, share, deal, and interchange with people beyond the immediate area.

At present with the Internet, every email, chat, information share, e-commerce transaction, social media exchange, and application are a blast across the reaches of cyberspace. And like the vastness of the outer space beyond planet Earth, cyber space represents seemingly endless connectivity to others over the Internet.

What will the Next Generation Internet (NGI) bring us?

ComputerWorld suggests the following—many of which are already with us today:

  • Improved mobility—like “showing you things about where you are” (for example, where’s the nearest restaurant, restroom, or service station or even where are your friends and family members).
  • Greater information access—“point your mobile phone at a billboard, and you’ll see more information” about a particular advertisement.
  • Better e-commerce—“use the Internet to immediately pay for goods.”
  • Enhanced visualization—Internet will “take on a much more three-dimensional look.”

I believe the future Internet is going to be like Second Life on steroids with a virtual environment that is completely immersive—interactive with all five senses and like speaking with Hal the computer, answering your every question and responding to your every need.

It’s going to be great and I’m looking forward to saying “Happy Birthday Internet” for many more decades, assuming we don’t all blow ourselves out of the sky first.


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September 4, 2009

Internet Addiction—The Real Thing

Yes, people talk about having an Internet addiction and chuckle. But this is becoming the real thing!

AP (3 September 2009) reports that ReSTART, the first U.S. residential treatment center for Internet addiction opened near Redmond (home of Microsoft).

The center offers a 45-day program costing $14,000 to treat pathological computer use.

This includes “obsessive use of video games, texting, Facebook, eBay, Twitter” and more.

So far only one patient is in treatment, but more are sure to be coming.

“There are many such treatment centers in China, South Korea, and Taiwan—where Internet addiction is taken very seriously—and many psychiatric experts say it is clear that Internet addiction is real and harmful.

How does using the Internet or computer harm people?

The effects of addiction are no joke. They range from loss of a job or marriage to car accidents for those who can’t stop texting while driving. Some people have did after playing video games for days without a break, generally stemming from a blood clot associated with being sedentary.”

Experts are debating whether to include Internet Addiction in the next version of the Diagnostic Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders 2012.

“’Internet addicts’ are folks who have severe depression, anxiety, disorders, or social symptoms that make it hard for them to live a full, balanced life and deal face-to-face with other people.”

What are the warning signs (according to AP)?

  • Preoccupied thinking about computers and the Internet
  • Using it longer than intended
  • Using it for increasing amounts of time
  • Repeatedly making unsuccessful efforts to control use
  • Jeopardizing relationships, school or work to spend time online
  • Lying to cover the extent of use
  • Using it to escape problems or feelings of depressions

I suppose everything can be taken to an extreme even computer use. In which case, even highly useful, productive, and transformative information technology can be misused and abused.

Oddly enough, we seem to be feeding the addiction like a glutton—there is an almost endless array of new computer gadgets and applications giving almost endless reason to get online and soak up all the information, social media, e-commerce, and entertainment available. It’s all very alluring and compelling.

Seems pretty easy for people to go of the deep end with this.

So when was the last time you stayed off the Internet for more than 24 hours? How many of you are compulsively checking email, Blackberrys, Facebook, Twitter, IM, texting, and surfing the net? I would even throw in compulsively on the cell phone—yap, yap, yap.

Will there come a time when people reject this 24/7/365 e-lifestyle and push for greater online moderation?

Looking at other types of addictions, at one time people smoked like chimneys and then the realization of the negative side effects led to people putting on the nicotine patches or otherwise going cold turkey, either kicking the habit or greatly cutting back.

The same occurred with a period in society of heavy drinking/alcoholism followed by prohibition and then a more moderate acceptance of social drinking.

It seems that the addiction line gets crossed when people can no longer control their behavior and it results in them hurting themselves or others.

The problem is that we don’t have very good foresight with any of this and we only tend to see the negative consequences of overuse/abuse only after some time—that the empirical nature of science.

So will we wait for a higher prevalence of socio/psychological disorders from Internet addiction, greater numbers of burnt out workers, higher divorce rates, more child neglect, further accidents because people can’t stop their darn texting while driving OR will we be able to foresee the unintended, but certain effects of doing too much of a good, Internet thing?


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August 30, 2009

Privacy vs. Exhibitionism

We are a nation torn between on one hand wanting our privacy safeguarded and on the other hand wanting to share ourselves openly and often on the Internet—through Social Media, e-Commerce, e-mail, and so forth.

These days, we have more information about ourselves available to others than at any time in history. We are information exhibitionists—essentially an open book—sharing virtually everything about ourselves to everybody.

Online, we have our personal profile, photos, videos, likes and dislikes, birth date, addresses, email and phone contacts, employer, resume, friends and family connections, banking information, real estate transactions, legal proceedings, tax returns, and more. We have become an open book to the world. In a sense we have become an exhibitionistic nation.

While we continue to friend, blog, tweet, and post our thoughts, feelings, and personal information online, we are shocked and dismayed when there is a violation of our privacy.

How did we get to this point—here are some major milestones on privacy (in part from MIT Technology Review--July/August 2009):

1787—“Privacy” does not appear in Constitution, but the concept is embedded in protections such as “restrictions of quartering soldiers in private homes (Third Amendment), prohibition against unreasonable search and seizure (Fourth Amendment), prohibition against forcing a person to be a witness against himself (Fifth Amendment).

1794—Telegraph invented

1876—Telephone invented

1890—Boston Lawyers Samuel Warren and Louis Brandeis wrote in Harvard Law Review of “the right to be let alone” and warned that invasive technologies threatened to take “what was whispered in the closet” and have it “proclaimed from the house-tops.”

1914Federal Trade Commission Act prohibits businesses from engaging in “unfair or deceptive acts or practices”; has been extended to require companies to write privacy policies describing what they do with personal information they collect from customers and to honor these policies.

1934Federal Communications Act limits government wiretapping

1969—ARPANet (precursor to Internet) went live

1970Fair Credit Reporting Act regulates collections, dissemination, and use of consumer information, including credit information

1971—First e-mail sent.

1973—Code of Fair Information Practices limits secret data banks, requires that organizations ensure they are reliable and protected from unauthorized access, provides for individuals to be able to view their records and correct errors.

1974—Privacy Act prohibits disclosure of personally identifiable information from federal agency.

1988—Video Privacy Protection Act protects against disclosure of video rentals and sales.

1996—Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) protects against disclosures by health care providers.

1999Scott McNealy, CEO of Sun Microsystems states: “You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it.”

2000—Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act prohibits intentional collections of information from children 12 or younger

2001—USA Patriot Act expands government’s power to investigate suspected terrorism acts

2003—Do Not Call Implementation Act limits telemarketing calls

2006—Google Docs release for creating and editing docs online

2009—Facebook 4th most popular website in the world

As anyone can see, there is quite a lot of history to protecting privacy. Obviously, we want to be protected. We need to feel secure. We fear our information being misused, exploited, or otherwise getting out of our control.

Yet, as technology progresses, the power of information sharing, collaboration, and online access is endlessly enticing as it is useful, convenient, and entertaining. We love to go online and communicate with people near and far, conduct e-commence for any product near seamlessly, and work more and more productively and creatively.

The dichotomy between privacy and exhibitionism is strong and disturbing. How do we ensure privacy when we insist on openness?

First, let me say that I believe the issue here is greater than the somewhat simplistic answers that are currently out there. Obviously, we must rely on common sense + technology.

From a common sense perspective, we need to personally safeguard truly private information—social security numbers and mother’s maiden name are just the obvious. We need not only be concerned about distinct pieces of information, but information in the aggregate. In other words, individual pieces of information may not be easily exploitable, but when aggregated together with other publically available information—you may now be truly exposed.

In terms of technology, we need to invest more time, money, and effort into securing our systems and networks. Unfortunately, businesses are more concerned with quarterly revenue and profit targets than with securing our personal information. We have got to incentivize every business, organization, and government entity to put security and privacy first. Just like we teach our children, “safety first”, we need to change our adult priorities as well or risk serious harm to ourselves and our nation from cyber criminals, terrorisms, and hostile nation states.

But the real issue is, why do we continue to treat technology as if it is more secure and private than it truly is? In a sense, we shut our eyes to the dangers that we know are lurking, and tell ourselves “it only happens to somebody else.” How do we curb our enthusiasm for technological progress with a realism of recognizing the very real dangers that persist?


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May 25, 2009

When Shall We Call For Change?

We see change coming. We hear change coming. We feel change coming. But what happens? It does not come. Why?

1.     Fear—people are afraid of changing or of not being able to adapt (for example, some may be afraid of changing jobs for fear of failing or of not being able to make the transition well to a different organization).

2.     Money—someone(s) is invested in the status quo (for example, could it be that oil companies stand to lose if we go with hybrid engines or alternative energy sources like solar, wind.).

3.     Politics—perhaps, those in power have constituents that will “yell and scream” or lobby if others seek a change that they are for one reason or another are opposed to (for example, those who are pro-choice will lobby vehemently when pro-lifers attempt to limit or regulate abortion).

Note: I am NOT advocating for or against any of these positions, just providing a contextual explanation.

However, as a CIO or other leader (and this can be an official leadership position or one that is taken on by strategic thinkers, enthusiasts, and so on), I am convinced that we must call for change and help change along when “its time has come”—that is when the following conditions exist:

1)    Time is ripe

2)    Support to the people affected can be adequately provided for

3)     It is unequivocal that society will universally benefit and the change is fair and ethical. (Yes, the last one is hard to demonstrate and may be considered somewhat objective, but the concept of having “justifiable” change is important.)

Here is an example of an interesting change being called for by David Wolman in Wired Magazine, June 2009 that clearly demonstrates how these three criteria for leaders to evoke change works:

Wolman address the cost and by inference the benefits of change (#3 above): We “create hundreds of billions of dollars worth of new bills and coins every year…the cost to the taxpayers in 2008 alone was $848 million, more than two-thirds of which was spent minting coins that many people regards as a nuisance. (The process alone used u more than 14,823 tons of zinc, 23,879 tons of copper, and 2,514 tons of nickel.) In an era when books, movies, music, and newsprint are transmuting from atoms to bits, money remains irritatingly analog, carbon-intensive, expensive medium of exchange. Let’s dump it.”

Then Wolman demonstrates that  time for change is ripe   (#1 above): We have all sorts of digital money these days, such as credit cards, debit cards, e-checks, automatic bank deposits/payments, electronic transfers, and online payments. “Markets are already moving that way. Between 2003 and 2006, noncash payment in the US increased 4.6 percent annually, while the percentage of payment made using checks dropped 13.2 percent. Two years ago, card based payment exceeded paper-based ones—case checks, food stamps—for the first time. Nearly 15 percent of all US online commerce goes through PayPal. Smartcard technologies like EagleCash and FreedomPay allow military personnel and college students to ignore paper money….the infrastructure didn’t exist back then. But today that network is in place. In fact, it’s already in your pocket. ‘The cell phone is the best point of sale terminal ever’ Says Mark Pickens.”

Finally, Wolman shows that we can support people through this change (#2 above): “Opponents used to argue that killing cash would hurt low-income workers—for instance, by eliminating cash tips. But a modest increase in the minimum wage would offset that loss; government savings from not printing money could go toward lower taxes for employers. And let’s not forget the transaction costs of paper currency, especially for the poor. If you’re less well off, check cashing fees and 10-mile bus rides to make payments or purchases are not trivial…”

Whether or not it is “Time to Cash Out” of paper money as Wolman calls for (i.e. this is just an example to show how the criteria for change can be used), the need for leaders to move us towards and guide us through change is at the essence of leadership itself. Change should not be taken lightly, but should be evaluated for timeliness, supportability, and justifiability.


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February 22, 2009

Disruptive Technologies

When companies get cozy, the marketplace gets innovative and from out of nowhere...a disruptive technology upends things.

We've seen this happen countless of times in big ways.

In the auto industry, 50 years ago neither GM nor Ford would have ever dreamed that they would lose their virtual monopoly on the U.S. auto industry to foreign car companies that would dislodge them with compact vehicles and hybrid engine technologies.

More recently in the music industry, Apple seized the day by combining functionality, stylishness and price on their iPod player with an accessible online iTunes music store.

More generally, the whole world of e-Commerce has stolen much of the show from the brick and mortar retail outlets with internet marketing, online transaction processing, supply chain management and electronic funds transfer.

Now, another disruption is occurring in the computer market. For years, the computer industry has made every effort to provide more raw computing power, memory, and functionality with every release of their computers. And Moore’s law encapsulated this focus with predictions of doubling every two years.

Now, on the scene comes the Netbook—a simpler, less powerful, less capable computing device that is taking off. Yes, this isn’t the first time that we’ve had a drive toward smaller, sleeker devices (phones, computers, and so on), but usually the functionality is still growing or at the very least staying the same. But with Netbooks smaller truly does mean less capable.

Wired magazine, March 2009, states “ The Netbook Effect: Dinky keyboard. Slow chip. Tiny hard drive. And users are going crazy for them.”

How did we get here?

“For years now, without anyone really noticing, the PC industry has functioned like a car company selling SUVs: It pushed absurdly powerful machines because the profit margins were high, which customers lapped up the fantasy that they could go off-roading, even though they never did.”

So what happened?

What netbook makers have done is turn back the clock: Their machine perform the way laptops did four years ago. And it turns out that four years ago (more or less) is plenty.”

“It turns out that about 95%...can be accomplished through a browser…Our most common tasks—email, Web surfing, watching streaming videos—require very little processing power.”

The netbook manufactures have disrupted the computer market by recognizing two important things:

  1. Computer users have adequate computing power for their favorite tasks and what they really want now is more convenience and at a price that says buy me.
  2. Cloud computing is no longer an idea full of hot air, but it is a technology that is here now and can do the job for consumers. We can get our applications over the web and do not have to run them on our client machines. We can afford to have computers that do less, because the cloud can do more!

The result?

Foreign companies are running away with the Netbook market. “By the end of 2008, Asustek had sold 5 million netooks, and other brands together had sold 10 million…In a single year, netbooks had become 7 percent of the world’s entire laptop market. Next year it will be 12%.”

“And when Asustek released the Eee notbook, big firms like Dell, HP, and Apple did nothing for months.” They were taken off guard by miscalculation and complacency.

The future?

Of course, the big boys of computing are hoping that the netbook will be a “secondary buy—the little mobile thing you get after you already own a normal size laptop. But it’s also possible, that the next time your replacing an aging laptop, you’ll walk away into the store and wonder, ‘why exactly am I paying so much for a machine that I use for nothing but email and the Web?’ And Microsoft and Intel and Dell and HO and Lenovo will die a little bit inside that day.”

Implications for CIOs?

  • End complacency and always be on the lookout for disruptive technologies and ways of doing business. There is always a better way!
  • Hardware becomes a commodity over time and supplying the infrastructure for the organization is moving the way that electricity generation did at the turn of the 20th century—to outside vendors that can do it more effectively and efficiently.
  • Cloud computing means that commonly used software applications are available over the internet and can be provide the foundation business functionality for the organization.

The important future value add from the Office of CIO is in IT strategy, planning, governance, and mission-focused solutions. We need CIOs that are true leaders, innovative, and focused on the business and not just on the technology.


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