Total Recall Or Total Bull? Some Perspective On The iPhone 4 Antenna Frenzy

Given the amount of coverage about the iPhone 4 antenna issue, you’d think it was the first sign of the apocalypse or something. It’s one thing for tech blogs to talk ourselves in circles about an issue, it’s another when the mainstream media starts leaning on the story in a major way. I mean, this was Keith Olbermann’s number one item on Countdown last night . And local broadcasts across the country are devoting time to it. I mean, the random people sitting next to me in the cafe are taking about it right now for chrissakes. It has become coffee house conversation. Seriously. It’s time to take a step back and get some perspective about what’s going on here. The Problem Is Real First of all, the antenna issue is very real . Depending on how strong the coverage is in the area you’re in, you may notice it to varying degrees (and some may not notice at all). But there is no question in my mind that holding the lower left corner of the device degrades the signal. And in places with already shoddy service — like San Francisco — it degrades it to the point of failure. I’ve seen this with my own eyes. I can reproduce the problem at will. It’s real. Software Won’t Fix It Second, I say there is no way software fixes this issue. Apple’s promised iOS 4 update will make your phone more accurately portray just how shoddy your service may be — but it will not stop failures. I just don’t see anyway that it can. Even with shitty service, the iPhone 4 works — and I would say works better than any iPhone before it in terms of signal — but when you cover the lower left sliver, signal fades. Apple can alter the software so it doesn’t show this signal fading, but it will still be happening. Free Bumpers Are Likely Third, Apple’s bumper case absolutely fixes the issue. This is yet more evidence that the issue is all about the human hand touching this area directly — again, a hardware issue. If you put on the bumper, you can hold the phone in the lower left corner and it still works just fine. I’ve tried this in dozens of different areas with a few different phones. That’s why I do believe that Apple will eventually give away these bumpers to users that want them. It’s a hell of a lot cheaper and easier than doing a product recall (more on that below). These bumpers were already way too expensive at $29 a pop. Now that they may be necessary for some customers, Apple needs to remedy this. I’m thinking this will be along the lines of when the Nintendo Wii first came out. People started complaining that they were throwing their remotes, so eventually Nintendo offered free wrist bands to anyone who requested them. And then they eventually made rubberized grips that they gave away. I think Apple will follow this model. Only Some Affected? Some people are still insistent that their iPhone 4s don’t have the antenna issue at all. I’ve tested four different units now — all had the same problem. I tend to believe that people who aren’t seeing it may be in areas of good coverage (which, as mentioned, make the issue much less obvious). It is certainly possible that only some hardware units are affected. But everything I’ve read and seen indicates that if the problem is limited, it’s “limited” to a massive number of units. I tend to believe these unaffected iPhones are the exception, not the rule. No Total Recall That said, I still don’t think a total recall is likely at this point. Some people are claiming it’s inevitable — but that’s the sexy thing everyone is hoping to read at this point. Think about what a recall means for a second. Apple would not only be recalling millions of devices, but they’d likely have to alter the entire manufacturing and design process of the device to fix the issue. Perhaps that’s why they delayed the white iPhone 4 — but I doubt it. The fact of the matter is that a recall is the last option for Apple. For that to happen, people would have to begin returning their devices in massive numbers. All indications are that this is not happening. The device has been out for a few weeks now, and I’ve only heard about a handful of people returning iPhone 4. If that’s not the case, feel free to let us know, but I’m pretty confident it is. Whether they admit it or not (which they won’t), Apple clearly made a mistake in the placement of this antenna crevice. It should be at the bottom or top (or even the upper left or right corner) of the device where it’s not natural to hold the thing. Apple will undoubtedly fix this in next year’s phone (and perhaps even the Verizon version, if that is indeed coming ) — but look for them to exhaust all other options to try and make it to the iPhone 5 launch next year without a total recall. Think (About Holding It) Different So if people aren’t returning the device en masse — and remember, millions of these things have already been sold — how are they dealing with the issue? First of all, as I said, in areas of strong coverage, this is much less of an issue — I’ve noticed that myself as well when I was outside of San Francisco. Second, one reason I didn’t notice the issue right away is because I naturally tend to hold the phone in a way that doesn’t cause the issue. Certainly, the fact that I’m right handed helps this (the lower right corner isn’t affected). But when I do hold it in my left hand, I tend to hold it a bit higher than the trouble spot. I’m not saying everyone is like me, but it’s certainly plausible that a number of owners are. As news of the issue was breaking, Apple CEO Steve Jobs famously remarked that perhaps users should hold it different . That remark was wildly criticized (and rightly so) but I suspect that some users may be doing just that. If you don’t want to use the rubber case — which, let’s be honest, does slightly ruin the beauty of the device — shifting your hand up so it doesn’t touch the problem area is certainly an option. Should a user have to do that? Of course not. But I bet that some are. It’s the easiest fix in the world — it was just dumb of Steve Jobs to say so from a PR perspective. A Hit On Apple Or Just A Hit? In the tech blogosphere, Apple has been no stranger to bad press over the past couple of years as their power continues to rise. But the fact of the matter is that most of this has not spilled over to mainstream consumers who continue to buy up Apple products in record numbers. This is the first issue that is both real and getting a lot of mainstream press. Apple is in a precarious position here. The people in the coffee shop next to me are now explaining the problem to someone else sitting next to them. The news is out there and spreading fast. That said, these same people are also gushing about how great the product itself is. Trust me, they’re not returning it. Instead, they’re going to hold it different. But the bigger problem for Apple is whether the news of this problems stop those on the fence from buying it. That’s certainly a very real possibility. Still, if I had to bet, I’d side with this being yet another massive hit product for Apple. The iPhone has never been a great phone (no matter if that’s Apple or AT&T’s fault), but that hasn’t stopped millions of people from making it their primary phone. It is still the best mobile device (even Consumer Reports agrees, giving it the highest rating , despite the recommendation that you don’t buy it) you can buy. And the Apple marketing juggernaut seems unstoppable. We joke about the fanboy stuff all the time. But let’s be serious for a second. If any company creates a product that users can’t use, people will return it or simply not buy it. It doesn’t matter if it’s an Apple product or any other brand. If a product doesn’t work, you can’t use it. And it won’t sell. It’s that simple. But that’s not the case here. I’ve been using the iPhone 4 for the past few weeks with no issues out of the ordinary except when I try to create one. If it didn’t work, I wouldn’t use it. That’s just reality. But I am using it, on a daily basis. And I will continue doing so. The problem is real. But in the end, most consumers may view it as not really a problem. But Apple absolutely needs to make those bumpers free. CrunchBase Information iPhone 4 Information provided by CrunchBase

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Total Recall Or Total Bull? Some Perspective On The iPhone 4 Antenna Frenzy

Inside CloudCrowd: Betting On Credibility [Video]

As one of the founders of the original Napster and CloudMark (an anti-spam service), Jordan Ritter , has always been fascinated by the idea of combining the power of the cloud and the potential of human capital. Last April, he met up with Alex Edelstein , a former CloudMark executive, to hammer out their next business plan. Over a round of beers, the idea for CloudCrowd was born. Like CrowdFlower and Amazon’s Mechanical Turk , CloudCrowd is trying to bring labor into the cloud, by creating a vast network of workers around the globe. Today, there are roughly 25,000 workers, who have completed more than a million tasks since the site’s launch in October 2009. That represents a small fraction of CrowdFlower’s claim to 500,000 workers, but CEO Edelstein says their force is quickly expanding, with some 2,000 additions each week. Although it took 7 months to reach the one million task mark, Edelstein predicts they’ll reach 2 million jobs in 8 weeks. See video above. CloudCrowd has two main segments. The bulk of its business is client-driven work: a company submits tasks to CloudCrowd and the service will farm that out to eligible workers. Workers access CloudCrowd through a Facebook app, where they can pick available tasks and arrange payment.The tasks can be as simple as checking the quality of an image or involve the translation of entire web pages. Because pricing is determined by the level of difficulty, the payouts range from one penny to several dollars. Once a task is completed, a separate user will check the finished product for an additional fee, creating a level of quality control. The second part of their business is a new layer of consumer-facing services. CloudCrowd recently launched EditZen, a simple web site, where consumers can submit pages for editing at $4 a page. The company will soon launch TranslationZen, which will offer translation services at $19.95 a page (far cheaper than some alternatives which are priced at $60 a page). Aside from their consumer services, CloudCrowd’s cut varies widely depending on the job— ranging from a 20% cut to as high as 80%. The average worker doesn’t get paid handsomely for their task, but it can be a nice source for supplemental income— especially for workers in developing countries where salaries are generally well below America’s mean. In fact, the company now attracts more workers outside of the US, with a heavy concentration in Southeast Asia and Eastern Europe (many from Malaysia, Philippines and Singapore). The startup, which has yet to reach profitability, is a 15 person operation in San Francisco with modest funding. So far Edelstein is their sole investor, with $1.5 million in the project, but they are talking to major VC firms about a Series A round. The main challenge for a company like CloudCrowd is keeping pace with its ever-growing workforce. Edelstein admits that feeding the machine with sufficient volume and variety is a difficult endeavor in this early stage. The company has not spent a significant amount of capital on marketing and courting clients, instead, CloudCrowd still relies on word of mouth to attract new business. “Well it’s true that the number one complaint of our workers is give me more work, I want more availability of jobs. In both of the previous outsourcing, disruptive eras, the era of manufacturing moving to China and developing nations and the era of white collar work moving to India it took years of explaining, educating and showing corporations and all sorts of people who had work how much they could benefit…how consistent the work quality could be….We don’t expect that overnight every single company in the Fortune 500 is going to outsource significant amounts of their work to the internet cloud but we’re sure that it’s going to happen over time.” The key to their success (and beating rivals like CrowdFlower) lies in the credibility of their workforce and amassing as much information as possible on the skills of their workers. According to Ritter, the system  is structured to create dynamic profiles on each user. Every time a user completes a task and that task is reviewed, CloudCrowd will learn how reliable that user is and which skills they excel at. If all that information is organized properly, that could be highly valuable for a client who needs to finish a targeted task in a short time frame. ”We’re building sort of what we call the credibility graph of known reliable people on the internet,” Ritter says. “If there are particular customers who… say, ‘I want a thousand reliable people on the internet to do a particular job for me.’ Well today you really can’t find that. Where would you find 1,000 reliable people on the internet.” CrunchBase Information CloudCrowd CrowdFlower Jordan Ritter Information provided by CrunchBase

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Inside CloudCrowd: Betting On Credibility [Video]

Small Business News: Your Social Media Brand | Small Business Trends

If social media is a new generation of marketing/PR/(insert your own description here), than figuring out how to integrate the power of social media into your.

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Small Business News: Your Social Media Brand | Small Business Trends

The History of SEOmoz (1981-2010) + Open Q&A

Posted by randfish Last week, Mixergy’s Andrew Warner interviewed me about the founding of SEOmoz and our trajectory to date. It was a very personal interview about the background of the company, but turned out to be a great experience. I’ve posted it below for those who might want to watch over the weekend and if you prefer, there’s also a full text transcript on the Mixergy blog post . After the interview, I

eMeter Smart Grid Software Company Raises $12.5 Million

Smart Grid management software producer eMeter announced a $12.5 million Series F round of funding today. The investment comes from Sequoia Capital and Foundation Capital , who have both invested in the company previously, along with Northgate Capital . The company was founded in 1999 and has raised nearly $70 million in funding. eMeter works with more than a dozen electric, gas and water utility companies which use it to provide detailed usage data to their customers. eMeter is not new to the space and other companies like OPOWER , Silver Spring Networks and Google are also working to secure similar utility company deals. eMeter will use the funding for sales and marketing, service improvements and new product development. The company recently briefed the White House and Department of Energy on results of the PowerCents DC Program, which used the company’s products to test different pricing models for consumer energy consumption. CrunchBase Information eMeter Information provided by CrunchBase CrunchBase Information Sequoia Capital Foundation Capital Northgate Capital Information provided by CrunchBase

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eMeter Smart Grid Software Company Raises $12.5 Million

Don’t Fall Into the Trap of A/B Testing Minutiae

Posted by randfish Jason Cohen recently authored a post on A/B testing that deserves both broader awareness and a deeper dive. Most of us in the online marketing world are aware of the power A/B tests can bring through improved click-through, sign-up and conversion rates. Getting a higher percentage of visitors to a page to take a desired action is powerful stuff. The process by which we hypothesize, design, create and run testing, however, is fraught with peril. And, one of the least obvious, but most insiduous potential pitfalls is actually what we choose to test . Visualizing

Oh, So That’s What Blippy Does (Video)

When Blippy was looking for a little help creating an overview video for their service, I recommended that they take a look at Mountain View based Transvideo Studios . I know executive producer Rico Andrade there fairly well and have seen some of the work they’ve done for Gmail ( another ), Box.net , Facebook , Mint.com (very dramatic) and others. It’s high quality stuff, and can be aimed at users, partners, advertisers, etc. depending on what audience you want. We’ve ranted before about the power of a good demo video to tell a story. Cash strapped startups can simply do one themselves with screen capture software and iMovie, or whatever. Or you can spend a few thousand dollars and get something professionally done. Either way it’s just a good way to communicate what your startup does. Here’s the final Blippy video, which makes the controversial service look quite cute and cuddly (see the Transvideo blog for more details): CrunchBase Information Blippy Information provided by CrunchBase

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Oh, So That’s What Blippy Does (Video)

Understanding the Small Business Cloud

As entrepreneurs, we’re increasingly hearing that cloud computing can benefit our businesses; but what is the “cloud” and how exactly does it work? The fact is that you’ve probably been using cloud computing for years, perhaps without realizing it. If you have a Hotmail e-mail account, use Facebook, or do your banking online, you’re utilizing the cloud. The cloud simply means applications and services that people access via the internet instead of installing software on their own computers. If you’re online, you’re somewhere in the cloud. The reason for so much discussion about these services lately is that, over recent years and months, many valuable services that once required installing applications have become available as cloud services. Often, businesses can use free versions of these applications in the cloud, while full-featured versions are available at low subscription rates. For example, Microsoft’s recently released Office 2010 contains free and subscription-based cloud versions of its popular business applications like Word, Excel and PowerPoint. Through the cloud, these documents can be accessed anywhere via browsers or mobile devices. Similarly, Google’s Gmail and Google Docs operate in the cloud. As it turns out, the cloud is more heavy-duty and provides more utility than initially perceived. Entrepreneurs now can access customer relationship management tools like those offered by Salesforce.com and SugarCRM.com ; project management applications like Redmine , Basecamp and Clarizen ; services to send digital files like Yousendit , and many other business-oriented programs via the cloud. Should your business be in the cloud? How do you know if your businesses backoffice operations belong in the cloud? Keep in mind that it’s not an either-or decision. You can continue to use the software you’ve already invested in while combining them with cloud-based services. Once you’ve had a chance to evaluate what is available online, you can make the decision to go entirely in the cloud, if it makes sense for your business. In the meantime, here are a few ways the cloud can offer entrepreneurs and small businesses enormous benefits: Save on resources You generally don’t need to pay an IT specialist to maintain software and install new programs and updates. Reduce operating expenses and streamline IT deployments. Decrease hardware investments. You don’t need to buy servers for your office, because your files and applications all can be stored online. You never need to buy a software upgrade for a cloud-based application; the company that hosts the application always keeps it up-to-date, and the latest version is immediately available to all users. Your employees can occasionally (or exclusively) work from home, a hotel or the neighborhood community center if your applications and files are stored in the cloud, saving the costs of commuting to an office, as well as the energy costs of heating, cooling, lighting and running equipment in the office. Rather than bulk business licensing, most cloud offerings are subscription-based. Therefore you have the option to purchase a single-user subscription or a full-office subscription for your entire company. Make your business appear bigger The cloud offers reliability, so there is little need to worry about data recovery or losing valuable business data. You can use any computer in any location to access your work, not just one that has the software. If you have employees in several locations, they can more easily collaborate in the cloud than they would with individually stored files. They all can download, revise and save the same document that’s stored in a single location online, and you never need to worry about on whose computer the latest version of a document resides. Alternatively, you may want to evaluate these considerations to determine if using cloud services is realistic for your organization: How reliable are the online services that you intend to use? A cloud-based service provider should offer assurances of a 99.9 percent uptime with exemplary security and privacy offerings. When storing to the cloud, be sure to research confidentiality, integrity and security policies for the service. Ask questions about governmental requirements for outsourcing data and regulatory requirements for data transparency and reporting. A good way to get started is to try one of the free versions of cloud services that are available. At www.Live.com , for instance, you can work with Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote; store and share documents and photos; set up an e-mail account; and even create a social network among your contacts, all at no cost. Then you might want to try a file delivery site, like www.YouSendIt.com , where you can send files too large to e-mail (such as video, graphics, images and data-heavy documents). And if you haven’t done so yet, create a Facebook Business Page and a Twitter account–again for free–to attract a network of colleagues, customers and friends who can share their best business practices with you. With little investment, you can easily get your business up and running in the cloud. It is a versatile, yet dynamic option that helps you save on resources without skimping on substantial IT solutions.

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Understanding the Small Business Cloud

Harold Jarche » Trends

Here’s an infographic from Ross Dawson on Trend Blends to watch as we consider our common futures: I’ve noticed these trends pop up in my readings and observations, for example: Power Shifts Eastward: Clay Burell’s advice for teachers …

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Harold Jarche » Trends

Etsy CEO: How Social Will Unlock Etsy’s Potential [Video]

After a brief hiatus, the founder of Etsy Rob Kalin reclaimed the CEO title in January of this year. During a brief interview at Etsy’s Brooklyn headquarters, I asked Kalin, “Why do you think you deserve to be back as CEO?…Is  there anything really unique about your vision that will take Etsy to the next stage?” Kalin responded: “Sure, so why do I deserve to be CEO is something that you gotta earn every day, so I definitely don’t take that title for granted. As far as where we want to go, to me the most important part of commerce is the social aspect of it. Social aspect drives the marketplace.” The five-year old marketplace for handmade goods is growing quickly each year, last year it pulled in nearly $200 million in gross merchandise sales. This year, Kalin says they’re on track to reach approximately $400 million in gross merchandise sales. That doesn’t translate into significant profits for Etsy— which only takes about 3.5% of each transaction— but Kalin says profits are secondary to the more important goal of increasing traffic and dialogue on the site. In the next few years, he expects gross merchandise sales to be in the multi-billion-dollar range, but in order to get there, he says they will need to succeed in their social ambitions. In the next 12-18 months, Kalin plans to roll out a social strategy that will go beyond the site’s current offerings, which include forums and chat rooms for members. He didn’t want to give away all the details, but he did say: “Markets are conversations. For us at Etsy we want to figure out how buying an item from someone is a conversation. So Facebook’s message is to connect and share, and so Etsy is taking that one further, where it’s connect, share and exchange things. We’re playing with ways to create more, more social layers inside that experience so one would be being able to have a conversation with people who you’re buying from inside of your shopping cart another one would be using search queries not just to connect people to items but to connect people to other people. To me this is the power of the web, so you know that quote from Aristotle, ‘Man is a political animal?’ is actually mistranslated. It’s ‘Man is a polis making animal,’ and not man, humans. Humans are village making species and we want to connect with other people.” In episode two of our company profiles series, Kalin gives us a tour of Etsy, discusses profits, his social vision and why he stepped down in the first place. CrunchBase Information Robert Kalin Information provided by CrunchBase

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Etsy CEO: How Social Will Unlock Etsy’s Potential [Video]