Jeremy Toeman’s LIVEdigitally

Short post, just wanted to draw attention to the fact that we’ve put up a “how to pitch us” page.  Why, you may ask?  Well, first of all, we get a lot of pitches, and frankly, many of them have nothing to do with what we blog about.  Enterprise pitches.  TV shows.  Viraga (and viarga and even v i a g a r a).  You get the drift.  So I wanted to help add some focus.

Secondly, I believe it’s the “right thing” for bloggers to do.  I put up a post on my marketing blog implying as such.  It’s not really fair for me to just say “here’s my email” if I don’t tell you what I want to know about.

Lastly, if you’re noticing I wrote “We” above, well, there’s a few new folks joining the team to help write more reviews.  I’ve become a little too entrenched into too many different people/organizations to be able to effectively write reviews much anymore.  Either I know the person/company behind the device or the PR firm (or both), and I feel way too conflicted way too often.  So expect to see some fresh blood showing up in the next few days!

Overall (with one glaring exception, which I’ll write about tomorrow), it was a great weekend down in San Mateo for the 2008 Maker Faire. As far as events go, it’s almost the anti-CES. Instead of expensive, polished booths, most exhibits were on foldout tables. Instead of a team of well-trained booth staffs, the typical demonstrator was the individual or small group who personally built whatever it is that’s on display. Instead of overpriced, greasy, carnie food, we ate… oh, well, I guess some things are universal.

I spent the bulk of the days at the Bug Labs booth, where we were showing quite a few demos of the BUGbase and modules in action. Our plan was to spend much of the time creating new gadgets, but there were so many visitors that the team only created a small handful of new applications. I really liked the “digital level” application, because it was such a great conceptual explanation for the power of the crowdsource-enabled gadgets. The digital level on its own worked just like any other (although Angel, a Bug Labs engineer, coded it in about 8 minutes using the motion sensor/accelerometer module!), but it’s the future of many “connected digital levels” that is so interesting. Still not making sense? Think of it as a globally connected, yet distributed seismograph. Again, not necessarily important on its own, but its the concept that is so important.

The show was a lot of fun. Much bigger than I was anticipating, I heard over 100,000 tickets were sold! I saw some amazing demos and products, including an open-source version of Rock Band, a digital foosball table (yes, I played, and managed to beat the guys who built it - sweet), a killer room of Lego town, warring battleships, DIY everything, geekdad.com RC airplanes, a homegrownremote control R2D2, and, of course, BBQ chicken on a stick. Check out some pix from Laughing Squid and Scoble’s video too. My pix are all here, but these are some of my favorites:

And, the most important photo of all…

As I write this, Comcast is worth 67 billion dollars.  Their stock has split 4 times in 20 years, and has grown massively over that time.  They have over 24 million subscribers.  They are one of several US cable companies, who take on the 2 satellite service providers as the main players in the TV space for the US.  And startup Sezmi was labeled today as a cable killer, with TV 2.0, whose advanced set-top box apparently blows away the TV.  Wow.  That’s quite a strong billing, don’t you think. The last device I recall with this type of hype was supposed to transform the way we build cities.

This isn’t just David vs Goliath by the way, this is David the little tiny ant versus Goliath the elephant.  Not only does Sezmi have to compete against huge players, they are doing it in a massively entrenched industry that spends ridiculous amounts of money advertising their own services.  And let’s think about that advertising for a second - where exactly is Sezmi going to run their ads?  Are they going to pay the very networks they need to compete with?

Now I do need to make a very clear disclaimer here: I have not used their product, nor even seen a demo.  I will go on the leap of faith that they have built the very best darn box ever built (even better than the ones I’ve built!).  I’m going to assume it’s utterly amazing, and the content quality is stellar, it’s really usable, etc.  I’ve only seen one such demo in recent months, but that’s another story for another time.  Let’s assume that in the world of “terrible Internet set-top boxes” they’ve built the iPhone of the batch.   I still think they have a huge challenge ahead.

First, they need to market the heck out of this thing.  I’ve watched MovieBeam try and fail, ReplayTV is gone, Akimbo is a service now, and even everybody’s favorite TiVo isn’t exactly a commonly owned product (somewhere around 5ish million homes is the latest I’ve heard).  Each of these companies have spent millions of dollars trying.  And I can name a dozen others who’ve tried.  Even Apple can’t really move the AppleTV in massive quantities.  And massive quantities is the only way to be successful as a startup in this space.

Beyond just “extremely good” marketing,  it’s a big uphill battle for Sezmi.  Both PaidContent and Engadget refer to the company as confusing.  In the articles I’ve read the company’s advantages seem to lie in (1) price, and (2) Internet services.  I don’t believe these to be true competitive differentiators in the “taking on the cable industry” space.  The players that be have effectively infinite dollars to throw at the problem, and we know they are all working on introducing Internet-enabled devices themselves.

Having spent most of the past 10 years of my career attempting to introduce products just like these, with variations here and there, I do wish the founders the best of luck with the effort.  I would love to try the box out, see if it’s exceeding expectations and get a sense of how they plan to accomplish their arduous task.  I think the visions of wanting to “change television” are noble, but unrealistics.  Just because we have deregulation and things like OpenCable doesn’t mean the window of opportunity is open.

I do believe we’ll see additional interesting new media concepts for digital devices and platforms, but I don’t believe going after the big guys is the way to be successful.   It isn’t about a “better than your cablebox” or a “more channels than you have now” or even a “get the Internets on the teevees” kind of play.  It’s about counterprogramming against the TV itself.  It’s about innovating on other, existing platforms.  It’s about moving around the concept of the cablebox and cable company completely.  Is Sezmi here with that new Innovator’s solution?  We’ll find out soon enough.

If you haven’t heard of Maker’s Faire before, check out details here (don’t worry, I’ll wait for you before continuing).  I tried describing it on the phone to a friend earlier today, I said “it’s like a big county fair except instead of people throwing small items at smaller targets, you see them building flamethrowers and personal helicopters and solar-powered stuff.”  It really isn’t the easiest thing to describe, but if you have any shred of childhood creativity left, it’s the kinda place you should go for a few hours this weekend.

I say all that, but now, wait for it, the truth is, oh boy, I’ve never been.  As I mentioned on the Bug Labs blog today, I’ve managed to miss it year after year.  I really believe that MAKE magazine and the corresponding event represent the best possibilities of “growing up”.  Yes, I was one of those kids who took apart toys then put them back together again, albeit slightly worse than when I started (and even threw them out my bedroom window, just to see what might happen).  I still have a huge bag of Lego sitting in my closet waiting for my son to get old enough to not eat them.

Tickets are only $25, though Scott Beale’s going to give away a few to some lucky folks.  I’ll be at the Bug Labs “booth” along with others from the team.  We’ll make some gadgets, hack some gear, and try to find a way to hook the BUG up to a flamethrower.  Please join!

Here’s the detailed account of Ed’s journey with the Vaio.

The above video should give you a pretty solid understanding, but if not, here’s the background:

1. Had a Vaio, it was great, it got stolen.
2. Bought a new Vaio ($2500 with insurance check), it ran Vista, it was terrible.
3. Bought a MacBook 10 weeks later ($1100), it’s been great.
4. Mocked the Vaio many many times until Ed Bott approached me, interested in seeing if he could fix its problems
5. He did, it works great.

My thoughts on the matter, in no particular order:

• It’s not Vista per se, it’s the PC manufacturers who are failing to deliver consumer-ready products. If you have either an IT department or an Ed Bott, you can do fine. If you don’t, you’re in a heap of problems.
• PC manufacturers should massively separate the “home/consumer” group from the business groups. Further, there is a huge opportunity for a PC company to make a finely tuned, consumer-ready Vista laptop.
• Making a great laptop requires a minimal quantity of options. For reference, call Apple. If the MacBook had 44,000 possible combinations, it would be just as bad as any off-the-shelf PC notebook.
• This is a very classic Innovator’s Dilemma situation - “the market” is telling PC companies they want options, but the reality is they want easy to use, reliable, affordable computers.

Until a PC company follows any of this advice, Apple will continue to gain market share, and here’s why: Virtually all MacBook users today are happily recommending others to try MacBooks, with a predictable, reliable recommendation. PC users cannot as easily do the same. I had a great Vaio, then a terrible one. I’ve used Toshibas before (great - in the 90s), a Gateway (wasn’t bad), and 3 Dells now (one good, one bad, one ugly). But they are all vastly different.

Thanks and hats off to Mr. Ed Bott for putting in so much time with me. I’ve learned a lot from this process, and I sincerely recommend to any PC company who is listening: go spend some time talking to Ed and take his advice. If you really want to stop the slide (and trust me, the slide is happening even if the numbers you look at today seem like rounding errors), you need to get experts like him to better explain the consumer PC needs of today.

Wouldn’t it be fun if they name it iPhone ][? It won’t happen, but … Then they could even have a mini-upgrade iPhone ][+! Okay, that’s enough geekiniscing for the day.

Spent the day hiking in Marin and having a BBQ with some old friends, somehow the iPhone came up as a topic numerous times, despite none of us being iPhone owners. There’ve been rumors aplenty about an iPhone 2.0, and I think it’s a pretty safe bet something‘s coming. As always, Steve’s playing it close to the chest, which is part of what makes Apple such a fun/special company (disclaimers: (1) I own Apple stock, (2) I own a MacBook, (3) I don’t own an iPod or iPhone, (4) I’m one of those guys that was fairly anti-Mac until mid-last year, (5) I don’t own any black turtlenecks).

In the day of chatting, a few ideas came through our conversations. I’ve decided to go throw my stage in the ground, even though I may be 4 or more months early on any timing. Further, I’m adding a little “likelihood” to each prediction.

1. I believe Apple will have 2 different iPhones available on the market simultaneously (not just v1 and v2, but two distinct models with a lot of similarities). Likely
2. At least one of these models will have a keyboard and will take on BlackBerry/Windows Mobile more aggressively in the business market. Possible
3. 3G. I Garontee!
4. Video recording. Very likely
5. Deeper .mac integration will be built-into the phone(s). Very likely
6. Put the above three statements together for a built-in live video streaming feature. Possible
7. Bluetooth tethering will be possible. Likely
8. A 4+ megapixel camera will be included. Possible
9. One model will be somewhat smaller/lighter/thinner than the 1.0 model. Likely
10. Microsoft will have some type of Office for iPhone available to coincide with the launch. Possible
11. It will not have two cameras (Steve won’t even allow them to put two buttons on it!). Not a chance
12. The battery still won’t be replacable. Likely
13. Real GPS is included. Possible

And now for some more outlandish possibilities. All are a bit more… out there. Warning: to my more serious readers, this list gets increasingly goofy. If in a hurry, it’s probably best to skip it altogether.

1. It might come in multiple colors.
2. They include an ATSC tuner for live, real-time HDTV reception.
3. They skip 3G but include Wimax support.
4. Instead of just two (or one) models, Apple introduces two different distinct lines of iPhones. The second is a much smaller unit - think “iPhone Nano” - but is still all-touchscreen. In an even wackier move, it’s a flip-phone.
5. They make the screen capable of playing 720p resolution video. Again, the more extreme prediction has an HDMI connector and IR interface and doubles as an AppleTV.
6. It has an infrared emitter and supports the TV-B-Gone technology. Just kidding.
7. Apple massively updates the .mac infrastructure to include mobile social networking features for iPhone users. This probably won’t be heavily used as iPhone people can actually feel the aura of other nearby iPhone people…
8. Voice-operation for all controls. As a downside it has the voice of Marvin from Hitchhiker’s, and after 90 days of use goes crazy, HAL 9000-style. After this point, one in every ten times the user touches the screen the iPhone starts playing Rick Astley at max volume.
9. Rather than continue support for YouTube, all videos are sourced from 1938Media, who Apple becomes a sponsor for and Loren introduces a Fake Steve Jobs puppet.
10. Forget touchscreen, instead consider these three words: rotary dial interface.

Turns out the speculation was true, you don’t have to be an a-lister to get attention from Comcast online.  I must say, I’m impressed.  I’ve never seen another company react this way before, and they deserve full praise for such actions.  This is one of those stories that I will definitely be sure to echo in the future.  Well done, no snarky or cynical remarks for you today!

Intro: Mike Arrington was able to get Comcast support via Twitter, I thought I’d do the same (although I am Canadian, I’m no Arrington and I’m not using Twitter).  I’m a subscriber to the NHL Center Ice package, offered via Comcast through iNDEMAND.  The regular season is over (Go Habs!), and now things got messy.

In the program guide, there’s no more information for the Center Ice package at all.  No listings, just baseball.  I googled, found a few scattered suggestions and possible answers.  I then proceeded to try Comcast’s support chat, the agent was polite and tried his/her best, but found nothing.  Eventually told me to call my regional office.  Which I did.

Local agent looked through a variety of things, and sooner or later started surfing the Web looking for more.  Nothing.  Found the Center Ice info page, which is missing all information about the playoffs.  Well, not all the info, just has a page showing where they would be, and nicely refers to them as the 2007 playoffs.

I called iNDEMAND.  The most help I got from them was that (a) there was a confirmed game on Versus, which I already knew, and (b) the channels to find Center Ice were numbers 461-470, which I already knew.  This information came just slightly after I managed to convince them that I was actually a paying subscriber.   Bottom line is at 4pm on Thursday I’m going to have to have my Slingbox ready so I can quickly find the right game and set it to record on my DVR.

First I blame iNDEMAND for not having the right information.  It’s not really Comcast’s fault since their vendor doesn’t have the data.  That said, Comcast shouldn’t do business with vendors who do not have the information needed to support their customers.  If Comcast made it an absolute requirement, I guarantee the iNDEMAND folks would have the answer already, but as it is, there’s little-to-no incentive for them.

As an aside, it’s like when I called Sony for support on my Vaio and they blamed Microsoft and NVIDIA.  They might be right, but nobody exactly forced Sony to use NVIDIA chips.  Then again, the laptop is on its way back from Ed Bott’s place, where he says it’s lightning fast!! Windows may just be re-entering my life (it still does have better keyboard shortcuts)…

Back to the topic at hand - customer service.  Service is as important as any marketing or promotion activity.  With the combination of blogs, Twitters, and Google, it’s impossible for a company’s bad habits to remain in the dark any longer.  Fundamentally I believe if you sell a product, you must support it to the fullest extend possible.  No passing the buck.  Setting the right standards for your organization isn’t hard to do, and in the long term can have a huge payoff.

I’ve followed Dash, the Internet-enabled GPS company, for quite some time (I even tried to be a beta tester), as I utterly love the concept. GPS receivers should obviously have Internet access to download new maps, get traffic data, and then of course do some more clever things. Like have my entire address book and calendar built-in. And have Internet services that call my phone when it’s time to leave if I want to make my next meeting on time. I completely expect the category to standardize around these services in the next few years. In the meantime, Dash is trying to be first to market and grab a comfortable spot.

First, here’s the state of the GPS market as I see it (as it pertains to Dash)

1. Dash is competing with massively entrenched, well-known players (Garmin, TomTom, Magellan, Mio, Pioneer, Sony, others, and of course, all the in-car receivers). The best of these companies (listed above in order) make great products, most of which are extremely well-liked by consumers.
2. In my opinion, enabling Internet access into a GPS unit is at best a sustainable innovation. In other words, this isn’t a revolution, it’s an evolution, and Garmin/TomTom/others probably already have working prototypes with similar functionality.
3. Major players are spending a lot of money on advertising (Garmin does Superbowl commercials!).
4. It is likely to suffer as an industry as GPS-enabled cell phones become widely available and affordable (which is probably why Garmin has introduced a phone, and is simultaneously facing revenue/sales problems).

So if I interpret these signs, I see a startup attempting to enter a commodity industry with a product that I’ll label as “slightly better”. Before any Dash fans roar at me, I’m not trying to say they haven’t made a great product, as I haven’t used it at all - the key point here is the consumer perception of their product. In other words, to the average Joe about to buy a GPS receiver, the Dash only stands out with one additional feature, and that feature is fairly complicated, which drastically diminishes its true value in comparison.

It’s getting mixed user reviews on Amazon (with 4-ish stars and is placing nicely in the top-25 for GPS), Engadget’s happy, and Walt sorta likes it, the combination of which isn’t enough to help push it over the top. Somehow this Silicon Valley startup needs to get out of the Valley and into millions and millions of peoples’ cars before the rest of the industry catches up. Personally, I don’t see how they get there in time.

At a personal level, friends have challenged me on my doubts, making Slingbox-to-Sony comparisons. Here are the quick differences:

• Slingbox/Sony LFTV was a brand new category to define - Dash is an existing, huge one (that may actually be on the verge of decline).
• Sony’s product was terrible (sure I’m biased, but virtually every single user and professional review backs up this comment), whereas companies like Garmin/TomTom make great products. Further, these products are cheaper than Dash.
• Slingbox averages 4.5 stars from Amazon users (181 reviews as of this writing), and had massive impact from strong word of mouth effects, yet Dash’s user reviews are nowhere near as glowing.
• Slingbox had an instant “I get it, I need it” (or “I don’t need it”) response when people heard about it, one that left almost no room for discussion. Dash has to define itself around existing categories with incremental (albeit cool) technologies. Worse still, Dash has a monthly/annual service fee.

Part of me really wants to see Dash overcome these odds. Another part of me thinks this is a whole lot of money chasing an excessively elusive goal. I believe the company’s best chance at mere survival is through licensing, which is another tricky path to follow on its own.

I hate to say it, but I believe this is one of those disappointing moments where good technology doesn’t appear to have the legs it’s going to need to survive for the long haul. Can Dash navigate these windy roads? Will I come up with yet another terrible pun? Can this post get any longer? Only time will tell.

Updated: while re-reading this, I realized I’m leaving out a key point here: it is entirely possible that the cost structure for running Dash as a company is low enough that they do not need to be a top player in the space. It could be a healthy company without being as big as the Garmin/TomTom/other pool…

For years I’ve envisioned a future of digital cameras that would be smart enough to take more than one picture at a time, but instead would simply take a stream of pictures that you’d select from a little later.  I didn’t have all the details worked out, but it seemed like the logical evolution.  When I read David Pogue’s column a few minutes ago, it looks like the guys at Casio have in fact worked it out:

It takes 60 pictures per second (not 60 frames of a compressed movie file, which is different), all are 6MP.

After taking, you can keep em, delete em, or pick manually.

Per Pogue: “In pre-record mode, you half-press the shutter button when you’re awaiting an event that’s unpredictable: a breaching whale, a geyser’s eruption or a 5-year-old batter connecting with the ball. The camera silently, repeatedly records 60 shots a second, immediately discarding the old to make room for the new.

When you finally press the shutter button fully, the camera simply preserves the most recent shots, thus effectively photographing an event that, technically speaking, you missed.” - WOW!

It also has a motion detector.

For a full review, go back to David’s article, it’s very balanced and thorough.

Will I really buy one?  I don’t know, I still don’t like the idea of a big bulky camera to lug around.  I’m also not sure if this is exactly up the alley of a “prosumer” such as Thomas Hawk, as Pogue laments about the quality of the actual picture-taking-thingamajig inside the camera.

But this definitely marks the future of the entire category.  In fact it’ll always be features and functions like these that keep the digital camera sector enough steps ahead of cell phones to remain extremely relevant.  Me likey.

I posted last night on my marketing blog about how I feel marketeers will need to deal with the conference overlap situation.  As I’ve watched the news unfold, the following is clear:

• DEMO’s schedule was announced first, so Shipley is pointing the finger at Arrington/Calacanis
• TC50’s announcement triggered the onslaught of conversation, which led to Arrington claiming that DEMO should die.
• Shipley has responded, questioning professionalism and more
• Arrington and Calacanis both respond pointing fingers back at Shipley

Prediction one: it will get worse from here from both organizing groups

Prediction two: people will take sides, which will further antagonize the situation

Here’s the ultimate reality: It doesn’t matter whose “fault” this is, and there’s no point in trying to determine who was trying to screw the other one over. This is a LOSE-LOSE proposition.  NOBODY benefits.  Startup entrepreneurs will not get nearly the impact from attending EITHER conference this way.  Bloggers, press, and media will not get to see half the companies they’d like to see.  The first week of September will be just noise, no signal.

My recommendation is the groups GET ON THE PHONE with each other, and find a solution.  I doubt this will happen, as it’s probably too late to deal with the financial consequences, and there’s probably so much bad blood already that nobody will get off their perches.

In some industries competition is a very good and healthy thing.  PCs are probably going to get better because of the recent success of the Mac.  This is good.  When it comes to conferences that have similar offerings to a limited marketplace, this type of competition is plainly unhealthy.

Chris, Mike, Jason - you are intelligent, respected thought leaders in our community.  Please go take the steps needed to help the industry make smart decisions about what to do this September.