February 2008 Archives

I will be blogging today from the Future of Web Apps conference in Miami.

The opening remarks point out that applications sometimes are designed by accident, like Twitter. It is a side project with no obvious need or reason. (I have seen this in science as well. Discoveries like penicillin and Rogaine were accidents). The value is found later (sometimes, since I still don't get Twitter).

Kathy Sierra is talking now about Cognitive Seduction. Why do people go to conferences? Most of this can be done virtually, especially the presentations and "knowledge". It's the face to face, the hallway, the networking. Life (to my mind anyway) is like billards. You need to ricochet off as many other balls on the table.

Great anology that Kathy made is about cameras. You buy it to take a picture, not to become a camera expert. If it is too difficult to use (like Movable Type blogging, then you are slightly off the mark when developing software (or any product or service). She is talking about creating passionate users, but what she is discussing is Marketing and designing a Purple Cow. Making something usable. Thinking about it from the users perspective.

One comment from last night stands out: There isn't even Beta any more. There's release of a web app via invite and it's a work in progress (like Grand Central and 37signals).

Kathy is a great speaker and she totally understands how to create a great app/product/service. She is speaking at SXSW too.

We didn't make it to BarCampMiami, but we did get here in time for the Nokia party at Delores/Lolita Restaurant. Nokia gave a demo of their N and S60 models. You could hardly hear the speaker. The room set-up meant that most people could not see the screen. So most people kept on talking and playing with thier iPhones. Yep. Most folks have iPhones, not Nokias.

As many of you know, I tend to poke at things, but I also offer suggestions. For Nokis, here you go. Everyone that registered should have given you a credit card. At the entrance, they were given a Nokia phone. Play with it all night and during the conference, then either return it or keep it and be billed for it. Folks would have been playing with Nokia's handsets instead of Apples. Also, Nokia could have utilized either the Crowdvine social app for the conference or Twitter to message people all day.

Instead they did Old School. Gather round everyone. here's a demo. I will now drone on for an hour while you people talk over me. Oh, well. It was free drink and apps, but I keep wondering when people are going to wake up to the fun you can generate at conferences. And Fun = Buzz = WOM (word-of-mouth). Isn't that what you are spending the money for?

More later, I have to get to the expo.

Rumor has it that Qwest is talking to VZW to replace Sprint. Is this just a play to make Sprint negotiate? Or is this just another sign that Sprint's troubles have become unmanageable? Yesterday, Sprint announced that it would take a $29.5B write down for Nextel. It bought Nextel in 2004 for $35.2B (Sprint made the offer on 12/15/04). So Sprint basically wasted the entire purchase.

Hesse also announced yesterday that it would lose another million wireless customers. Hesse must feel like a real estate investor in Florida. Nothing is at it seems, but then I think Hesse is just a cost cutter. Will he have any REAL ideas to turn Sprint around? Sprint's market cap this morning is $23B. It wrote off more than it is worth? How upside down is that? But at least he decided to come clean to Wall Street. Yet he did not offer a turn around plan to go with the bad news. (Extra point: Alltel went private for $24.7B last November.)

While Sprint hemorrages customers, the other 3 players all moved to unlimited price plans. Sprint follows suit with an all-you-can-eat-everything-we-got plan for $100 (see Gary's article here)

One the one hand, it should stop the bleeding. On the other hand, if the network and customer service are so bad, how will they support this package? (How will current subscribers move to this price plan without pain and headaches? And will they be frustrated by a network not up to the challenge of all you can eat? Presumably, that is why Qwest is shopping, right? It wants either a better network or a better deal. But MVNO is not an easy game. It's worse than UNE-P. With UNE-P, the landline resellers knew what the going rate was (via tariffs). They negotiated low wholesale rates (too low according to the RBOCs who fought to end this). Then sold the landlines below RBOC rates. It worked to a degree, since at one time their were quite a few CLEC's with 500,000 lines each (Z-Tel, STS, Birch). But today that wholesale game is more difficult as the margins are tiny - whether it is landline or cellular.

It would be interesting to see what Hesse does next. If he wants a suggestion, I would say spend a week talking to some of the best marketing gurus you can find, like Seth Godin and Jack Trout. Develop a Purple Cow. That's the only way Sprint will come back from this. (Seems like thier fiber network is almost forgotten these days).

This is a little off topic, but since I have spent 2 days restoring my laptop after a Windows Update issue gone bad, I figured I would share some nifty widgets.

Backup your data. SD cards are 4GB and cost $30. That's where I keep my Outlook pst file now. (I still have to find a way to backup my Thunderbird mail. At coffee with Jack Brandt (of Register.com), Jack said to get an iDrive account. There are others like Box.net and MyFabrik. Jack says that iDrive is automatic backup in the background. Yeah!

With having to re-install all my software, I use Trillian for IM, but looked at Meebo. However, meebo is a multi-platform IM website. No download. Connect via a website (or a Firefox add-on).

Other Firefox add-ons I like are TinyURL, Adblock, Flashblock, and Image Zoom. Jack says to try Foxmarks to sync bookmarks between computers.

And as long as we are talking sync, how about synching my Outlook Calendar with my Google calendar? I tried SyncMyCalc, but it locked up my Outlook too often (even with the purchased edition). Now I am using gSyncIt from davidswebsite.

I noticed that Google pack includes more stuff now, like RealPlayer, Skype, Spyware Doctor, GoogleTalk, Firefox, StarOffice, Norton Security Scan, and Adobe Reader --- all in one easy download. Now that was EZ! I like easy. So if you have any widgets or ideas on software to make things easy, drop me a note at rad at virtual-cio.com. Thanks!

I get a headache trying to figure out the FCC (Federal Communications Commission). First, it works diligently to UN-Regulate the RBOCs and to re-create not on, but two, Ma Bells. Then it orders states to give franchise deals to the Ma Bells to hasten triple-play. For the sake of competition, FCC Chair Kevin Martin (herein refered to as K-Mart) says.

The FCC is currently running the 700 MHz spectrum auction with some problems, like one small bidder for the public safety spectrum.

The FCC has spent a great deal of effort on Indecency on TV. (Think Janet Jackson's nipple and Charlotte's butt on NYPD Blue, both resulting in big fines and work for the court system.)

Then the FCC in 2007 went on a national tour to get public feedback about media ownership, which K-Mart immediately and deliberately ignored, ruling in favor of Big Media as opposed to what the public wanted - more localism and minority ownership in media. (BTW, this might be why newspapers are screwed. Instead of listening to the public, at least at the Tampa meeting that I attended, Big Media sent people to say how TBO helped them. If your customers want A and you decide on B, don't be upset if your customers don't buy). Sorry for that tangent. Anyway, public feedback ignored. Big Media win. Newspapers still laying off despite K-Mart's attempt to save Big Media. (The FCC's mandate from the Communications Act in 1934 is spectrum management.)

Menawhile the FCC seems to want to regulate cable more heavily. by proclaiming the 70% rule is in effect. Basically, that means that once cable gets 70% penetration in a market more regulation applies including inhibition on M&A.

The FCC spent today getting public feedback on Network Management. Wait a minute. Public feedback on Network Management? K-Mart doesn't listen to public feedback - and what does the public know about Network Management? Comcast is now being sued over P2P traffic throttling. So they have the FCC and courts now. To me Network Management should be spelled out in the User's Agreement and Terms of Service, where Comcast does spell it out. It's their network. According to the FCC reports, you have other providers to go to. I just do not think that the FCC is equipped to mandate to network providers how to run their network. If it was selective traffic, sure. But all P2P? No. That's okay with me - as long as you spell it out clearly in your TOS and UA. That makes it a Truth in Advertising issue which is the domain of the FTC. I did not hear any talk about AT&T wanting to examine and filter all traffic over its network. And as long as you are taking on Network Management, Kevin, buddy, how about the AT&T wiretap room. It would see that THAT would be a violation of your CALEA rules, since no warrants were issued. Where's the hearing on that? Oh, wait. It was Ma Bell. Right. If Comcast had that room, there would be televised hearings.

Facebook has a dialogue on this.

BTW, opinions expressed On RAD's RADAR are solely those of the blogger.

Rich pointed out Cbeyond's 4th Q financials and they are amazing!

Highlights include:

• 4th quarter net earnings = $12.5 million due to quarterly sales rising 31% to $76.9 million!
• Cbeyond now has 35,041 customers in the 9 markets it has operations in; that's net 1754 customer adds this quarter, which is about 65 clients per metro per month!
• ARPU is $750, up a dollar.
• Mobile penetration = 24%

Cbeyond CEO Geiger did warn that the slowing economy might affect numbers the next 2 quarters, but they are watching their credit process and receivables. Cbeyond opens Miami this quarter. Minneapolis = the 11th market.

My readers are probably tired of reading the name Cbeyond, but its rare to find a company that has this kind of plan - and is executing on it so well.

1. They sell basically 4 products: Dynamic T1, DIA, SIP Trunk and Cellular lines. (They have other apps, but this is the focus).
2. They didn't Go Big! Meaning they hit one market at a time. (If only Covad-Rhythms-Northpoint had done that). Telcos complain about the price war, but they all sell (the same stuff) in the same 38 markets. Look up Differentiate in the dictionary or Positioning on Wikipedia
3. They beat the street with show leather marketing.
4. Execute on the plan and deliver the promised service to the client.

This industry seems to think that scale solves everything, but that is rarely the case. The larger you get, the harder it gets. Like Seth Godin said: Small is the new Big. And there is a lot of room in the Long Tail.

Lots of travel the next 7 weeks.

• Next Thursday, Friday and Saturday, I am attending Future of Web Apps in Miami Beach.
• March 6 is the webinar How to Sell SAAS with HyperOffice. (There is a webinar with NeuStar about Recursive DNS in March as well. Email me for more info or to register).
• Then March 9 through 12, I am in Vegas for Channel Partners, where I am moderating a panel on Virtual Office.
• NCTA is holding an executive forum in Tampa from March 16-18.
• VoiceCon is in Orlando on March 17-20.
• An ISP association is meeting in Orlando on March 20.
• I'll have copies of my book with me every where I go

The one show I am skipping is CompTel. Why? SSDD. It never changes. CompTel needs fresh air. The speakers hardly change: Sherm, Crowe, Arunas. Oh, and Deb Tate. What can she add? She has voted against every CLEC issue at the FCC. (Will they hit her with a whip cream pie? That would be worth going for.) But to listen to old-timers talk about the business that hasn't changed much in 10 years is boring. What have CLEC's done for you lately?

Welcome to ON RAD's RADAR! My name is Peter Radizeski. I work for RAD-INFO, Inc., where I have been knee deep in telecom and ISP's since 2000. I will be writing about telecom: ILEC's, CLEC's, VoIP Providers, Cable MSO's, Hosting, data centers, and managed services. Oh, yeah, and on Web 2.0.

I started in telecom in 1999 as a BellSouth Agent for IEI after three years in IT with a Novell shop. While I am still a telecom agent for over 20 carriers, I also work with many companies on sales and marketing strategy. The technology is great, but it's all about the marketing today. No marketing; not many sales. Not many sales, poof!

I started writing a newsletter for my clients in 2003. That turned into a blog; then another blog was added just to discuss marketing; then into a book titled, SELLECOM. Now I am writing at TMC on top of my other blogs. (Hey, I have a lot to say and there's a lot going on).

Drop me a note if you have something you want to discuss. I can be reached by email at peter at rad-info dot net.

The face of telecom is changing. More people are moving away from landlines and more people want mobile broadband. Unfortunately, the telcos and cablecos want you to have it their way: landlines bundled with broadband and maybe wireless, but you have to take my TV too. The younger generation doesn't talk in minutes; it communicates in bits - on MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, IM, and text messaging. The duopoly is in a price war for every consumer segment - cellular, voice, broadband, and TV. And that Red Ocean marketplace means higher customer acquisition costs, more churn, and lower profit. Meanwhile, the debt is mounting. Cablecos are still paying off the $100B in DOCSIS 2.0 buildouts, while the ILECs are re-tooling their networks with fiber and TV, which is costing billions. And both have upgrades to make. Telco needs to do FTTx as well as 4G/LTE/UMA; Cable has to move to DOCSIS 3.0. At a time when ARPU is shrinking. Good luck on that.