By David Sims

David at firstcoffee d*t biz

 

The news as of the first coffee this morning, and the music is Elvis Costello's This Year's Model, one of the very few albums in rock to use a hockey-rink organ correctly:

 

Etelos has announced the first of what will no doubt be many CRM apps for the iPhone.

 

“Etelos CRM works great on the iPhone” Etelos CEO Danny Kolke reassures consumers. “It allows you to get access to your tasks, projects, appointments or any of your other business processes while you're away from the office. It's almost as good as carrying a laptop.” Yeah, and a whole lot cooler.

 

The Etelos CRM suite gives users contact, task, group, sales and project management, as well as group messaging and reporting functionality in one interface that is now compatible with the iPhone's Safari Web browser. The day it's compatible with Firefox is the day First Coffee's impressed.

 

CRM for iPhone is integrated with Etelos CRM, which can already be run in Google Apps, Netvibes, Windows Live and Pageflakes.

 

The iPhone edition is available to Etelos CRM Professional, Enterprise and Developer edition customers immediately. A 24-hour test drive is available to iPhone owners at www.crmforiphone.com.

 

Existing users will be able to access their traditional CRM tools while away from their computer. Note taking, appointment setting and contact management are all available on the Etelos CRM for iPhone product.

 

Etelos CRM for iPhone was designed combine functionality such as project management, call logging, appointment management, in-depth reporting and more with AJAX-enabled functionality.

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PacificNet, a vendor of gambling technology, e-commerce and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) services in China, has announced that its Take1 Electronic Bingo Machines have received Technical Systems Testing Certification, so they're a good bet. Okay, sorry.

 

This certifies that (draw deep breath) TST has verified through mathematical and statistical analysis that the Take1 Electronic Bingo Machines operate with sufficient non-predictability, fair distribution and lack of bias to particular outcomes and complies with generally accepted industry standards for highly regulated jurisdictions.

 

PacificNet's Take1 Electronic Bingo Machines are played much like traditional bingo, but without the hassle of paper cards and mess of ink blotters. The Take1 Bingo Machines are based on a client-server computer network architecture and players can buy electronic bingo tickets using one of the many electronic bingo terminals (or client betting stations) situated in a variety of electronic bingo sales outlets.

 

This automation allows for players to play more games faster and to play from any location that's linked to the central electronic bingo server, thus increasing bingo operator's revenue.

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An old First Coffee favorite item resurfaces: Those who suffer from paraskevidekatriaphobia are going to have a rough day today. They're in good company, however, as fear of Friday the 13th is probably the most widespread superstition in the United States.

 

With real-world effects: Few hospitals, high-rise buildings or hotels have a 13th floor. Airports rarely have a Gate 13. A British study found that fewer people drive on Friday the 13th than on Friday the 6th, yet hospitals report more accidents.

 

And Donald Dossey, founder of the Stress Management Center and Phobia Institute in Asheville, North Carolina cites estimates that $800 or $900 million is lost in business because people won't fly or pursue other normal routines on Friday the 13th.

 

The origins of the superstition are lost in the mists of time — it's not some ancient Christian/Catholic thing, a study done in 1894 found that the Islamic Turks so disliked the number 13 they practically never used it if they could at all help it, and ancient Hindus and the Norse believed it was unlucky for 13 people to gather.

 

First Coffee finds a credible theory in the fact that ancient Egyptians considered the quest for spiritual fullness to occur in 12 in this life and the 13th was the eternal afterlife. So 13 came to mean death, in a good way, since you were transformed into spiritual glory, but after the nice connotations perished with their culture the death imagery remained with the number 13.

 

Couple that with the fact that there were 13 people at the Last Supper and Jesus Christ was crucified on a Friday — the day of the week for executions in pagan Rome — and you have a practically shrink-wrapped superstition for Western culture. Readers of The Da Vinci Code know that the Knights Templar were effectively destroyed on Friday the 13th, October 1307.

 

What's strange is that the number 13 has long been considered unlucky, Friday's been considered unlucky, yet there is no evidence that people before the 20th century considered Friday the 13th a particularly unlucky day. It's a purely modern superstition which nobody can explain. Which, of course, is how a good superstition ought to be.

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SWsoft have announced that Internet Fr, a hosting provider in France, has integrated SWsoft Plesk control panel and Virtuozzo virtualization software into its professional line of integrated shared hosting products, Plexus Products

 

Based on Internet Fr's management of Web extensions of information systems for large customers, Plexus Products offers Plexus Shared Hosting HP (High Performance) pack, a shared hosting product to offer the Tomcat application server to run and manage enterprise Web applications, as well as Plexus Shared Hosting OEM, which lets resellers and Web agencies complete their offerings with a shared hosting product using their brand name.

 

Powered by Plesk and Virtuozzo software, Plexus Products simplify and unify the online management of Web and e-mailing services, and provide continuous follow-up due to integration with Internet Fr Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools. For example, customers can follow the processing of their requests and check their network or system resource usage.

 

By implementing its shared hosting products on Virtuozzo, Internet Fr has more control over the hosting environment, including rapid backups, easier migrations, and isolation between blocks of hosting customers, company officials say.

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On July 18th, Altico Advisors will be sponsoring a 30-minute Web seminar on Microsoft Total Solution Financing. Participants will learn how they can take advantage of Microsoft Financing to purchase a world class product that will grow with their companies for decades to come.

 

Microsoft Financing will cover the hardware, software, and services associated with buying new financial, business, and customer relationship management systems -- namely Dynamics GP and CRM.

 

Dynamics GP is a complete financial and business management product with functionality for manufacturers, distributors, service organizations, and software development companies. Dynamics CRM adds the sales, marketing, and service management components.

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Pharmaceutical managed care account managers can now access a managed care-specific CRM product from Verticals onDemand. Built on the Salesforce Platform to deliver all the advantages of the Software as a Service (SaaS) model, VBioPharma an SaaS CRM product for the increasingly important managed care area of U.S. pharmaceutical companies. The product is also Verticals onDemand's inaugural product launch.