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RSS FeedAugust 27th, 2007
Bank of America – Is it a one man show?
Ages ago, when website was a business enough, 2 of my friends opened a company, providing information on pet birds. Chuck, who is not exactly at the cutting edge of technology, wanted to be the business guy. So Nitin had to do all the hard HTML programming.
Chuck wanted to be the customer front. So, on the website, contact page, 3 links were provided:
Sales: sales@mypetbird.com –> forwards to Chuck
Existing Customers: customers@mypetbird.com –> forwards to Chuck
Support support@mypetbird.com –> forwards to Chuck
So, a two people company with 3 addresses, all of whom forward to Chuck. A classic case of a small company trying to appear big.
Anyhoo. This is what happened today, that prompted Chuck’s failed business history coming out in the open.
Due to a late onset stupidity, I lost my wallet. Everything gone – credit cards, debit cards, license, cash, all. So, I started the painstaking process of canceling the cards. Credit cards (Citibank and Chase), went smoothly. Talked on phone, all taken care of. Then came the debit cards.
Called my credit union. Those cheapos have consolidated into one line for all CUs, so a not so pleasant lady took all the information, and said, ok, they will forward to my credit union. Forward??? Fine, it is off of my plate. If the card gets used in the meantime, it is their problem, I have already reported it, and it was lost less than 3 hrs ago.
Then came Bank of America. On the website, they list a dedicated number for lost/stolen cards. I called in. The voice asks me for my card number. I lost the card damn it! OK, they provide a social security number option, used that, the voice is able to track. The voice asks me what I would like to do:
To check your balance, press 1.
To transfer balances, press 2.
To pay your account, press 3.
Hmm, I had called lost/stolen card number. Why I am I talking to Chuck. Whatever, I used to “Other, press 7″ option.
It says it will forward me to a representative. Anthony comes on and asks me for my card number. I lost the card damn it (just once, but deja vu is beginning to set in). Ok, he provides a social security number option, I used that. Now, everyone on the bus knows my social. Fine, what is so special about a number with 5 7s and 4 6s anyway. He says, what would I like to do – check balance, transfer, get a home equity line of credit. Basically how he can help me. Now that I know he is helpful, I tell him I lost the card, and would like to cancel it. He says he will transfer me to the right department.
I am back to voice. Voice is telling me about the home equity line of credit. You know, after a couple of times, that is starting to look good. Perhaps I will wait till after I have a house.
Ok, voice wants me to press 7, for “Other”. I do that, voice puts me on the queue. It tells me my wait time could be about 16 minutes. Holy cow! I get to wait for 16 minutes, while someone uses the Bank of America check card. Maybe I ought to call my broker and short on BOA. Perhaps I will wait till I have a broker.
So, how is it that a large company like Bank of America, routes all of its different (specialized) phone numbers to they same system. Should I ask, what the Chuck?
August 23rd, 2007
Stealing the wireless internet – man you got me!!
So, here is the thing. A guy in UK has been charged with stealing wireless internet! Apparently, the guy was walking around with his laptop, until he found an open wireless, and then he used it.
Boy, I sure am glad the Scotland yard guys have not made it to my northern virginia neighborhood. I have an unprotected wireless, all my neighbors do, and I don’t really know when my computer connects to mine, and when to someone else’s! I also don’t know when my neighbors connect to my router, and I don’t really give a hoot.
Anyone itching to tell me about the security risks with this, hold your pessimism to yourself. My laptop has a good firewall, a virus scan and has never been hacked. Can you say that for yourself? Also, I have never not had Internet. Now, can you say that for yourself?
August 22nd, 2007
The Genius Bar Needs a Liquor License – Problems with an iPhone
Saw this most outrageous post about iPhone – some had a truly bad experience with Apple’s customer service. (If you are a mac zealot and want to tell me there was nothing wrong with iPhone, read my comment again, it says nothing about iPhone, but while we are on the topic, I do consider iPhone as an unusable device).
This person’s experience tells me two things:
Firstly, Apple’s geniuses are not that smart, or they had a very off day. The crucial point is not that they failed to see a simple thing, or that they failed to fix the problem. The crucial point is that the guy simply reinstalled the system 2 times, and then claimed it was fixed, when he knew it wasn’t. The author of the note made a clear note of the wait times, the guy’s attitude, and none of that is favorable. Read Joel’s this blog entry (#4) about a guy who tried 2 times and did not fix the problem, yet won over the customer with his simple attitude (and by fixing it 3rd time).
Secondly, comments on the blog are a bad idea. If you happen to read the comments, you can notice that they are quite distasteful (the comment’s author may be thinking they are funny, or witty sarcastic, or something, but in reality they are plain hateful).
August 21st, 2007
From not so good to not so great
Just finished reading “Good to Great” by Jim Collins, and I feel a bit underwhelmed.
My friend and mentor puts it a bit less mildly: “All business books start with a known result (success) and then work their way backward from that known point.”
I don’t completely disagree with that, though I think that books such as G2G do provide some insights into the business.
Let me just stop beating around the bush, and present a chapter by chapter summary:
- “First who, then what“: Good employees, will usually create positive value on their own. That being said, there are some good workers who may struggle to create positive value if totally left without any guidance. So, practically, if you don’t know “what”, it may be difficult to get the right people, and then engage them.
- “Consider the brutal facts“: This is the “backward” part that my friend talks about. The successful companies are called the “honest” fact facers. The unsuccessful companies are called arrogant.
- “Hedgehog concept“: Gist of the book. This is really important. Identifying golden circles of a company does provide good clarity to everyone.
- “Culture of Discipline“: Basically, this is just common sense that the discipline has to be in moderation.
- “Technology Accelerators“: As the author says himself, companies should use technologies to accelerate, not provide growth opportunities. Valid point, but a bit on the simple side.
- “Flywheel and the Doomloop“: Good chapter, a bit cheesy, but the overall concept is that the transition point may not well defined. Flywheel takes time and constant improvement, and that should be the goal, not a retreat that is going to provide a sudden lift-off.
- “G2G and B2L“: I don’t think anyone considers this a real chapter, its more like trivia.
- About 80 other pages at the end of the last chapter, such as FAQs, etc (not a regular book).
August 16th, 2007
Thank you for all the greeting cards!
Thanks to everyone for all the birthday cards – my neighbors, worshippers, friends, familymembers, mates, schoolmates, coworkers, classmates – for greeting cards, animated cards, video cards, everything. You truly made me feel special.
To top it all, it isn’t even my birthday.
(Seriously, what is up with all this SPAM?)
August 13th, 2007
Kevin Pietersen’s class
True, the 3rd test match between India and England is just heading for a draw, but full credit must be given to England for holding out three and half sessions. Too many teams have see the 4th inning fold out in less than a day when facing a task even less daunting than faced by England today.
Remember Australia in India, 2001, second test (that eternally belongs to VVS)?
There was a fair bit of talk for England chasing down 500, pushing for victory. That was a bit unrealistic, but then again, records do get broken, and dreams do come true. It is to England’s credit that such talk was popping up even in the post-lunch session.
The everlasting “better lose series 2-0 than lose 1-0 and not try” comments are always seen in similar situations in the 3rd test, but people tend to agree with them only until the team does lose 2-0. After that, losing 1-0 starts sounding much better. Remember South Africa vs. Australia, 2006, when Graeme Smith gifted the 3rd test to Australia by setting them a target of less than 300?
I do too.
August 7th, 2007
Does it bother you now – the clothes you told me not to wear?
Man,
I feel like a teenager when I listen to Dido. Especially, some songs are really cool for me – like this one, with nice up and down music. I sometimes dream that I am playing in her band, in a large audience, and that the audience is only watching her, and I am coolly playing an instrument in a group of 10 band. Nobody notices me, exactly as I would want, and yet, everybody hears the undertones of music as they sing along to her, and take different meanings out of the same song and the same music, each one of them.
It is extremely dorky to say, “Oh this artist really gets me”. Dido isn’t really aware of me. I am aware of Dido. Yet, to say “I really understand Dido” would be meaningless. Really, all that happens is that the artist says something that the listener is then able to understand and enjoy, but you already knew that.
Unpause.
.
August 6th, 2007
Curse of Free Email
I will not start my tirade by wasting sentences about the curse of SPAM (how much and what kind of SPAM I get, etc).
Rather, let me reminisce. In olden (pre Internet) times, if you remembered someone (or you were forced by parents to), you would send a post card to your relatives. Or a letter. Or a card. Something. You would take a stamp, wet it with your dog’s nose and put it on the letter. Then, send the post card on its merry way. Would get there in a couple of days.
If you had *lots* of post cards to send, you may wish, wow, if it cost only 3 cents to send a post card, that would be much better. Say, your wish was granted, then you could send 4 times as many post cards. But you wouldn’t start sending it to people you didn’t know.
Today, with the new technology, the cost to send mail (email) has gone down to zero. Zilch. Nada. Therein lies the problem. If technology makes something cheaper, that is good. Making something totally worthless, not so much.
Say we had to pay 1c everytime we send an email. Looking at my outlook sent times and my OExpress sent items and my gmail sent items and doubling that all, I would have paid 22c yesterday! About 7$ total for a month. I would really love to do that, if in return the SPAM is eliminated. Now at this moment, a bunch of you are pressing Ctrl-N to send me a new SPAM email raising this question: (i) 7$ not so little for everyone, (ii) who would the money go to?
Ok, I have gotten your email, and here are my thoughts:
(i) If 7$/month too much money, how about 0.70$/month? That is 0.1 cent per email. Remember the problem is with spammers who send tens thousands of messages a day. It would start costing them 10$ a day. Maybe not a show stopper from them, but worse than 0$.
Also, giving some basic free (like some cell phone companies give first 600 minutes free).
(ii) SMTP/IMAP server. Money can only go to mail server host. They are the only ones who know when an email message is sent. ICANN could regulate that and collect some portion of the money from the mail server owners (and perhaps give a portion of that portion to some charity). Many of these mail servers are owned by companies such as MSFT, Yahoo, Google etc, so they would get some money too. Perhaps that would put an end to the term “free email”.
Wow, going back from free email to “very cheap” email. Anyone with me?
.
August 6th, 2007
Frankfurt Airport – Clean or Dirty?
Traveling through the Frankfurt airport very recently, my entire notion of German cleanliness was busted. (Ok, so I was biased before, and now I stand corrected – indeed freed! – from my prejudices.)
The airport had dirty floors, full trashcans, crowded paths (that is, all signs of hustling human activity). So, what did I not like here? Well, let me explain.
The airport, being an airport of a free nation, cares for the various groups of people, especially one set that frequently goes underrepresented – the smokers! So, the airport has dedicated smokers zones to help those people live as well. So far, so good. Here is sort of how the smokers lounges are laid out:
As you walk alongside these smokers areas, you are literally walking in them. Are we to believe, that like the law abiding smokers in a law abiding German airport, the air also refuses to go outside of the “smoking areas”? Accuse me of assuming, but I don’t think so!
So, your experience in the airport necessarily gets a bit clouded by the rings of fire. Quite remarkable, that the airport thought it was necessary to give the smokers a break, but did not think it was necessary to shield the other people by using aloe-mist, providing disposable oxygen masks for walking by (or by using more boring methods of better planning, or closed smoking enclosures).
August 3rd, 2007
iPod doesn’t rock
It seems that it has become fashionable to call iPod fashionable.
Put another way:
It is cool to say iPod is cool.
I have had an iPod nano for almost a year now. The list of pains that I have suffered with it is long. Following 3 points stand out:
- It doesn’t have (or I have not figured out) the capability to delete songs. Dumb. Real, real dumb. If I put a bad song on my iPod, it stays on, until I venture into the basement, connect the iPod, start iTunes (I do NOT like doing this) and figure out iTunes. What really ends up happening is that I end up not using the iPod as much as I would like.
- It creates a fuss when I connect it to a different iTunes. I have upgraded my PC a couple of times. Each time, it creates a fuss, that now iPod is connected to a “different” iTunes. Who the banana cares? (It would be fine even if it wiped everything that came from old iTunes and loaded from new, as long as it does that automatically.)
- iTunes is really lousy software. It is a case in point on how to write non-responsive software. I am a software developer, and I like showing this to new guys in the team on what we do not want to write. (It is helpful in that aspect, so it is not like it doesn’t serve any purpose.) iPod only works with iTunes (Maybe not, but estoy no hacker.)
- I can’t charge it with a regular USB charger. I need to connect it to computer or to cradle (which I don’t have).
Ok, so I have 4 main gripes, not 3. Whatever.
.