Herein you’ll find articles on a very wide variety of topics about technology in the consumer space (mostly) and items of personal interest to me. I have also participated in and created several podcasts most notably Pragmatic and Causality and all of my podcasts can be found at The Engineered Network.
Amazon Are Doing Just Fine: For Now...
The tech news world is always a buzz this time of year, as the final quarter of the previous year which includes the holiday sales period is usually the strongest for tech companies. Apple recently released record breaking results. Amazon just released their results.
There are two keys items in the report: Net Income down from $416M in 2010 Q4 to $177M in 2011 Q4 (a 58% decrease) and the “…Kindle (is) our bestselling product across both the U.S. and Europe.”
Whilst Amazon don’t break out their Kindle numbers or even allude to them in real terms, one can assume that their new Kindle Fire is selling well, though unlikely to be selling better than their existing Kindle eInk e-Readers. Clearly there is year over year growth for their existing Kindle eInks, bolstered by their new Kindle Fire Tablet PC.
It’s no surprise that their net income was down: for Amazon introducing a new product as expensive (relative to their eInk Kindles) as the Fire has drained their resources and a bounce-back is very likely in the near future. In short: Amazon are doing just fine: For now.
When Are You Finished? Don't Chase the Line.
Lately I’ve been wondering when you are finished. So long as there is imagination, so long is no such thing as perfection, so long as someone believes there has to be a better way, nobody will ever be finished anything.
On a given project there is a specification (or hopefully there is some kind of design direction) and the job is costed, project awarded and a person or company starts working on that project to meet the specification. Then the project is finished or nearly so, and the arguments begin. The specification was too broad: the person/company doing the project has excluded some items from its scope of work but not enough. The customer points out defects with the job, adds functionality where they can and then, begrudgingly they hand over final completion and the end of defects. The customer looks around their shiny new device/plant and then start thinking about how to make it better and plan the next upgrade. Next time it will be quicker, smoother and less painful, right?
The truth is that this applies to pretty much everything. People set themselves a goal. What happens when you achieve that goal? I want to be the fastest runner in my school. Then when you are, you want to be the fastest runner in your state. Then when you are, you want to be the fastest runner in your country. Then when you are, you want to be the fastest runner in the world. Is there more? What if you were wrong all along and you just enjoyed running: what about marathons? How many will you run? Will you ever be finished?
The key point seems to be that nothing is truly finished, but the finish line can keep moving. The trick is stopping that line from moving away from you - whether you have control of the line or not, you can still choose to chase or to ignore it. Being happy with the current state of your progress toward a goal is a better way to define completion. If you don’t do that, you’ll forever we worrying about the fact you haven’t achieved your goal and you feel like it is unfinished. Define the finish line if you can. If it moves, don’t chase it endlessly - redefine the line and stop when you reach it.
If you always chase the line, you will never be finished, anything, ever.
Having An Epiphany Doesn't Make You A Hypocrite
I wrote last year that opinions about opinions aren’t worth reading or writing and I stand by that stance. What’s changed is I’ve decided to extend this to podcasting activities. I recently started working on a podcast with long-time Twitter and Forum acquaintance Clinton Philips. The Podcast is called The Exastential Podcast and this post is partly a shameless plug.
I’ve noticed a trend with a podcast network that has many podcasts where the majority of hosts know or knew each other prior to the podcasts and during their own podcasts they comment on each others, other podcasts. It seems very similar to the spoken form of opinions about opinions.
As I am now in the Podcast game (early days - I’m aware of this) I’m endeavouring not to critique or comment on other podcasts on Exastential or any other podcasts I may be involved with in the future. I can’t speak for the Clinton, any guests or the panel but as I challenged readers to last year, email me if I break my own rule.
Trying not to be like the rest of them.
Email Tech Distortion if breaches to my new self-imposed code of conduct are documented from this date forward
RIM Sack Their Co-CEOs: Is Anyone Surprised?
RIM announced yesterday that their Co-CEOs: Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis were being “named” and shall “remain” in different positions in the company and Thorsten Heins would take over the role as CEO: this time just the ONE CEO…
Since demotion is the less aggressive way to sack people, let’s just call this move exactly what it is: RIM have sacked their CEOs and we have to ask: is anyone surprised by this? Both have performed somewhat badly in interviews, presentations and leadership for what was once the leading smartphone manufacturer in the world, and have lead it into a decline that seems unlikely they can recover from.
They dismissed the iPhone: a device that has truly changed the smartphone industry. Some of their short-sighted comments include:
Jim Balsillie in February 2007: “It’s kind of one more entrant into an already very busy space with lots of choice for consumers … But in terms of a sort of a sea-change for BlackBerry, I would think that’s overstating it.”
Mike Lazaridis in November 2007: “Try typing a web key on a touchscreen on an Apple iPhone, that’s a real challenge. You cannot see what you type”
Mike Lazaridis in 2008: “…the amount of marketing and the attention (Apple) generated in the market–the customers are now coming to the store and saying I didn’t know you could do all that with a phone. And when they get there they realize there’s a selection–there’s not just one device. And so what it’s actually done is increased our sales.”
Don’t forget the Playbook marketing slogan: “Amateur Hour is Over” and how badly the Playbook has sold.
That all said, not every good or bad decision comes from the top. In fact many companies have succeeded despite their bad management at the top: it’s just rare and a lot of hard work for the people at the more hands-on level of the company.
Thorsten Heins has a challenge to get RIM back on track. I wish him all the best, but I fear the ship that it RIM is sinking and there’s no nice and easy way to stem the flow.