T-Mobile: Agitator Extrordinaire

Reading this piece about John Legere and T-Mobile’s marketing drove home several thoughts that have been lurking in my mind. First, creating a unique brand presence in a saturated/commodified market is very, very hard. How do we make these boring items sexy? Working in real estate, I’ve been struggling with that for some time. Having a flamboyant leader, one who doesn’t shrink from the limelight nor controversy is critical.

How does one rise to front of mind in today’s media landscape? Uniqueness is key. A certain eccentricity, and self-love of that, really helps. It also helps having gobs of cash to spend.

I think the next wireless sector winner will be a fierce competitor. T-Mobile matches that.

T-Mobile: Agitator Extrordinaire

Reading this piece about John Legere and T-Mobile’s marketing drove home several thoughts that have been lurking in my mind. First, creating a unique brand presence in a saturated/commodified market is very, very hard. How do we make these boring items sexy? Working in real estate, I’ve been struggling with that for some time. Having a flamboyant leader, one who doesn’t shrink from the limelight nor controversy is critical.

How does one rise to front of mind in today’s media landscape? Uniqueness is key. A certain eccentricity, and self-love of that, really helps. It also helps having gobs of cash to spend.

I think the next wireless sector winner will be a fierce competitor. T-Mobile matches that.

The Limits Of Web Solutions

Today, one of the main sites I work out of is struggling with a DDOS attack. Well, it’s actually been the past few days. This site tracks my workflow, and houses my to-do list. Being locked out has moved from annoyance to inconvenience to problem to serious issue.

This has me wonder, though: is technology really ready for “prime time”? For those of us who have shifted our calendars, tracking systems, CRM to the web, what is at risk? A relatively simply action can create significant paralysis.

To be clear, I’m not ready to abandon all my tech solutions and grab paper and binders yet. But I am considering what I can do, analog or otherwise, to be better able to react to these nuisances. There is no guarantee that any website will remain in business tomorrow. There are technological snafus. How do I minimize the risks inherent with going all-in with tech/web solutions? I’ll be meditating on that for the next few days. 

Prime Music

In case you missed the announcement, Amazon has launched Prime Music. As you can guess, Amazon is the latest tech animal to enter the online music fray. I downloaded the iPhone app last night and have been streaming music at my desk at work today. For now, the music selection is pretty small for the streaming service. As a heavy Spotify user, Amazon is not going to displace my current habits. Prime looks to be supplementing/feeding their mp3 download service. That’s not where I am, at this point. Key phrase: at this point.

I fully expect that Amazon is “in it to win”. They’re fierce competitors, and I expect that they’ll push this service further. Probably, there will come a point that Spotify’s $9/mo service will seem redundant to my Prime membership fee. Then it will be tough. I’m not keen on giving too much control over my life to one vendor. However, I value my cash. Yeah; tough. Or, perhaps, Spotify will be bought by one of the big players and this will become a non-issue. Always in motion, the future.

MaydayPAC and Hope for Democracy

I am excited by this project: Mayday, creating a crowdsourced SuperPac to end all SuperPacs (SuperDuperPac?). I’ve long admired Larry’s work, and also have been concerned by cash’s influence in politics. For me, this has the potential to be a profound pivotal moment of the internet age and social media driven democracy. This coming Monday (June 16) at 8:00 pm EASTERN time, Mr. Lessig and Amanda Palmer will be hosting a video conversation that I expect will be very much worth your time. If I can at all make this work with my calendar, I will be online for this.

Update: Here’s some recommended “pre-reading”:  1) http://thebea.st/UhhBVV  2) http://bit.ly/MD-TNR  3) http://bit.ly/MD-Medium 

Annoyed with my iPhone

Currently, I’m annoyed as heck with my iPhone. The glorious Jesus phone started doing such things as calling random people, after my screen going black. Weird enough, I guess. My usual solution to such ails is a reboot. And, lo, there’s an update to install. So, let’s combine the two. Dear lord, no, no…never again will I make that combination. Stalled installations, resetting to factory defaults, then reinstalling from a backup (glad I’m a bit neurotic about my backups), all making for a delightful night and morning for me. And I’m still discovering weird tweaks: incomplete syncing of contacts the most recent.

Grrrrr…..

Thoughts on Blogger and Google+

As a long time Blogger user, I do worry a bit about how much longer Google will support this. The rise of Google+ drives that. The various features added lastly to + make it look like they compete, and we all know about “Houses Divided”.

It seems that “+” gets all the developer energy, all the press. Blogger is way behind Word Press as far as features. So, probably, I’ll do what so many others I know have done and port this over to WordPress.

Why I love Twitter

Been thinking about the mighty Twitter. Why do I like it so much, yet others I know hate the platform? One key thought: chaos. For me, the beauty of Twitter is it’s chaos. This manic, crazily shifting feed of information delights me. Yet I understand how this could be a hard style for others.

I specifically, deliberately follow smart and creative people without millions of followers. The people I follow will grab anything a celebrity would say (that’s interesting) early enough for me to still be in the front of the thought curve. I value unique thinking over most anything else.

Twitter is more global. Maybe it’s my follower curation, but my list does a great job of giving me a global view, more so than I’d ever see reading a US based news org.

If I need order, I have Google or Bing. And Facebook gives me a good look into the macro interests of our culture. Twitter trend to be where I see the cutting edge thinking, the leading stories. And I love that.

Is Smartphone The Right Term Anymore?

I remember using the term “smartphone” long before the iPhone. Devices like the BlackBerry, Windows Mobile and the Treo: these were the original “smartphones”. However, these guys are a league separated from today’s devices. As I consider it, the main difference seems to be accessing the web. Today’s smartphones interact with the web as well as desktops, or closely so.

The modern devices easily seen mis-named in comparison. I wonder of a new name is justified? Well, who am I to decide? Plus, even if I were to craft the most brilliant name, would it get traction? Would it get adopted?