Waze provides free turn-by-turn directions, with help from your friends:
(Via TechBlog)
Nice review of the mapping app Waze.
Power to the public
So now companies don’t just need to hire people to watch Twitter and blogs and put out fires. Now they have to fear that their abusive policies will become the subject of large-scale, instant protests.
(Via BuzzMachine)
What company or organization will be destroyed by customers who mass cancel their accounts? This will happen someday, probably in the next ten years. Some firms live on the cash flows monthly subscribers pay them.
You have a real problem If your customers loath your organization. New options are becoming available. Some customers will do without, rather that do business with you. A good example of this is people canceling home cable TV service and not replacing it with satellite TV. These people are likely choosing video programming from the Internet. It’s also possible that they are watching over the air HD broadcasts. The power to disrupt that is broadband Internet is hard to over estimate. Many new services will come about as more people have broadband at home. Faster speeds will also enable new businesses. Old ones will decline and some will be eliminated. Online data backup might disrupt the external hard drive industry in the not to distant future.
Forbes Contributing Writer Attributes Attractiveness, Children and Housekeeping to “Why Women Do Not Become CEOs”
Editor’s note: Most men will also never become CEOs, too.
(Via Women 2.0)
Love the Editor’s note at the end.
Urban bike riding as training for tree-skiing season
Urban bike riding as training for tree-skiing season:
Riding (er, snowboarding) through trees / down chutes requires you to make pretty quick decisions at decent speeds.
(Via teendrama :: hello my name is dennis.)
Bicycle riding has a lot of inputs. Curbs, people, dogs, oncoming cars, driveways, other cyclists, waters, leaves, etc.
This rapid flow of incoming stimuli requires the mind to analyze a lot of data and to make rapid decisions to prevent bad outcomes. Falls, slops, slides, flips and other injuries to people and property.
The ability to make correct decisions quickly is important in life and in business.
Filene’s Files for Chapter 11 Protection
Filene’s Files for Chapter 11 Protection:
Discount retailer Syms and its Filene’s Basement subsidiary filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection with plans to liquidate.
(Via WSJ.com: US Business)
Sometimes it’s not a good idea to buy things in a bankruptcy sale. In a weak economy and with tight credit the margin of error gets smaller. If the economy was growing or strong, this could work.The weak economy and integrating in the assets of Filene’s Basement distracted Syms management from what they should have been focusing on … creating customers for their own stores.
When I think Syms, I think suits. Well, in a weak economy people are not looking for new suits. They might have considered expanding their brand to comfort-casual to get more people in the stores. People want to look good and be comfortable with what they are wearing.
Notes:
The U.S. economy is changing. Some expanding trends are, contracting, consulting and casual dress.
Certainly there are some people still buying suits in a weak or contracting economy. Some firms still have old school dress. When facing increasingly intense competition it’s important to focus, focus, focus if you want to win and survive. The weak players will be eaten by the stronger players or by some adjacent market that destroys ones own market segment. In the Syms example it’s professional dress. The casual dress market is adjacent to and expanding, at the same time also taking away customers.
Lenovo Profit Rises 88%
Lenovo said its profit rose 88% in the latest quarter, when the Chinese company passed Dell to become the No. 2 PC maker by shipments.
(Via WSJ.com: US Business)
Moving on up. Expanding profits too!
It’s not clear if there are special reasons that profits expanded. Increasing sales seems to be done so often by lowering prices to gain access to more customers, thus driving down margins and total profits. Time will tell if Lenovo is able to continue expanding profits or if there were other factors that lead to expanded profits for this period.
How many baskets?
One basket, cared for and watched carefully. When no one else can focus on and serve that customer as well as you (because you have no choice, it’s your only basket) you have a huge obligation but you also have a platform to do great work.
(Via Seth’s Blog)
Find a problem you care about. Create a solution or a system to fix it. Focus on it. Delight people you need to achieve the goal. These people might play a few differentnt roles, such as, client, supporter, employee, volunteer etc.. Without delighting people, they loose interest and stop actively supporting the mission.
You want to get people to be engaged, enthusiastic and empowered.
Engaged: Sharing ideas on how to be better … Caring.
Enthusiastic: Excited to be part of. The value and importance of this in people cannot be over stated. It’s important to create this in people.
Empowerment: Belief of the individual or the group that they can do what it takes to get things done. It’ also important to consider that people want their input and participation to make a positive impact.
Follow Strategy – SoundCloud – Jordin Sparks
From an email from SoundCloud
Hey,
Jordin Sparks started following you.
This means that Jordin Sparks will get updates about your public tracks and comments.
If you want to get updates on Jordin Sparks’s tracks and comments you can start following Jordin Sparks too.
Your host,
The SoundCloud WeatherMan
Well, I’ve heard of Jordin Sparks but I was not familiar with her music. Two songs are currently featured on the her SoundCloud page. Listened to both, subscribed and favorited both songs.
Looks like she recently joined and is using a follow first strategy to get noticed. A notification invitation ended up in my email and after listening to here songs I became a Follower on SoundCloud. It worked because the content shared was good and this is still the early days of SoundCloud. If every Tom, Dick and Harry does this it will get annoying to have so many email notifications. At that point, those users will be marked as spam or the notifications feature in SoundCloud settings will be changed so I am not notified about requests or new followers.
N&EC:
Currently she has 71 Followers. *Actually 85 as I write this post. Just refreshed her Soundcloud page. How long will it take until she has 2,000?
52 Cups of Coffee • Cup 50
52 Cups of Coffee • Cup 50: “the way you get from Point A (the start of a career) to Point B (the end) isn’t going to be a straight line. But if you keep moving forward, if you have a goal you’re shooting for—and the right mix of hard work and passion—you’ll get there. “
(Via .)
Life is sort of like the stock market, there are daily ups and downs. Sometimes your stock falls in the short term, current examples are Amazon & Netflix, even as you play out the long term strategy of working hard (Hustle + Intensity w Passion) and helping others along the way. Give value first (Gitomer) and be interested in other people (Carnegie) are a few other personal traits that will be useful in addition to working hard.
Codecademy Looks Like The Future Of Learning To Me « Uncrunched
Codecademy Looks Like The Future Of Learning To Me « Uncrunched:
“The service comes from CEO Zach Sims wanting to learn how to code. Cofounder Ryan Bubinski had been teaching people to code for years as a side job in college”
(Via .)
People need to express their problems to other people. Especially people that are willing to listen and to think about what is said. Meet with people and play a role (Talker/Listener) on both sides. Perhaps you and another person will find something important that needs to be done.
My original comment on the post is below. This was the idea that appeared as I read the sentence in the quoted text above.
A + B = C
Scratch your own itch. You may find others have the same issue that needs solving even if their threshold to pain is quite high.
Itch, itch, itch.
Notes & Extended Thinking:
An itch is any problem big or small that needs solving. Small problems solved, even at a low price, a lot of times can be enormously profitable and can make the world a vastly better place. Only a few people will create and win in the race to be the next big thing. There are a lot of small problems that need solving. Coding and computer programming is not a major subject in the U.S. public education system. Educating people how to code is a mostly untapped market. There are millions of students that will need to acquire the skills they need to participate in the workforce of the 21st century. Each year, several million new students enter the education system. As high school graduates leave, a new group of students is coming to the age where technology is interesting to them.
Opportunity.
D.L. Damore 