From the newsdesk- a blog from computing.co.uk

Thursday, 02 April 2009

View from the US: And now for the good news

Last October, the head of Sequoia Capital, the top dog in Silicon Valley venture capital, called a now infamous meeting. The heads of the companies in which Sequoia had invested were ushered into a boardroom where, standing before them, was a gravestone bearing the epitaph “RIP Good Times.”

British partner Mike Moritz then began a detailed explanation of how bad the next few years were likely to be. Staff would have to be cut, budgets trimmed to the bone and all industries would be hit business and consumer. Given Sequoia Capital’s clout and track record, the whole tech industry took the message to heart.

However, nearly six months later, the situation may not be as gloomy as some first believed. Redundancies have been bad but businesses are still buying they are simply more selective about IT.

A case in point is the move to green computing, which is receiving a double stimulus from government spending and the knowledge that it makes sense, because efficient technology saves money.

Likewise, mobile data also seems to be surviving. Mobile internet is taking off in the US in a big way now that services are being standardised. The duality of mobile phone standards in the US has left the country two steps behind Europe, and to an extent one behind Asia. But 3G has won out and there is now strong growth in mobile applications, particularly in financial transactions and location-based services.

But the really safe bet seems to be services. Salesforce.com and other software-as-a-service firms have seen a big uptake in business. It is partly the result of reliable web connections but also the cost savings involved. Buying software on CDs is seen as wasteful and so old fashioned.

Companies such as IBM have been seeing growth in software services revenue while hardware sales head in the opposite direction. IBM’s sale of its PC division to Lenovo is now looking like a very smart move indeed.

The one bright spot in hardware is mobile sales. The iPhone is making a play for the business market, although it needs much more application support to really make an impression; RIM is continually hitting the market with better BlackBerry models, and the new Palm Pre looks to be a smash if the company can deliver on time.

By Iain Thomson, US editor

Posted at 10:57 AM in hardware, innovation, internet, mobile, software, Sports | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Monday, 16 March 2009

Lord Carter’s Digital Rights Agency - Straw Man or Wicker Man?

Last Friday, Digital Britain supremo Lord Carter unveiled a Digital Rights Agency (DRA) “straw man”, inviting public views as to whether it should be, “torched, tolerated or a touchstone for the start point of constructive debate and design."

The responses should address what role any DRA, “should play in protecting and promoting the legal use of copyright content online, and how industry, consumer groups and government can work together to create an environment where investment in creativity is rewarded,” said Carter.

However, it looks like the two main points in the punt for public comment are: who exactly is going to fund this agency, and who will have the clout to legally enforce any decisions the DRA needs to pronounce on. And does it become an independent industry body with back-up legal powers held by Ofcom? Presumably Lord Carter will pronounce more authoritatively in the final Digital Britain report due in the summer, but this particular “straw man” consultation will end on 30 March.

Coincidentally, anybody watching ITV1 the night before the unveiling of the DRA proposal, would have seen that classic British horror film The Wicker Man, with Edward Woodward’s god-fearing police officer uncovering pagan rituals and other shenanigans on a Scottish Isle while investigating a missing person.

One of the “other shenanigans” involves being tempted by Britt Eckland dancing naked in the room next to the one Woodward is trying to sleep in. I suspect Lord Carter has yet to be similarly tempted, but he should know that Woodward, the government’s official in that film, ends up being burnt alive in a 60 foot high wicker man at the end of the movie.

Lord Carter is unlikely to suffer the same fate, but the proposals for any DRA just might.

By Dave Bailey

Posted at 11:40 AM in government, internet, security | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Thursday, 26 February 2009

Joining the dots for a successful domain

Over the past four years I have covered my fair share of top-level domain (TLD) launches. Think of .eu, .mobi, .whatchamacall it; they have all kicked off to great fanfare, then slowly reached respectable if not earth-shattering registration numbers.

That’s the problem with them – there are so many out there, companies tend to snap them up out of obligation, and for brand protection reasons. In reality they end up relying on the old favourites – .com, .uk and so on.

The .com TLD is pretty much a must-have if your firm wants to compete at a global level, and if you are reaching out to a specific national market, a country code TLD has its advantages.

Well, .tel is very different. “Game changing”, “innovative”, and “very significant” are just some of the terms being used to describe the latest TLD to be launched. The domain is being promoted by London-based registry Telnic as a one-stop shop, allowing individuals or companies to display in one place all their contact details – phone numbers, web and email addresses, physical address, Skype, Twitter, social networking page, GPS co-ordinates – the list goes on.

In technical terms, the domain is also different because a .tel URL will not point to a web site stored on a local server. Instead, it will return information stored on the internet’s Domain Name Server.

So what’s the value of having one of these?

Well, if you have a business, it would be incredibly handy to have a place to point people if they needed contact information from you.

And that’s not all. It will allow firms to offer up particular contact details depending on the location and device of the user. A customer could be offered the phone number of the nearest branch of a particular store if they access a retailer’s .tel site via mobile phone, for example. Those nice people at Telnic have also thought about potential privacy issues allowing the domain to only be viewed by those you authorise, although this is more likely to be a concern for individuals than it is for businesses.

In general then, it is meant to cut out all the hassle of ploughing through the web to find a company’s contact details. Now, this column is not meant to be an advert for the new domain, but most of the experts believe this is a big one, and could experience significant take-up, given its unique proposition. So with all this at stake, organisations that missed the initial sunrise registration period – which was reserved for trademark holders to put in their applications – could be missing out. It’s now landrush time, open to all-comers.

Its ultimate success, of course, will depend on whether these companies actually choose to market their .tels, or if they see it as just another expense, another domain they have to register to prevent cybersquatters and domain name speculators nabbing them first and possibly abusing their brands.

It will also be interesting to see how creative firms get with their marketing. For example, sports apparel titan Nike might want to register a domain such as heretofindyourshoes.tel – to integrate some new marketing campaign with geolocation capabilities. The possibilities are enormous.

But .tel still faces the challenges of any new TLD – to serve a particular market need, increase use over time and therefore sustain long-term popularity. But people are inherently lazy, and .tel has the opportunity to make peoples’ lives easier by offering one place to go which contains all the contact information anyone could need.

It is for this reason that I think the domain will prosper where .biz, .mobi and others have failed.

By Phil Muncaster

Posted at 09:39 AM in communications, ecommerce, innovation, internet | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Tuesday, 24 February 2009

Broadband brownie points for Virgin

Virgin Media plans to bump everybody on its 2Mbit/s broadband service straight up to a minimum 10Mbit/s – at no extra cost apparently. For people languishing on what Lord Carter's Digital Britain report says will be the target download speed to aim for by 2012, Virgin's altruism seems very laudable.

The brownie points earned by Virgin Media with this announcement will be banked in May, just a month after Lord Carter's final, final Digital Britain report sees the light of day. With BT still rolling out 24Mbit/s – for people close to their local phone exchange - the Virgin Media upgrade looks like another turning of its broadband speed dial. Being able to say that on average, your download bandwidth is greater than BT's, always goes down well with salespeople.

By Dave Bailey

Posted at 01:48 PM in communications, internet | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Thursday, 27 November 2008

How not to sell more laptops

You have to wonder what AMD was thinking when it promoted a new survey by highlighting the fact that it suggests seven out of 10 Britons feel having internet access is more important than having a car, a washing machine or socialising with friends.

Because taken one way, the chip maker’s message appears to suggest that there is a sizeable part of the UK population that lives a kind of hermit lifestyle, unwashed and unloved, locked in the confines of their own house, rarely going out or interacting with real people, and only using a laptop to communicate and shop online.

This dubious insight was delivered in a report entitled Connect-aholic, no doubt written by some poor PR executive, cursed with having to make microprocessors sound appealing.

The resultant waffle tries to suggest that anyone who, say, regularly uploads digital photos to the internet is somehow just a few clicks away from becoming a zombie-like web surfer with an unnatural craving for content. A psychologist was drafted in to add weight to this spurious suggestion.

It’s difficult to believe that somebody who must be fairly high up in AMD’s management team actually approved this release. As Gerald Ratner found to his cost, showing contempt for your customers is very bad for business, and AMD may have come close to crossing the line between gentle rib tickling and outright condescension on this occasion.

Few people like to be portrayed as in need of psychological advice, and the idea of being diagnosed as a “connect-aholic” is hardly an appealing one.

In my experience, most people want to be seen as being sociable, outgoing and hygienic, even if the reality is somewhat different. So why AMD thought it was a good idea to portray most of its customers as suffering from this strange antisocial condition is anybody’s guess. What’s really odd is that the research could have made for some interesting reading if AMD’s marketing people hadn’t put their bizarre spin on it.

AMD commissioned market researcher YouGov to go out and discover the kind of features that today’s surfers would most value in a new notebook PC, whether good graphics and video playback, weight, size etc. The survey questioned more than 1,000 British citizens, and though it did not say how old they were, their preference for social networking, music downloads and YouTube videos tends to indicate the 18-24 year old age bracket.

And once you discard the ridiculous notion that 70 per cent of them are soap-dodging agoraphobics with few interpersonal skills, you can unearth some nuggets of interest in the actual findings.

For many people the internet is essential for their work whether paid employment or study probably more so than a car or a washing machine, or even hair straighteners, which are apparently less desirable as a Christmas present than a laptop (though I suppose this depends on the specific profession in question).

Perhaps the most ludicrous statistic of all is that an estimated 16 million Britons more than a quarter of the entire population will put laptops at the top of their Christmas lists. This is very much wishful thinking on AMD’s part, I would suggest. Plus, if these people never go out, why do they need a portable computer, when a cheaper desktop will do?

Christmas is a time for giving, so rather than undermining people’s confidence in themselves, AMD should give its customers something to smile about, particularly in these times of financial hardship.

As for anybody thinking of buying an AMD-based laptop, think again maybe just use the money to hold a party instead, just to spite them. Besides, they’ll be cheaper in the January sales anyway.

By Martin Courtney

Posted at 12:07 PM in hardware, internet | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Thursday, 30 October 2008

E-commerce success is all in the delivery

It had to happen in the end. “Green” has been replaced on the list of most overused terms employed to sell IT by “economic downturn”. The list of vendors prepared to reinvent their products to highlight just how much money and time they could save you, and how much more efficient they can make your staff, has reached critical mass. The world’s going to hell, but before we get there, you might as well save your firm some money and get a promotion by buying a new piece of IT kit.

Actually, can I shock you for a moment? E-commerce is doing pretty well. Among all the talk of recession, depression and economic regression, there is a success story out there, and used in the right ways, the web channel could be a godsend for retailers. It could help public-sector bodies too. Get citizens to request and pay for council services online, for example, and imagine how many drop-in centres you could close.

A recent report by affiliate marketing firm Linkshare found that shoppers are increasingly turning to the web for the best bargains or to do research before shopping in store. Sites that feature peer reviews of products are also reporting healthy rises in traffic. While 56 per cent of consumers said they are planning to decrease offline spending, only 46 per cent said the same about online buying.

The message is clear get your online store in order, preferably before Christmas, although by now it’s probably too late for this year’s festive period. Improving your online store involves a range of different factors, including a search engine optimisation strategy to ensure you rank high on Google, as well as usability, availability and performance testing. Another key consideration is the integration of online, bricks and mortar, and call centre channels.

But the mistake many in the e-commerce sector seem to make is paying too much attention to the bells and whistles on their web site and spending too little time on the back-office stuff that can make or break the business. They might not be as sexy as web design, with its Ajax this and Flash that, but supply chain management and other disciplines are just as important. You might have made the check-out process as smooth and the site navigation as effortless as possible, but if a customer’s order is left unfulfilled because you’ve run out of stock, you can kiss your next sale goodbye.

It has become something of a truism these days, but in the world of e-commerce the customer truly is king; retention is difficult when switching suppliers is so easy, and prices are so competitive. That’s when factors such as delivery become extremely important.

Industry body IMRG last year launched a new initiative Internet Delivery is Safe (IDIS) to combat the woeful levels of delivery service provided by most e-commerce firms. Very few allow you to choose delivery times, or if they do it will come at a premium price.

Retailers displaying the kitemark have to ensure they provide clear information on deliveries before an order is placed, delivery within an agreed timeframe, and clear charges. The emphasis is on convenience and reliability.

Recently, I had the pleasure of ordering a new bed from the Co-op like your typical Web 2.0 shopper, I have no loyalty to this company, I just found it through Google and noticed the IDIS emblem proudly displayed.

Available delivery dates were shown on an easy-to-read calendar display, three-hour time slots were offered, then follow-up phone calls to check the address, and finally a text to confirm details. It’s not rocket science, but these things could help your customer retention at a time when, as you know, we’re all headed for economic disaster. Oh, and the bed was delivered on time too, by the way.

By Phil Muncaster

Posted at 05:00 PM in ecommerce, innovation, internet, skills, strategy | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)

Thursday, 16 October 2008

The business of social networking

Next month’s Gartner Symposium, to be held in the exclusive Mediterranean playground of Cannes, will explore corporate use of social networking. You could argue that is like meeting up to talk about the opportunity to eradicate the need to meet up in the future, but in a nicer place, with better weather and the chance to enjoy some decent food and wine on business expenses.

But Gartner is serious, and it is predicting that 60 per cent of Fortune 1000 companies will connect to or host a form of online community by 2010. Once you get beyond the headline-grabbing statistics, the key phrase here is “form of online community”, which may or may not resemble Facebook or MySpace, but which could well have something in common with LinkedIn.

Social networking is big business, or at least it is predicted to be in the future. Irrespective of whether Facebook, MySpace, Bebo et al can actually make the sort of money that eager financiers anticipate, the dizzying success of social networking sites to date has made a big impact on the business world.

Marketing executives now worry that their competition is getting better brand awareness by creating social networking profiles, for example. Sales staff are paranoid that deals are being made with rivals on social network sites behind their back. Even HR professionals agonise that potential candidates will go to other firms that make better use of Web 2.0 collaboration technology.

But what is the attraction? Photo and music sharing, contact lists, bulletin boards, classified adverts, email and instant messaging were all widely available from other web sites before.

The difference is that they are accessible at one site that works its socks off at fostering a sense of community among its visitors.

Certainly one of the best uses I have seen for a social networking site which Gartner has also identified is much like an extended customer support platform, basically just one more way for disgruntled users to sling mud at the manufacturer or supplier that sold the latest duff widget.

Another use would be to find more information about a product or service, although it is hard to explain why customers would want to visit a social networking site to find the same information that is on the company web site. The deciding factor could be that sense of user community, which means that other customer opinions can be sought and read at the same time, and people can swap notes about their own experiences.

Even so, the big draw of social networking from the corporate perspective remains the sheer number of people who use them. Web site monitoring resources such as Comscore now report that Facebook and MySpace regularly receive more than 120 million unique visitors per month.

Nevertheless, these numbers call for careful scrutiny. One recent estimate suggests that if these sites are being honest, there would be about 1.3 billion people worldwide using social networks almost the entire internet population.

How many of these registered users are like me? I signed up to the site out of curiosity, discovered I had no friends (at least none that I wanted to contact) and never went back.

So when, if ever, will we know that the use of social networking has really taken off in the business world? Bearing in mind the questionable metrics of the digital world, maybe we should look for evidence of real-world signals, such as when the amount of business travel is vastly reduced. The point when airlines, taxi companies, hotels, restaurants and bars start going out of business in their droves might be as good a reference point as any.

Posted at 09:36 AM in ecommerce, innovation, internet, software | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Thursday, 18 September 2008

Virtually disappointed

Following all the anticipation, the kick off to the VMworld conference this week was slightly disappointing. And after speaking to customers and analysts at the event, I know many feel the same.

A full audience awaited the new VMware president and chief executive, Paul Maritz. It was the ex-Microsoft employee's first major presentation to customers, partners and press since he joined VMware earlier this year and replaced founder Diane Greene, and he had a chance to put right the stories that have circulated on how Greene's departure caused share prices to plummet and important senior executives to step down. Maritz's keynote speech could have been an opportunity for VMware to show the world it would continue its innovation climb and not let the purchase by EMC diminish its hunger.

Instead Maritz's opening speech was flat and the announcements he made did little to surprise anyone. He did not mention his past or register any excitement with his new position.

Customers I spoke to expected the cloud announcements that were made. Some had read the gist of the strategy in the press already and others expected the move because of Maritz's background as chief executive of EMC's Cloud Division and founder of the company's acquired firm Pi.

The keynote told the audience VMware will expand its server virtualisation technology to build the first virtual datacentre architecture – which the firm calls a Virtual Data Operating System - that will allow businesses to pool all types of hardware resources, including servers, storage and networks, into an aggregated on-premise cloud. The capacity will then be able to be federated to off-premise clouds, said Maritz. VMware will partner with vendors such as Intel, Cisco and IBM to ensure the platform succeeds.

But it seems the idea has still to be developed a great deal before VMware can expect a large uptake from customers.

The topic concerning many customers is how secure is it for them to host their infrastructure off-site? And will such a move comply with regulation, especially European Union data privacy laws that require information to be stored within the EU. Indeed, that is why EMC's consumer cloud division, Mozy, has just opened its first datacentre outside the US, in Dublin.

Maritz is aware the new idea needs a lot more work before it will start appealing to customers. Following a question and answer session with the press, Maritz told me it was a complicated issue and he did not have to time to expand on the details, but he said: "The strategy will not take off before VMware solves these data issues and puts in place the necessary solutions".

Considering the cloud announcement was the main focus of Maritz's keynote, I don't think I was alone in expecting some more granular details on how the initiative would actually take off.

Posted at 08:00 AM in innovation, internet, software, strategy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Tuesday, 09 September 2008

Remote working; it's the technology, stupid!

Remote access technology has been instrumental in helping to forge a social and commercial revolution.

A report from the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) suggests that 46 per cent of UK businesses now offer some form of teleworking option to their staff, a figure that has more than trebled in the last two years.

If accurate, this is a huge victory for both technology and common sense. Not least because it indicates that, in some quarters at least, many of the old prejudices about responsible working adults turning into mischievous truant schoolchildren when let off the nine-to-five leash have finally been overcome.

IT has been instrumental in this turnaround, though perhaps only because its proven success has given bosses one less thing they can object to when considering a home working request.

The technology is there and it works. From the simple reliability of remote access to office email systems combined with internet links and mobile phones, to the sort of IP telephony and centralised applications being used by call centre staff to utilise office systems and databases from different locations.

If the CBI figures are wrong - and there may be instances of employers’ being unwilling to admit they do not offer flexible working options to their staff when questioned - the barriers to widespread adoption of home working are certainly not being raised by either a lack of suitable technology, or its reliability.

As always, the biggest hurdle is people’s attitudes, loosely based on their fear of one thing or another. Employers are scared that workers they cannot physically see will be putting their feet up and avoiding hard work. Employees are scared that working flexibly will limit their chances of promotion and the scope of their wider career advancement.

Both scenarios are occasionally true, but hopefully remain the exception rather than the rule. For the most part, home working can be successfully implemented using reliable technology, sound working procedures, and the willingness of both sides to be flexible.

If homeworking figures continue to climb at the pace the CBI suggests, remote access technology will have laid the foundation for the most significant alteration in global working practices since the beginning of the industrial age.

Posted at 05:25 PM in communications, innovation, internet, skills, strategy | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Friday, 25 April 2008

China hopes to promote the "People's Games"

Despite having access to CNN, BBC World, reasonably fast broadband and clearance into a high security Olympics testing lab, I am unable to read Computing’s newsdesk blog in China. I can read Computing's news pages and the comments, but when I go to the blogs, there’s a long pause before being told “page can’t be displayed.”

Apart from that 'restriction', it’s not so different from home. The most alien morsels on tonight’s menu were duck brains - served with the rest of the duck - and turtle. I don’t mind admitting that I wasn’t brave enough to try either - and was very happy with mandarin fish and ginger-spiced scrambled egg. Our hosts dismissed our queries about the likelihood of encountering monkey brains or cat, which they said would be “very unusual…possibly in the south.“

Chinese people are very tolerant of westerners who haven‘t got the hang of the etiquette; we have it very easy here, more so than in many European countries, I would say. There’s no pressure to speak Chinese, or do things the Chinese way - and their understanding of British culture is as good as ours. The most challenging thing for me, so far, has been handing over business cards with both hands, while trying not to drop my handbag.

As a technology journalist, I’ve been welcomed with open arms and apart from not being able to get to our blog, I can find out everything I need to know. I don’t have to ask any awkward questions about politics and human rights, because I’m hear to find out more about something that China clearly does very well.

Hosting the Olympics is a century old dream for China, since a student paper in 1908 asked when it would happen. Sun Weide, deputy director of Beijing’s organising committee for the Games, reminded us about this earlier today, as he talked about what the Olympic means to China.

“We have adopted three key concepts,” he said. “Green Olympics, high-tech Olympics - to promote the growth of high-tech industry in China - and the People’s Games. And we hope the events will promote better understanding between China and the outside world.”

The National Aquatics Centre, known as 'The Water Cube, is glowing blue tonight. Sometimes it’s red, or is set up so the bubbles make a ripple effect. I guess I won’t see it any other way before I go, but I’m certainly glad to have been here at all.

By Janie Davies

Posted at 09:54 AM in innovation, internet, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)