Maroon Ventures Blog

It isn’t every day that I get to do the “I Told You So” (ITYS) dance twice.  Remember some months ago when I ranted about the release of the Apple iPhone and iPod touch API being a clear and present danger to major wireless carriers?  Remember? Remember when I pointed to the first VOIP application for the iPhone? Well, here’s another.  JAHJAH announced that now with microphone support for the iPod Touch you can essentially turn your iPod into a wi-fi hotspot “cell” phone. Yep. All you need is a hotspot and your iPod Touch is now a phone. And, unlike the iPhone, you don’t need to engage in any long term contract with AT&T Wireless.  All the benefits of the iPhone without the wireless contract.

Now, to make this really work we just need everyone to open up their wi-fi routers across the country. Ready? You go first…. 

Posted by Chris Tippie

“Everything is relative”

Okay, okay, context is important. Like much of the country, Crested Butte has been getting pounded by winter storms for the couple of weeks. In fact, I can only remember two days out of the last 14 that it didn’t snow. Yesterday, we woke up to 18 inches of fresh snow on the mountain. Like any good powder addict, I popped out of bed at the crack of 4:30, checked the snow report, gave thanks to Ullr (pagan god of winter/snow) and immediately made preparations for heading up to the mountain to catch one of the first chairs. For those of you who aren’t familiar with this wintertime ritual, avid powder skiers start lining up at the chairlift at least one hour before it opens in hopes of untracked powder. The higher the fresh snowfall, the greater the crowds and excitement.

So, as I stood in line for the fourth chair (I am such a slacker) I heard the following conversation take place.

“This winter is epic so far!” - New CB Resident

“This is nothing like last year. Last year we were getting 30 inches overnight, not 18” - Old CB Resident

“That was nothing like back in the 80’s when would get 50 inches overnight” - Older CB Resident

“Well, everything is relative I suppose” - New CB Resident

I started to think about that as I patiently waited another 30 minutes for the ski patrol to finish their avalanche routes and for the chair to start spinning.  Is that really true? I suppose it is largely true. Now that it is winter here in Crested Butte, the snow piles are starting to reach over 20 feet high in several areas. My 3 and 5 year old daughters eye these snow piles much as a mountaineer eyes 14,000 foot peaks. My daughters plot their routes up these snow piles and celebrate their successful assents with unabashed glee. They’ve started naming them and progressively picking harder routes to climb. That’s relativity in action.

I was speaking with my financial advisor the other day and he proudly proclaimed that my portfolio had out performed the index by 15% and his portfolio average by 10%.  That is to say, I lost 10% less money this year than his other clients. Ah…. the sour smell of success. That’s certainly relativity in action albeit painful.

This morning I woke up and it was –2 degrees outside when I walked to work (not counting wind chill). Two months ago I would have pronounced it a bone chilling frigid morning and driven to work. Now that I am in the full swing of winter I decided that is was delightfully balmy and walked to work. Okay, I didn’t really think that – I thought, “damn, it is cold outside but at least it isn’t –35”. Plus there was a 3 foot pile of snow that the city bulldozers left in front of my driveway overnight that prevented me from driving even if I had wanted. But that’s not important now. Back to temperature – that’s certainly relative.

The other week I was discussing the difficulties facing newspapers with a few colleagues. By any measure, these are trying times. However, as we cynically pointed out, at least newspapers can take solace that they’re not oh say US automakers, mortgage companies, investment banks, hedge funds and insurers – those guys are really screwed. Relativity at its finest!

So what isn’t relative. That I put to you is right in front of your face. Friendship, family, love, companionship and the sparkle in a child’s eye as they open their Christmas or Chanukah present. That my friends, is not relative. So on this Christmas Eve and fourth night of Chanukah, let us take time to reflect on the few things that we can all be certain are free from relativity.  

One more thing that isn’t relative – 18 inches of fresh powder will always, ALWAYS constitute a great powder day.

Happy holidays everyone! 

Posted by Chris Tippie

It is that time of year again here in the rockies - the annual unveiling of the White Ribbons of Death (WROD’s) all across the state. What’s a WROD? It is the one or two “runs” that a ski area opens up in November. A few open up a WROD in October. Basically, what they do is wait until it gets below 32 degrees F and make a ton of artificial snow.  

disclaimer: photo of a different ski area

The snow cats push the piles of artificial snow into a carpet or ribbon of snow that runs down a relatively low angle slope at the bottom of the mountain. When enough of the fake stuff has been pushed around they are then able to “open” the mountain.  If they actually open the mountain is another thing. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by Chris Tippie

Ran across this on Technorati’s State of the Blogshere. It is a good read and has some interesting demo and revenue data. The thing that just jumped out at me was this quote:

Whether or not a brand has launched a social media strategy, more likely than not, it’s already present in the Blogosphere. Four in five bloggers post brand or product reviews, with 37% posting them frequently. 90% of bloggers say they post about the brands, music, movies and books that they love (or hate). …Companies are already reaching out to bloggers. One-third of bloggers have been approached to be brand advocates.

Four out of five bloggers write about Proper Nouns/Brands/Products and 37% of them do it frequently. I mean, there is a “no duh” factor here to some extent. Sure, you pull up Paid Content, TechCrunch and Boing Boing and that-is-all-you-see, posts about Proper Nouns. But I guess I didn’t really expect that to translate to your run of the mill blogs. I expected that there would be a whole non-commercial sub tier devoted to… well… talking about ideas and concepts, belief systems and values. However, to get right down to it we’re humans and humans need context. So, even if we’re blogging about something nebulous as “values” we need context and to get context we talk about stuff. Stuff, for most people, involves products and brands. I once read a fantastic blog post on trust and how ultimately extending an altruistic flavor of trust to everyone you meet is at the end of the day profitable for you. Easy concept to grasp - hard concept to live by. To bridge this gap the author referenced two brands: Target and Craftsman Tools as evidence of just how right he was. So there you have it - inexpensive consumer electronics and hammers in a post about altruism. 

With this as an underlying truth in today’s world - if I were a product company why wouldn’t I pay more attention to what people are saying about my company and my products? In large part, they are. However, there is one segment that characteristically doesn’t engage in this proactive outreach: the media. Seriously, car companies take issue with blogs who give unflattering reviews of their new models. Software makers reach out to bloggers around releases and new product launches. However, the media is vilified and misrepresented each and every day in a multitude of blogs. My question is this: how are media companies managing the perception of their products in the blogsphere? For the longest time, there was a reluctance to “stoop to their level” implying that bloggers generally are one step below tabloids. Is that changing? I hope so.  So look above at my quoted text for the highlighted portion. I wonder it that applies to bloggers who review and discuss media?

Posted by Chris Tippie

Strike

Posted by Charity Huff

Via Greg Sterling, Dynamic Logic research shows consumer reaction to ads in various media. Perhaps surprisingly, consumers are a lot more amenable to ads in traditional media than new, and newspapers are at the top of the heap with 42% of respondents having a “somewhat positive” view of newspaper ads.

Is it time for print to start borrowing some of the measurability that’s common online? Why don’t more papers use 800-numbers in ads so they can track the actual phone calls their ads drive? How about the ability to track e-mail or web responses using proxy server technology (think of something like Tiny URLs in print ads that help the paper measure how many people are going to the advertiser’s site based on what they saw in print)? Online products have been doing this for a long time.

It would be really interesting to see someone buy one of the myriad newspapers on the market based on a pro forma that would allow for a sane, easy to understand rate card that completely rethinks some of the gouging that’s created advertiser disdain for newspapers.

Yes, newspapers have lost much of the marketplace status they once held. But most of them still have significant classified franchises and ad volume. And they have substantial, albeit dwindling, local audience. Cutting rate (sorry, Mark, someone had to say it) might be the right, if counterintuitive, way to re-establish some of that clout with advertising that consumers actually like. What if you coupled this with a compelling online strategy that isn’t afraid to put advertisers on the web — even at the expense of the print product if it makes more sense for the advertiser?

Maybe it’s not too late for a truly innovative — even disruptive — approach to print advertising. But it probably will have to come from someone arriving fresh to the industry with a sober view of the current economics it faces. Recent “fresh” arrivals haven’t followed this route …

Dynamic Logic research results

Posted by Bob Benz

I discovered the Wall Street Journal’s Blackberry app via Silicon Alley Insider a few weeks ago, but I waited a while before posting a note on it to see if it’s the real deal. It is.

It’s a great, utilitarian way to browse the Journal, and it’s free. Not sure how long that will last, but enjoy it while you can. It gives you access to pretty much everything that’s in the Journal. I like the tabbed approach to browsing, and it downloads headlines and summaries quickly and efficiently. While I like Yahoo! Go on the Blackberry, it’s slower to launch and more cumbersome to maneuver through. I often find myself just going straight to the WSJ now because it’s faster and easier.

Two complaints: I had one instance where the app stopped downloading new headlines. I shut off and restarted my phone, which seemed to unkink it. Also, I haven’t been able to get the Keyword tab to work. I enter the keywords I want to track, but it doesn’t seem to retain them. Not sure if I’m doing something wrong or if this is a bug.

I guess a third complaint would be that an iPhone version isn’t available. But I’ll leave that for my iPhone-fanatic Partners to voice. If you had to start somewhere, Blackberry is the right place with a bigger install base and business-focused users.

Want to check it out? Download it here.

Posted by Bob Benz

I am. Drop me a line if you want to get together to compare notes, hear about Maroon Ventures’ schemes for world domination or just get caffeinated …

I’ll be participating in the Optimize and Monetize panel on Friday, Sept. 12 from 2:30 to 3:45. Here’s a PDF schedule for the entire conference, and here are details on the Optimize and Monetize panel …

“Master the art of online advertising and understand what works for your site. Are you using excess inventory to your advantage? What do advertisers need? What do marketers think when they decide what to spend and where to spend it? Where are you going wrong?
“Panelists: Ken Doctor, news industry analyst for Outsell; Mark Rose, director for sales strategy, Tribune Company; Bob Benz, partner, Maroon Ventures.”

Posted by Bob Benz

Aurora (Part 1) from Adaptive Path on Vimeo

Via LifeHacker, I came across this intriguing guess at what life on the Web will be like 10 years from now. Is it just me, or does it seem rather Apple-esque? And that creepy music in the background. It’s just a little too close to the airy-yet-ominous soundtrack on the Epic 2015 video.

But all snarkiness aside, Adaptive Path’s Aurora represents some fascinating thinking. Definitely worth a look.

And while we’re talking about user interface, check out “The Creative Destruction of a Website” post on Innoblog. It looks at the disruptive implications of ad agency Modernista!s new home page design. It takes the disaggregation that’s occurring on the web to the next level, essentially conceding that users will find, gain and access information in their own way. Modernista! just provides navigation and tools that allow its users to learn about the agency in a way that isn’t predicated on everything residing on the agency’s site. It’s almost the navigation equivalent of RSS ..

Update: Part Two of the Aurora video is now online.

Posted by Bob Benz

Root Clip, which has emerged from the innovation group at Scripps newspapers, has opened voting on its second film, Chance Encounters. The site has come a long way since I initially took note of it in this blog. Clearly, Erik Luchauer and Kevin Antoine are iterating as they go, refining the process and streamlining the user interface.

The premise of the site is that Erik and Kevin post a short video, a root clip, and other filmmakers are urged to submit the next video in the sequence. Users vote on the best submission with the winner becoming the second installment. Then on to the next round. In the end, if all goes well, you end up with a short video story that is created by myriad filmmakers in a collaborative process. Talk about social media.

The major obstacle I hit when voting on Chance Encounter was the need to register. While I understand why it’s necessary to avoid voting fraud, it was a pain to have to go and register just as I was about to vote. But go ahead and register. Then vote. It’s an interesting project that’s worth checking out.

And why would a newspaper company be messing around with this? I’m not sure, exactly. But there’s something cool here, something outside the bounds of what newspapers traditionally do that could help as they cast around for what role they’ll play in an interactive world. It doesn’t take much extrapolation to come up with ideas that could apply in local markets, advertising and news.

Posted by Bob Benz