They who own content also own pricing, part 2

As background and addendum to post just previous: Take  a look at this helpful post by Saul Hansell in NYT.

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http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/01/the-problem-with-cable-is-television/

New York Times – Saul Hansell, Bits Blog. The problem with cable is television. 05 01 09.

They who own content also own pricing. Comcast is not Joost-ing.

I was intrigued by the possible Joost-Comcast combination. But didn’t think it would go. 

My reasoning was basic. Cable economics are about content. Content tends to price the market, not distribution or delivery (though these clearly are in play on the rev and expense side.) So Joost, as a destination and distribution model, would be helpful but not essential.

So, apart from other excellent detailed arguments for or against, including Volpi being a smart guy Comcast should really be talking to, the duet is less compelling.

I question, however, what the motive on the associated news headline is – I would have looked to a post by Spangler (see below reprint and link) or other on what this looks like trendwise. If Comcast is trying to gain control on the content side – basically to manage costs and increase revenue opportunity as bulk sub models transition to a la carte content pricing and channels (which I anticipate will happen later this year) is this decision not to acquire Joost merely a trend recognition? And, what does this mean for Joost and other marketplaces? 

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Comcast Tells Joost ‘We’ll Pass’: Report. Todd Spangler in Multichannel News. April 27, 2009. Reprinted in full, link to post follows reprint.

 (Spangler) Internet TV site Joost, which has reportedly been trying to sell itself to a cable or satellite operator, has met with Comcast — and the nation’s biggest cable operator has turned the startup down, according to the AP.

Well, there wouldn’t appear to be any reason for Comcast to acquire Joost, given that the cable company has spent almost a year and a half developing Fancast, the entertainment portal and video site.

Time Warner Cablemay or may not still be interested in picking up Joost. TWC doesn’t have its own online destination analogous to Fancast and might presumably have an interest in getting to market more quickly than rolling its own site

Link to post is here:

http://www.multichannel.com/blog/BIT_RATE/12605-Comcast_Tells_Joost_We_ll_Pass_Report.php

A bustling town square: This Twitter Is.

As recently discussed on Facebook:

Nielsen has some astute observations about Twitter, but one seems to miss the mark. Is Twitter plagued by quitters?

Twitter appears at first traditional glace to have some retention issues with first-timers.

I don’t think that’s at all the point.

The Nielsen report should ask whether brand loyalty/user retention matters to Twitter at all. Likely not.

Twitter’s eventual business model (of course I’m surmising here…) seems geared toward the “bustling town square” format, in which the specific user is never in the exact same space – or even ever present in the user space.

Aggregate data focus works well with this – targeted messaging does not.

If the aggregate trend is a business case basis, all good for Twitter. They are there.

Targeting, retaining, cultivating a customer – what Nielsen seems to prioritize in its post - would therefore be someone else’s business. Most certainly it would be  a benchmark that Twitter wouldn’t pay much heed to.

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Twitter Quitters Post Roadblock to Long-Term Growth

April 28th, 2009 Posted in Nielsen News, Online And Mobile

http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/twitter-quitters-post-roadblock-to-long-term-growth/

Practice. (repeat 2x)

I’m a firm believer that wisdom in entrepreneurship is about – perhaps equal to – doing.

Maybe the reading part saves a bit of time on the journey. But alone, it is never relevant. Reading a management book is mere entertainment unless you have actually been there. Same here. Do, and fail at least once if you want to succeed.

I will likely refer back in future posts to Goldenson’s points shared here. Well done basics (read this as you are doing!) Thanks to Dean Takahashi for sharing this link.

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10 Lessons from a Failed Startup. Marc Goldenson, Guest columnist – Venture Beat 04.29.09

http://venturebeat.com/2009/04/29/10-lessons-from-a-failed-startup/

Vision is about knowing that you don’t know. Vision is humble.

Steve Tobak on Management, reprinted in full below my own quick post. This one is good for a bit of thought. And even some clarification, which I’ll do briefly.

Speaking to people of many different cultural and experience sets, I encounter many differences in the perception of the term “humility.”

Without stating that only one is correct, here is mine:

Humility is a state of being knowledgeably self aware.

It is associated with extraordinary self confidence, as only the confident person is able to see him/herself honestly – and even desire to.

It is associated with efficient action, as an aware person draws on more facts than most, and therefore can optimize actions of those he/she manages.

It is also associated with empathy, enabling greater awareness of other team members’ capabilities and skills.

Lastly and obviously, humility is associated with good listening and with a heavy dose of mature reality.

Arrogance? The opposite. With impulse, with lack of factual basis, and with continuously (perhaps expertly?) masked lack of confidence. With the need to fool others.

These characteristics are dangerous. If this arrogant person doesn’t actually commit fraud, he/she will certainly appear to be a good candidate to do so.

This is not the guy you pick for your team…makes a big boast then can’t even hit the ball… Then blames the ball for this dilemma! He’s amusing, yes.  maybe even clever. But if he could do the job, he would not need to act this way. Fact.  

Basically, the qualities Tobak describes are all humility, in different forms. Choose another term if you like, but don’t brush off the knowledge that might make your management skills real.

Don’t start out thinking you know it all, because the facts say otherwise.

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(Tobak) When I was a young engineer at Texas Instruments, I had a manager named Dick. Dick had a sign in his office that read: “I may not be smart, but I sure am experienced.” Being a smart-ass, I made a sign that read: “I may not be experienced, but I sure am smart” and hung it in my cubicle. Dick didn’t appreciate the humor.

Last week’s Does Management Ability Improve With Age? sparked an excellent dialog, but it also got me thinking about the qualities I’ve developed over the years since my “sign war” with Dick that made me a better manager and leader. Here are five and they’re not the ones that would automatically come to mind:

Balance. Dick and I were both wrong – balancing intelligence and experience is more important than either one. Strategy versus operational execution, ideology versus practicality, intuition versus logic, passion versus calm. The key to balance is knowing when you need one versus the other and not going overboard in either direction.
Humility. It’s okay to be arrogant or young and full of yourself, but it also leaves you wide open to all sorts of issues like shortsightedness and believing your own BS. Humility leads to objectivity. It’s also an important leadership quality; if you can be humble, then confidence and strength can’t be far behind.
Objectivity. Since executives are by definition immersed in their environment, perspective is as critical as it is difficult to achieve. One of the most powerful tools in decision-making is being able to take a step back, ask others what they think, and see the big picture.

Teaming. I once had a boss who asked me if I ever looked back to see if anyone was following me. I was more than a little head-strong in the early days. I can’t overstate the importance of team, meaning aligning with peers, working with customers to solve problems, and understanding what being part of a company means.

Knowing what you don’t know. It’s good to be intelligent, logical, and able to wrestle tough problems to the ground and reason them out. But knowing what you don’t know is just as important. Until you know what you don’t know, you won’t ask the tough questions and arrive at the right conclusions. What qualities do you think contribute to being a better manager?

http://blogs.bnet.com/ceo/?p=2132&tag=nl.rSINGLE

Steve Tobak, 04.24.09, The Corner Office

And again… it’s all about the network.

John Murrell in GMSV (San Jose Mercury www.mercurynews.com) 04.27.09.  Reprinted in full below.

The momentum continues…and the theme remains the same. And, Apple is ruling the roost on this one big time.

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Is an iPhone on Verizon’s horizon? By JOHN MURRELL
In a development that likely sent a shudder down a few spines at AT&T, USA Today is reporting that, according to the ever-popular “people familiar with the situation,” Apple is talking to Verizon Wireless about developing an iPhone model for that network and introducing it next year. Verizon, you may recall, initially passed on an exclusive iPhone deal, balking at Apple’s financial terms, before AT&T landed the contract that allowed it to hitch a lucrative ride on the device’s success. That exclusive deal, however, reportedly expires next year, and AT&T is pressing hard for an extension.
According to the USA Today report, the Apple-Verizon talks, being conducted at a “high level” for several months now, involve development of an iPhone that would work with CDMA wireless technology, in contrast to the GSM tech used by AT&T’s network, though a different timetable, keyed to the coming rollout of a 4G wireless protocol that both networks will use, would seem to make more sense. It all makes for a tantalizing vision for Verizon loyalists and those whose only gripe with the iPhone is the network it comes with. And in the here and now, it’s the kind of chatter that could give AT&T just an extra bit of motivation at the negotiating table, strengthening Apple’s already strong hand.

Tech stocks. Transparent, trusted consumer staples? Yes.

Not so when I was at Morgan 10 years ago. But perhaps now? We had an inkling that technology would ooze itself into every other sector, thereby arriving at the position of conservative investment fundamental.

It has.

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Link to post in Financial Times:

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7d0ce2b0-30fa-11de-8196-00144feabdc0.html?nclick_check=1

Technology comes to the rescue  April 24 2009 19:27 |

The consumer isn’t broke,” says Joe Clark, managing partner at Financial Enhancement Group. “Besides we are seeing a generation of people who see technological goods as staples rather than discretionary items. My 16-year-old daughter would say a cell phone is a need, not a want.”

Hail to the ‘Chef’ – Opscode $2.5Mill Series A

Comments forthcoming on this deal, and the evolving  area  of Cloud infrastructure automation. Here’s the blogpost. (Thanks to Dave McClure for sharing the link)

“Opscode’s mission is to bring infrastructure automation to the masses.  Our team is uniquely experienced, having built and operated some of the biggest websites and services that people use and rely on every day,” said Jesse Robbins, co-founder and CEO of Opscode. “With the financial and strategic support of our investors, we are positioned to fulfill that mission.”

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OPSCODE ANNOUNCES $2.5 MILLION IN SERIES A ROUND

 Draper Fisher Jurvetson Leads Round in Infrastructure Automation Start-up Founded by Former Amazon.com Operations and Cloud Computing Experts

http://blog.opscode.com/2009/04/opscode-announces-25-million-in-series-a-round.html

Cisco + Avail. SP solution – IPTV

In IPTV news – here’s the recent press release from Cisco (04.21.09) on their team-up with Avail Media. This is directed at service providers; being more top down in its market penetration play, should have some early effect on SP willingness to engage this revenue opportunity more fully.

Link to, and quote from, the release are here:

http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2009/prod_042109c.html

“This solution greatly reduces the complexity of and time to market for service provider IPTV deployments,” said Dave Davies, vice president and general manager, IPTV Solutions, Cisco. “We are extremely pleased to be working with Avail Media in our efforts to help service providers deploy flexible and differentiated end-to-end IPTV solutions that are designed to evolve and help them stay competitive in an ever-changing marketplace.”

Hey if you don’t need to eat, they can’t make you starve

Josh Quittner’s piece in the 4.20.09 issue of Time  is titled “Get Rich Slow.” 

How dazzlingly appropriate. I like it. It is the kind of title I want to wave at people all of the time, especially those that want a startup success without the work, or marriage to a rich person without having to love them. Both just don’t work for me. More importantly, they usually don’t work at all. 

But back to Time. It’s a fun piece that says now’s a good startup time. It gives examples of creative people who are making a lot with a little.

All good – but here’s the punch. Try your idea out, and get some revenue. Get some paying users before you ask for money.

Is this true in my world? You bet. But a few aspects of this piece ( read it; it’s short and accessible)  need clarification.

1) Should you have customers before you go to get funded?

Yes. Some get funded (angelically usually) before they have customers. But not so much lately. Having customers increases your credibility exponentially.

2) But that means I have to go to market on my own power. My own sweat and dollars.

The short answer is yes. But consider Tom Sawyer. He was supposed to whitewash a fence, and he somehow charmed his pals into doing it. While you definitely have some work ahead, find ambassadors to use, love and chat about your product on Facebook and Twitter. Alpha and beta on those you know.  Don’t promise money; do like Tom S. and make the whole thing fun.

3) But I need money before I can make my complex, fantastic product.

Sit back and think here. Say you don’t get money. What happens then? One of two things: 1) you go back to your normal job that pays your bills or 2) you do 1) and scale your project to something not requiring an entire manufacturing plant.

Example:  Say you want to build a device that connects to a smart device or phone, and enables online shopping. It stores your info, it keeps your budget, it tells you about offers in your area.

But that device part needs money.

Ask yourself the big questions – what am I really trying to do, and in what sequential steps could I do it, if money was not available?

The answer (one of many) is this. Your original plan was device +app. What if you start with the app, and write it for an existing device like iPhone? Your cost and time to alpha/beta just went down considerably. You choose to build a quick website and you grab some server space unused by a friend’s company.

You have a product.  You have testers, you have users. You have spent little money and feel entirely unglamorous. But you have a more viable funding idea for this time in history.

Take that idea out, convert it cash positive, and then (months, year later) throw out that other idea.

Or maybe you won’t even need to.

This is only a high level example of course – take it conceptually and apply it within your own frame.

4) But I cannot pay myself just yet.

Are you doing this to pay yourself or because you have the best idea and plan, and a huge passion for doing? This is not a cliche. Do the right thing and do money second. If money is priority 1, please work for someone else right now.  Wait until your plan clicks – with you, and with others.

5) But I thought business plans were passe?

No. Again, no. What is to be avoided is the analysis-paralysis of planning for inertia.  You always need a plan. What is different now is that early plan action – concurrent doing and planning, clairvoyance for all, is recommended. Get your widget to market. But plan the go to market, and do so flexibly.

Note: Flexibly does infer “inexpensively.’ Considering the social media toolbox out there, this is not impossible. You will be in charge of your own idea. Daunting, yes. Also ideal in a lot of ways.

6) Do I actually have to eat ramen?

No, but have you tried it? It’s actually quite good.

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 www.time.com“Get Rich Slow” Josh Quittner 04.20.09. Page 42 of print edition.  

(Note to Time: Hate quotas, but I’m pretty devoted to reality. Your article might want to have photographs of female and non-white entrepreneurs, who in very real life are right out there and have been bootstrapping creatively for ages.  With no disrespect to the geniuses like Paul Graham who are pictured (great!), I was surprised by the monochromatic photo array.)