Keep Snow Leopard waiting

This week I've updated two MacBooks with Snow Leopard. Problems so far:

• Cannot send email anymore using our corporate server. Our server accepts only encrypted connections with user authentication. When I try to send messages, mail client just keeps on asking the password even though server answers that authentication is valid. I'm not the only one, check here.
• Our second machine had fonts messed up after the upgrade. Old documents were suddenly unreadable because the font was kinda packed, many characters were drawn to the same position. I was able to fix this problem by going to Font Book, selecting all fonts and validating all of them. Then I deleted and reinstalled the fonts that failed the validation - this fixed the problem. Again, I'm not the only one having this problem, check here.
• I wasn't able to watch some videos with Safari's vlc-plugin before I put Safari to 32-bit mode. To do this, open the properties for /Applications/Safari and select "Open in 32-bit mode". This is not probably Apple's fault, but annoying problem after the upgrade, anyway.

//Harri

Comment moderation turned on

Small piece of information about this site: I've turned on comment moderation to keep spammers away. All real comments will be accepted without delay, that's a promise!

//Harri

Sports Tracker, again

Once again I'll write about my favourite application Sports Tracker (ST) because latest edition of Finnish business magazine Talouselämä has a short article about the new company that will continue the development. Longer version of the article is available from Talouselämä's website (Finnish only).

The article tells how the ST core team has founded a new company and how this initiative is part of Nokia's "Innovation Mill" (I wrote about that earlier).

According to the news, Nokia didn't care about ST anymore, because "everybody who is interested about this application has already installed it". That's just crazy idea, ST has been so badly marketed solution that only those lucky enough to know about the application have installed it. Dig this: July 2009 edition of Wired had a cover story about "Living by Numbers", i.e. solutions like ST. Was ST included in the story? No. If this solution doesn't exist for Wired, it doesn't exist for average users.

Based on the article, ST is now in search of the business model but using the service will remain free. However, the phone application will be on sale in some channels and not free anymore. I've always thought that ST is so good solution that I'd even pay for some extra services but if the client application would have had a price tag, I guess I would never have downloaded and tried that. Here are some ideas for business (in no particular order), but please think again if it really is beneficial to charge for the basic application. ST is not just an application, it's a solution.

1. Keep the basic solution free and create a subsciption model for extended features (classic "freemium" model). One example of premium services I'd be happy to pay for is the weather information. Whenever I record new activity with ST, premium version could add the current weather information to the event. Also improved training analytics features would be worth considering.
2. Partner with gyms and connect ST to their client registers. When user visits gym for excercise, that information could also be stored to ST's database. That way ST becomes the storage for all sport activities, not just outdoor sports. Compare this to solutions that are only for runners: ST is already far ahead those and with this feature comparing ST to others is just waste of time.
3. Create a partner network of trainers that can analyze user's exercises and suggest them improvements in training schedule. Something like "this is how I've trained so far, what should I do to be able to run marathon in 6 months?"
4. Partner with insurance companies. User's who can display long records of healthy life from ST database can get their life insurance cheaper, for example.
5. Sell special hardware. Polar's hear rate belt is a good example of hw that really adds value to ST. I remember when I once went to Nokia flagship store and tried to buy one - just to learn that it is not available. It seems I wasn't the only one disappointed, based on Polar's support site.
6. Sell service to large companies, specifically to their HR department. Encouraging employees to take care of their health saves costs. Take a look at Pekka Niska to see an example what this means in practice.
7. Allow open innovation and publish API's to add entries to your database. The more users have personal information in ST database, the more value it has to user and to the company hosting ST. There is also a possibility that somebody else writes the client applications for iPhone, Android, Maemo and all the other current and future mobile platforms.

//Harri

Update to Nokiagate

After the summer it's good to catch up what has happened for "Nokiagate" lately. For those who don't know what Nokiagate is, read my posting that started it all and follow the case from here.

I did receive a couple of calls from Nokia during the summer and they were interested to hear my opinion about how they managed the situation and how their processes could be improved. I told them that it appeared as if there was no process at all to handle security reports like this and it took far too long from my initial report before action was taken. After the starting difficulties things began to go smoothly when the conversation channel was opened.

I just ran a quick test with some updated terminals I had available and here are the results (device / firmware version / result):

• E75 / 110.48.125 / Opens connection without asking permission, content unknown.
• 5800 / 30.0.011 / Opens connection without asking permission, content unknown.
• N96 / 30.033 / Account can be created in offline mode, OK.

It looks that E75 and 5800 still go online without asking user's permission. However, new firmware ensures the validity of server certificate and doesn't anymore let me examine the contents, but the connection goes to ccds.serviceactivation.ext.nokia.com. Let's hope they have removed password information form the request as they earlier promised, unfortunately I cannot verify that.

//Harri

Are SMS alerts an opportunity or an expense?

Just now there are two major factors that shake the ground under the (postal) logistics business; first is the economic downturn and second is the almighty internet. The combination of these two means that the volumes in their business have fallen significantly and will continue to do so. As an example, volumes for Finnish Post have decreased between 9% to 16%, depending on the product category.

Someday the economic situation will improve, but internet and electronic communication are here to stay.

There is a major trend to move away from paper invoicing to electronic invoicing because of the huge cost savings. Deutsche Bank estimates there is a potential of €54 billion savings if invoicing process is improved, and that’s just in Germany! It is safe to assume that volumes of paper invoice are going to drop dramatically in favor of electronic invoicing.

Let’s leave business-to-business invoicing aside and concentrate on business-to-consumer invoices. In the B2C world the problem is how to send the electronic invoice to the customer, the scene is very fragmented and solutions are many. The selected media should be reliable, fast, common and cheap.

Assume that someday electronic B2C invoicing is working flawlessly and you will in some digital way receive the minimum information that’s needed to accept the invoice. What’s missing from the business’ point of view? Today paper invoices come with customer newsletters, marketing material, offers and so on - invoice has become an “advoice” that carries much more information than just the invoice. At its best advoice concept is so powerful that customers are delighted to receive the invoice, because of the attached content. When everything is electronic, what will happen to advoices and this media? The progress reminds me of the banking business in the 90’s - banks created products that allowed customers to do self-service instead of visiting the offices. Later banks understood that maybe they succeeded too well in allowing self-service as they had lost contact to customers. Now banks and insurance companies try to get customers sometimes visit the office, but results haven’t been good. How to sell new complicated products to people without personal contact?

Ok, what’s my point? Finnish Post has a service that allows companies and organizations securely send messages (e.g. invoices) to customers; it’s like an email system that allows only pre-approved senders to send messages. When new message arrives, user will get an alert to his email inbox and he can login to see the message.

This summer system was upgraded with an option to send also SMS alerts when new messages arrives to inbox, end-user price is €0.25 message. This is a mistake, messages should be free and here is the reason why.

I can easily understand why there is a price tag in the alert message, it’s just the easiest way to secure the decision maker’s background in the current economic situation. "Customers want SMS, let’s put it there and charge for every message" goes the easy rationale. Last year there were total 2.1M messages sent through the system. Just taking list price from an SMS-aggregator shows that if they had sent alert for every message, the cost would’ve been about €72.000. I don’t think that is much if compared to other media that they use for marketing: with that sum Finnish Post can’t even get two front page ads in a major newspaper - and that's just the printing cost. Comparing a print media ad to a highly engaging SMS message with a call to action and immediate return channel is like comparing a steam train to a sports car. Studies have shown that Blyk’s answer rate for SMS’s has been around 25%! If Finnish Post were able to do the same, they (or their customers) would have received 500.000 replies from end users. (Yes, this is not a fair comparison because Blyk’s model depends on having a very homogenous user base with information about personal preferences, but that’s still an evidence how SMS marketing works at its best.) Can you see the business here: trend towards electronic invoicing suddenly becomes an opportunity instead of a threat, but that needs some new thinking.

In short: it’s is just wrong to punish users who want SMS alerts. If that channel is used well, Finnish Post could in fact reward users who accept SMS alerts with information about new message and a short ad with a clear call to action.

//Harri