Category Archives: Business

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My online ski journal, Colorado Snow, has done some serious “growing up” these past five seasons. So, this year I decided to treat myself to a professionally designed logo by Wet Frog Studios. For posterity, here’s a quick look back at where it’s come…

How to report spam text messages to AT&T Wireless

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Short answer: forward the message to 7726 (SPAM) then reply back with the number it originated from.

The business-minded folks over at AT&T have yet again gone out of their way to try and squeeze extra money out of their “already-paying-near-cartel-prices” customers. I knew they were greedy but the last straw was when I realized they charge extra for the “privilege” of tethering an internet connection (wired or wireless) through your mobile device in addition to the cost for the additional data. Really? My data allotment is data no matter how it goes through my devices, why do they get to charge for a software feature of my wireless phone?

Then… then today I received a terribly annoying spam text message:

After searching DuckDuckGo and Google, AT&T’s own customer forums come up (with people helping each other out), after their official FAQ page.

Thus, if I were to rely entirely on AT&T through its official support channels I would be greeted with a lengthy explanation as to what spam messages are, what the sources may be, and how I can prevent them:

Click to view full size screenshot

The best part: it dedicates much of the page to terrible suggestions (send “STOP” back to a spammer?) and then (for wireless number text messages) they suggest you pay for “AT&T Smart Limits” which is a $4.99 / month package to block specific numbers before mentioning it has a responsible method to report spam.

So, if I’m a typical user I skim the page, see a solution (oh, set up “Limits” and add the number, great!), stop reading and now AT&T takes more of my money. At least, I’m sure that’s the hope based on the way this helpful page is designed. It doesn’t seem like AT&T is dedicated to reducing spam, it appears to be in a conflict of interest: it’s in their best interest for more people to receive unwanted spam messages in order to continue promoting an additional paid service.

Disgraceful.

I’ll be switching to Verizon Wireless once my contract is up.

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I just finished reading Mike Monteiro’s book: Design Is a Job. As a principal at Mule Design for over ten years, Mike has a lot of great experience and much of what he said elicited severe head nodding and a me-too’ing. This book is a great roadmap of the things I’ve learned working with Alex and the team at Crowd Favorite for the past 3 years. I’d say anyone in the web design and development industry should take look at this book. It’s a quick read (finished it in a couple hours) and extremely insightful into the “business side” of web design at a small firm.

Apple TV is (just) an accessory

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The Apple TV as we currently know it (a black hockey-puck shaped paperweight), is an accessory. It sits on the final page, before you check out, of the iPad store experience. You will see it right there below they keyboard and charger, next to the printer.

Apple is laser focused on a handful of technologies. iPad, iPhone and Mac as “hardware” and iCloud, iTunes and iOS as “software”. The Apple TV is the middle of the venn diagram. It’s an accessory to continue to bring the experiences (hard and soft) together cohesively on a big screen (a different kind of “social media”).

It’s priced at $99 but has brought so many hours of value to our household. Considering how much a DVD player, sound system, PlayStation and other devices cost: this “accessory” is the most underrated, most disruptive, and least costly device that is sneaking in and making way for the next wave of Apple.

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Here’s Ethan Kaplan, a smart developer slash executive, and his take on “culture”:

Too often, the things that constitute “culture” are seen as additive or “perks.” I hate defining things as “perks” because it relegates them to things that should be seen as optional if and when times get tough. Similarly, in recruitment, “perks” mean “these are not core, but are additive in order to be attractive.” I’ve found perks are always the first things to go as cultural efforts in a company’s decline. And more damaging still, perks aren’t an element of culture. They are frosting on a thin cake.

The argument to build culture like a product makes good sense in a product or development-centric environment. This was a good read…

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We’re looking for smart folks that identify with a few skill sets we’ve outlined (e.g.: we don’t have specific “job titles”). Take a look and if you or someone you know is looking for a great opportunity in Denver, drop us a line…

Google’s Executive personalities make me uneasy

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I’ve been a bit bearish on Google lately and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Not to join in on any kind of pile-on, but I think I’ve figured out my unease: the awkward, stupid things the people over at Google say (and how they say it).

Exhibit A: Andy Rubin

The guy behind Android itself tweets that the ‘definition of open source’ is a command to create and build the Android source code. While this is no longer the case, at the time it came across as pompous, inaccessible, and pretty smug for a group that has become less and less open (while still touting it as their mantra).

Exhibit B: Vic Gundotra

As one of the more prominent presenters from Google, Vic has continued to lead us through the Google I/O keynotes and make snide jabs at Apple. In addition to coming across as petty and immature, the first time I really remember Vic’s “presentation style” was when he awkwardly hosted Conan O’Brien at Google. Conan himself (around 5:30) asks “why are you running this?!”

Exhibit C: Eric Schmidt

“I don’t believe society understands what happens when everything is available, knowable and recorded by everyone all the time,” he says. He predicts, apparently seriously, that every young person one day will be entitled automatically to change his or her name on reaching adulthood in order to disown youthful hijinks stored on their friends’ social media sites.

Is someone recommending to the Wall Street Journal we change our name if we have information available on social networks we no longer want known? That someone is the former CEO, now Chairman of Google. And he certainly has a record of saying weird, stupid stuff. The latest gaff is around the Google+ integration and how Google is unfairly promoting its own content (from Google+) within search results. Danny Sullivan talks to Schmidt who says, essentially: “for competitors to be part of this integration, we need to talk”, and did you guys talk?, “I won’t talk about specifics.” Well, the data is already there in Google’s index; it knows about millions of Twitter profiles and Facebook profiles. What is there to talk about? What are you really saying, Eric?! What the hell is going on over there…

Sure, Steve Jobs wrote a letter all about how Flash sucks. Some pundits thought it was inappropriate and a sign of weakness, but in actuality: it was well written, made fair points, explained a company’s position succinctly and candidly and seemed genuine. These bozos with their “candor” actually seem anti-social, awkward, and out of touch with reality. They make me nervous.

Maybe these examples are good reason why some tech companies keep their employees quiet and behind rehearsed presentations and prepared press releases. I hope that filtering, restraint, and preparation start to be viewed more as virtues. Because, without them, I hear things and read things and worry about what these personalities behind these companies are really thinking…

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt. —Abraham Lincoln