TechFold - Bold tech & web commentary

Will the idiocy never cease?

CNN compares radiation oncologists to “Second Life Laywers” in their article on the new new careers.

cnn, oncology, second life secondlife

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SwitchPlanet.com: Free Media Trading with a Conscience

SwitchPlanet.com is a new entrant into the busy “trade your stuff that your done with” market dominated by Peerflix, Zunafish, and Craigslist. SwitchPlanet taps the Amazon Ecommerce webservice for product information, and allows for the trading of DVD’s, games, CD’s, and books.

SwitchPlanet.com, a Fresno based internet trading platform aims not only to succeed in business, but also help society and the environment. The company’s mission is simple, “establish a premier online community that is committed to helping reduce the impact waste is having on the planet by trading the things we no longer use to get the things we want.” [from PRNewsNow]

SwitchPlanet, according to the founder/developer/owner Chris Samarin went live at the end of Feb. ‘07, and since then has signed up ~6,500 users. For the first 22 days of April, SwitchPlanet had successfully completed 2,000 trades, with 1,000 more in progress.

Free Trades and a Social Agenda

SwitchPlanet differentiates itself by offering free trades coupled with a charity component: instead of paying for trades, users can opt to donate any amount whenever they trade (or zero) to SwitchFunds - a donation fund that is regularly gifted to a number of charities. This social agenda, combined with the “green” element of trading instead of purchasing, has garnered SwitchPlanet some very positive press at sites like Sustainablog, TreeHugger, and GroovyGreen. Chris seems legitimately committed to doing some good with his venture:

Members have already stated they love the option and will have no problem making small donations when they can; especially if they keep receiving cool stuff for free. Every little bit counts so if we could get 1 million members donating $1 a month that would be pretty amazing. If we got $1,000 a month that would be great too but obviously the goal is to grow this thing as big as possible so the impact is HUGE. [from GroovyGreen]

…and so do SwitchPlanet members, who since launch have donated $1,500.

Insulating Users from Risk

As with many other sites, SwitchPlanet uses a proxy currency - “SwitchBucs” for actual trading. When you add a movie/book/whatever that you have, you set its price in SwitchBucs, which are credited to your account when you successfully send it away. Similarly, when you “buy” something, you use SwitchBucs in your account, or top off your account by purchasing SwitchBucs (1:1 USD). SwitchPlanet guarantees switches - refunds can be issued to buyers for items not sent, and to senders for items lost in the mail, and so on: SwitchPlanet has anticipated one of the primary barriers to utilization (the uncertainty of trading with a stranger) and eliminated it.

The use of SwitchBucs, a damaged/counterfeit disc banning policy, and the guarantee are all designed to make SwitchPlanet a comfortable and risk-free place to trade.

We offer a 100% Satisfaction Guarantee so if a member receives a broken, unplayable, scratched, wrong, counterfeit or no disc at all they can submit a claim to SwitchDiscs and receive a full refund. If a member is repeatedly involved in sending bad discs or is repeatedly involved in making false disc claims then their account will be terminated. There are many factors involved so each account would be reviewed thoroughly before termination. [from GameShark]

SwitchPlanet adds a layer of reputation security as well, adding an eBay-style member rating and commenting system to the site which allows for the evaluation of potential trading partners:

Business Model

In an interview with GameShark, Chris detailed three components in the SwitchPlanet business plan:

1. Amazon Affiliate Sales: Each disc listed on the site includes the option to buy new. I quickly found that given the 1:1 USD:SwitchBucs exchange and people’s bizarre listing expectations, Amazon was often more cost effective that trading or buying. See more on this in the suggestions below.
2. Advertising: SwitchPlanet has a tasteful AdSense deployment in place already. IMHO, particularly with the environmental and social agenda angle, there’s a better opportunity for woot-style sponsorships (see below).
3. SwitchBuc purchases: As mentioned members can purchase SwitchBucs to start getting discs without having sent any, or to top up their account. Chris indicates, however, that revenue from this stream will be used to fund the purchase of more media to seed the network.

Suggestions

1. A “Suggested Price” feature: When adding discs, it would be great if SwitchPlanet made use of the extensive pricing information that Amazon’s API can surface to suggest a price for a given disc. Amazon will surface, best, new, and used prices; SwitchPlanet could suggest a range between best-used price and new for members to price their discs in depending on condition and whether they are shipping with packaging, etc. Checkout that first screencap above with FlyBoys at 29 SwitchBucs - that’s twice Amazon’s regular price.
2. Site Sponsorship Ad Model: Instead of AdSense, in the long term, SwitchPlanet may wish to sell weekly or monthly site sponsorships. i.e.: charge a flat rate for exclusive placement on the site, in a subtle-yet-always-visible placement format. Woot does this well. Creating a subtle AdSense placement that doesn’t clutter up the site means that ads will get few clickthroughs; the sponsorship model would offer more for SwitchPlanet, advertisers, and members. SwitchPlanet’s unique environmental and socially aware value proposition also makes the site well suited for this type of ad model - the strong brand associations and specific psychographic member profile create a powerful branding environment for companies trying to target the “green” demographic - auto-manufacturers, Whole Foods, etc etc. SwitchPlanet could also be marketed to movie studios, book publishers, and so on. Note - this is a longer term suggestion, once traffic is high enough to back up sales of this type. In the meantime, I’m sure AdSense is good bridge.
3. Social Networking: In a few interviews, Chris has stated his intention of developing the social networking aspect of SwitchPlanet further. I’m not convinced this is a good idea - to my thinking, it dilutes the key brand elements of SwitchPlanet, adding confusion to the switching concept, and positions SwitchPlanet as a competitor against sites which dwarf it. I agree that there’s a place for social networking in the trading-sites space (finding new trading partners, creating interest groups, etc.), but those elements need to be added in support of the site’s core value proposition, not as competitor to it.
4. Localization: Back when I was working on BlockRocker.com, my original intent was to create a hyper-local trading site, such that you could trade with people within walking distance - cutting the greenhouse gas emissions from shipping media back & forth across the country, when copies were likely gathering dust in shelves down the street. Localization, provided that there was a means to protect privacy while still enabling trades would be another great source of differentiation, and really get the green blogosphere going.

Summary

I believe SwitchPlanet offers a quality implementation of a business plan that has merit, and that while the market may have several players in it already, there is room for more. SwitchPlanet goes a step beyond being a credible competitor by adding a differentiating agenda, free listings, and a social element - all good ways to drive adoption and differentiate from the competition.

I’m looking forward to seeing SwitchPlanet continue to grow and evolve, and will be following Chris’s progress.

For other good coverage of SwitchPlanet, take a look at Bob Caswell on Computers.net and PlayWii (which actually has completed switches).

craigslist, p2p, peer2peer, peerflix, swapping, switchplanet, trading zunafish

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eBay launches embeddable listing widgets

Good grief - eBay is actually doing something useful. Today, as covered by TechCrunch (I copied their widget, btw), eBay has released embeddable flash widgets. Anyone can widget any auction, and any widget you see can be easily cloned for embedding in your own site (as I did with the one on TC, it was about a 5 second process).

The widgets, are slick, useful, and easy. The are created through togo.ebay.com, and can take a variety of formats (single items, search results, slideshows). The process is very straightforward, with the exception of the fact that you need to manually enter an Item ID.

That Item ID part is the big opportunity that eBay is missing with this: IMHO it would just make sense to embed the creation tool in each listing page so that anyone can promote any listing without the need to copy and paste Item ID’s between eBay sites. A single click, in-listing widget creation tool would get much more utilization. Hopefully this is in the cards.

blogs, ebay, embed, togo widgets

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NBC Buys RSS to E-mail Service R-Mail; Part One of a Social Strategy?

Roger Cadenhead draws our attention to the sale of rss-to-email service R-Mail, to - oddly enough - NBC. R-Mail.org is a wicked simple site with a “subscribe via email” widget for blogs, a very simple UI, a top feeds list (which shows an international user base), and so on.

According to Rogers…

The service has 50,000 users, 100,000 subscriptions and sends out more than 50,000 e-mails per day, according to DMW Daily, though I suspect a zero’s missing from the last figure.

Founded in 2006 2005, Rogers considers R-Mail to be one of the most missed stories of late, having been passed over for coverage in favour of Zookoda. With 50,000 users, a one-person team (Randy Charles Morin), and now a successful buyout (sum unknown), it does seem like one that’s flown under the radar.

That being said, there’s nothing on how much NBC paid, or what their plans are for the service. Morin’s blog notes the news, but adds nothing more to it. If they picked it up for a song (and hired Morin in the process, then it may have been less expensive than developing an email subscription service in house. The current NBC site includes neither RSS nor email subscriptions, and has the enigmatic byline “social-networking coming soon.”

email, nbc, rmail, rss social networking

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Subscribe!

Inspired by Danny Sullivan’s post over at SearchEngineLand, I’m throwing down a “Subscribe!” post. If you like TechFold, by all means subscribe! There’s only one TechFold RSS feed, and its full-text, and advertising free. Click the big orange doodad below…

Subscribe to TechFold

Now - Danny’s shooting for 20,000 subscribers by the end of May. I’ll be gunning for a more modest target; TechFold hit a peak of 69 subscribers last week - do you think I can break 100 this week?

I’m cautiously optimistic as I’ve got some good articles queued up, but your help would be appreciated: if you like the site, subscribe yourself and spread the word - its appreciated, and if you drop me line in comments (or pingback) when you subscribe or do some word-spreading, I’ll happily hat tip you and your blog, and subscribe myself to your feed.

And cheers to Danny for the concept.

appeal, feeds, rss subscribe

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Mark Evans: Communications 101 - some further thoughts on email

Mark Evans, Canadian B5 blogger, writes a good post on quality of communications in our hyper-connected present. I won’t re-iterate the whole thing, but in quick summary his position is that physical meetings and phone calls hold value above and beyond the email paradigm that many have come to accept as the default form of communication.

I’m one of those. I love email, for two reasons that Mark didn’t mention:

1. Contiguous conversations discontinuously: Email let’s me have a conversation when I and the other participants want to have it. I can respond to emails when it suits me, prioritizing tasks independent of the immediacy of the medium in which they reside. The way workflow works for me, this is paramount: I’m a “burst” working, functioning best in roughly 40 minute blocks of hyper-productivity. Catch me in the middle of such a block and I’ll be surly and distracted (ask my wife - sorry!). Catch me outside, and I’m cheerful, helpful, etc.
2. Paper trail: For indexing and ass-covering, email is awesome. In my blogging, I love communicating by email because it gives me a searchable index of facts that I’ve compiled in email conversations which would otherwise be scrawled in one of my frequently lost notebooks. In my day job, I love the paper trail: it keeps everyone accountable and transparent.

So - call me a ogre-ish jerk if you will, but I love email and online communications in general.

communications, email, markevans phone

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VuDu - will this set-top box deliver more than buzz?

The blogosphere is predictably abuzz about VuDu - darkhorse set top instant movie purchase box. NYT dropped the story first, Giz had first UI and hardware pics, and Engadget’s got comprehensive coverage from the top of the pile on Techmeme.

Somewhere in that mass of coverage, I read the thought that I think will sum up the un-appeal of the concept for many: paying $300 for a set top device to have the privilege of paying $6-10 more for movies is a long stretch. Especially when you find out that movies are stuck on the VuDu box and can’t be transferred to your iPod, DVD burner, or anywhere else. In fact, VuDu seems to be about as weak a value proposition as the original crippleware divx disc format. Lots of hype, major studio support, DRM all over, and expensive - sounds like exactly the sort of system that the status-quo players wish would dominate the market.

AppleTV and the XBox360 enable much the same sort of transaction; but in their cases, that business model is buried in a tonne of other value-added functionality that empowers users. In the “battle for the living room,” Apple and Microsoft are taking a tactful, user-centric (though by no means perfect) approach, while VuDu is taking a ham-fisted, compromised flailing swing at it in the clueless style of the RIAA and MPAA.

Yes, I am biased against crippled functionality models like this, and no, I don’t know all of the details, so who knows - I could be embarrassingly wrong. Engadget seems to have come to a similar conclusion though, Mathew Ingram seems to agree, NewTeeVee’s quotes David Zatz’s assessment that Vudu will go the way of Akimbo or MovieBeam - nowhere fast. Paul Stamatiou asks a lot of intelligent questions about pricing and control structure, well Rex Dixon sounds reservedly optimistic.

As for myself, I’ll go on record as having the opinion that this has too many big studio business paw prints on it to take off.

akimbo, apple, appletv, downloads, moviebeam, p2p, video vudu

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Hey Pete: What happened to Noodly?

Just a quick curiosity post for Pete Cashmore at Mashable: what ever happened to Noodly? It quietly ceased to exist, and the domain just redirects to Mashable now. What was it? Why did you wrap it up? Just curious to hear the story!

cashmore, mashable, noodly startups

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Friday Listening Post: The killer mashups of Luke Enlow, downloadable MP3’s

TGIF, and time for another Friday Listening post. The first was here (Billy Bragg) - basically, the spirit of this series of posts is that Friday is time to chill and check out some tunes that can be at least vaguely related back to the world of technology.

I’d hoped some other blogs would share some tunes and expand my horizons (just tag your post “fridaylistening” and it will queue up with any others on Technorati) - but no dice so far! How about it, Jason? (couldn’t resist taking the bait somewhere today, though I didn’t follow any rules.)

Anyway - without further adieu: I strongly recommend checking out the audio stylings of Luke Enlow - Bostonian and audio mashup auteur. Lenlow mashes up artists, genres, beats, and riffs into catchy, inspired tunes.

In particular, I recommend (right-click, Save As time):

Mercedes Beck: A spectular mashup of Beck and Janis Joplin - sounds like they were in the studio together.

Get Eastwood: The Gorillaz and Sean Paul in a mix that just works.

Kanye Mahna - Mr. West vs. the Muppets - wicked.

…and pretty much all of the rest of them too. Always creative, always fun, always mashing up - Luke Enlow personifies Music 2.0.

beck, boston, calacanis, fridaylistening, joplin, kanye, lenlow, luke enlow, mashup mashups

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B*ISH: The New Four Letter Word, or River of Complaints

Rex Dixon points us to ilovetocomplain.com, or B*SH, as the site is formally named. Its a simple, registration free bulletin board to post your bitter angry complaints about life, work, or school to the world, as anonymously as you wish. Its funny, relaxing to post, and relaxing to read - makes you realize you’re not the only one out there grappling with whatever vexes you.

bish, complain, vent yarrghhh

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