Watching this video is good for two reasons*: 1. It explains how to use a newsreader in a way that is clever and simple to understand. 2. It proves that you don’t need broadcast-quality production values to create a killer how-to video.
Sidenote: My friend Scott Karp thinks the video is clever, but thinks it’s ironic that it takes 3.5 minutes to explain a killer app. Actually, Scott, it has taken about six years to explain.
I wish Scott and I were able to explain things this quickly when we appear together on panels.
*I removed the embedded version as it was not performing well.
NashvillePost.com has an post (subscription not necessary) today that includes a reprint of an interview with journalist and author David Halberstam in which he recalls his four years at the Nashville Tennessean, from 1956-1960. Halberstam, 73, died in a California car crash yesterday.
Quote:
“The newspaper boasted a proud tradition as an aggressive, combative, fearless voice of the people, a public trust. Compared to Mississippi, which was a de facto police state, Nashville was a nice, livable little city — the state capital, a university town, a pretty literate place, where you could say what you wanted (if you didn’t mind being unpopular in some quarters). The atmosphere had not congealed in fear, as had happened farther south. And best of all, the newspaper was right in the thick of every fight, and I was like the proverbial kid in the candy store, just devouring everything I could get my hands on.”
Also, today in the Tennessean, John Seigenthaler and others recall Halberstam’s days at the paper and in Nashville.
I really don’t have a dog in this hunt. To be honest, I don’t care if the iPhone is or is not a potential “enterprise” product. I know that I’ve seen video of executives at other companies scoffing at the notion — the typical “whistling by the graveyard response” when you don’t know what a market will think of a new product. And I know that Apple’s near-perfect success in consumer marketing is equaled by its near-perfect failure in marketing to the enterprise. (Please, no arrows from Apple cultists: my 25-person firm is 95% Mac.)
However, this article in InfoWorld about AT&T’s plans to aim the iPhone at enterprises is either a brilliant smokescreen designed to exploit the paranoia of the traditional players in the mobile phone market, or, well, simply brilliant. Again, I don’t care. I know my small business will probably own a couple of them before the year is out, but that’s not going to be because of any “enterprise” solution they may offer. It’s because that businesses that are comprised of people who run their lives and their businesses on their mobile phone/email/web device, don’t want two hunks of plastic in their pocket. If an “enterprise” is comprised of people, then it stands to reason that if enough of those people decide to over-rule the pundits and analysts about what feature-set is critical on an “enterprise” phone, then, who knows? Again, I don’t care. However, I thought it would be interesting to place the following quote on the record and check back on it one year after the iPhone is released:
“The idea of marketing the iPhone as an enterprise product baffles some analysts. If AT&T announces that it will be marketing the phone to enterprise customers, “we’d be against it,” said Ken Dulaney, an analyst with Gartner, who said he hasn’t heard of such a plan from the operator. “We’d immediately tell our customers that’d be a very serious mistake.”
Technorati Tags: iphone
Passing along something that hit my SmallBusiness.com radar this morning: Today, eBay is having a one-day only 20¢ listing promotion (typically, fees range from 20¢ to as high as $4.80). From time to time, eBay runs these special 20¢ listing days, but does not announce the promotion until immediately prior to the day. Spring cleaning, anyone?
(via: AuctionBytes.com.)
Technorati Tags: ebay
