Announcing the Lastocean.org blog

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In my last post, I told the story of meeting John Weller, an amazing guy who’s part of a team that is making a great effort to make the world a better place.  The post was titled, "One last place we haven’t screwed up" and it’s just the beginning of the story.

I asked John how I could help, and I signed up for two jobs.  One is to help him fund some of the effort, and I’ll be writing more about that soon.  The other job I took on was to help him get a blog going while the real website is under construction.  It occurred to me that there is email access even in Antarctica, so I suggested to John that he could send me updates while he’s there and I would edit and post them so that people could go along on the journey via the Last Ocean blog.

I hope you’ll subscribe to the blog at lastocean.org, and follow along.  John’s going to be camping out in the Falkland Islands over Thanksgiving, and then he’ll head on down to Antarctica.  You might remember him as you are sitting down for dinner – he and the team are doing great work.  Check out the latest at lastocean.org.

One last place we haven’t screwed up

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My good friend Verna at Integrity Arts told me just before I went on vacation that she had a new client that I just had to meet.  Wow, was she right!  John Weller is a photographer and author who has decided to change the world, if not actually save the world.  He’s making great progress.  He dropped by today and we ended up spending three hours together looking at photographs and talking about The Last Ocean Project.  I immediately signed up to help and I hope you will too.  John’s given me permission to use a few of his photographs, but trust me – you have to see them in person to really appreciate them.


“John

 

This is a photo of sea ice in the Ross Sea in the Antarctic that John took on his last trip.  What I didn’t realize until today is that this is pretty much the last place on earth that we haven’t screwed up.  It’s the one place in the world where we can imagine that all is right with the world.  It’s the one place where scientists can go and study ecosystems that are pristine.  It’s where the penguins live!


“John

It can be overwhelming to think about all the places in the world that need to be cleaned up and put right again.  But here’s a place, and an important place, that all we have to do is not screw it up in the first place.  Sounds easy, but it’s going to take a great effort.

Until recently the Antartic and the Ross Sea were just to hard too get to.  Where have you heard about the Ross Sea you wonder? Think Sir Ernest Shackleton. But the push to put one more fish on your sushi plate has created an incentive for companies to figure out how to fish the last frontier. John has a degree in Environmental Economics, so he knows there is a price to be paid for harvesting or protecting the environment.  He looked like a meat-eater to me, so I know he doesn’t want to ban all fishing; he just wants to save this last little piece of the earth from exploitation while working with the fishing industry to fish elsewhere in a sustainable way.

Luckily there are people like John who have stepped up to lead the effort.  He’s already brought together an impressive group of scientists, educators and corporate sponsors.  He’s preparing to go back to the Ross Sea to do the underwater photography for his next book while working with scientists to write the recommendations for the politicians to do the right thing here.  And he’s working with a group that is putting the finishing touches on a fantastic looking website AND he’s working with educators to get the facts out about this amazing part of the world.  I felt like a slug sitting there thinking about what this guy’s doing to make a big difference in the world.

John’s most immediate need is a commitment of $10,000 to finish off this round of fund raising.  I realize the NPR pledge drive just finished, but this is important.  I’m going to help, and if you can help too, email or call me.  I’ll put you together with John and you will see why I’m so enthusiastic about his project.  I’ll be writing more about this soon.


“John

Angel Capital Summit

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Elizabeth Kudner emailed me to let me know about the Angel Capital Summit, hosted by the Rockies Venture Club, that is happening November 13th, 2007.  The Rockies Venture Club has been around for over twenty years, in fact it was one of the first non-profit organizations to help entrepreneurs launch and fund their businesses.

Acs20logo Rockies_logo

If you are an entrepreneur or Angel investor in the Rocky Mountain area, check it out!  We’re very lucky to live in a place that is so friendly to entreprenuers, has good sources of capital and is a nice place to live too.

Thanks Bren!

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I’ve posted a lot of photos since I started my blog, and I’ve spent hours trying to get the text to flow properly around those photos.  I had just given up until I mentioned my problem in my last post.  Just a little while later Bren left a comment telling me exactly how to do it. 

Lake

If I’ve done it right, this text will appear below the photo.  It worked!  Thank you very, very much Bren!

Just to make it easier to find next time, or for anyone else having trouble with it, I’ve copied Bren’s comment below:

Terry,
When you are adding a photo in Typepad, after you’ve hit “Browse”, and have chosen your photo, don’t hit the “insert image” button yet. Instead, look under number 2: “Set Image Option”. Choose “Use Custom Setting”.

New settings will pop open. Make sure the box by “Wrap Text” is NOT checked (wrapping text is what makes your text show up alongside your photo instead of only underneath or above it). Instead, check the box by “Create Thumbnail”, and choose your pixel width (400 is about max). Now scroll down and hit the “insert image” button. (Doesn’t matter if the "Pop-Up Window" box is checked or not.)

If you want to change a photo that is already in a published post, you’ll have to remove it and then re-insert it. Just do that with your “edit post” function.
Bren

Phone Geek

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Bos_desk2

I’ve been called a phone geek, but I don’t think I can claim sole title at Gold Systems.  This is a photo of the desk of our Unified Communications Program Manager, Bo Molai.  He only straightened it up a little for this photo!

From left to right, back to front you have:

Hot laptop from Dell (Or at least it was hot a year or two ago)

Polycom Tanjay without a dial-pad.  VoIP.  This works with Microsoft Office Communicator software and is a USB device.

Polycom USB Speaker Phone.  Very cool – I could see traveling with this and it even comes with a case.

Webcam

Polycom Tanjay with touchscreen, fingerprint reader, presence indicator and Ethernet.  Works alone or with Microsoft Office Communicator.

Catalina wired, USB headset with call control buttons

Cisco 7960 VoIP phone

Treo 700w Windows Mobile Device

Plantronics digital headset

Lucent/Avaya digital display phone

I think the boxes in the background are full of VoIP gateway devices.

(Not visible in photo – Microsoft Roundtable conference device)

(P.S – I sure would like to know how to format photos better in Typepad.  I would have liked the text to appear below the photo.  Any ideas?  Thanks!)

Wireless in the wilderness

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I’ve had one of the Microsoft Tanjay VoIP phones for three or four months now and I’m really liking it.  I start my day by swiping my fingerprint to unlock the directory, which automatically sets my presence to "Available", unlessImg_7633_2  I have a meeting scheduled, in which case it talks to the Exchange Server and magically sets my presence to "In a Meeting".  The sound quality, which is what really matters in a phone, is great.

A couple of weeks ago, the Microsoft product manager for UC wrote about how cool it was that he was able to take his Tanjay phone home, plug it into his home network and it just worked.  He could make and take calls just as if he were sitting at his desk at work.

Yep, that’s cool all right, but you just know (if you read my blog) that my first thought was "I wonder if it would work in the FJ Cruiser?"  Not only did it work in the FJ, but I was able to go up into the mountains, and sit on a rock with both my laptop and the Tanjay working together on the FJ’s EVDO hotspot.

Img_7637 I was able to surf the web, check email AND carry on a conference call via the Tanjay.  Yup, I’m a geek.

A quick note – the new FJ Cruiser Car computer has arrived and I’m starting the installation.

Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 Pricing

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Michael Dunn, one of  the gotspeech.net guys, wrote the first article that I saw in public about the pricing for the new Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007.  Michael does an example configuration of a typical speech recognition system that will handle 96 ports.  For the speech recognition engine, Text-to-speech, development and deployment environment the software license price comes to $700.  Not $700 per port, but $700 for software for the entire server!

That’s a little more than $7 per port.  OK, that doesn’t include hardware so factor in the price of a good rack mounted server, and a VoIP gateway if you can’t talk SIP with your PBX.

Michael speculates that you could do a touch-tone application and get as many as 200 ports on a single server.  Still $700.  He says that’s roughly $3.50 per port for the software.  “Insanely Cheap” he says.  I’d agree with that!  Even allowing for redundancy and extra capacity, this still slashes the price in the market for the typical speech recognition telephone self service application.

You can read more about the product at http://www.microsoft.com/uc

Microsoft also published two new case studies that I’m particularly happy to see, given that Gold Systems did the software development on both of them.

Avaya, another one of my business partners, began the move from "Big Iron" to software solutions many years ago, designing less proprietary hardware and relying more on industry standard hardware.  It’s been a smart move for them.  They also saw that computers and telephones would come together and they’ve moved away from closed systems to open systems, being one of the earliest proponents of Unified Communications.  As I’ve said before, lower prices and more companies deploying applications is good for the industry and the consumer.

I’m sorry

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I knew it was going to be an interesting day when my morning news alert said that I had been mentioned in a Denver Post article about Lindsey Lohan, Mel Gibson and Michael Vick.  I had lunch yesterday with my friend Mike Gellman, CEO of SpireMedia in Denver, and he emailed me later to say that he had given my name to Al Lewis, a columnist for the Denver Post who he said was doing a story on "the value of apologizing" in business.

I probably don’t do it enough, but I try to say I’m sorry when I make a mistake.  Being a CEO means I also sometimes get the opportunity to say I’m sorry when my company makes a mistake too.  I vividly remember my mom explaining to me when I was very young that saying "I’m sorry" also means you will attempt to be better in the future.  So I try to tie saying "I’m sorry" to some action or commitment to avoid having to say it again in the future.  It isn’t easy though.

I’ve been frustrated as a customer myself seeing how a lot of businesses, small and large, just will not say "I’m sorry."  It either doesn’t occur to them or they are afraid that they may be admitting liability for their mistake.  When I say "I’m sorry" to a customer, I often will see a complete change in attitude and I think it is because they just don’t expect it.  They were prepared for a fight and they didn’t get it because if I screwed up, I am really sorry, and because a fight never helps to fix a problem.  Sometimes it turns out that I apologize for something that turns out not to really be my fault.  That’s the nature of big, complex software systems and when it happens I just feel really good to have helped solve the problem.  When it turns out it actually is my fault, I’m glad I didn’t waste a lot of energy and credibility pointing the finger at other people.

I once read about a study that a major hotel chain did regarding guests who reported problems with their rooms.  They found that if a guest had a problem,  they reported it during their stay, AND had it resolved to their satisfaction, then they were actually MORE likely to return to that hotel than a guest who didn’t even have a problem.  How cool is that?  I know it’s true for me.  I placed my first Amazon.com order almost eleven years ago.  I don’t remember the details now, but at some point an order didn’t arrive as I expected.  I contacted Amazon.com, they apologized, took responsibility and jumped through hoops to fix the problem.  As a result I’m a loyal customer who’s even more tolerant of future glitches that will inevitably happen because I feel like they will stand up and fix any problem that I have in the future.

When Al called to interview me about "the value of apologizing in business," I was enthusiastic.  I thought I had maybe even written a blog post about this before so I used the built-in search tool in Vista (which I love) and discovered that the phrase "I’m sorry" appears on my computer over 500 times!  I told Al that there were a lot of duplicates in that number and that I have a large archive of emails going way back.  (If you have to say your are sorry in an email, it’s often part of a long string of emails, so one "I’m sorry" might show up 10 or 20 times.)  Also, some of those emails were people saying "I’m sorry" to me.  Still, that seemed like a big number and I joked that there was probably a curve where apologizing too much is probably just as bad a sign as not apologizing enough.  (Note to self:  Don’t joke with reporters.  Everything is fair game to be quoted.)

As Sharon Linhart said in the column, "People are pretty forgiving."  Thank goodness! 

SearchToPhone

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About a year ago David Cohen, entrepreneur investor, and author of the ColoradoStartups blog, dropped by my office and asked if I would be interested in working with some new entrepreneurs as part of a new venture called TechStars.  I love talking to entrepreneurs, especially new ones because some of their energy always rubs off, and I hope to help them avoid some of the mistakes I’ve made over the years as an entrepreneur.

Searchtophone

Through TechStars, I met Carmin Turco and Sebastian Replanski.  Carmin and Seb were well on their way to success with their company SearchToPhone when they were invited to join the TechStars.  Fast forward to today, and they have launched their service, received some great press and I’m happy to say that my company Gold Systems and SearchToPhone have created a strategic alliance.  Carmin talks about the TechStars experience, the SearchToPhone service and how Elvis showed up to help with the VC pitch.  Congratulations Carmin and Seb!

Coinstar – cool company, great service!

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Coinstar places coin counting machines in grocery stores so that when you fill your pickle jar up with coins, you can go there and get spendable cash without going to the bank.  I found out a long time ago that if I didn’t spend any change, I could save a pretty significant amount of money for new toys.  The only problem was dragging my heavy sacks of coin to the bank, waiting in line and then waiting for the coins to be counted.

Coinstarmachine

Along came Coinstar.  When I first noticed them I wasn’t thrilled to pay a fee to have them count my coins so I didn’t use them.  Then I noticed that they had partnered with Amazon.com and if you got your cash in the form of an Amazon gift certificate there was no fee.  (You can get also get certificates from Circuit City, Starbucks, KB Toys, Cabela’s and many others.) For me, since the money was going to Amazon eventually anyway, it was a great thing.  It’s even kind of fun to pour the coins into the machine and watch as it steadily counts the change, ejecting the odd video game token or Canadian coin that would get into my pocket.  The first time I used them I had two big cloth bags and I got a gift certificate for over $400!

Now I cash in when the bags are a little less full, and the last time I did it I got a gift certificate for $109.69.  Still not bad for spare change.  I put the gift certificate in my wallet, and then forgot about it for about a month.  To my horror, when I took it out a few weeks ago to cash it in, the gift certificate number was gone!  It had rubbed off in my wallet.  I tried everything to recover it – high powered lights (the paper was photosensitive and it almost worked), a magnifying glass – I even took it to a friend’s lab and tried a microscope.  The numbers were just gone.  Cointstar_2  The certificate from Coinstar clearly says if you lose it, it’s gone but mostly to satisfy The Person Who Prefers Not To Be Blogged About, I called the 800 number for Coinstar to see if they would replace my gift certificate.

Lara, the very nice person who answered the phone at Coinstar, made me feel better immediately even though I was well prepared to feel stupid and disappointed for losing all of that change.  This has happened before she said, "just give me the certificate number and we’ll reissue it for you." "uh, that’s gone too."  "Ok, what date did you use the machine."  I thought hard – "Two months ago, maybe three?"

Lara seemed only slightly less confident that she was going to be able to get my money back, but then asked for the store number where the machine was located and the breakdown of quarters, dimes, nickels and pennies.  That information was still legible.  She put me on hold for about thirty seconds and then came back and asked for my email address saying she would email me a new amazon.com gift certificate number.  Wow!

Three things happened here that Coinstar, or any other business, should be proud of.

  1. They used an IVR system that got me routed to the right person very quickly.  (It would have been better had it used speech recognition, but it was OK.) 
  2. Lara was very friendly, professional and competent.  Coinstar’s brand went way up in my mind while I was talking to Lara.  (Repeat after me – good contact center agents do not cost you money, they make you money)
  3. Lara apparently had a system which she was trained to use, that allowed her to search the records of a particular machine based on the exact combination of coins that were dropped into it anytime during the last three months. (Someone at Coinstar could have decided it would be cheaper to just tell customers that they were screwed if their gift certificate got messed up, but they didn’t.)

I love seeing companies get it right.  The new certificate arrived in my email after I got off of the phone with Lara and I very quickly added it to my amazon.com account before I had a chance to lose it.  And next time I’ll put the certificate in my shirt pocket and go right home and add it to my account.  Coinstar has a machine locater here that works for the US and the UK if you have a big stash of coins at home that you’d like to turn into a new toy or a month’s worth of lattes.

Ford announces pricing on Sync

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Ford Motor Company announced pricing yesterday for their new Sync product that was developed in partnership with Microsoft Windows Automotive.  It’s going to be a $395 option on new Fords and will be available in the Ford Focus, Ford Edge and the Lincoln MKX.  It’s a "fully integrated voice-activated in-car communications and entertainment system for mobile phones and digital media players" according to Mark Fields, the Ford Motor Company President of the Americas.  You can see Mr. Fields and Mr. Gates talking about the Ford/Microsoft partnership and a promo video at the Zune-Online website.  Sync will be available in nine other Ford vehicles by the end of the year.  You can get more information at Ford’s SyncMyRide.com website too.

Here are some of the cool things that can be done with Sync.

  • You can use speech recognition to access any track in your Zune, iPod or even a flash drive (yes, it has a USB interface).  I saw a prototype in a Lincoln Navigator earlier this year and it worked perfectly.  The person demoing it had a Zune full of pop music and he was taking requests from other people in the car, saying the track name and then a moment later the music started playing.  I suggested "Blue Moon of Kentucky" and the guy said he didn’t have any Bluegrass on his Zune, but he offered to plug mine in and show that it really would work on any device.
  • When you get in the car, Bluetooth pairs automatically (as you would expect) but if you are talking on the phone it moves the conversation from the handset to the sound system automatically so that you can keep both hands on the wheel.  If you are talking on the phone when you get to work, you just pick up your cell phone and walk in and the conversation automatically moves back to the handset.  (If you must talk and drive, use hands-free and be careful out there!)
  • If you get a text message to your phone, the Sync will read the text message to you over the sound system, even translating emoticons like smiley faces.  This has great prank-potential and I can’t wait for one of my friends to get one!  Of course, they can always block me from sending them text messages, so maybe I’d better rethink that.
  • Hands free-dialing, as you would expect, and caller-id read aloud for incoming calls.
  • The video mentions conference calling, but I didn’t see that demo’d and I’m not sure how it’s implemented.

I think it’s great that Ford decided to release this across the line, starting with the lower-end cars.  If they had made it a high-end, expensive option I think it would have died on the vine, but with this strategy I expect that a lot of people will be ordering it.  Congratulations to Ford for getting ahead of a technical wave that is surely going to just get bigger over the next few years.  At a price that isn’t a lot higher than what some manufactures have charged for putting a 29 cent headphone jack in the dash, Ford is delivering a lot of capabilities and I’m sure there will be more to come.

Speaking of Fords, does anyone know where my 65 Mustang is?  I sold it for $2,400 in 1977 after restoring it to what you see here.  Last I heard, 25 years ago, was that a collector had put a set of red-stripe tires on it and was keeping it in a warehouse.  My name is on a blank IBM punch-card underneath the carpet on the passenger side.  The bill of sale says it was a 64 1/2, but I’m certain it was a 65. I’d love to get it back someday and I realize it has appreciated a bit since I sold it.

Terrys_65_mustang_corrected_2

Land Cruiser/Tank on Amazon.com

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I wonder if I could trade the FJ Cruiser in for one of these?  NAO Design has created the ultimate off road vehicle, and it might even have a car computer in it.  And you get a free T-Shirt with every order.

Donkprofeat1

What is really interesting though is you can buy it through amazon.com.  (Not eligible for Amazon Prime.) When you look at it on the amazon page, scroll down to the "Customers who bought items like this also bought" section.  Listed are grapes, bananas, Wonder white bread, Fart Bomb Bags and Stink Bombs.  I want to meet the person who’s driving this thing eating grapes and bananas on white bread and throwing stink bombs from the armored shell!

There are 154 customer reviews of the tank, giving it 3 1/2 stars overall.  Most people like it, but many complain about the gas mileage and the bullet-proofness being less than expected.  According to the Museum of Hoaxes website, where I first saw this, it is for real and there is even an option to have flame-throwers installed.

NAO Design also offers the "TV Table" for anyone who just can’t wait for the Microsoft Surface Computer or who is on a limited budget.

Tvtableprofeat1 There’s even more good stuff on their website.