CPA

At my day job, CPA means cost-per-acquisition bidding. But last night it meant nothing else but Chrome Packaged Apps.

I'm making a fresh start and giving it another go. Previous attempt ta app development stopped right after Hello World, but inspired by the Kendo video here, I've got fresh blood in my veins.

The idea is a simple reminder app. You see, at work we sometimes have need to consult a particular product expert, of which there are many, and depending on the area of expertise, they would hold office hourse at a specific time, day and place. This can become an awful lot to remember for most customer service reps. You soon realise you can't possible remember all office hours times and places, not to mention keeping tabs on when they change. This ends with tediously looking up online resources each time an issue comes your way you can't troubleshoot. Worse yet, sometimes you may forgo office hours, and send an email consult. I know... bad times. Office hours are way better than sending emails - the problem can be resolved there and then, instead of the ~24hr turnaround time for an email reply (in most issues).

We can't have that system. As soon as we know a situation is beyond our knowledge and immediate resources, we need the computer to take this off our hands, and tell us when the right expert is available and where. If necessary, a calendar entry should be easily entered based on this. That's the plan.

I am here too early. Oh so early.

Sum 41 etc.

I've spent the last few weeks reliving my teen years. Old Blink 182 albums, My Chemical Romance, Taking Back Sunday, Fall Out Boy and Sum 41 albums. Next on the list is Gym Class Heroes and Panic At The Disco!...

A Boring Life with Tasker

Urgh, biggest waste of €4.49 and possibly the most impulsive app I ever bought. I spent a few solid hours applying to automation to my phone with this app that fans consistently herald as the way to unlock the true power on Android. Probably true, but less than amazing in actual reality. Although it's great I can automate my phone to turn of stuff, and launch stuff and whatever, it's really down to a bunch of stuff I should really be expecting from the phone anyway. One popular use is to launch Google Music when the headphones are plugged in. Cool, but why not do it anyway. I guess part of the issue is the huge list of possible customisation for your automation. Or, maybe my phone just needs to get smarter on it's own. Seriously, I wasted time with this app, and highly doubt it's saving me enough frustration to warrant it.

Chromebook Failings

It's been well over a week, and I just ain't feelin' the lurve.

The Chromebook has some concepts down that I think will take great shape in the next 10 years for how operating systems work and for what we expect from them. For example, I have this dream that any laptop I find, or desktop, mobile, phablet, whatever, I should be able to log into it and I should feel like I'm in my computer. This is how I use Google+, Facebook and all else in the cloud, so why not even my OS? Chrome OS demonstrates admirably that this is possible and that this kind of future makes total sense.

But we are not there yet. I kindly received this as a holiday gift from Google, my oh so generous employer here in Dublin, and I do receive it gratefully. However, I use it painstakingly.

This thing is slow guys. You can't just work on a desktop that is blazing by at 100mph and then expect anything close from the Chromebook. This was my dream, and perhaps this is my mistake. I envisioned an early use case for me as one where I would work on my desk from the trusty MacBook Pro, and for meetings, taking work home, working from other hot-desks/spaces around the office, the Chromebook would suit nicely, being light, unplugged, and in the cloud. While this works, it's just annoying. The trackpad is slow to respond. Clicking feels weird. The mic and speaker crackle and suck (this is solved with a trusty pair of Urban Ears, so no hard feelings). In general, you get a deep sense of gratitude when you come back to a decent laptop. I thought I was just spoiled by my MacBook Pro, which admittedly is beyond decent, it's pro. But I'm much happier on my super old black MacBook... hell, I'm even happier on my girlfriend's Windows 7 laptop than I am on this Chromebook.

These are hardware issues, and what can you expect for $250, right? A lot, it turns out. Laptops are a lot cheaper than I think they get credit for. Throw in another $100 and you save a lot of grief that comes with the Chromebook. This laptop is priced cheap, but not cheap enough. It should be a $100 laptop; a sort of throwaway that you think about as an add-on when you buy a real one.

Not to say that all is bad. The future looks good, and I think that Google's idea here is right. Computers need less in them than they did before, so we need to start thinking about devices that work entirely in the cloud, with some reserved local features. What I love particularly about Chrome OS is how some apps, Hangouts for example, look and act like native applications, rather than something running in the browser. I think with Google working on new ideas for hosted apps and web apps, we'll start seeing traditionally web based services more like the main function of the computer. I think a lot of users probably do anyway. How many people boot up just to check Facebook? Why load all that crap in the background when all you want is a browser? The traditional operating system is a bad idea. The only problem is that the browser based OS is just not really good enough yet. It doesn't mean we shouldn't stop trying though, and I expect Chrome OS has a lot more to show us over the next few years, and hopefully beyond that.

A week ago I posted a picture with my Chromebook alongside my MacBook and my iPad, and said that I needed all four devices, including the Galaxy S3 I took the picture with. I can safely say that my Chromebook is demoted. It's here because it was a gift, and I'm grateful. It's part of my family of gadgets, and it will be used here and there. I could even give it a strong recommendation for some people, who I know need simpler computers in their lives. (I dare not forsake them to Window 8.) But for myself, I just don't think me and my Chromebook are going to be very close. I'm sticking with Apple for now.

Nintendo's Grim Future

I started writing this after finishing my exams in final year of uni, so it draws a lot from Management theory on strategy and innovation. It's weird how so many terms here don't get used in the real world, but I think this demonstrates more heavily how out of touch academics can be, rather than vice versa.


I have grown up with Nintendo franchises my whole life, and even as I have aged and matured over the past few years, I have never been tempted to invest in PlayStations or XBoxes in order to play crap like FIFA or COD. Give me Mario; give me Zelda; give me Smash Bros instead. So it was with a hopeful eye that I watched the release of the Wii U. But like many, I am disappointed.


First, the culture problem

The manufacture of a gaming console is fundamentally a platform strategy, but it is particularly more so for Sony and Microsoft than Nintendo. Platform strategies succeed when they scale quickly, and lock in users with network effects and dominant designs. In essence, this refers to things such as XBox Live - a network that the user accepts as standard and does not prefer to adopt a new one. In order for these strategies to become strong in the market, the platform has to achieve a great deal of scale in the market, and the greater the scale, the greater the foothold. PlayStation 2 owners will relate to the high switching costs of jumping to XBox, since the PS3 was backwards compatible with all those games you already own. But to scale to something the size of the PS2, a platform has to nurture an environment that attracts developers and users. The more users, the more developers (since their potential market is bigger), the more games, the more users...

But for Nintendo, their biggest and most significant developer has always been themselves.

This is the observed problem. This is a problem because it feeds from the Nintendo culture. While the Wii was able to radically disrupt the video game market, the cultural tendency to alienate other developers perpetually fragments the overall strategy. Nintendo will continually fail to satisfy the demands of its 'hardcore' gamers (I hate that term) if it does not find a better way to scale it's platforms, and attract powerful developers to make powerful games.

Culture can be a very challenging thing to change. When things go wrong, the first thing comanies do is fix the execution, then they try strategy and finally some might consider fundamentally turning the wheel on the very paradigm lens that the organisation views the world through. Nintendo did this remarkably when launching the Wii. But the Wii U is merely logical incrementalism, and not a true response to the critical gamers that will make decisions over the next two years.


Second, the environment

The market is far more social these days. Intenet gaming is a massive source of revenue for Microsoft, and the free subscription is a valuable competitive advantage for the Playstation Network. Moreover, Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and other social networking sites have grown dramatically in the last few years, and developed powerful social integration tools including games, voice calls, and video chat. Social interaction is at the core of gaming now, and it has moved from the three friends sitting next to you, to the 200+ friends you have all around the world.

Technology is not a spec game. While videogames used to be a power war, this method of differentiation is slowly being abandoned by all players, and this trend preceeds the Wii. The problem is that consumers now expect technology to improve, and if it does not, the new system forgoes an important threshold capability.


The Solution

It's time for Nintendo to focus. Since they started out in games, Nintendo have nailed both hardware and software, but those days are over. Software is now the companies home turf. The technology in hardware is best left to Apple, Samsung and Sony. They need to start developing for Android and iOS, and maybe consider Mac and PC.

They could do it. There's no reason Nintendo couldn't execute extremely high quality content on mobile devices. Their expertise in handheld gaming would allow for rich and powerful handheld games. Much bigger markets exist on these platforms than the one's Nintendo will have to build by launching another DS or Wii. Social integration is already built in too with links like Facebook Connect and Game Center.

Then there's the television. It's a tricky one for everyone to figure out, although Apple giving it a go (as the strong rumors suggest) might change things dramatically. Even if this doesn't happen however, we are on the eve of an emerging Android Game Console market that Nintendo may as well prepare for.

I believe Nintendo treads it's current path over the edge of a cliff, and it will be immensely difficult for it to stray from this and change it's culture. Everything happening in the industry today, including the dire Wii U, suggests that some time not too far off, innovative game design will lose an old and once wise leader.