Back in 2011 I had a nice one bedroom apartment, 62 square meters (some 665 square feet) where the closets where brim full of clothes and apparel, the basement storage was almost full with stuff like my snowboard and the clothes that weren’t in season, and my shelves and drawers full of other stuff. I was surprised to realize that besides the photo album with photos of my family and me as a kid and my computer, there were very few items I’d really miss.

Now don’t get me wrong, it was a very nice apartment. I felt at home, safe and at peace there. Me and my friends had some great time there, marathon watching series like American Horror Story, eating dinners, having drinks. But like all places, it wasn’t about the place or the items there. It was about the people.

I got a chance to put this to the test when I decided to move abroad for a long while. I sold my apartment, and I got rid of most of the stuff. Some stuff, like the snowboard and my couch I sold. Other stuff like books, DVDs my TV and surround system, I gave to family, friends or to charity. I saved two suitcases of clothes and a couple boxes which I stored at my mom’s place. I managed great with the stuff that fit in two suitcases. I learned two things about me:

1) I didn’t miss the material things. The only thing I sometimes missed was my Xbox, as videogames tend to put my brain in a very relaxing kind of free flow when I’m in my most introvert mood.
2) Having a home is very important to me.

All this came back to me just a few weeks ago, when I read “Living with less. A lot less“. Graham Hill wrote about how he got rid of most of his stuff, and how he never has been happier. I knew exactly what mr. Hill meant when he wrote “Often, material things take up mental as well as physical space”. And then I remembered reading about the top five regrets of the dying. Guess how many people regretted not buying more stuff?

It all came full circle when I got back to my mom’s house this weekend and looked through the boxes I saved. I turns out that even the stuff I thought was worth saving, for the most part wasn’t. I talked about downscaling with Fredrik Wass (@bisonblog), who founded blog100 – a challenge to get your blogging spirit reignited, where you blog once a day for 100 straight days – who’s also been having these thoughts. We were both thinking about downsizing, and we wanted to share the experience and how the change affected us. And so crop100 was born. For me, crop100 is about getting rid of material clutter, and leave both mental and financial room for more experiences shared with my loved ones.  I’m going to share the process here on the collective crop100 blog. I invite you to join me – if you hashtag your posts, they will show up there. Read more about the crop100 project, and how to join.

All you have to do is start downsizing and document it in your preferred way, just add the hashtag #crop100. Me and Fredrik will compile a list of people joining the movement and publish it. I’m looking forward to living with less. A lot less.

The post Living with less inspired me to #crop100 appeared first on Digital McGyver.

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For those who can’t read Swedish, here’s a translation:

The Swedish Transport Agency is trying to stop Uber in Stockholm! We need your help NOW!

Sign the petition HERE!

Uber has since the start in February this year become beloved in Stockholm. Of the thirty cities around the world where Uber now exists, the growth pace has been by far the fastes in Stockholm We’re very happy and proud about this and we have you, people of Stockholm, to thank for that.

Unfortunately, fast growth often means big challenges. In an attempt to protect the existing taxi industry the Swedish Transport Agency (STA) want’s to end Uber’s presence in Stockholm.

Officers of the STA identify Uber’s drivers and deny them the permit that is required for a service like Uber – which makes it impossible for us to continue in Stockholm. Why are they doing this? It’s simple. The existing taxi industry is big and strong – and the STA wants to protect it at any cost.

The STA’s explanation for this is that the permit that is required should only be given to companies that drive members of royal families or prominent business leaders. We thing that such a qualitative, safe and modern mode of transportation should be available for everyone – not just for the above mentioned!

It’s not only bureaucracy that gives us resistance. Out on the streets, since a couple days the police are working on the orders of the STA to make life harder for Uber’s drivers and customers – with fines and frightened customers and drivers as a result. If we get the permits for Uber’s drivers the harassments on the street will end – and we can stay in Stockholm.

If we don’t manage to turn this situation, the resistance we’re meeting will force us to discontinue Uber in Stockholm. That’s why we need your immediate help with convincing the authorities that limitations of modes of transportation aren’t acceptable. We who have gotten used to the authorities in Stockholm protecting innovation and new technology are both surprised and sad about what’s currently happening.

Remember: the STA’s is not acting to improve the safety or quality for consumers. They’re acting to stop innovation and protect leading taxi companies – which hurts individual drivers and risks us having to end Uber’s services in Stockholm.

Both customers and drivers have embraced Uber and it’s now up to each and everyone of us to make sure that relevant representatives of authorities understand what the effect of their acts are. We think they will listen and understand us if many Stockholmers show what they think. This is what you can do to help:

ACT NOW!

Sign the petition HERE!

Tweet and spread the campaign here.

Contact the below mentioned decision makers and ask them to STOP HARASSING UBER ON THE STREETS AND APPROVE THE PERMITS IMMEDIATELY:

[list of names, e-mail addresses and phone numbers of officers and civil servants.]

The response was pretty huge. What surprised me was that people who are bright and often critical of sources jumped on the wagon without asking obvious questions:

1. What permits are being denied?

2. What has Uber done to resolve the situation?

3. What’s with the conspiracy theories?

• The police don’t take orders from the STA.
• The STA, the police and the Swedish Taxi Federation meet all the time to handle what we call “svarttaxi” (literally “black taxis”, drivers that drive without a permit and are often scamming people and worse – several women have been raped while going in a “black taxi”)

Then there are factual errors: The STA is indeed acting to ensure that customers of transportation companies are well informed and get pricing information that’s comparable, but more on that later.

First, let’s have a look  at the taxi market in Sweden:

There are some 15 000 taxi cabs in Sweden. About 5000 of these drive in the greater Stockholm area. The market is unregulated, meaning that you can set any price for your services. On the market in Stockholm, there are three major companies: Taxi Stockholm (1650 cars), Taxi Kurir (some 2000 cars in all of Sweden) and Taxi 020 (some 1100 cars in all of Sweden). There are independent drivers (“friåkare”) who don’t belong to any central, but most drivers are connected to one of the 350 central switchboards in Sweden.

You can safely say that there’s healthy competition on the market.

You do need a permit to have a taxi service: the company needs one, and the driver needs a “taxi licence” (driver’s license where you also take tests to prove specific knowledge required of taxi drivers). You also need a taximeter which is tamper-proof, for tax purposes and for the security of customers. Every one of the taxis driving legally in Sweden fulfills these requirements. You recognize taxis that fulfill the requirements by a taxi sign on the roof, yellow license plates and a sticker displaying prices on the back door windows.

You can get an exemption from the requirement of having a taximeter. Typically, these exemptions would be given to companies that rent out limousines and similar. All of these companies use fixed prices, most commonly per time unit (for example, a Mercedes S from Crown Limo is 1200 SEK per hour, a Chrysler 300C Superstretch is 1700 SEK per hour). On a side note, anyone can use these services, not just “royal families and prominent business leaders”. This exemption also allows you to skip the taxi sign, and since they’re not driving on taximeter they don’t need yellow license plates. They don’t need the price comparison stickers either, for obvious reasons.

The key here is “chauffeur services where you pay per time unit, not for distance”. Uber is not a a chauffeur company by these standards, as they charge for distance and time, just like any other of the 5000 cabs in Stockholm.

The fact is that the Swedish Transportation Authority requires taximeters and price comparison stickers for the safety of customers (and tax evasion reasons). The stickers on the cabs allow customers to be informed how this particular cab/company compares. The average comparison price for the major companies in Stockholm is around 300 SEK. So when you see a cab like this one, you know it’s more than twice as expensive as the average ride with one of the major companies. While the execution of the regulation (the information of the comparison stickers for example) can be discussed, this goes on the contrary with Uber’s claim that “STA’s is not acting to improve the safety or quality for consumers”

So the fact is that what Uber are currently asking for is an exemption to be able to compete on unfair grounds: they want to conduct a taxi business where price is based on distance, but they don’t want to be regulated like their competitors. If Uber for example only offered fixed prices based on time units, the exemptions wouldn’t be as problematic to get. And Uber are using an unfair comparison. They talk about “other companies getting exemption from the permits” but all these “other companies” have one thing in common: charging fixed rates. Uber don’t. And still want an exemption.

I’m also curious why Uber doesn’t offer what they’ve done to meet the regulations. Have they discussed and offered other solutions? For example, getting the app certified as a taximeter by SWEDMA, the organization that handles certifications? The Swedish authorities have been trying to get in touch with Uber, and help has been offered to navigate the issues, but Uber seem less interested in contributing to a solution and more interested in whipping their army of zombies into a frenzy with a lot of emotions and allegations, but few facts. I can only see this as Uber wanting everyone to adapt to their way, without having to budge an inch themselves.

I did speak on the phone with Travis Kalanick yesterday, who explained the situation in more detail. However, all of my questions in this blog post remain mainly unanswered. Add to that that Uber refuse to answer questions or to clarify anything in the official channels, for example the simple question “How many cars does Uber have in Stockholm?”. The answer to the latter would be relevant to judge their claims that this is “an attempt to protect the existing taxi industry”. Considering how many cars there are in Stockholm, Uber would need a fleet of at least 100 cars to make any impact on the 5000 existing cabs in Stockholm. And even then, accusing an authority in one of the countries with the lowest levels of corruption in the world is more petulant and tin foil hattery than constructive.

All in all, Uber have a lot of questions to answer. But these questions are hard, and instead they choose to use sleight of hand to shuffle cards and a throw a tantrum to raise a mob of angry zombies. I liked Uber before this, but seeing this behavior that would barely be tolerated from a petulant teenager has turned me off big time. I would be more than willing to help them to get rid of regulations that indeed are bad for both customers and companies, but so far what I can see is that they want to get rid of regulations that actually help customers.

EDIT: Uber claim being “harassed” by the police. But they are today, as far as I know, the only company in Sweden who run an organized business breaking the regulations. They have several drivers that work without the correct permits. So Uber are the only target in this case, and you don’t need a conspiracy theory to explain why police suddenly start acting against organized law breaking.

EDIT: Uber have posted what they consider a clarification (in Swedish). What they’re saying is that they refuse taximeters (or rather, that their customers do) and therefore should be given exemption. They don’t explain why they don’t simply get the app certified. So all questions are still unanswered. Also, they finally answered my question about how many cars they have in Stockholm by saying “Like all companies we have numbers we don’t give out”. All other major Swedish taxi companies state how many cars they have, so this is another strange thing.

Also relevant: Joakim Jardenberg’s blog post (in Swedish). Thanks to both Jocke and Joakim Vollert who helped with research.

The post Uber Stockholm throw a PR-tantrum when refused unfair advantages appeared first on Digital McGyver.

When sci-fi meets human rights

The Natalia Project, by Civil Rights Defenders, is a bracelet that makes sure that violence against human rights activists doesn’t go unnoticed. They need your help: join the project to get alerts when a human rights activist is kidnapped.

The post Link roundup April 22, 2013 appeared first on Digital McGyver.

Before watching it, I was a skeptical. Mostly about brain functions, a skepticism that was dispelled by a neuroscientist that Michael Mosley interviewed, but the question about muscle mass was never really answered. I wonder if you can have a lot of muscle mass, and go on this diet, work out and keep it.

Having a lot of muscle mass (I’m around 90 kilos or 200 lbs, mostly muscle) I decided to try it on myself.

I already have a blood pressure monitor, a Withings scale and use several different self-trackers to monitor my sleep and my activity. I got a kit that allowed me to track my blood glucose, triglyceride and cholesterol levels. (If you’re interested, I got the MultiCare In from Pedihealth)

For a week, I’ve been following my regular routines and measured my levels I also got my body composition measured as a baseline. Tomorrow, Monday April 22, I’m starting the 5/2 diet where I’ll be fasting on Mondays and Thursdays.

According to the Bodpod, my weight is 90.2 kilos of which 17.4% is fat (15.7 kilos). That means 75.5 kilos is lean mass. My resting metabolic rate (how much energy my  body would consume if I were lying down and resting for 24 hours) is 1986 calories, and if you add my daily activities I average around 3000 calories a day, with an additional 700-1000 the days I work out.

My blood glucose varies between 4.5 and 5.2 depending on how much and what I’ve eaten (I tend to eat healthy in the weeks), my triglyceride levels have been between 0.7 and 2.2 and my cholesterol at 7.6-7.8. My blood pressure is low, the diastolic value tends to be between 50 and 70 and the systolic between 110 and 130.

I will keep working out: I walk about 10-15 kilometers per day and teach two Bodypump classes (Mondays and Fridays) and one Bodycombat class (Thursdays) per week.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask them here – and if you’re curious how it’s going you can follow me on Facebook, Twitter or on Google+ where I’ll be sharing my insights. There will of course be updates here as well.

The post The 5/2 diet: An experiment with my own body appeared first on Digital McGyver.

In short, it goes like this: Before the digital age, you could design the moment when potential customers first met your products or services. Be it the packaging on the shelf, or when a customer walks into your office. It’s what Procter & Gamble call “First Moment Of Truth” or FMOT. Today, that first moment has a moment before it: Zero Moment Of Truth (ZMOT). That’s when someone who needs your products or services googles you, or asks on Twitter about what people think about you, or posts on Facebook … and so on. The answers and reactions affect whether the person will get to the FMOT and on to becoming a customer, reaching the Second Moment Of Truth, SMOT, which is when a person experiences your product or service.

From the moment someone has had a Zero Moment Of Truth about you, they may become someone else’s Zero Moment Of Truth. Even if this first person never uses your services or products – because the First Moment Of Truth was bad, or because someone they trust advised against using your products or services during their Zero Moment Of Truth – they will relay that information when the next person asks.

This means that in order to fully thrive and survive, companies have to become proactive. They have to start designing the customer journey in a way so that each step is delightful, simple, shareable. The experience is everything. Unfortunately, most companies today that are “good at social media” are reactive: instead of creating a superior experience, they patch the flaws in their experience by superior support on Facebook, Twitter and other platforms and networks. I love how Brian Solis puts this into words, and it turns out life directs itself: just a couple days after reading it, I got a practical example of what it looks like:

A while back, I got a gift voucher for a night at Scandic Hotels, a chain of hotels in northern Europe. As my boyfriend is moving from the US to Copenhagen next week, I thought that it’s a perfect time to use it: we’ll have a weekend at a hotel in Copenhagen. No worries about cleaning, making the bed or fixing breakfast – and most important, time for ourselves.

I go to their site and try to book a room using the voucher, but any attempt at searching for hotel rooms yields a page without any results. I go to their Facebook Page and ask how I go about using it. Two of my digital friends work at Scandic, so I knew that the organization was good at social media, but they managed exceed my (high) expectations by actually answering my question at 11 PM on a Thursday night. The support was great, and when we took it to e-mail they kept answering promptly and helpfully. The problem was that it wasn’t very clear which of the numbers and codes printed on the voucher you were supposed to enter, and the one you were supposed to enter was very easy to misread.

Here’s the first thing that’s badly designed

Instead of having gift vouchers that are very clear and simple to use (designed experience, proactive) I had to contact Scandic to find out what to type in (reactive). I was also told that since I wanted to use the voucher for one night, and pay for one night, I had to make two separate reservations.

Here’s the second thing that’s badly designed: 

Instead of making it easy for me to spend more money at one additional night, Scandic was making me jump through hoops. Add to that the uncertainty about whether I get the same room for both nights – what if we had to move rooms? Still, the lack of proactive experience designed was compensated by the reactive and helpful customer service.

Okay, so I know which code to use, and I have to make two separate reservations. I start with the one I intend to pay for, saving the voucher for last. There are at least 8 Scandic Hotels in the Copenhagen region. Four in the city, and four outside (like the one at the airport).

Searching for available rooms, paying with cash, shows available rooms in all central hotels

I settle for Scandic Palace Hotel which has a range of rooms available. I’m looking for a weekend getaway, and I’m prepared to pay extra for a nicer  room. As I’m still unsure how the voucher works, I open a new tab and do a search for rooms with the voucher code. Now I only see hotels far outside the city center.  The hotel by the airport is the closest one. (Note: this screenshot is taken at the time I write this blog post. As I did the search when trying to make the reservation, the ‘price’ was 1 voucher.)

Searching for available rooms, with a gift voucher. All of a sudden, no central hotels have rooms (at the time I was trying to make the reservation, the ‘price’ was 1 gift voucher)

So pay it seems that if I pay cash, there’s a range of rooms available in central Copenhagen. When I try to use a gift voucher, suddenly only non-central hotel are available. I e-mail customer service back asking how this can be, offering to add cash to the voucher value if that was the problem.

Their reply?

“In your case I’m afraid it’s related to the search date, which is next weekend. Some of our hotels have to close gift voucher rates and other special rates when you’re booking a room close to the arrival date, and this is due to how full the hotel is, price policies etc. If you were to book in two weeks you’d find availability at more central hotels, but I do understand that your travel dates might not be flexible.”

Here’s the third thing that’s badly designed

Not honoring your own “gift vouchers”. You’ve already been paid for the gift voucher, but still treat it as some sort of second grade payment option. Somewhere along the way when you designed this process, you decided that your own gift vouchers are not as valuable as cash payment. This makes you look like cheap and greedy. And here’s where the reactive customer support starts failing, because as a customer I don’t care about what your excuse is. I just care about the fact that I feel cheated by you.

Here’s the fourth thing that’s badly designed 

Designing computer systems and reservations processes that are so rigid that instead of upselling to a willing customer, you turn the customer away. I do understand that gift vouchers have a certain value (even though mine only said “Gift voucher for one overnight stay, valid at all Scandic Hotels. Valid Friday and Saturday nights.” – there’s nothing about a certain value on it) and that the rooms available might be more expensive than what the voucher is worth. What I do not understand is why I am unable to add more cash to get the rooms I know are available.

Here’s the lesson

You might be great at reacting in social media, with prompt and courteous replies on Facebook and Twitter and a customer support that’s on with a smile 24/7. But that’s not enough to survive. Having a great customer service and a badly designed customer experience means that you’re always being reactive instead of proactive. It’s like having a dingy old airplane, but great parachutes. Being reactive only goes so far; customers will in the end choose the option with the delightful experience, not the option with the bad experience and the delightful customer service. Being proactive means your current customers will push your future customers towards you in their Zero Moments Of Truth. Being reactive means that your customers become someone else’s customers.

I ended up using Hotels.com to find another hotel. I almost booked with Marriott, but realized they charge 150 DKK ($25) per day for internet. This is another thing that’s poorly designed: “our customers can obviously pay our high rates, so let’s charge an unreasonably high price for something they really need so that our revenues increase”. When an experience is clearly not created with a mutual benefit in mind, you’re likely to look more like Ryan Air than an upscale hotel.

So I ended up choosing Radisson Blu. So next time someone asks me about where to stay in Copenhagen, there’s a chance I will say “I stayed at Radisson Blu Scandinavia, it was awesome!” – because unlike Scandic and Marriot, nothing so far has scared me from experiencing Radisson’s Second Moment Of Truth.

Brian Solis has put up a deck with the insights from the book on Slideshare.

The post Scandic Hotels: why “good at social media” isn’t enough to survive the digital shift appeared first on Digital McGyver.

I wrote a review of my Basis monitor after having used it for 6 weeks. After having used it for more than three months, I still like it but now I’ve discovered a huge glitch in it: the heart rate monitoring. In short: Basis heart rate monitoring is very inaccurate, essentially showing and recording wrong data or no data at all as soon as you move around.

I discovered it quite early on when looking at the “data details” view. Here’s a screenshot:

Each dot means that Basis has a data sample. As you can see, the data samples are fewer – in some cases non-existant – at certain points. These points have one thing in common: I’m not sitting still or lying down. In the morning I take a 40 minute walk to work. The middle of the day was lunch. I left work at 6 to take a Bodycombat class, then I walked home. This means that Basis only has fairly accurate data for when my pulse is low and I’m being still.

I decided to put the Basis to the test. I have a Polar FT80, which uses a chest strap to monitor your heart rate (Basis actually monitors your pulse, which is a result of your heart rate, while Polar monitors the electric impulses created by the heart). I used it to see how the Basis monitor compared in three scenarios:

1) Aerobic exercise (in my case, a Bodycombat class)
2) Weight lifting (in my case, a Bodypump class)
3) Moving around (in my case walking to the gym)

Here’s a breakdown of the data:

Aerobic exercise 

This is the graph of my heart rate during a Bodycombat class, as recorded by the Polar FT80.

A graph of my heart rate during a Bodycombat class, as captured by Basis.

According to my Polar monitor, my heart rate averaged 157 and maxed out at 179 during that hour. The Basis monitor failed to log enough data to create a graph, and it recorded a high of 148 (lower than my average heart rate for that hour) and an average of 116. At least it got the calories somewhat right: 802 to my FT80′s 1058.

Weight lifting

The graph of my heart rate during a Bodypump class, recorded by the Polar FT80.

Graph of my heart rate during a Bodypump class, as captured by Basis. (Green staples are calories)

Again, the pictures look different. I do get a pretty high heart rate during a Bodypump class, due to loading up the bar; the Polar monitor shows an average heart rate of 137 and a high of 169. The Basis: high of 138 and average of 107. If we look at the calories, my Polar FT80 reports 706 calories, the Basis monitor 251 (and since the Basis cannot zoom in on 60 minutes it’s actually showing the count for 75, 15 minutes longer than the Polar)

Brisk walk

A heart rate graph from a brisk walk, recorded by my Polar monitor

Graph of my heart rate during the same walk recorded by the Basis

This walk was 3,2 kilometers (2 miles) and took 45 minutes – a pace of 4 miles per hour. It’s a brisk walk, but nothing extraordinary. And yet the Basis fails: it shows a high of 141 (the Polar gives 122) and an average of 85 (the Polar says 100). The calorie count for the Basis was about 200, while the Polar said 299.

Once I realized how bad the Basis was at recording heart rate whenever I’m not sitting or lying down, I decided to do another test: check how accurately it displays the current heart rate. I wore my Polar FT80 for a whole day, and checked my heart rate on both monitors at random times, and I wrote down what I was doing at that time. Here’s the graph:

The blue line shows the data from the Polar monitor, the red from the Basis monitor

(Note: when standing and walking, I waited a couple minutes before checking the monitors, as to give the Basis monitor a chance to catch up and eliminate any lag.)

It turns out that the Basis displays an inaccurate heart rate whenever I’m doing anything else than sitting down.

Conclusion

Basis did address the heart rate monitoring in a blog post in November 2012 (before the first units had shipped). However, I don’t think that that blog post is honest about how bad the Basis is at recording your heart rate. It basically displays one thing right: your heart rate when you sleep, and sit.

The bigger problem is that Basis’ poor heart rate monitoring also affects the calorie count. If you look at the calories burned during my walk, Basis says 200 calories when the actual number was 50% higher (the Polar FT80 is accurate, because it uses VO2max in addition to sex, age, weight and height). During the aerobic exercise the Basis monitor showed 800 calories, when the actual number was more than 30% higher. The weight lifting was the most incorrect calorie measure; Basis says 251 when the actual result was 180% higher. The reason the Basis did better for aerobic exercise is that you move your arms a lot in Bodycombat, while you move them less in Bodypump – so the higher calorie consumption comes from the accelerometers, not from the heart rate monitor.

Even once Basis opens their API, you can’t do much with the heart rate data except for the resting heart rate. Considering that they still cannot take any new orders, and devices like Amiigo soon coming out I’m changing my recommendation: don’t wait for the Basis. A second generation has potential, but the first is not worth the money.

I’ve been comparing the Fitbit One, Nike Fuelband, Jawbone Up, Basis and Bodymedia when it comes to calorie consumption and sleep, and will return with a summary of which of these devices are accurate and which are not.

The post Basis and heart rate monitoring appeared first on Digital McGyver.

The post Link roundup April 8, 2013 appeared first on Digital McGyver.

As you type, autocomplete predicts and displays queries to choose from. The search queries that you see as part of autocomplete are a reflection of the search activity of all web users and the content of web pages indexed by Google.

If you’re logged in, Google will throw in your search history as well. These searches were made in an incognito window in Chrome (which, by the way is a great quick fix to get a more neutral search result with Google). Internet is the sum of its users and it’s not strange that our prejudice and our stereotyping shines through.

Thanks to my friend Diego Angemi for the idea.

The post Stereotyping with Google appeared first on Digital McGyver.

Crowdfunding your launch in a new market

Everlane is crowdfunding their Canadian launch, to gage and raise interest. I love how they think.

How times change …

(via Photo by todayshow • Instagram)

Photo Credit for header image: Julia Manzerova via Compfight cc

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