DONDEQUIERA

More social media help for agencies

2010-03-05T05:44:00.004-04:30

I'm finding that MediaPost is a resource of growing relevance and assistance. If you're looking to understand this new mess of interactive, digital, Internet, and social media marketing, then I'd suggest you become a member (it's free, hehe, well except for the plethora of ads) and subscribe to a few of their feeds. I think you'll agree that they offer some great advice.

In a recent post from David Berkowitz on the Social Media Insider they offer some more valuable insight into the challenge marketing agencies face as they attempt to morph into the social media agency of the future. In a brief interview with 360i's CEO Bryan Wiener, Berkowitz spells out some clear mandates for understanding what social media means for agencies.

Social marketing is indispensable in creating a direct relationship between a consumer and a brand. And building relationships is becoming a more critical component of brand marketing as the media landscape becomes increasingly fragmented and cluttered.
For agencies that want to be indispensable marketing partners to their clients, they need to commit to developing expertise within social and, even beyond that, commit to keeping pace with consumer behavior and bolstering their skills at fostering consumer relationships across all channels.
The old, siloed model of advertising, promotion, sales, customer service and IT just doesn't cut it anymore.
If marketers really want to rapidly and radically impact change in the agency ecosystem, it starts with how they allocate their dollars. And while many are paying lip service to relationships and conversation, not enough marketers, media properties or agencies have made the structural and budgetary changes necessary to adapt to this new model of marketing.
Understanding that there now NEEDS to be a value exchange between consumers and brands in their advertising and marketing is probably the single biggest change to the marketing industry since the advent of TV advertising. The strategy of intruding and interrupting is replaced by informing and engaging.

Again, just five simple mandates that could dramatically change how any agency of marketer in Puerto Rico approaches Internet Marketing. Unfortunately with most everyone still stuck in "ostrich marketing" land, these steps might seem impossible. For me, as our economy continues to contract, the imperative to change behavior is becoming overwhelming difficult to ignore.

All your brands are us: Ostrich Marketing

2010-02-26T10:00:00.005-04:30

Found this awesome article written by Mahesh Murthy, who writes the WSJ's India Chief Mentor blog. In a recent entry he lays out a strategy for how zero-budget advertising builds word-of-mouth marketing that you can't put a price on; or what he calls "remark-worthy messages." Of course that latter bit riffs on "Seth Godin's Purple Cow" meme of being remarkable, which, if you haven't read, you should.

So I think the first thing Mahesh's post makes us do is to challenge our pre-conceived notion of what is your brand image. As far back as the "The Cluetrain Manifesto" up to "The Long Tail," you should accept that the Internet now owns your brand. As Mahesh puts it: "a brand doesn't exist on shelves—it exists in the hearts and minds of people. Your brand is the sum total of perceptions about your product in the heads of your relevant audience."

Now before you jump to the conclusion that these two thoughts contradict themselves, I'd suggest you connect the dots. Simply put, the Internet has become the largest storehouse of what people think about your brand. Through product reviews, blog posts, Facebook fan pages, and thousands of other sources, the Internet is the very public collection of what people think about your brand.

In many ways, this is THE BIGGEST challenge for marketers and marketing agencies have to confront. They no longer control what people think about their products. As you can imagine, that scares the shit out of them; it scares them so much that they, like ostriches, believe they can stick their heads in the sand and simply ignore the Internet. Of course, doing so sentences your brand to the whims and least common denominator mentality of the Internet; a place, I assure you, that no brand wants to go (Ostrich Marketing).

So how do you get started? well, Mahesh offers a clear five step process:

Start on your brand by answering a simple question: Are you remark-worthy? When someone talks about your offering, is there a 10-second sound bite that is "re-tweetable" on Twitter? If not, go back to basics and craft a simple, clear hook that that sets you apart.
Now apply a single test: Do a Google search on your brand to see whether every element of the resulting page can support this position.
Now work to own the presence in each of these elements.
Then audit every mention of you. Google alerts alone won't do it, but it's a start. See who's saying what.
Then intervene in conversations and respond to complaints, visibly, with your own Twitter account or some other way of interacting.

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: catlovers

Liberty Cablevision installs bigger tubes

2010-02-02T21:45:00.005-04:30

Effective yesterday, Liberty Cablevision introduced their new "Internet Extreme" offering. Under the new pricing, all existing subscribers with connections less than 1Mb will be "automatically" bumped up to their new minimum connection speed of 1Mb. According to product literature, they have recently upgraded their cable network to Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification (DOCSIS) 2.0. Put another way, according to ex-Senator Ted Stevens, Liberty Cablevision installed bigger tubes in their Internet.

Due to this upgrade they are now able to offer higher broadband speeds at reduced prices (compared to their previous packages). The following table lists their new packages:

Download speed	Internet only price
1 Mbps	$34.98
3 Mbps	$59.99
5 Mbps	$79.99
10 Mbps	$199.99
15 Mbps	$349.99

Now a word to the wise, if you're a Liberty Cablevision Internet subscriber, then I'd check to see if you are benefiting from the new downloads speeds, that is for customers who had connections slower than 1 Mbps.

There any number of sites that offer free testing services to check your connection speed. Two of the more popular sites are Speakeasy Speed Test and Speedtest.net - The Global Broadband Speed Test. So check out your connection and see if you're getting a result near 1 Mbps.

The reason I recommend checking is because I had to call customer service in order to get my account updated. I was expecting the change to happen automagically, but after waiting patiently for a day and a half, I ended up calling. It was pretty painless, but be prepared because the customer service rep is going to hit you with a cross sell to add the now customary triple pack of Internet, cable television, and VoIP.

Conclusion

All in all, I was pretty happy to receive the good news that I was being upgraded to 1 mbps, for even less then what I was previously paying. After the call earlier today, when I got home in the evening, I rechecked my connection speed and was happy to see that I was actually getting near 1 Mbps. So I congratulate for successfully upgrading their system and offering some more competitive pricing. Now I'm trying to figure out how to convince my wife why it's worth paying $25 for a 3 Mpbs connection. Oddly, the argument "But it's 3 freaking Mbps!" doesn't seem to raise her attention. Hmm, go figure.

Warning: snarky comments imminent! Although I do have to say, it's about freaking time. I think that prior to this change, Liberty had some of the least competitive pricing and service offerings. Now I'm not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, but if Liberty Cablevision just upgraded to DOCSIS 2.0, that puts them only 9 years behind the standards. According to Wikipedia, DOCSIS 2.0 was announced in December 2001. In fact, DOCSIS 3.0 was already announced in August of 2006. So that puts us right about where I've said previously, the Internet in Puerto Rico lags about 10 years behind the US, who, by the way, isn't even at the head of the list anymore.

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: wools

Puerto Rico and The Long Tail

2010-01-25T10:54:00.007-04:30

Although I read the original Wired article on The Long Tail I have to confess, I've never read Chris Anderson's longer explanation in his book of the same name. Although I started the audio version a couple of times, I couldn't finish it. Well over the holidays I scored a discounted version of the second edition in the bargain book section at Borders and have been working my way through it.

It's been useful seeing the more detailed explanation, but nothing I would describe as an "A Ha!" moment until I came across the following table. Ladies and gentleman, the following table explains EVERYTHING when it comes to our state of Internet marketing. Let me show you the table first, then I'll describe why it is soooo explains so clearly our state of Internet marketing (Let me first set the context, this table describes how consumers use "filters" to make purchasing decisions. Pre-filters decide what gets produced, and post-filters decide what to consume after it is already been produced):

Pre-filters	Post-filters
Editors	Blogs
Record label scouts	Playlists
Studio executives	Reviews
Department store buyers	Customers*
Marketers	Recommendations
Advertisers	Consumers*

* Refers to word of mouth

In each row, the table illustrates a different head of the tail filter and attempts to correlate it to it's corresponding long tail tail filter. So why does this explain everything? Here's a hint, look at the words that I've highlighted.

So, as I've described before, the Web 2.0 participation by Puerto Rico Internet users is abnormal. It's really kind of interesting when you think about it. While most local Internet users do take advantage of post-filters, like Google rankings, suggestions in Amazon, NetFlix recommendations, and product reviews, very few contribute their own post filter data. So what we end up with is a globalized post filter influencing a very regionalized consumer base. This, for me, explains why it is sometimes so difficult to identify, from the Internet, what's "hot" in Puerto Rico, no matter where it lands on the power curve of availability and consumption.

No conversation = No Long Tail

So, as I see it, since we know that Internet Marketing is really a free-for-all conversation between marketers and consumers as well as consumers and consumers, since Puerto Rico specific post-filters are so scarce what it really means is that there is no Puerto Rico specific conversation going on. To their credit, I bet local marketers intuitively know this, and therefore still prefer to use pre-filters to impact the local consumer. So instead of venturing out into the conversation, local marketers stick with the tried and true marketing strategies based on traditional advertising.

One could just as easily submit, however, that local marketers haven't yet made the connection between their own personal Internet behavioral patterns and how they should approach using the Internet to market their brand. As I mentioned, while they rapidly consume other's post filters, they can't make the connection between post filters and their own brand. For me, that explains why most local Internet Marketing still tends to be a one way push of branding outward, instead of the normal long tail conversation. Another example would be how local brands try to use Facebook, the clear lowest common denominator of Web 2.0 in Puerto Rico. They either try to use ads, or they simply try to fill fans news feeds with a bunch of news feed spam.

Recommendations

Now, here's where it gets really confusing. While I submit that Web 2.0 participation by Puerto Rico Internet users is abnormal, that does not mean that it does not exist at all. What I believe is the problem, is that it is too widely dispersed as to be useful. What is badly needed is a way to gather and condense post filter information so that it becomes easier to access and easier to analyze. If the comments, reviews, and recommendations created by local users were collected from the hundreds of thousands of web sites we visit, then the aggregate consensus of the likes and dislikes of Puerto Rican consumers would be easier to identify.

In addition, as I've stated it many times before Internet Marketing is all about the conversation. So for Pete's sake please, would the local Marketing community join the conversation going on all around them. Facebook and Twitter are not billboards! They are communities full of living breathing consumers who are eager to engage in a conversation about what they want and don't want, and by the way, they HATE SPAM.

Here's a quick piece of advice for every brand in Puerto Rico that wants to get it's message out to the local consumer. Hire, or pick from within your company, the most Internet savvy 18-24 or 25-35**, year old person, regardless of their preparation and dedicate them to engage in conversations on the Internet FULL-TIME. Of course, this should be someone with excellent customer service experience and impeccable writing skills in Spanish and, if possible, English. Put them through an intense marketing indoctrination of what message you want communicated and then turn them loose. That's it! Do that and I bet you're going to be infinitely more successful in your marketing.

** The reason I wouldn't go with someone any older, is that there is an inverse relationship between age and the willingness and adaptability to really "get" the Internet.

A challenge for Puerto Rico Broadband Usage

2010-01-19T20:59:00.005-04:30

This is going to be short. Recently Akamai came out with yet another dismal report on the state of broadband in the U.S. According to the report, web users in the U.S. connected at an average speed of 3.9 Mpbs in the third quarter of 2009 -- slower than in 17 other countries. One year prior, the U.S. only lagged behind 16 other nations. We're losing ground!

A while back Gil The Jenius suggested that our dismal usage of the Internet for Marketing might be connected to our assumed low state of broadband. Now that I've seen the US's continued broadband usage decline, it made me wonder whether he might be on to something. The problem is, as I've pointed out before, we don't even have enough organization around the Internet to have any reliable information regarding Internet usage. So as far as I can tell, there are no broadband usage statistics for Puerto Rico broadband usage and how it might compare to the world.

So here's my challenge, if someone can provide us with bona-fide Puerto Rico broadband usage statistics, that we can publish for free, then I will dress up in a clown suit and they can throw cream pies in my face in front of the Puerto Rico Telephone Company corporate headquarters. Of course cameras should be rolling for full YouTube coverage. Simple, show me the numbers, and then you can throw pies at my face. I await your responses.

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: SethLemmons

The Engima of Puerto Rico Tourism

2009-12-22T06:00:00.001-04:30

For me, nothing describes the enigma of Puerto Rico better than it's sorted relationship with tourism. For on the one hand we have our stated goal, which was recently summarized by Governor Luis Fortuño: "Tourism enriches our economy and is a very important focus for us." While on the other hand we have such an ineffective approach to managing our tourism industry that it makes one wonder if there is a coordinated and intentional plan to sabotage that industry.

I remember asking a highly intelligent, well connected, Puerto Rican friend of mine why Puerto Rico wasn't more like Orlando, and his response was "Did you ever consider that Puerto Ricans like Puerto Rico just the way it is?" Now I don't think he was jerking my chain or kidding, so like wine, savor his statement for a while, before reacting.

With recent reports of Governor Fortuño signing eight new tourism initiatives into law, it appears that reform of the Tourism industry is at hand. In this first post on tourism, I'll examine an initiative launched recently by the Puerto Rico Tourism Company, again I would like to remind everyone that I don't go looking for things to bash, they come to me. My wife sometimes tells me, "You don't think Puerto Ricans can do anything right," so I guess it does seem like I focus on the negative too much here in Dondequiera. I think for the most part I tend to stick to what I was taught as a child, "If you don't anything nice to say, then don't say anything at all." However, what gets my blood boiling is when people make claims that under examination only reveal hypocrisy, vanity, and plain old incompetence .

In my opinion, here in Puerto Rico we accept bad service too easily. I believe the tendency is to avoid a confrontation about "hot" topics like incompetence, bad service, or injustice because we don't want to make anyone look bad. So instead of confronting a situation head-on and calling someone (or some company) out on doing a terrible job, we say "¡Ay Bendito! and let it slide, but then we'll go around to all of our friends talking badly about someone (or some company). Then when presented with the same situation again, we try to navigate around the situation, just to avoid confrontation.

SeePuertoRico.com

Recently the Puerto Rico Tourism Company announced a new integrated marketing campaign designed to increase awareness and make Puerto Rico a "top of mind" destination. At the center of the initiative is a series of Elliott Erwitt photographs taken during a return trip to Puerto Rico last spring where the world-renowned photographer re-discovered the Islands' essence: romantic, rich in culture and experience.

The $10 million advertising campaign will run on networks like Bravo, Food Network, Fine Living, Travel Channel, CNN and CNBC. Print ads will run in titles like Vanity Fair, Architectural Digest, Food & Wine, In Style, Town & Country, and Travel & Leisure. The advertising plan, will run in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Washington DC, Dallas/Ft. Worth, Atlanta and Miami, consisting of television, print and online webisodes with messaging that evokes a personal connection with Puerto Rico and inspires people to visit the islands.

Observations

First of all, and I've said this before, I don't think that big budget advertising campaigns are the answer to reforming our tourism industry. I'd say that advertising is more of the same, and by the way, I'll be getting to the scandal behind us re-adopting "Lo hace mejor" slogan. Now I've not seen any of the print or television ads, although I'm sure they're stunning. Nor have I found any of the webisodes mentioned in the press release. No, I'll be approaching this from a web perspective, specifically the Internet Marketing aspects of the campaign:

Non existent SEO - I hope they take a little bit of the money they are spending and buy their way to the top of any search for "See Puerto Rico", because right now the site they created SeePuertoRico.com doesn't even show up when you search for the words in the domain name. Ladies and Gentlemen, you have to try very hard to avoid getting a site associated with the words used in domain name itself.

In fact, I would submit, only a complete noob would create a web site that couldn't be indexed by the words used in a domain name. Once again, I would point to Adobe Flash as the culprit, but the problem with Flash is usually indexing content inside the movie, I mean you can't even find this site if you search for it. I mean check out the meta name="keywords" collection. Did they leave anything out? Well perhaps one important one "See Puerto Rico."
All rights reserved - Did you know that there is an alternative to the traditional copyright, namely, Creative Commons? On the Flash movie, it clearly assigns the traditional copyright, "All rights reserved" to the Puerto Rico Tourism Company (PRTC). Now one can assume from that declaration that the photographer Elliott Erwitt transferred the copyright of the images used in the website to the PRTC. So they could license them anyway they want, so the question is: "Why wouldn't they want to "protect" the images?" The answer involves understanding the importance of the Remix culture on the Internet.

Essentially the logic goes something like this. We assume that the PRTC paid a hefty amount for the world famous photographer to capture these images. Putting a "All rights reserved" declaration on the images only protects them in the United States, those words are mostly meaningless elsewhere. But if they did pay a lot for them, wouldn't you want the most people possible getting a hold of the pictures? If they are, as Jaime Lopez, executive director of The Puerto Rico Tourism Company says:
"He depicted the true realism of Puerto Rico; he captured our beaches, yes, but he unveiled so much more with images of our rain forests, our architecture and culture that make Puerto Rico so special."
Then wouldn't you want everyone to have access to the pictures to use as they want, just as long as they promote Puerto Rico as a, how did that go again? Oh yeah, a "top of the mind" destination.
Linking - Now one of the reasons that no one can find the website "See Puerto Rico," is because they don't even link to it from their own website. Go on, go check it out. So riddle me this: "Why would you create a new $10 million campaign and not even link to it from your main website?" Is it sabotage or ineptitude? If anyone has seen any of these ads, can you tell me whether they direct you to the "See Puerto Rico" site or to the main GoToPuertoRico.com site?
Flash - Again, why Adobe Flash? It takes a long time to load and none of the content gets indexed. When are we going to get over this hammer predisposition, that every website looks like an Adobe Flash nail?

By the way, as soon as I hit publish, I bet this article will be the number one hit in a search for "See Puerto Rico." Why, because Dondequiera is recognized by the search engines as an expert in all things Puerto Rico, in other words, we have a strong search engine optimization strategy that guarantees that our content is indexed effectively. I've also used a few tricks within this post to ensure a high index for the phrase "See Puerto Rico". Get it?

So once again, riddle me this: "Why doesn't the PRTC have a blog which shares information about Puerto Rico?" or "Why does the press link on the GoToPuertoRico.com have only one news item about No Passport Required?" or "Why doesn't it include a copy of the press release they sent out announcing the See Puerto Rico campaign?" And finally, "What conclusion am I supposed to come to, when you put all of this together?"

¡Ay Bendito! They did the best they could! At least they're trying! No! I'm sorry! If they are going to spend $10 million of our hard earned (and collected) tax dollars, I believe they can do much better. We can and should demand better, and the first step is criticizing them publicly for their shortcomings. I hope you can understand.

CaribbeanBusinessPR.com to move behind a paywall

2009-12-14T07:06:00.006-04:30

Trying to stay up to date on how Casiano Communications tries to leverage the content of their vanity press business newspaper is a challenge. After building a pretty good reputation with PuertoRicoWow.com, a couple of years ago, they decided to completely destroy that URL and reinvented itself as CaribbeanBusinessPR.com. They also briefly launched IslaEventos.com to take it down only a few months later without any explanation

Over the weekend, I decided to see what was up on the site. When I tried to read one of the articles, I was met with the following two splash pages:

Analysis (setting the the stage)

Now if you've been paying attention to the newspaper and publishing industries, you'll know that a great evolution or revolution (depends on your role in the change), is taking place. Previously here on Dondequiera, I shared that Entrepreneur magazine predicted the extinction of newspapers in 10 years.

Lately the debate on the future of web-based content has been heating up with Rupert Murdoch of News Corporation, drawing a line in the Internet sand and announcing that he was not going to allow free access to content on any of his online properties, which include: the Wall Street Journal, AmericanIdol.com, Fox(*).com, Hulu.com, IGN, MySpace, to name a few.The additional implication of moving these sites behind a pay wall, was that they would also be excluded from indexing by search engines.

Analysis

It has been clear for years that Casiano Communications does not understand the Internet, proof of that lies no further than merely examining the history of the many changes they've made. For example, while careful control of one's digital brand is critical, why would you eliminate sites completely from the Web? All traffic is good traffic. And sites cost nearly nothing to keep up and growing. Elegantly rerouting traffic to where you "really" want those visitors to go is the real trick.

The simple analysis of Casiano Communications' latest move is that CaribbeanBusinessPR.com is not meeting revenue expectations. While their pages do have some banner ads, most pages end up with only Google AdSense displayed beside the content. As I have mentioned, repeatedly, to the detriment of all local businesses, they do not understand Google AdWords, and therefore do not use search engine marketing. Which ultimately means that the inventory of Google AdSense ads for Puerto Rico is woefully small.

Now it could be that Manuel A. Casiano has been listening to Murdoch and saying to himself: "Yea, that's the ticket. That old fart has a point." Could be, but I'd say that Casiano is no Murdoch. The amount of content under the News Corporation umbrella is massive compared to Caribbean Business. In a response to Murdoch, Google's Eric Schmidt had this killer quote:

"There are enough free sources that the marginal value of paying is not justified based on the incremental value of quality"

Conclusion

I think it is dangerous for Casiano Communications to make such a bold decision about a technology that they clearly don't understand. My guess, is that they will be underwhelmed with the Internet's response to their new strategy. They just don't bring enough quality to the table to expect people to pay for online access to their content.

Why? Basically two reasons. First, according to one estimate Murdoch's intention to move the Wall Street Journal behind a pay wall could cost the site 25% of its traffic. So following a similar strategy will make Caribbean Business Online disappear almost altogether. Second, the experts say that the odds are against them. According to the new 2010 Media Outlook report from Fitch Ratings, most newspapers attempting this strategy will fail.

In the end, the poor state of affairs for Internet Marketing in Puerto Rico makes the whole idea of online advertising a losing proposition, for anyone in Puerto Rico. Unless you're a monopoly, like El Nuevo Dia, but that's another post.

TicketPop Server Crash Raises Questions

2009-12-05T12:28:00.012-04:30

One of the most controversial posts I've ever made was when I claimed that Banco Popular was full of bullshit when they claimed they had spent $2 million on a complete redesign of their Internet Banking site. Ahh, good times. Of course part of the flame war that ensued could have been because I implied that one possible explanation was that the programmers at Banco Popular suck. Again, boy people really seem to react strongly to the use of the word "suck."

Buying Metallica tickets on TicketPop

Now I want to go on the record as never being too impressed with TicketPop.com, but my experience last Saturday morning has so unacceptably horrible that I need to share my experience and opinion. At 9:00 a.m. Saturday morning the Metallica tickets went on sale and it's likely that thousands of people began hammering the site in their desperate attempt to get choice seats. Now it's never fair to say that a site is slow because there are so many failure points between your computer and a server, but it seemed that the site was quickly starting to slow down.

Tip: If you're ever going to buy tickets using TicketPop, make sure you create a login first, and be already logged in before the gates are opened and the thousands of requests start hitting the servers.

So following my advice, at 9:00 a.m. I was already logged in and trying to get just the right tickets. From my very first attempt it was clear that, like many other concerts, the primo seats had already been snatched up or reserved. These days the only way to get the best seats is to be a fan club member of whatever band you're looking to buy tickets for. And while some fan clubs are still free, Metallica (and AC/DC) memberships run about $45 a year.

So with the serving slowing down with every click, I finally got a hold of a couple tickets that I liked. I started the checkout process, which with a pre-established account, is just a couple of clicks. Then on the last step where you have to accept the Terms and Conditions (which you should have already signed off on when you created a login id, but whatever), when tragedy struck. The TicketPop server crashed. My connection was reset and I was in a state of limbo. Did my transaction go through before the crash? Well the only way to know for sure was to log back into the system and check my orders. Now it took about 10 or 15 minutes before the system recovered from the failure. When I was finally able to logon I discovered, to my horror, that my transaction had been lost. By the time I got around to securing a couple of more seats, they weren't quite as good, but I guess they were best I could do, so I was finally able to get my tickets.

Analysis

Now I'll be the first to say, that sometimes bad things happen, and there's just nothing you can do. Hell, one day I shocked the senior management of a company I was working with by saying that "Shit happens," when they were pressing me on the deadline for a project. However, I think that what happened last Saturday with TicketPop was unacceptable and reeks of negligent mismanagement.

I used to always piss off marketing executives when they would walk into my office and explain some crazy promotion they wanted to do and then ask me if we could do it. My standard answer was always, "Sure, we can do anything you want as long as you're willing to spend the money and resources necessary." That seemed to baffle them, their eyes would glaze over, they would mumble something, and then wander out of my office.

If you asked me, having a ticket server crash during a peak demand suggests the inadequate allocation of resources. Of course, as I tried to mention above, in any technology project there is a delicate balance between the "cost" of the solution and the "benefit" that technology provides. But failure is failure, there are NO possible explanations, exceptions, or qualifications.

The big question here is: "Was this the case of a good-enough solution created with a limited budget collapsing under excessive demand or is the case of the best solution possible with an adequate budget failing because of human negligence?" We'll probably never know, but as this is not the first time I've heard of TicketPop crashing during peak demand scenarios, I'm thinking that the failure is a little of both.

Is fool-proof software possible?

According to the theory of diminishing returns, the answer is NO. For as the effort ($) increases, the reliability gained becomes gradually less and less. However, just for the record, I DO believe it is entirely possible to build a reliable ticket purchasing system that can withstand 50,000 simultaneous users. With the dirt cheap cost of hardware, automated web software testing tools, and the relatively well understood requirements of an e-commerce site, there is no reason that should prevent Banco Popular from creating a crash-proof TicketPop web-site.

Let's get real here. Last Saturday morning, how many people do you think might have been trying to buy tickets simultaneously. My guess is somewhere between 1,000 and maybe 5,000. Now if you really want to give them the benefit of the doubt, you could say 10,000 tops. Ladies and gentlemen, in the ranks of e-commerce sites, 10,000 simultaneous users is, how do I say this, a valley of demand. It's the equivalent of Mr Universe, Arnold Schwarzenegger, picking up a five pound barbell.

Now I know what you're going to say, that we are not talking Amazon, Buy.com, or Overstock.com. This is a local site dedicated to Puerto Rico, in other words a fairly predictable peak stress load. However, I would remind you that Banco Popular is entirely capable of building a 99.9999% reliable system. That's how these types of problems are managed. An organization determines to what place (how many 9's after the decimal) do they want a system to be available? Please remember that Banco Popular, oops I mean Evertec, does know what it takes to build a very reliable system capable of handling tens of thousands of simultaneous transactions in the case of their cash cow "A Todos Horas" (ATH) network.

What is good enough software

So if you are Evertec, let's ignore for the moment the fact that they know exactly what the maximum peak demand for TicketPop could be. Let's say instead, they put little thought into peak demand, and therefore do not plan to handle the demand, nor do they ever test the web site simulating peak demand.

Now accepting the case that peak demand is not a requirement, then Evertec probably followed their ordinary web application software development process. Now one of the things that burned my britches way back in August 2008 in the Internet banking article, was Banco Popular's implication that their $2 million dollar investment would advance the state of Internet applications in Puerto Rico. Because in this case, it is clear that TicketPop didn't benefit much from their $2 million Internet banking system.

No, a "good enough" system starts with as small of a budget as possible to produce a workable automated ticketing system. If I had to hazard a guess, I bet that Evertec spent quite a lot less than $2 million to develop TicketPop. In the "good enough" scenario, management accepts from the very beginning the possibility that the system might have limitations. They might even be thinking, if the server crashes, where else are they going to get tickets?

Conclusion

As I mentioned before, if I had to make a guess, TicketPop crashing during a peak demand scenario is probably a mismanagement of resources. Very quickly, most system crashes are the result of: infrastructure failure, hardware failure, external software call failure, or plain and simple software failure. I've been in the Evertec server facility, so I'm going to scratch infrastructure failure off of the list. I'm also going to say, I hope they are not stupid enough to pinch pennies on hardware. You could probably pay off double redundancy of every piece of hardware with the fees TicketPop earns off of one sell-out show like Metallica. So that only leaves us with software problems.

I'd put my money on some kind of crash caused by the external calls out of the web application to the ticket database or the payment purchasing process. It would be that or some kind of memory leak, but in reality, I don't know what happened. All I know is that, one moment I was confirming my transaction, and the next moment the connection to the server was reset.

To conclude, I bet that for Banco Popular, the TicketPop system is considered an important, maybe even a critical application, but not a mission critical application. I bet that the senior IT management in Evertec knows TicketPop's limitations, and have drawn up short on testing the system, especially stress testing. So, in my opinion, they've mis-managed their resources by not investing more time and attention to TicketPop so that embarrassing outages like last Saturday's don't occur.

Unfortunately for us, we don't live in an environment that values trust or authenticity. If we did, Evertec would have already published an apology for the server crash having inconvenienced their customers. I'm sure some of you might be laughing at that notion, however, when you "get" that everything you do on the Internet is under a microscope, then nothing is more important than maintaining your customer's trust. Then again, when you're a monopoly, you really don't care what people think about your business. The sad thing is that if you want to go to the Metallica show, then you HAVE to use TicketPop, so why should they care?

Dogfooding Internet Marketing in Puerto Rico

2009-11-30T16:40:00.007-04:30

A while back I caught some flak for being a little too harsh in my summation of Internet Marketing in Puerto Rico, however, within that post I was trying to make a point. It's not surprising that Seth Godin could make my point more succinct and direct. I encourage you to click on over and read one of his latest posts "Watch the money."

Seth gets right to the heart of my post with his closing sentence:

"Money (time and attention) is more than a transfer of value. It's a statement of belief. An ad agency that won't buy ads, a consultant who won't buy consulting, and a waiter who doesn't tip big—it's a sign, and not a good one."

I broadened Seth's definition of money because sometimes we tend to undervalue the time and attention we spend on some "work", but they do have a cost; even if it might be an opportunity cost. For example if you spend time following people on Twitter and responding back to their messages, that is time you could have used on something else.

If I could get you to do (get) just one thing from reading this post, it would be this. The next time someone is trying to sell you something related to Internet Marketing, a new web page, a Facebook application, an iPhone application, a Facebook campaign, a banner ad, whatever, take a good hard look at their web presence.

If they say that Facebook is the next best thing since the invention of the hinged tostonera, look at how the salesperson and her (or his) company is using Facebook. If there is a mismatch, I would be very cautious in doing business with them.

Our Story

Throughout our life on the web, many people have suggested that we use off-line advertising to promote our site. However, we've always resisted the urge, especially guerrilla marketing tactics. Why? For just the reason that Seth describes.

We stayed away from offline advertising for two reasons. First, we believed that it was important to show how much we believed in our product and how much we believed in the Internet. We knew that the only way to build our traffic was by using search engine optimization and through the power of search engine marketing. We knew that the best time to reach users (and customers) was when they were siting in front of a computer, not driving 65 mph.

Of course, the other reason we didn't do any off-line advertising was because we were flat broke and couldn't afford anything else. LOL, but seriously. We are one of the most popular web sites in Puerto Rico, made in Puerto Rico, that is not a media company. While that might not seem like much of an achievement, when you consider that we've never spent a dollar on off-line advertising, I'd say we are living proof of the power of Internet Marketing. And that is what I'm talking about.

If you can find someone else who is doing a better job at promoting Internet Marketing in Puerto Rico, by all means, check them out. However, if you can't find another company, or if their web presence doesn't match up to what they are trying to sell, then drop us a line. As they say, we eat our own dog food.

Photo Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

A Real Puerto Rican Champion

2009-11-17T08:12:00.004-04:30

Last weekend was huge for Puerto Rican sports history, but it's probably not because of what you're thinking about. Yes, there was a big professional boxing match where, champion Miguel Cotto was demolished by Manny Pacquiao. No, last weekend belonged to Hector Arana.

I know, most of you are like, Hector who? Before I tell you what championship Hector won, let me tell you a little bit about Hector. 51 year old Hector has dedicated his last twenty years to a sport that has only a marginal following here in Puerto Rico, but this was his breakout year. With Lucas Oil as his sponsor Hector was able to accomplish something no other Puerto Rican has.

Not to diminish any other sport, but the sport that Hector competes in is one of the most competitive in the world. It draws millions of spectators a year and receives even more in terms of team sponsorship. That most of you don't know his name is a huge injustice. While people are lamenting all over Facebook, that it's too bad that Cotto lost, but they were still proud to be Puerto Rican. Another Puerto Rican goes completely unrecognized for his achievement. There was no front page photo on El Nuevo Dia, in fact there wasn't even any mention of Arana anywhere in the newspaper.

Growing up in the heartland of the US, auto racing was just part of the culture. Cruising the streets of your home town and watching racing on Sunday were popular activities for me and millions of others. Of course most people are familiar with the monster NASCAR racing has become, it's even its own demographic, the NASCAR Nation.

Here in Puerto Rico, with the exception of the drag strip in Salinas and the road course at El Tuque, automobile racing is almost unheard of. That is, unless you count the thousands of people who use our public roads as impromptu drag strips. Anyone who lives close to a straight flat stretch of road, can attest to the popularity of drag racing in Puerto Rico every weekend at about 12:00 am.

So it was last weekend, that after twenty years of drag racing, Hector Arana was crowned the 2009 NHRA Full Throttle Pro Stock Motorcycle champion in the series's last event of the season, the Automobile Club of Southern California NHRA Finals. As I mentioned before NHRA drag racing is one of the most competitive sports in the world. In a grueling 18 event season, Arana qualified first 8 times and won 5 finals to beat last years champion Eddie Krawiec by two points. In a sport were champions are decided by thousandths of a second, I think that Hector's accomplishment is huge.

Puerto Rico Closes Nine Beaches

2009-11-14T07:48:00.000-04:30

It might not be safe for work, but when the shoe fits... I mean everybody, but everybody knows that you don't shit where you eat. Now it might be a little off color statement, but what does it mean? Well according to the urban dictionary, it means that you:

"do not have romantic relationships with any co-workers. Basically, you don't want to make yourself uncomfortable (by potentially having a romantic relationship get ugly, or 'shitting') at the place where you work ('where you eat')."

Of course leave it to us to come up with a more literal interpretation. Now, if you accept the premise that tourism is one of our biggest industries and that our beaches are one of our most important resources. Then can you explain to me why nine (9) of our most important beaches are full of shit?

Recently the Junta de Calidad Ambiental alerted everyone that nine of our beaches were contaminated with bacteriologicals Enterococci and Fecal coliforms, therefore making them unsafe for people to enter the water. The beaches affected include:

Cerro Gordo, en Vega Alta
La Monserrate, en Luquillo
Boquerón, en Cabo Rojo
Mojacasabe, en Cabo Rojo
Rincón (60 colonias)
Puerto Nuevo, en Vega Baja
El Escambrón, en San Juan
Sardinera, en Dorado
Crash Boat, en Aguadilla.

Now this isn't the first time I've seen these warnings, but I don't ever remember such a wide contamination. On a very serious note, the article announcing the contamination does not answer one question. How could our beaches be full of shit?

Now when I was a young child I was a taught a simple lesson. If if looks like shit and smells like shit, it's probably shit. In this case, the bacteria identified are both produced from human feces. So I repeat the obvious question, how could our beaches be full of shit.

Now I don't have any proof for my answer. However, in this case, it is quite difficult to identify any other potential explanation. Somehow, somewhere, the La Autoridad de Acueductos y Alcantarillados is dumping treated sewage into the ocean. Like I said, I'm only guessing, but let's say that I'm right. How could anyone find any defense for the disposal of treated sewage by dumping it into our most valuable resource?

I mean seriously, am I the only one who finds this incredibly wrong? We are literally shitting on our tourism industry (the place where tens of thousands of people work).

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: magnusfranklin

Is Anibal Acevedo Vila Lying or What?

2009-11-11T21:56:00.007-04:30

Recently Ex-Governor Anibal Acevedo Vila has been making the rounds, he even stopped by La Comay, pimping his new book. During several interviews I've heard him make the following claim, Governor Fortuño is worsening our economic situation by firing government employees. To support his argument he is sugesting that we follow Barack Obama's example of using economic stimulus investments to spend our way out of our respective economic problems.

While, Acevedo Vila is right on both counts. He is incorrect in putting forth a theory that Puerto Rico can spend its way out of our current economic problems. His argument fails to make a huge distinction between the US Government and Puerto Rico. The United States has one huge resource available to them that Puerto Rico doesn't. It's called the United States Treasury.

If necessary, the US Treasury can just print up new money to pay for its deficit. All we can do is issue bonds, which means we've got to face "El Cuco." And that brings up another difference, the financial instruments of the US Government, like Treasury Bills, are not subject to rating by Moodys and Standards & Poor.

In addition, I don't think anyone is suggesting that the cuts being made by Fortuño are meant to purposefully hurt the economy, that is the unfortunate side effect of trying to appease the credit agencies. Which, just like when Acevedo Vila closed the government back in 2006, they both [Acevedo Vila and Fortuño] are merely dancing to the tune sung by "El Cuco."

Conclusion

So here's what gets me. From all accounts, Acevedo Vila is a smart man, so why would he try to build a case based on flawed logic? Is it just spin? Is is just politics? Is he purposefully excluding this "small distinction" in favor of making a larger point? Is he purposefully misleading people? Is he lying? Or is my assumption incorrect, and he's just too dumb to realize how the two situations are NOT the same?

Twin evils of obstruction

2009-11-02T20:01:00.004-04:30

I guess it was the comment by ex-Governor Carlos Romero Barceló in an interview on WKAQ radio that set me to thinking. He made his comment following the Puerto Rico Supreme Court's ruling that former island governors have an acquired right to publicly funded security details. During the interview he said:

"El pueblo de Puerto Rico se comprometió conmigo en esas cosas" (Loosely translated, he said, "I'm a bitter old man who cries over spilled champagne and the terrible thought of facing my own self-imposed lack of importance." Or something like that...)

His comment reminded me of an old observation of mine, but it also reinforced a well explained sentiment. The sentiment is "entitlement," one which I believe that Gil the Jenius has well documented. The other evil twin to entitlement is "settling." It's the odd characteristic where people just accept their situation, and then become comfortable with it. For me, the odd combination of these traits create a formidable barrier to any possibility for change in Puerto Rico.

Proverbial career ladder

When I was young and naive, I used to believe in the illusion of building a career. The often used metaphor for this objective was climbing the rungs of a ladder. Here's my interpretation of how entitlement and settling have made this metaphor obsolete. While still working in corporate Puerto Rico, I saw two scenarios that led me to this conclusion.

Scenario #1: The top of the ladder

The first has to do with executives that rise up (or grow up) through a (with) company until they have obtained one of the senior positions, and then settle in for the long haul. As far as I know, most of the senior executives in the company where I used to work, over six years ago, are still there, in the exact same, or equivalent, jobs.

Now, in their defense, these executives "earned" their ways into those positions, and are entitled to enjoy all the fruits of their labor. However, what I see, is a group of executives which have stopped climbing. This presents two obstacles. The obvious one, is that if they stop climbing, then no one below them can move up.

However, the second obstacle, is the belief that there is only one ladder. I'm amused at how the single ladder mentality fits so well into the zero-sum, single pie analogy. Part of the belief that they've "arrived" at the top of "the" ladder, is based on the unfortunate fact, that for some executives, there aren't many (or any) companies left on the island which could offer these executives more challenge or pay.

What these executives miss is that they should keep climbing, even if that means building a new ladder and starting at the bottom once again. Let's take two examples: Romero Barcelo and Richard Carrion. With nearly thirty years of public service and nine years since he last held office, Romero Barcelo should be building new ladders. With his influence and connections, he should be working on new initiatives to solve what our inept government can not fix, and DO something to help Puerto Rico.

Moving on. Let's face it, do you think there is any reasonable explanation for why Richard Carrion should be receiving 750K a year to run Banco Popular? It's not like he needs the money. By staying put he creates a "tapon" at the top of the Banco Popular ladder. And again, with his influence, connections, and resources, he should be working on building new ladders for Puerto Rico.

A model that you frequently see in the US and around the world, is that once leaders reach the top, they exit, and then create their own foundations (or companies) to work on initiatives that were not reached during their tenure or were out of scope. Four examples come to mind, Jimmy Carter, Bill Gates, Newt Gingrich, and Bill Clinton. Two other lesser known examples are Paul Graham and Seth Godin. In each of these cases, these gentlemen have everything they need to survive, yet, they each stepped back again onto the ladder. However, this time, they were climbing into the arena of social change; each in his own way hoping to make the world a little better place.

Scenario #2: Stopping the climb

The other scenario I've seen happens well down the ladder. What I've seen there is highly qualified professionals that stop climbing. They find a comfortable job and then they hang up their learning caps. They settle for their current position, and become completely at peace with their accomplishments. There is no more continuous learning, nor is there any motivation to give back or help others in their climb. It's essentially the same problem as the senior executives, just on a smaller scale.

Who knows? Maybe they were the first one from their family to graduate college and get a white collar job. Maybe "life" gains control of their decision making and they become convinced there's no more reason to keep trying. To use a well worn metaphor, on the journey of life, these people simply decide one day to stop traveling. They settle down and wait to die. They may titillate themselves with trips to Disney and a large screen LCD television, but, in reality, they've accepted that they have arrived, even if the road (or ladder) continues on ahead of them.

When someone reaches this point in their life, they become a huge obstacle for change. Change by its' very nature brings with it the unknown. Once someone has settled, nothing is more terrifying than the unknown. Their perception of the world is no longer based on logic or reason, it is motivated by fear. Once you've settled, you will resist any change which could cause you to un-settle and continue your journey.

Conclusion

I try not to pass judgment on people. You never know what their life has been like, or as they say, unless you've walked in their shoes, then you can never really know what they've been through. However, I can pass judgment on their actions. I can say, this person did this, and that is the conclusion. I condemn the action not the person.

If I could sum up the differences between some of the examples I've mentioned and what we see locally it is this. In other parts of the world, when you reach the top there is an overwhelming sense of gratitude and charity. People like Bill Gates say to themselves, hey, I've had an incredibly fortunate life and I want to express my gratitude, by giving back to the world. They form a long chain of leaders before them. They join into a circle of renewal, that aims to promulgate a process they helped build and continue a system that enables future leaders to continue the process. Stephen Covey of "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" fame wrote another book entitled "First Things First." In this book he describes the actions I've described as leaving one's legacy on the world.

Locally, once again, we see a different pattern. We see our ugly friend zero-sum mentality motivate our leaders and workers to say something more along the lines of hey, I've got it made. Screw everyone else, because I've earned my place in this world and am entitled to keep what is my due.

To summarize, whether they stop at the top, or somewhere in the middle, they essentially break the ladder. They abandon the system they took so much juice from. In the end, instead of leaving all of the tools ready for the next person, they break them and throw them to the ground. Instead of leaving the orchard ready for the next person to come along and partake of its fruits, they leave a dried up orchard full of dead plants. That is their legacy. Can you see the difference I'm trying to illustrate?

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: jon|k

Why Internet Marketing Sucks in Puerto Rico

2009-10-28T14:19:00.008-04:30

Sometimes I'm afraid as coming off as someone who puts everything down, and I can see how that might be an unintentional result. However, I want to believe. I really do! I've met most of the players and I know they are smart, well qualified professionals, with mostly good intentions. It's just that I'm not sure where the line is drawn between what they want to do, who they claim to be, and what I can witness and objectively conclude.

I think this comes from having heard too many people, make too many promises that are never fulfilled, that I've adopted a proof is in the pudding (btw, a shortened version of an old Jewish proverb "the proof of the pudding is in the eating.") mentality. For me, actions speak much louder than words, and when you stack up the evidence against some things, I'm afraid that what is said, and what may be the intent do not match the evidence.

So in this post I just want you to see what I see. I see three organizations who claim to be the leaders of Internet technology, marketing, and advertising. However, what I see again and again, are high qualified professionals trying to do the right things, professing what are the right things to do, but who don't DO any of those things on their own or in their respective organizations.

A lesson that I try to teach the young'uns is that whatever you want to be, the only way to master that goal, is to do the things a professional in that career does. For instance, if you want to be a programmer, then you have to write a lot of programs. If you want to be a singer, you have to practice singing all the time. Or if you want to be the next Ivan Rodriguez or Roberto Clemente, you have to play a lot of baseball. Simple, right?

So here, without analysis (well not as much as my usual cynicism) are three case studies which, I believe, demonstrate why Internet marketing sucks in Puerto Rico. In these case studies, I'm going to sample the pudding. I'll try to gather as much information about these organizations, the individuals leading those organizations and the companies they work for. For all of this data collection, I will use simple search engine queries and follow clicks, till I reach a dead end.

Internet Society of Puerto Rico and Archer Lebron, President of the ISOC-PR Board of Directors; CEO and President of TranXcend, Inc.

ISOC-PR has been around since 2001. It's major achievements have probably been participating in various studies of the Internet in 2005 and 2006, establishing some Internet Clubs, and conducting fairly regular activities (usually seminars). One of the things I find aggravating about their Joomla based home page is the lack of sorting or ordering by date of items (messages, archived files, news). While getting bonus points for hosting their site on an open source CMS, the intent of the site seems to be the transfer of information TO visitors. Consider that for a moment as I'll revisit that point in my conclusion.

If you'd like to meet some of the folks at ISOC, here are their scheduled events for the rest of the year:

11/4/09 - Segundo Foro de Tecnología: Perspectivas de la Academia
ORADORES: Presidentes de Universidades
LUGAR Microsoft Caribbean, Inc.
Metro Office Park, Microsoft Building, Calle 1 Piso 5
12/2/09 - "Liderazgo, Visión y Tecnologia: La Historia de WAL-MART"
ORADOR: Renzo Castillo, CEO, Walmart Puerto Rico
LUGAR: Puerto Rico Telephone, Avenida Roosevelt, Edificio 1515

The latest president of the Board of Directors is Archer Lebron, who is also CEO and President of TranXcend, Inc. Now let's take a quick look at his company's web site. Any way you slice it, it looks like it's straight out of 1994. Simply put, it is an online brochure. No blog, no news, no forums, just contact information. The site only talks TO visitors. There are no links to any social media sites. A quick search of Facebook and Twitter reveal nothing for TransXcend and nothing for ISOC-PR.

Sales and Marketing Executives Association and Olga Rivera, President of the Board of Directors; President ICPR Junior College

While the objectives of the SME of PR are not exactly aimed at interactive marketing, they do have a committee focused on the Internet. This committee is responsible for the annual SME event, the Puerto Rico Internet Forum. As mentioned before, they also sponsor the WebAd Awards.

Their web site seems to be primarily aimed at their members. While they do have a news section, everything else is a communication of information TO visitors. Are you starting to catch the trend here? The current focus of the SMEPR is their celebratory orgy of their Annual convention at the Rio Mar this weekend. The event starts today.

Here's a perfect example of what I introduced at the beginning of the post. The SME site has no links to any social media web sites, nor can can I seem to find any trace of them on Facebook or Twitter. But wouldn't you know it, it seems that their keynote speaker is UberCool founder Michael Tchong. His topic will be "I want to Tweet you up."

So while the organizers of their convention recognize that Twitter is UberHot and should be of interest to their members and participants of their convention, the SMEPR doesn't actually appear to participate on Twitter. I wonder how many of its members do?

Quick note: Non-members are allowed to attend the conferences but for a small fee. For example, if you'd like to see Michael, it'll set you back $160. However, if you'd just like to schmooze around and maybe get some free beers ;-p I think registration for the exhibit hall should be free.

The current president of the board of Directors is Olga Rivera, who is President of ICPR Junior College. Again, the ICPRJC web site has no links to any social media websites, but they do have a games section (WTF?). They also have an interesting page that cobbles together photographs, videos, and other news regarding events and other "cool" stuff, including a link to Youtube! In general, while the ICPRJC site successfully targets students, it is still basically focused on communicating information TO visitors.

IAB Puerto Rico and Ernesto Gonzalez, President of IAB Puerto Rico ; President of GTA Marketing Agency

While IAB Puerto Rico/Caribe are new to the Internet, Ernesto Gonzalez has been a long time participant and leader on the Internet. First, I pretty much covered IAB Caribe or IAB Puerto Rico, how ever you want to call them, in my last post. So let's take a look at GTA Marketing Agency.

GTA has been a huge proponent and developer of Flash-based sites, so most of their site is in Flash. Talk about your online brochures, GTA makes the best you'll ever see. However, what you won't see is any news, blogs, or any thing else besides information aimed AT visitors. I will give them credit for being the fist of the sites discussed today with links to Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and YouTube. So there is so movement towards, or at least invitation to, a conversation.

Conclusion

Of course, these case studies offer only a very narrow perspective, but I think I've made the case. These are the three leading organizations and resident experts on all things Internet and Internet Marketing in Puerto Rico, and none of them are leaders on the Internet. However, within the news and all of the elite power circles, these people and organizations are the recognized experts when it comes to the Internet.

Kudos to Ernesto and his efforts to join the conversation, even if he is late. However, over all the primary message these web sites communicate is that the way to approach the Internet is nothing more than an electronic brochure. I always learned and professed that you lead by example. So you can see why I think Internet marketing sucks in Puerto Rico, when none of its supposed leaders are actually leading in anything Internet-related.

What these leaders have not begun to comprehend is that the Internet is a conversation. Therefore any marketing aimed at the Internet must be approached from a conversational perspective. I tweeted about this before, but it bears repeating. In a post from Karl Greenberg over at MediaPost, he shares some thoughts from Jeff Goodby, who spoke recently at the Association of National Advertisers' Agency/Client Forum in New York. This one is killer:

"Goodby argues that only a fraction of marketers are really willing to face the implications of digital media, and most do not fully comprehend that there's a need for a new kind of advertising -- "a new way of talking to people."

Amen brother. The Internet is all about talking WITH people, not TO them. It's just as simple as that. To see what I'm talking about take another look at UberCool from Tchong. That's the standard that our Internet leaders should be reproducing. Yes Timmy, it's true, the emperors are really not wearing any clothing.

Bonus: Check out Robert Bowling, a 24-year-old who serves as the Modern Warfare 2’s community manager has to say:

“I like to think of it as having the fans as part of the team.”

Do you think any of the organizations above can claim anything new that? Yep, that's what I thought, no clothes!

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: Al_HikesAZ

What to expect from IAB Caribe

2009-10-27T10:20:00.000-04:30

I recently caught wind of evidence that the local chapter of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) has sprung to life. As long as we're discussing Internet Advertising and Marketing, then I'd be incomplete if I didn't examine the organization and provide recommendations.

First let's start by introducing the IAB, since 1996 this non-profit has been dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend.

As I mentioned, the Puerto Rico chapter of the IAB has recently sprung to life. Which is a good thing, because it has been dormant since established back in 2005. As identified by this recent article in El Nuevo Dia (sorry it looks like they put that article behind their pay wall), the local chapter recently held an event, "2do IAB Digital Networking." From the looks of it, everyone enjoyed themselves.

Caveat Emptor

Let's start off with that old refrain, "Let the buyer beware." Why did I start there? Well, let's look at a few things:

The domain iabpuertorico.org was created on June 3rd, 2009;
They started tweeting on September 21st, 2009;
And they joined Facebook on October 1st, 2009.

The great (or worst) thing about the Internet is that it never forgets anything. So from this evidence we can see that they've only been active on the Internet for a short period of time. While I know most of the leaders have been active on the Internet for much longer, as an organization it looks like they're just getting started. I'd like to welcome them to the conversation and look forward to substantive contributions from them.

Non-profits in Puerto Rico

My impression, however, is that the young organization may be falling into the trap so many other non-profits have. Locally, there is the tendency to only participate in non-profits of this nature only as a way to directly improve your own business. However, in my opinion, you can not serve two masters; you can not attempt to directly grow your business while also spearheading an organization that aims to grow your company's industry.

Don't get me wrong, I understand that participation in any organization of this nature is about growing your company. It's just that it becomes counter-productive when all the members of the organization do is attempt to "lure" new business to their activities and then fight amongst themselves trying to "steal" the business for themselves. In short, another example of zero-sum thinking. Instead of saying I'm going to help make more pie, people just fight over the existing pie, trying to get as much pie as possible for themselves.

Conclusion

While it may be too early to tell, I'm getting a bad feeling about the local chapter of the IAB. I'm sure it's nothing, but something from their tweet history gives me reason to be wary. One of their tweets is: "1ra regla: Se autentico." From reading the article in El Nuevo Dia, I'd say, please return to rule one. To be authentic is to be worthy of trust, reliance, or belief. I find it somewhat disingenuous that the local IAB Caribe chapter uses statistics from the U.S. IAB, and fails to spell out that Puerto Rico does not actually contribute to those statistics. If someone only did a quick scan of the article, they might believe that interactive marketing in Puerto Rico represents 9% of total ad spending. The last time I checked, it's more like less than 1%.

I also found this new article announcing the opening of the IAB Caribe chapter in Puerto Rico at the Caribbean Business website. In the article they report that:

"Among the first projects the local IAB chapter has in the pipeline is the commissioning of a market research study to determine how much investment in the online advertising sector has grown in Puerto Rico in recent years."

Not to poke fun, but the first project is the "commissioning of," hehe, you certainly can tell that sales executives are involved in this project. I think "completion of" would sound more definitive. Had it been a bunch of senior executives, I'm sure it would have been the "creation of a committee to study the need of." Just to be fair, if it had been a bunch of computer programmers, then it would have been the "collection of and analysis of sales data in order to determine the validity of." Also if a study has never been done before, shouldn't the first step be to establish the baseline level of investment first? How can you establish growth when you have nothing to compare it against?

In the end, I think the proof will be in the pudding. If the local IAB chapter delivers a cogent and honest examination of the local online advertising sector by early Q1 next year (their stated deadline), then perhaps they will have something substantive to add to the conversation. If not, then we can probably only expect fancy cocktail parties, networking activities, and generally more of the same (zero-sum thinking) as we've seen from other local Internet organizations like the Internet Society of Puerto Rico.

Implications of Puerto Rico being a popular drug smuggling origin

2009-10-20T13:18:00.009-04:30

I don't know how many times I've read it before, but it's always tacked on to any news article about the most recent massacre or crime in general in Puerto Rico. As the news of the latest tragedy hit the Associated Press, there it was again:

An estimated 30 percent of drugs reaching the U.S. come through the Caribbean, with Puerto Rico a popular transshipment point because drugs do not have to clear customs to reach the mainland.

However, when I read it this time, a light bulb flickered on inside my head. If the purported root cause of the violence, crime, and mayhem in Puerto Rico was directly linked to Puerto Rico's popularity as a transhipment point for drugs, then why don't we change Puerto Rico's classification? Why don't the travel and shipping authorities change Puerto Rico to become an International destination and origin?

That way, all of the travelers going between Puerto Rico and the United States would be forced to comply with the rules and procedures of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection. In addition, all cargo shipments from Puerto Rico to the United States would also face the same scrutiny as those from Mexico, Columbia, or Turkey.

Pros and Cons

Of course, this means placing a significant burden upon the millions of travelers that leave our ports and airports. For any business travelers, this would be a steep price to pay. However, I think it may be the only chance we have, besides decriminalizing cocaine and marijuana in Puerto Rico, to increase the safety of our citizens. Although, after looking at the data, I bet that if Puerto Rico would decriminalize drugs, we STILL wouldn't see any significant reduction in the crime rate.

In the past, I think that it has been easy to miss the larger point that dawned on me when I read about the massacre in Toa Baja. While we have the perfect storm conditions for a large drug trafficking trade in to Puerto Rico (high welfare, large cash economy, corruption, and high supply of drugs), it pales in comparison to the profit generated from controlling the major drug trafficking which flows through Puerto Rico.

In my opinion, the high number of murders and violence in Puerto Rico are not caused by the mere trafficking of drugs into the island, but the trafficking of drugs through the island.

Then you also have to consider, if Puerto Rico is a popular place to smuggle drugs into the United States, then what else is being smuggled into the US? Maybe guns, maybe even weapons of mass destruction. Of course, that is unthinkable, but it is difficult to deny the logic.

Conclusion

Sometimes the simplest solution to a problem is right in front of our noses. Sometimes it just takes being hit over the head with that solution one more time before the gears and tumblers fall into place to reveal the answer to our problems. I'm sure that's what happened here. I'm so confident about this, I can feel it in my bones.

Just to check my conclusion, I've compiled a spreadsheet comparing population to homicide rate. Per person, Puerto Rico exceeds all other states in homicides. For the data I was able to quickly compile, in 2005, Puerto Rico had twice as many murders per person than the highest of any other state, in this case Louisiana.

Puerto Rico is probably just like any other densely populated state. The number of drug users has to be relatively the same. So why the huge spike in murders? There can be only one answer. While there may be millions available to people willing to sell drugs within Puerto Rico, there HAS TO BE hundreds of millions available to whoever controls the shipment of drugs TO the US.

I'm so convinced that I'm right, I'm going to initiate a campaign to communicate with all of the authorities that might be able to take action on this information. My challenge is to figure out who to contact, and how to get this information into their hands. Wish me luck, the future of crime reduction on the island may depend on my success. Hmm, who knew, MC Don Dees would become a crime fighter?

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: oddsock

Rights we take for granted

2009-10-19T08:44:00.007-04:30

Last Thursday, I have to confess, that I was glued to my television as the "paro nacional" ran its course. The whole thing was surreal. Really, I bet nowhere in the world do they protest with as much emotion, creativity, and exuberance. Witnessing the wide variety of ways people chose to declare their righteous indignation was truly a spectacle. I could even imagine outsiders believing that they were witnessing a parade, carnival style, instead of a protest.

One of the things I noticed was how many people participating in the "paro" claimed that the government of Governor Luis Fortuño was violating their rights or those of the thousands fired as a result of "Ley 7." While it is easy to mistake righteous indignation, for the violation of ones' rights, the uncomfortable truth is that while there are many laws, very few of them guarantee one of certain rights.

Here in Puerto Rico there are two documents which establish our rights as a citizens of Puerto Rico and of the United States of America. Of course, these documents are the Constitution of the Freely Associated State of Puerto Rico and the Constitution of the United States.

Our Rights

It was the famous author Voltaire who said, "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." So I congratulate the organizers of the "paro" (Todo Puerto Rico Para Puerto Rico) for their peaceful assembly and communication of their grievances. What we witnessed last Thursday was democracy in action; the citizens of Puerto Rico exercised their rights guaranteed under section 2 article 4 of the Puerto Rican Constitution and the first amendment of the United States Constitution.

However, nowhere, in either of these documents is there any discussion of an individual's right to have the government provide a job for its' citizens. Although, the copy of the Puerto Rican Constitution available from the Oficina de Servicios Legislativos de la Asamblea Legislativa de Puerto Rico does recognize the existence of the following human right:

The right of all person to obtain a job.

Now let's flash back to the most tense moment of protest when police clashed on PR52 with protesters, who were allegedly students from the University of Puerto Rico. And wouldn't you know it, there amongst the protesters was one individual wearing a t-shirt with the famous portrait "Guerrillero Heroico" of Ernesto "Che" Guevara.

Surreal is as surreal does

It just gives me a headache when I try to make sense of someone participating in a protest against their government, while wearing a t-shirt of a revolutionary and totalitarian who executed people for doing exactly what he was currently doing. I assure you, in 1959, the citizens of Cuba did not have the right to free speech.

Still today, very few other countries in Latin America would permit the type of protest Puerto Rico held last Thursday. Can you imagine what would be done in Cuba with the leaders of a major protest against Fidel Castro? Or what might happen with someone who protested against Hugo Chavez by burning tires in the middle of the busiest street in Venezuela?

It boggles the mind to consider the paradise we live in compared to most of the world. As most of the world suffers through, living on less than $2 a day, we protest over spilled champagne.

Conclusion

You might think I'm insensitive to the plights of the families affected by "Ley 7." However, you'd be wrong. I've been laid off, twice, so I know what it's like to lose your job. But let's not lose sight of the reality that each of the people fired choose to work for the government, and even though they knew the government was struggling with a major deficit they choose to stay working for the government. I hope they were prepared for the unthinkable, but with most Puerto Ricans in debt up to their neck, and a negative savings rate, I'm afraid their future looks bleak.

As a country we've been living above our means for way too long, and "El Cuco" is coming. As citizens, some of us, have also been living above our means. Well the system that we created is failing, or as Gil the Jenius puts it "the fabric of Our society is unraveling."

It's now clearer than ever, nothing can be done to save life in Puerto Rico as we know it. As it stands, the "nature" we have evolved in the last 50 years is our biggest obstacle. Only massive cultural change can set up the conditions for us to rebuild our system, our society. And that my friends, is only going to happen when our current system finishes its self-destruction.

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: SEIU International

Achieving Your Childhood Dreams

2009-10-15T11:58:00.006-04:30

While the topic of the day is protest , I'd like to share another perspective. When you were a child, did you ever have a dream? Perhaps you wanted to be a fireman, an astronaut, or who knows, maybe a Transfomer. However, as you grew older, your hopes and dreams changed. For most of us, reality begins to diminish the glimmer of those dreams. We begin to make subtle decisions, which slowly extinguish the light of our dreams. Then, before you can even catch your breath, your dreams have died, victims of years of subtle decisions. Want to hear another version, then I highly recommend you watch Randy Pausch's Last Lecture:"Achieving Your Childhood Dreams."

I have a close friend and his son he has a dream. He wants to be a pop star. While he finished high school, got a decent job, and started working his way through a degree at UPR, an opportunity presented itself. He started singing with some friends and finally formed a group. However, to pursue his dream, it meant that he had to quit everything. So he did.. But his father said that he wouldn't support him like he had been while he was attending school; he could stay and eat at home, but that was it. It was a tough choice, not only for him, but his family.

Over the course of the summer, I had a few opportunities to speak with the young man. I wanted to share with him my support for what he was doing. I wanted to let him know that he wasn't alone, and that the isolation he was feeling was normal. Much like the manifestations today, I told him that his greatest struggle was to combat the status quo. While he wants to chase his dream, most adults are encouraging him to get back into line and not to make waves. To them I offer you the words of Steve Jobs:

"We're here to make a dent in the universe. Otherwise, why even be here?"

So to hell with not making waves. I say, make so many waves that you dent the universe. So today, I'm asking you to help my friend's son put a dent in this world. I've talked with the young man, and he knows the reality of the new music industry. So while embracing all of the social media tools available, they have started their journey. They've created their first waves and who knows how far he'll be able to go or how big of a dent he will make.

However, I hope that when you hear them, you'll help me to amplify his waves and help him reach his dream. Please watch the following video. If you agree with me, that these young Borikeños have something worth spreading, then please do so. Become of fan of theirs on Facebook, follow them on Twitter, share their video with your friends, and help them make this world a more beautiful place. It's an honor to present you "Me Falta" from Anima 5:

Just in case, so what?

2009-10-07T10:33:00.004-04:30

As I feared, it looks like this crisis is continuing to gain energy. With supposed death threats against the governor and the truckers unions threatening a general work stoppage as well, this looks like a bad situation which continues to get worse. As I explained in a comment yesterday, it looks like the prime objective in these protests is to create as much chaos as is humanely possible.

However, bad this gets. Here's a small little prediction. It occurred to me that the protests against the proposed government layoffs are based on a weak premise. That weak premise will eventually limit the effectiveness of the protests and at best will only end up in a situation where the layoffs happen, the protesters get bored, go home, and everything goes back to "normal" with both sides claiming victory.

Let me explain. When Puerto Rico decided to protest against the bombing in Vieques, we were on the moral high ground. We were making a stand FOR something; something which defended our right to not have our island be used as a bombing practice range. The civil disobedience conducted then was effective because it brought into the light, the injustice being conducted by the U.S. Navy.

However, take as an example the general work stoppage and protests that occurred when then Governer Anibal Acevedo Vila proposed a shutdown of the government. In my opinion, those protests were ineffective. While they did get Acevedo Vila to end the shutdown (mostly because he had no backbone), in the end nothing was GAINED. What was being protested was the continuation of the status quo.

We have the same situation again with the proposed layoffs. There is no moral high ground. If anything the government, may have the moral high ground because the cuts are aimed at improving the future of Puerto Rico. All of the current protests are aimed at keeping things the same. Historically, any protest against change has lost or at best resulted in a tie, where the issue is merely buried for a few years only to rear its' ugly head again (Hey! That's just like our budget crisis!).

So what?

Another way to see the weakness of the protests is to examine the situation by assuming the protesters achieve their goal. All layoffs are canceled or reversed and the 17,000 stay or return to work. Essentially, that would be like saying to the credit agencies, we don't have a solution to our budget crisis and the people have spoken. They want everything to stay the same. Then what happens?

Ok, so if we say "screw you El Cuco, you can take your credit rating and go to the lookout basket in the top mast of a Spanish galleon (look it up...). This will most likely result in Moodys and Standards and Poor lowering our bonds to junk status.

Well here's one possible scenario if "El Cuco" drops our bonds to junk status. Since we don't have enough money to pay the extraordinarily high interest rates junk bonds require, then we won't be able to borrow any money to pay the $3.5 Billion we owe.

Since we have outstanding bills and no money, our government will have to do what most families do (remember my analogy...). If that's the case, then our old friend zero-sum theory raises its ugly head again, but in a slightly different manner this time. In this scenario we have too little pie. Still only one pie, but in this case we have too many people asking for pie. Well the government must then decide who doesn't get any pie. After you account for essential services like public health, public security (police, fireman, civil defense), and public education, oh and don't forget the politicians large slice of the pie, my guess is that there won't be much pie left.

Well then, the government will be forced to lay off all non-essential personnel (either temporarily or permanently. And the layoffs will not be 15,000, or 30,000, but probably more like 100,000 employees. It's either that or everyone within the government decides to take like a 30% pay cut. What do you think will happen then. Yep, we'll be back to the exact same place we are right now, which is exactly like it was in 2006.

The sad moral of this story is that there is no way to defend the status quo. Change must come, our government must drastically decrease in size and increase its efficiency. The complex problem which took 50 years to create, is not sustainable. There too few people and companies paying taxes to support the size of government that we have. It's a simple numbers game. We don't have enough money flowing into the government to pay all of the expenses (or debts) that they have. If this were a company it would have to declare bankruptcy, most likely to reorganize itself so that it can lower its expenses.

There is one other conclusion we could make. We could make more pie. The government could drastically raise existing taxes and impose new taxes so as to bring income in line with expenses. Nah, never mind, I was just kidding. Really, please put down the torches and pitchforks.

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: thomwatson

Here comes "El Cuco"

2009-10-06T18:47:00.011-04:30

As promised, here's another examination of "Ley 7" and the layoffs it authorizes. Before jumping into that pit of despair, let me share with you a small warning. With tempers rising on both sides of this issue, it looks like either side could lose control at any moment. If I were you, I'd steer clear of any areas were active protests are happening or planned to happen. I would also suggest everyone review the following safety guidelines available here and here. I'm not a prophet, but I got a real bad feeling about this one.

Between a huge budget deficit and an angry mob

Let's begin by setting up the assumptions for this situation. First, the main problem we have, just like 40 or more other states, is a major budget deficit. Many people like to complicate this issue, but it is quite simple. Think of your family's finances as if it were the government. If you're like most households, both Mom and Dad work and together earn, let's say $50,000 a year. If, at the end of the year, you've paid all your bills and you have some of the $50K left, you have a surplus. However, in the case of the Puerto Rican government, it's the end of the year, you've spent your $50K, but you still owe $3.5 billion. That's a deficit.

The difference between our families and the government, is that they are allowed to have that deficit. However, bills are bills, they have to get paid, so our government is able to use a variety of financial tricks, which allow them to borrow the money they need to pay all of their bills.

The most popular trick is issuing a bond. And a bond is a formal contract to repay borrowed money with interest at fixed intervals. For example, an investor "buys" a Puerto Rico Government bond, for which the investor receives an "IOU" from Puerto Rico for their initial investment plus interest in 5 years.

El Cuco

Here's where the credit rating agencies come in. Moodys and Standards and Poor are the most powerful of these agencies. They grade financial investments by their belief that the issuer of the bond will be able to successfully repay those investments. The higher the rating, the lower the interest rate the bond issuer must promise. A lower rating means that the issuer has a higher risk of not being able to pay back the IOU. As with most investments, the higher the risk, the higher return on the investment. In the case of a bond, it means a higher interest rate. Another way of looking at low bond ratings, is that it ultimately costs the issuer more money to borrow the money. (Which for an institution that is already having a budget problem, is not a good thing)

Finally, just to be clear, the Puerto Rico government's budget didn't grow $3.5 billion since January, when Luis Fortuño became governor. This is the budget and deficit he inherited when he took his oath of office. The budget has been growing through many administrations both Red and Blue.

But what's different now? While the deficit has been growing through all of these administrations, our credit ratings have been dropping. The last two administrations, however, have faced a new threat. Moodys and S&P have been aggressively threatening the reduction of Puerto Rico's bonds to "junk" status. The last time this threat occurred, in 2006, Ex-Governer Anibal Acevedo Vila closed the government. He did this hoping that it would be enough action to demonstrate that Puerto Rico was managing their budget and deficit. Much wailing and gnashing of teeth were heard back then, as there is now.

The limits of credibility

While many people accuse Fortuño's administration of falsifying the budget and deficit numbers, all I can say is that it seems improbable. It seems that way for two reasons:

There was a deficit problem three years ago under the administration of Acevedo Vila. Billion dollar deficits don't disappear quickly. So if there was a problem then, there is a high probability that the problem still exists. Plus, given the over-estimates Hacienda has been making, the problem is probably bigger.
"El Cuco" in this here story are the credit agencies. In order for them to make their evaluations, I can only assume that they have access to Puerto Rico's complete financial picture. So while politicians may be able to stretch the truth before their constituents and local media, I find it very difficult to believe that Moodys and S&P would risk their reputation by not conducting a complete financial audit. Since they are pressing the issue, I'm inclined to believe that we have a "bona fide" budget crisis.

In search of a Savior

So now we finally come to "Ley 7." As the captain of this sinking ship, Governor Fortuño is a desperate man. He must provides answers to the credit agencies and demonstrate action that will improve Puerto Rico's budget crisis. During his short nine months in office, I can assure you that this has been his number one challenge. Unfortunately, during those long nine months, very few options have been identified which can fix our budget deficit, and all of them include layoffs.

Since he doesn't have any other options, Governor Fortuño has to do whatever he can, because, "El Cuco" is demanding results. As with any other company that is looking to cut expenses, the easiest and most direct way is to reduce payroll. Enter "Ley 7."

Now to make matters more desperate for the Governor, unions are organizing, universities are closing, a general work stoppage is planned, and a general strike is looming. All of which are aimed at the Governor revoking "Ley 7".

Here's where it gets really squishy. Let's say that "La Colación Todo Puerto Rico por Puerto Rico" is successful. They accomplish the impossible, and get the governor to revoke "Ley 7." What do they pretend that we tell "El Cuco?" What do we tell them to keep them from lowering our bonds to junk status? Nothing, that's what they have to offer "El Cuco." And believe me, "El Cuco" will not say: "¡Ay Bendito! the people of Puerto Rico have banded together to reject a plan that might have helped them fix their budget crisis, let's let them slide for another year."

No my dear readers, "El Cuco" has no heart; only hard cold facts, numbers on a page, are the only thing that can make any lasting impressions. All "El Cuco" wants to hear is how our government is going to reduce its' budget deficit and see those plans in action. And yes it is heart breaking, and yes it is bad for our short term economy, and yes it will make many thousands of people's lives more difficult, but in the end, with great sadness, "El Cuco" doesn't care. We do, and that's what makes this situation even more heartbreaking.

All I can hope for is that these manifestations are conducted with strict adherence to the principles of non-violent disobedience and the utmost respect for the rule of law; from the government, the police, and anyone else who has the unfortunate task of defending "Ley 7", protecting the peace, and the law, may they act with great restraint, patience, and compassion. May the seeds which have been sown within "La Colación Todo Puerto Rico por Puerto Rico" grow to unite us all to work together, identify new solutions, and weather the storm that must pass. May we find ways to share in the sacrifices necessary to calm "El Cuco," so that we all can survive with our dignity in tact.

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: Mark Berry - Photographer & Graphic Designer

Standing on the brink of chaos

2009-09-30T21:56:00.007-04:30

As if on cue, just after my post about "broken windows" and restoring the rule of law in Puerto Rico, Roberto García Díaz hurls an egg at Governor Luis Fortuño. With emotions running high ever since last Friday, when the Governor announced the layoff 17,000 government employees, this type of "protest" is not a surprise.

While I've already laid out why these layoffs, while devastating to thousands of families and for our short term economy, never the less, they are unavoidable. I'll explain this in more detail in my next post, but I'll also identify "a hidden partner" who must also share the blame for this unfortunate mess.

Right now, I just want to reiterate what's potentially at stake in this whole egg throwing business. After seeing the news of the event on the morning news, I wanted to see if any new developments were available on ElNuevoDia.com. On the site, I found this: "Causa para arresto por tirar huevo," explaining that Judge Wilfredo Viera Garcés, from the Río Grande Tribunal, has determined that there is sufficient cause to arrest García Díaz.

On the same page, the Dia was conducting a poll. The questions was "¿Está de acuerdo con que se le radicaran cargos por intento de agresión al hombre que lanzó un huevo a Luis Fortuño?" With "Yes" or "No" as the possible choices. As I explained before, I believe that he should be charged (and punished) for whatever crimes are applicable to the situation, most appropriately, assault.

After completing the poll and getting the results, I jumped up in anger and shouted at my monitor, "You've got to be f#@!*&% kidding me!" I stormed out of my office and headed for the bathroom. The results showed an overwhelming opinion (nearly 7 out of every 10 people) were against pressing charges.
Before my checks even touched the toilet seat, I exclaimed, "No. No, that's exactly what I should have expected. It makes perfect sense." Amongst the powerful political and "Aye Bendito" emotional influences stirred by this situation, this result should not have been a surprise. We live in a criminal state.

While amongst the ever-growing break down in tolerance everywhere, from Kanye West, to Joe Wilson, and now Roberto García Díaz, I urge everyone to put aside their emotions and think about the long term impact of how this situation is handled.

As we established with "broken windows" if this crime goes unpunished, it sets up a dangerous precedent for other acts of violence (other crimes). As tempers continue to rise, lowering the threshold for violent protest creates the serious risk of a dangerous escalation of the severity and size of the "protests".

First it's an egg. Then it's a stone. Then it's a bitch slap. Then before you know it, the police are clashing against armed mobs representing various unions. While a minor skirmish has already occurred, if we ignore the crimes alleged committed by García Díaz, I'm afraid things will get out of hand very quickly. We are quickly racing towards a point where the passion and anger produced by the layoffs will not be calmed and someone is going to get seriously injured.

In my opinion, we are standing on the edge of a steep cliff. The only thing that keeps us from jumping is the shreds of civility we have left which bind us together as a community. If we continue to ignore the rule of law, we are merely setting the stage for the very fibers which hold this nation together, to be torn apart. The result will an unprecedented rise in crime, misery, and despair, the likes we have never seen. You may think I'm wrong, you may think I'm over-reacting, but unfortunately, I'm not.

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: slworking2

Restoring the rule of law in Puerto Rico

2009-09-28T06:54:00.001-04:30

As I have written repeatedly, I believe that Puerto Rico suffers from the "Broken Windows" theory. For example, have you ever noticed when you're stick in a tapon that no one uses the emergency lane until that first person breaks the law and accelerates across the solid white line. You do remember it is illegal to cross a solid white (or yellow) line painted on the street, right?

Well after that first car zooms by, then you'll see them whiz by in droves. That's a simple example of "broken windows" in action. Everyone usually obeys the law until someone breaks it, then it's "Okay," because someone else did it first. Or perhaps they think "They can't catch us all." Anyway you look at it,

Following the theory, if we can catch enough drivers and fine them accordingly, we should drastically reduce the use of the emergency lane. Raising the fine to $250 worked, a little. Unfortunately, when you have Senators breaking the law and the government reducing or eliminating traffic fines, well it's a little hard to convince anyone not to break the law.

A simple solution?

While I'm against any increase in unauthorized surveillance and the ever closer reality of "Big Brother," why don't we install cameras along the primary toll roads and capture the license plate numbers for anyone who uses the emergency lane? The cameras could be motion activated, so when an invisible threshold is crossed, the camera snaps a picture, and a computer scans the picture for the plate number and sends the owner of the vehicle a ticket. Simple, right?

But you know, that really wouldn't be any different then it is right now. Follow with me as I break this down using deductive reasoning. In this exercise, we'll start with the following assumption, we already have a "system" in place that should force a payment for every parking or moving violation.

Every year we must pay any parking tickets we receive in order for us to buy our "marbetes." Then every six years, in order for us to renew our license, we must pay fines for any moving violations we receive.
So let's now continue by asking why our government would be tempted to grant amnesty for all or part of the tickets we receive?
If our system is working correctly, those fines would HAVE to be paid in order to continue driving legally (which is another BIG assumption, I know). Right?
So there must be a loophole somewhere in the system that allows people to renew their marbetes and their license without paying those fines. Right?
Of course, it should be obvious, that the only loophole possible is that someone who works within the system permits people to obtain their marbetes or license without passing go, and without paying $200 (or $2,000 in the case of Evelyn Vázquez).
Which leads us back to the rule of law. Most of our systems are based on the assumption that we will follow the rules. When we allow people to break the rules and escape punishment, then we negate the rules.

Unfortunately, our society is based on the assumption that if you break the rules you will receive punishment. Don't do the crime, if you can't do the time. Right? When you eliminate the threat of punishment, then rules cease to exist. When rules cease to exist for "some" people, then the theory of broken windows implies that the rules cease to exist for more and more people.

Pop Quiz

What do you call some one who breaks the law? Yes, we call them a criminal.

While I know it seems a little totalitarian, but I think we should, to the best of our abilities, follow the rules (laws). Some rules are widely known, while some we've just become oblivious to their existence. Some crimes are harsher than others, that's why they carry stiffer penalties, but in the end, the more we all break the law, the more we empower others to break the law (again broken windows).

So it becomes a slippery slope between a little corruption in your local CESCO office and someone committing a drive-by shooting. The slipperiness comes from our different boundaries. While you and I might think that a traffic ticket is no big deal, others might believe that rules that govern "street respect" or "street cred" outweigh the threat of any punishment for murder. And with a very low percentage of arrests and convictions for murder in Puerto Rico, the threat of punishment for murder is uncomfortably low.

Conclusion

From corruption, to running red lights, to assassination, to driving in the emergency lane, to operating a cash-based business, and not paying for licenses or taxes, unfortunately, too many of our citizens live in a state of criminality. They live beyond the rule of law, they live in direct defiance of the rule of law.

I know I seem like a starry-eyed idealist who believes in the importance of concepts like truth, honesty, integrity, fairness, and duty. If so, then I'm guilty as charged. What I do know, is that no matter what I think, no matter what you think, we all share one thing. We all live on this rock in the middle of the ocean. That means that we are all connected and intermingled within a cobweb of systems and relationships. Very little can happen to anyone without it having direct or indirect influence on each our lives.

What I'm hoping for, what I'm calling for can not be better expressed than in the infamous lyrics of Michael Jackson. He too was sometimes ostracized for being an idealist, but in the wake of his passing, I was struck with how those ideals are what most people remember. So in his honor, I offer you these lyrics:

"I'm Starting With The Man In The Mirror
I'm Asking Him To Change His Ways
And No Message
Could Have Been Any Clearer
If You Wanna Make The World
A Better Place
Take A Look At Yourself, And
Then Make A Change"

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: Diane M. Byrne

Interruption Marketing and the Internet

2009-09-21T06:12:00.001-04:30

This is part of an ongoing series of posts which focus on improving Internet Marketing for Puerto Rican companies. In this post, we'll examine "interruption marketing" and determine its effectiveness in Puerto Rico and on the Internet.

Interruption Marketing

I'd have to say that it was Seth Godin back in 1998, who first pointed out this idea when he introduced the concept of permission-based marketing. As he called it, interruption marketing was the "The undesirable opposite of permission marketing." For most of us, interruption marketing, is all we've ever seen (or heard). And while it's all we've seen, I bet that very few marketers or consumers think about advertising as an interruption. Annoying, sure, but an interruption? Probably not.

Whenever you (the marketer) interrupt whatever your target audience is doing to pay attention to your advertisement, you're conducting interruption marketing. Here's a few examples:

While watching a spine tingling episode of Fringe the program stops and all of sudden you get a commercial for Ciales. The commercial interrupts the broadcast of the show, giving everyone a chance to learn about erectile dysfunction.
While you're flipping through today's edition of Primera Hora, you turn the page and discover two side by side full page advertisements from Doral. By inserting the ads between the newspaper's articles, the marketer interrupts your news reading experience.
While using the Internet, you decide you want to see what's new over at ElNuevoDia.com, but before you can get to their home page you get a ScotiaBank ad first. The ad interrupted your surfing experience by throwing up a skip through ad (you have to click on the "Skip Ad" button to get to the home page).

So what's the big deal, right? This is the way advertising has been conducted for ever, right? Well the problem is, that no matter how enticing the advertisement might be, the odds that we actually wanted to see the advertisement, or just happen to be in the market for whatever is being pitched, we've learned to ignore them.

With increasing regularity we seek out any way to ignore advertisements. What may have started with the mute button on our remotes, the fast forward button on our VCR, and now on our DVR, has grown into a clear pattern of avoiding advertisements nearly altogether on the Internet. How many out there have actually clicked on the "More Ads" link on Facebook?

Pop Quiz

I'm going to give you a advertisement hook, and you tell me the company who paid for the ad. Ready? "Brazilian Wax? Nice!" I bet if I did a poll, less than 10% of you would be able to name the company. As you can imagine, even when an advertising agency breaks through and captures our attention, we rarely associate the ad with the sponsor, which sort of misses the whole point.

Is Advertising Broken?

For me, I think it is. I've argued with people about this, but I wouldn't have this position if it weren't for people like Seth, or Sergio Zyman. Now, I'm not so deluded to think that all advertising is broken. Let's just say that getting your message to the right audience at the right time, has become a lot more difficult than it used to be.

Consider the following, how many times do you make a purchasing decision because of a recommendation by family or friends, as opposed to an advertisement? From what kind of cars we drive to where we vacation, there a lot of influences that go into our purchasing decisions. Twenty years ago, the formula was simple. Make a decent product and then blanket every media channel we believe our target audience pays attention to. A lot has changed.

Internet Marketing

So if regular advertising works less often, what does that mean if we choose to advertise on the Internet? Well not only do we pay even less attention to advertisements on the Internet, we even create software to protect us from seeing them (pop-up ad blockers). Unfortunately for marketers, almost because regular advertising has become so ineffective, you HAVE to use the Internet. So now what?

As I've mentioned, the first step in the move to Internet advertising involves getting acclimatized to the new environment. The simple lesson is this: advertising on the Internet requires more marketing than merely coming up with some catchy copy and glittery graphics; it requires participation, it requires involvement, it requires adopting new rules to play in this new medium. A medium that daily becomes more critical in reaching target audiences with any accuracy or efficacy.

And remember this, while the Internet has already passed television in the amount of time we "pay attention" to it, it is still a relatively new and immature technology. It will continue to capture more and more of our time as it slowly penetrates every aspect of our lives. It is inevitable that it will become the dominant advertising platform of the future. It's not quite clear how, but it will eventually capture more advertising dollars than television (or El Nuevo Dia here in Puerto Rico).

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: Kevin Steele

When politics become irrelevant

2009-09-11T07:08:00.005-04:30

I don't really want to weigh in on the "big" news that Caguas Mayor, William Miranda Marin will run for Governor in 2012, but I'm compelled to, so I'll keep this short. For me, there isn't any more evidence needed, than this simple declaration, to demonstrate how seriously doomed we are.

In my opinion, any discussion about candidates or elections so far ahead of the actual electoral process, is just a waste of time. There are too many failing systems and critical issues on the table for anyone to be parading around discussing politics.

I'm disgusted with the politicians that opened up the topic. I'm disgusted with all of the news media for slobbering over themselves to report this "news" and for failing to hold these politicians accountable for taking their attention off of their current responsibilities.

To complete the disgust trifecta, I'm disgusted with every citizen that latched onto this non-news event and willingly discussed politics at a time when we should be discussing how we are going to organize ourselves, roll up our collective sleeves, and get to work fixing our broken social, education, and economic systems. These problems are our problems. The failure of these systems impact our lives and those of our families.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I'll tell you why Willie's declaration is irrelevant. It's irrelevant because it doesn't even matter anymore which party runs our government. It should now be obvious after 9 years of non-leadership and non-action by both PPD and NPP parties, that our political system is pointless. It's pointless because our government is so completely incompetent.

We continue to believe that "the government" is responsible for our problems, and therefore should resolve them. We blame them to avoid the uncomfortable truth that we are the real ones to blame for allowing our enchanted island to become what it is today. How bad must things get until we collectively exclaim, in disgust: "Enough is enough, we will not accept the status quo?"

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: Mauro Luna

Death spiral down the economic toilet

2009-09-09T07:20:00.006-04:30

We interrupt our ongoing coverage of Internet Marketing in Puerto Rico to present you with this brief message from our sponsors. Well not really, we wish (hint, hint) but we are going to examine how doing the same things that got us into this mess, will fail to get us out of it. I'll illustrate this by examining the new Banco Popular campaign "Junto Se Puede." First off, let me share my admiration for BPPR wanting to unite us, for together we shall overcome, unfortunately it just won't be done by feel good jingoistic commercials.

According to recent news coverage, BPPR announced that they were spending $1 Million on the new "Se Puede" campaign. In my opinion, spending that kind of money for commercials that aim to make us feel "united" is a waste of money. Just like their last ad campaign, the new commercials contain iconic images which demonstrate why we should feel "united". My question is, "Other than lining the pockets of the agency responsible for the ad campaign, how is this going to grow our economy?"

Most folks in public relations and marketing would state that these quasi-public service announcements are plain old good business. The justification for funding such, usually large, campaigns involves creating good will and promoting a positive brand image. Who can blame them, at $2.25 a share, the board of directors of BPPR would probably consider offering free oral sex to any stock holder if they thought it would rebound the stock price.

The problem with this effort, is that it will not directly contribute anything that can, how did David Chafey put it, oh yeah "...get [us] back on our feet...]. It should be obvious to everyone at this point, that we can not advertise our way out of Puerto Rico's economic recession. That my friends, is trying to use an old strategy on an old problem. We need new solutions, new strategies.

If I would have been given the green light to spend $1 million dollars, I would have dedicated the money towards the research and development of new products and new businesses. However, unlike the failed "Llave de tu negocio" program, I would only fund R&D for products and businesses aimed at a global market. The only way for us to get back on our feet is to create products, that create new small businesses, that grow into big businesses.

Believe me, I know, first hand, the challenges involved in pursuing this goal, but it really is the only thing that will work. In the end, if we don't eliminate the obstacles for startups and begin to create new wealth, we will be stuck in an endless pattern of repeating the same mistakes that got us into this mess.

As it stands, it looks like we're destined to do more of the same as our economy slowly spirals down the toilet. Just last weekend, Coors of Puerto Rico announced a new $500,000 campaign to promote recycling. Our society continues to crash around us and we throw up more feel good advertisements. Unemployment is still on the rise, crime is on the rise, the underground economy is on the rise, while the arts are being slashed everywhere (in both public and private sectors). Why couldn't Coors have taken that money and funded 50 startups aimed at producing products from recycled materials?

Flickr Creative Commons Contributor: Lynda W1