Friday Fives at Six

How Can Foursquare Can Serve Small Businesses?

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 16:37:00 +0000

Foursquare is fun. For me, Foursquare is a utility. I'm less into the standings than I am into remembering things I want to do and places I went that were good. I'm very much into hearing what my friends think about places I want to go. It's been getting a lot better at helping me 'explore'. I think that these are the pretty obvious use-cases from my (end-user) perspective.

But, the service is free for me to use. And, as they say, "if you aren't paying for a product, you are the product being sold." So, what are some possible use-cases for the real potential buyers, the businesses?

1) Venue Stats

The venue stats can be valuable to small business owners who do not have the time or tools (or the interest in investing in them) to measure traffic patterns. It does not require installing any hardware, and only minimal effort to 'claim the venue' and start understanding when people check-in to your business. Foursquare provides these basic analytics for free. Great. Now what to do with that?

2) Help Managing Inventory and Staff

To me, an industrial engineer and all around numbers guy, I love digging into the info about peak usage, flow rates, etc. I think improved inventory management is amazing because it often feels like free money. Or rather, what's so amazing is that it doesn't necessarily feel like anything and then, suddenly, money!

Regardless of the business, a better understanding of congestion can help better plan production. That's the same if I run a restaurant or a salon. Most business owners will tell you they already understand their peak times (e.g., lunch at a deli, "2:30 Feeling" for5 Hour Energy). But, for those places that do not invest in a high-end POS, Foursquare provides hardware-free analytics showing how busy business really is. These analytics could help anticipate growth/decline and manage it more effectively (e.g., through changes in staffing or offering specials as a means of congestion pricing).

3) Specials and Loyalty Programs

Ok. Specials. Daily Deals. Groupons. Whatever you want to call them. They exist already from multiple parties and are among the hottest areas in startups right now. Foursquare reaches lots of customers who are near a purchase decision. It already has specials and is distributing deals from partners (i.e., LivingSocial, AmEx). That’s great.

Futher, the Foursquare Specials platform can easily be a turnkey customer loyalty program (and it sells it this way). It provides additional value past punch cards because customers broadcast their spending to their friends. And, right now, it does not cost anything more than the cards for the free advertising. At redemption of “10^th coffee is free” it would create desire in other customers wanting free stuff and could motivate new customers to choose that coffee shop over competitors.

4) Close the Loop & Estimate Cash Payments

Now it’s time to use the data you have on customer behavior. Other than credit card companies (and maybe Mint.com) no one has a better handle on customer behavior than Foursquare. There has to be more here than specials, right?

Foursquare gets data on consumer interaction regardless of their method of payment. Use that information to create some measure (estimate, SWAG, whatever you want to call it) of cash spending. That would be an enormously valuable bit of information for businesses and their payment providers, from established banks and credit cards to Square and PayPal all trying to grab a bigger share of payments.

5) Customer Experience Measurement

Provide an easy way for customers to share info about how long they spend in the store. Maybe they were going to come in, but didn't because it was too crowded. Maybe they didn't find what they were looking for.

I bet a delicious new burrito store would pay up to find out how long it takes someone to come in, get a burrito, eat it, and leave.

Adding this complexity could easily drive users away, but it might make the remaining users much more valuable sources of info. One way to implement could be a 'simple check-in' tab and a 'complex check-in' tab. Users would opt-in to sharing their progress through the line to give feedback that helps their favorite businesses improve their own experience, like a business focused version of the Yelp Elite.

6) Follow Up Feedback

Another way to improve data collection for businesses could be to let users receive email and quick (and I mean quick) surveys from venues they visited. I already get an email from online purchases I make asking me to rate the experience. Even the receipt (which I don't want, btw) at the Duane Reade encourages me to fill out an online survey for a chance at $10,000. There's value in fostering that data collection.

7) Potential Business Owners

Provide insights into the aggregate check-in data for a neighborhood. When a commercial real-estate agent says "great foot traffic", Foursquare can provide the real data behind that and the specific times of day. Is this a neighborhood for a late-night spot or a mid-day spot? How many locals are here? How many tourists? Where do the various groups check-in?

Show me the CarFax.

8) Business to Business Sales

Help business connect with each other to sell efficiency products (e.g., better registers, better inventory management, scheduling software, etc). If the data analytics are still free for the small business owners, well, then they might be a second layer in the “you are the product” stack. So, Foursquare can act as lead generator or market maker to help connect small businesses with service providers.

Even better, integrate Foursquare software with existing solutions and makes it easy to close the loop. Then it can provide understanding of the customer experience from check-in to payment to follow up through customer feedback.

Ok. Those are some ideas. What might be a hurdle to adoption?

1) Understanding the psychology of the 'check-in'

A small businesses owner needs to understand when and why people check-in. Is it before their experience, regardless of what happens? Maybe afterwards? Maybe only check-in if they loved or hated it. This, to me, is the biggest limitation facing Foursquare. Possibly the very large and growing user base would wash away the outliers.

2) Customer Segmentation and Bias

Customers are going to be more diverse than the subset of smartphone owners who also have Foursquare who also check-in who also leave tips. Business owners are already busy managing a Yelp page (and the actual business). They don't have time to check out the check-in data. Maybe the data around specials is more interesting, but by then, the business has already been convinced of the value of the Foursquare deal platform over competing deals services.

3) Fine. So, why Foursquare?

10 million registered users. Free business analytics (for now). Data. Insights. Profit!

I’ve made some assumptions about the depth, breadth and quality of data and inferences we’d be able to pull from Foursquare. Which are too big? What do you think of these options?

Androids and iPhones

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 17:20:00 +0000

With the launch of the Nexus One, there is a lot of talk about whether Android will ultimately beat the iPhone. Lots of very smart people are going both ways on it. Comparisons to the Microsoft / Apple competition of the past have said that Apple will be content to own just a small share of the marketplace, while Android is apparently going to go on to be the Windows for mobile that Windows Mobile should have been.

I think these people are probably right. Despite having an iPhone (and kind of loving it), I do like the idea of an OS that lets you change everything about it. I have gripes with the iPhone settings and apps that can't change (email, contacts, text messages, sound profiles). However, I have to imagine that Apple will one day improve them.

An important advantage the iPhone (the 3GS at least) has for now is that it is noticeably more responsive than any android phone I've used. Again, that probably will change as HTC, Motorola, Samsung, etc get better at design and the suppliers build capacity for the newer chips. Plus, the iPhone software is pretty slick. And, until the hardware manufacturers get better at customizing their android builds to make them as slick, the top of the market will belong to the iPhone.

The first mover advantage of the iPhone is huge as well. It already has a ton of apps, and by being first, it got all the geeks and nerds to adopt it. Mobile apps are generally built for the iPhone first, with Android (and Blackberry) versions following later. That's probably due to the market share of iPhones, but it's a virtuous cycle for Apple (apps beget market share which begets apps) that will be very hard for Google and its partners to bust. Getting the iPhone onto Verizon next year, as rumored, will go a long way to blocking the biggest avenue Android has to reach an untapped audience.

In mobile, since the device is carried all the time, it seems rational to spend a bit more to have the best, rather than accepting second tier. Android will try to, and probably need to, be lower cost at first. I hope that the competition opens up the iPhone OS a bit more, but if it doesn't, hopefully Android will catch up in slickness by the time I'm ready for my next phone.

Another music site

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 04:22:00 +0000

Image via Wikipedia

I came across this website, called StereoMood.com recently, but it does a good job of playing music by theme. I've been digging it lately. It's not fantastic for discovery, like hype machine is, but it has the benefit of playlists by 'mood', so you don't have to think for yourself.

No time for a full write-up, but it plays with limited lag, even at my office that seems to throttle anything that might help me enjoy my day. So, that's a big plus.

My iPhone Experiment: Conclusion?

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 12:25:00 +0000

So, I caved an bought an iPhone 3Gs, 32GB. After about 3 weeks of use, I'll say that I'm used to it. I do not think I am as crazy for it as everyone else is. Apple has a history of limiting the options available to users, for me that's annoying. I love to play around in the advanced settings and customize things to fit the way I use them.

So now, here is a quick review, followed by some tips I discovered while playing around on how to make your iPhone more productive.

The Big Things that Everyone Else has Already Commented on:

The Keyboard. It's fine. It's not great. I miss having a real keyboard. It's not that typing on the keys is so bad, but not having a dedicated keyboard makes having keyboard shortcuts impossible. This is a minor knit, but I notice it constantly. Especially in the email program
The Keyboard again. Automatic correction is awful. Why is "Yo" not in there? Also, I constantly hit "b" instead of space and "m" instead of backspage and Shift instead of "a". Hassles, all of them. Landscape mode makes it easier, but it's still not as nice as a real keyboard.
Landscape Mode. Sometimes, I don't want to rotate. Sometimes, I want to rotate back. It is often unresponsive and requires closing and re-opening an app. (If you have a tip on how to solve this better, please let me know!)
The Email Program. It stinks. No push email is fine (suboptimal, but fine), I can survive because I only use my personal email and things are rarely urgent on that line. I don't like that I cannot sort by unread. Also, the search stinks. If, the gmail webapp weren't available and good, I would go crazy. It would be nicer if it used tags instead of folders, but, again the gmail webapp comes to the rescue.
Copy and Paste. It stinks. It's nice that it's there, but it's a pain to use. It makes composing emails harder because moving thing around is tricky. If I had this phone before copy and paste, I would have left it instantly. Huge feature missing at the original launch.
Multitasking. It's impossible. Other than playing your iPod, you cannot do two things at once. That is annoying. Again, it makes this device terrible for being productive. Or even just chatting and sharing links at the same time. Push notifications have proven to be pretty good for IM. Except that you have to reload the entire program every time.
Battery life. It lasts for a day, max. I think they should be required to include two chargers so you can always have one with you. Frankly, there is no reason they couldn't use the mini USB plugs adopted by Blackberry and roughly everyone else at this point to charge. That would be MUCH more convenient.

Little Things that Irritate (probably only) Me:

No sound profiles. This seems like a pretty major oversight. I don't need a million, but I would prefer 3 or more. Also, I'd like more options than just "ON/OFF". On my old Curve, I used at least 4 on a regular basis.
Home screen can't be customized enough. Sure, you can set a picture. But, I want a notice of how many missed calls, voicemails and emails I have. Seems like there should be an easy fix, but I haven't found it yet
Not a portable hard drive. If it exists, I haven't seen it. I want an app to let me use my iPhone as a hard drive. I want to be able to upload from it and download to it. Not even necessarily to view the files, but to be able to transfer them (via USB, bluetooth and wifi). I don't know why I thought I would have this option. Lame to leave it off (a DropBox app would be sick!). Even if it was not ideal, the Blackberry with a microSD card let me use it as a storage drive.

Good things that I like

The internet. It's good. I used Opera Mobile on my Curve, and it was good, but slow. I believe that is entirely due to the EDGE vs. 3G network that I was on. But, basically 3G is way better than EDGE. So, get a new smartphone, [almost] any new smartphone.
The apps. I have fallen in love with a few apps (listed below). Instapaper is by far my favorite. I have a full reading list to check out on the subway or anywhere else when I finally find time to catch up on the news / analysis I want to read. I actually paid $5 for this when I was still testing out the original iPhone because I love it so much.
One device. I only carry my iPhone now. No need for an iPod and Blackberry. Though, the battery life sometimes makes me limit how much I listen to the iPod.

Tips

Shake to undo. No one else I know managed to discover this, but if you shake your iPhone it undoes your recent typing. Try it, it works. You look stupid, but it can be helpful.
Double Click for iPod. When you're in the locked screen or any app, you can double click the home button to bring up the iPod controls and change the song. The only multitasking you can do on the phone, and it isn't even the default setting. Go into Settings > General > Home and flip the switch labeled iPod Controls to "ON"
Turn down the brightness on the screen to save battery. That's a no-brainer. The battery life is bad. Help switch it to not good by turning down the brightness as low as you can stand.

App Recommendations

Instapaper PRO. It's amazing. Start with the free one, and then upgrade. It's great because all the links and articles you see at work are there for you to read when you commute home. This is the only app I've paid for. (I've been writing about it for a while)
Evernote. It's a note taking application that also syncs with your home computers and a web interface. Also, if you take a picture of something with text, it converts that text and makes it searchable. Amazing!
Palringo Lite. Free IM application that has push notification. I like it. I wish it had landscape mode, but it works fine.
Facebook. Seriously, v3.0 is amazing.
WSJ and NYTimes. Free apps that give you all the articles on these papers. They also download for you for reading later, so definitely practical if you don't know what you want to read later.
KICK Lite. Free NYC subway map.
OpenTable, UrbanSpoon, Yelp. If you don't know what these are, google it.
Fandango. Let's you order tickets from the phone, which makes it better than Flixster in my opinion.
Remote, Boxee, VLCRemFree, MochaVNC Lite. These are all remote control apps for full programs your computer. They are great if you use the associated programs, which I recommend (and have in the past)
Shazam, Pandora, Imeem. Music apps. If you don't know what these are, google it.
Google and Vlingo. Both enable voice search of your phone. Vlingo let's you search your phone too, though, and make phone calls. Though, I'm not sure it's voice recognition is as fast or accurate.
I have a bunch of others that I don't use as much. But a sudoku game is great. As is the Chipotle app, Epicurious, AllRecipes, TripIt, TweetDeck among others. If you have favorite apps, that you can't live without. I would love to hear about them.

Overall, my impression of the phone is that it's really great at everything not related to actually communicating. On the communication front, it's passable, which is why those other things finally swung me in favor of the iPhone. But, I think I would have been equally happy with a new BlackBerry Tour, HTC myTouch, or even Palm Pre (oh, and I've been on AT&T for my entire cellphone life, so I don't really notice network issues).

My iPhone Experiment

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 23:17:00 +0000

I just activated an old, first generation iPhone. The experiment begins. If I can last a month, I'm getting an iPhone 3GS. If not, Blackberry, Palm, HTC / Google are all in the running.

I expect to miss my BlackBerry. But, I don't want to commit to an iPhone 3GS over the Blackberry Tour (probably on Verizon), without at least seeing if the apps can be worth the loss of instant messenger. Key things I expect to miss in addition to google talk include background apps, over the air syncing with my google account, and a real keyboard. I'm already not looking forward to deleting all the duplicates this just created by using both my google contacts and apple address book (which it forced me to do!). Note to apple: I don't always want to use your product. In fact, most times, I don't want to use it. So, leave me be.

Any tips for making the switch greatly appreciated.

On the bright side, I'm no longer carrying around 2 Blackberry Curves and an iPhone. Not sure if that makes me more of a geek or less of one.

Quick comments on Cuban

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 15:48:00 +0000

Mark Cuban is a leader in thinking about the future of media. No one with more money is more open to challenging the existing paradigm. He knows what consumers want before they do, maybe because he is a consumer (though I have no idea how he could have time to be one).

His recent post about the issues that new media faces and internet TV in comparison to the two other businesses that have been decimated by the new distribution methods already (music, news). I highly recommend it. I want to say that he agrees 100% with what I've been writing recently. I have been advocating for the cablecos who already control the pipes to take advantage of their monopoly on delivery and get the on demand content to a higher level and basically shut down all of the upstart web companies (though I love them so much). However, he raises issues I haven't gotten to yet, so definitely give it a read.

Here the main argument against internet TV:

The path of least resistance to get TV, is turning on the TV. It works. It works fast. It’s reliable. The product is consistent and equal for everyone. It is predictable. The best content is available first on TV. The same can not be said for internet delivered TV. In fact, its the opposite. You have to work to get your internet TV to work. Which site has which content changes. Which content is actually available changes. Internet TV quality is not consistent from usage to usage. Internet TV requires upgrades to software to stay compatible which creates work (your next flash/silverlight/quicktime upgrade is when ?). The experience is not consistent from website to website. So every time you want to sample something new, you never really know what to expect. TV is the no work platform relative to Internet TV

I think his definition of Internet TV is too narrow. Based on his narrow definition, he is definitely right. A lot of the advantage traditional TV has is due to legacy content partnerships based on the distribution monopolies that cablecos had. There is no reason it has to stay that way.

However, cablecos should be upgrading the software (and remotes) on the set-top boxes they rent. As you know, I think that's the way to crush internet video startups, grab new media ad dollars, and justify their new emphasis on broadband pricing tiers (or other price increases). To me, his arguments in favor of cablecos dominating are the same as why an internet company would dominate in the absence of a cableco pricing per byte (which is probably why Hulu has seen such impressive growth). Sure, the cablecos could do it, but that doesn't mean the right startup isn't already there (e.g., TiVo or boxee). There should be a lot of OS/interface options to choose from, and they all should just work.

And, frankly, my cable (from Time Warner Cable) is often not working. My HD channels will go out, or onDemand won't work. And, the choices on any channel are constantly changing just like they do on the web. Further, the argument that 'which site has which content changes' is just as true if you replace site with channel. So, regular TV is just as frustrating as Internet TV.

And, while his argument for/against a la carte pricing may seem slightly insane today. It isn't. There is no reason to bundle shows together on a network. That is an artifact of a legacy distribution method. If we had to buy individual groups of television shows like we buy tickets to sporting events, we would not buy tickets to see Nets vs. Bucks when, for the same price, we could buy Cavaliers vs. Lakers. But, the way ABC chooses the Sunday Double Header shows that people will pay for good content (even if they just have to pay attention).

He ends with this:

In order to be sustainable as a platform, there has to be a way to pay for it. TV is winning this battle and by all appearances is advancing further, faster in a more standardized way than Internet Video. Hard to believe, but you need to ask yourself “Who would you rather depend on for open platforms and standards for advertising, google or cable/satellite/telcos”.

He is right, of course. That cable/satellite/telcos are more likely to make this happen, but I think that consumers don't want Internet Video. They want video on demand. Right now, the internet does a better job of providing options/selection, even if you don't get the benefit of the big screen TV.

Comcast hits 11 billion served

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 12:51:00 +0000

Comcast recently announced that it served it's 11 billionth video since it launched 6 years ago. That's more than tons of other products over the same period (2x iTunes, 4x Big Macs, blah blah)

Here's why it's important. They felt the need to tell someone. Seems to me that means that Comcast gets it. Sure, they're moving way too slowly for my (and the web's) taste, but then, they don't have any competition in their markets. So, I say kudos to Comcast for finally doing something on their own. They also launched PBS in HD OnDemand. Nice.

Hopefully, they are getting convinced that people will cut the cord. Also, hopefully, they won't push too hard on bandwidth caps. Anyways, progress is progress. Let's try to keep a positive view of the world.

Another great read about digital video

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 21:55:00 +0000

From the guys at TV by the Numbers: Four TV trends to track that don’t involve whether Chuck and Dollhouse will be renewed!

The four theses:

Reallocation of existing revenue streams
Increased DVR viewing and advertising strategies aiming to combat it
Increased online viewing and more commercials online
Look for new and better offerings from your cable and satellite providers (watch out, Netflix!)

I definitely agree with everything he says. I would love to see more on-demand content in general, if it comes from the cable guys, that is fine with me (I pay them every month already). Interestingly, he feels online video is the least important of the trends. I agree with him, the real importance of online video is the potential for on-demand everything all the time. And that won't happen until content owners can figure out how to get paid.

Boxee finally gets an iPhone remote

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 02:10:00 +0000

Image by nwistheone via Flickr

My favorite mediacenter software finally got the iPhone app that has been so longly anticipated.

It has two modes, gesture and buttons. The button mode is straighforward and pretty easy to use. The gesture mode is good as well, though it takes some getting used to the sensitivity.

My only complaint is that there are no shortcuts on the phone. This app definitely does not take full advantage of the canvas that is the iPhone screen.

Search is the biggest missing component from Boxee in general, but the remote app could go a long way to solving that. Ideally, it would have text-based search function. Scrolling is so analog. At the very least there should be an alphabet down the side like the contacts app. Different sources may organize differently, but if you take the term alphabet loosely it can mean anything. It could mean a adding shortcuts for date, show title, or any other category of data they can get.

So, is this boxee's next move in usability? Should they start to catalog all the content they have available from their different sources by all the available information so that you can browse and search your available video content like it's your email? That would be very much welcome.

Interesting Reading re: TV networks future

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 17:37:00 +0000

Take a look at this article, he's definitely onto something (though a certain someone may have been making similar points lately)...

Today’s Threat To Broadcast TV Networks (TV by the Numbers)

Hulu is actually video on demand, not online video

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 03:57:00 +0000

I want to formally suggest that we stop thinking of Hulu (and others like it) as online video and more as video on demand. Hulu competes with youtube in name only. The products are different. Hulu is selling video on demand. It competes with regular tv, timeshifted tv, dvds, and video on demand offerings from other sources (cable, netflix, etc).

Related: boxee is asking people to help them write their pitch to get Hulu back. Personally, I think too many of the users complain that the content owners should basically just give their shows away. They complain when there are more ads. They complain when they would have to pay for it. They talk about downloading shows as 'stealing' and make it sound like civil disobedience. I want free stuff as much as the next guy. But, I will not delude myself into thinking that because I know how to steal, it's ok. That's like walking into a bodega and stealing a pack of gum because the gum company was doing a free-sample promotion on the street the other day. These people are hurting their case and only making content owners more nervous about the internet.

Just to be clear, despite recently writing on the side of content owners, I do think that a lot of what they do is potentially not as valuable as it once was. The drop in costs of advertising and proliferation of outlets to reach consumers really should change the economics. It's hard to think that the networks were actually in the business of matching advertisers with receptive customers, rather than making the great content we've been enjoying for all our lives and selling it (that's the movie business). The content has always been a loss leader. If we accept that, it's lot easier to accept that people in production are probably overpaid. It's not as complicated as it once was: technology makes it easier to produce and the distribution is getting to be almost free. There is maybe not a good reason for an actor on a sitcom to make $1MM an episode in the future. Hopefully, the dropping cost of advertising leads to cheaper prices for our toilet paper. Though, it would probably also mean more scarce, and therefore an increased price for, good content.

Content Owners Need to Make Money Too!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 12:59:00 +0000

So, there is a tangled web of content owners, distribution partners, websites, employees, ad salesmen, actors and more that all have an interest in extracting the most value from their spot in the value chain.

Because traditional distribution (television) is still by far the most profitable (in that it provides the most revenue and cost per episode is basically a sunk cost), it certainly has a chance to influence where content is delivered. Ultimately though, the content owners should get to make the decisions. They are hopefully thinking about value per eyeball per episode in their decision making. Unfortunately, the OVERWHELMING majority of viewers will come from television. Online video sites would need to make a major case for substantially higher CPM for their viewing experience, which would probably be difficult to maintain if they were aiming to build for the 10-ft viewing experience (though with a wiimote or ipod touch as the remote, who knows!).

Hulu, as the leader (in my opinion) in the online video space, is going to be involved in probably every shitty thing that is going to happen as the content owners and distributors work to protect their legacy revenue streams/business models. This week, they removed their content from TV.com and asked to remove their content from Boxee. It's a major blow to the progress being made at the expense of cable companies, but that is how it's going to happen over, if I had to guess, the next 5 years (not to say that Hulu or Boxee will be around after that).

It just goes to show that being a web portal is not enough. There has to be some other differentiator. I think these guys need to focus on providing a superior interface, recommendation engine and innovative advertising model. It also makes me wonder who the ad sales guys are at Hulu. There really weren't that many ads from actual advertisers in there, in my experience. Obviously, they limit ads per show on purpose, but even the ads they have don't seem to be major advertisers. Maybe the low sales drove the content partners crazy? It's too bad really, because Boxee had potential to turn Hulu into the iTunes of streaming. Easy to use, slick interface with a deep library.

Well, if only Hulu had enough lobbying, we could have tried to use the stimulus to buy all the already laid cable/fiber in the US and nationalized the infrastructure, which would have created a real competitive environment. I have been meaning to research the history of the national highways, but I haven't yet (I'll opine anyway). I think the highways were once private, with a toll collector literally turning a pike (hence turnpike) to let people pass onto his road. At some point, we nationalized it (it's going the other direction now, but let's not think about that for now).

In the meantime, I have a suggestion for content owners. You made the choice to succumb to the large audiences that the cable companies can provide you. That is an understandable business decision. Just consider the impact of cableco provided DVR. People use DVR to skip ads, that costs you money. The cable companies provide these DVRs for super cheap. Maybe the case can be made (though I don't know the actual viewership figures) that you lose as much to people watching on DVR as they lose to people dropping cable in favor of Boxee. Not to mention how pissed off all the early-adopter, techies are. I hope you are putting pressure on them to build a channel like Hulu in the OnDemand section. In that channel, place unskippable ads or micropayments. Everybody wins (except maybe the Pirate Bay).

What is going to happen to online video?

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 11:54:00 +0000

Currently, Hulu is my favorite online video site. Boxee is my favorite way to bring online video to my TV. Well, what is going to happen going forward? How do companies make enough money from online video? Trading analog dollars for digital pennies is a legitimate concern for these ginormous corporations.

ABC has an interesting strategy. They only allow their content to be streamed from their site, with their player (well, Boxee has it too). The user experience is crap. They make you click to continue the show after the advertisement plays, which makes it tough to watch from across the room. On top of that, they just increased the amount of ads they are going to show. But, if you are a fan of Grey's Anatomy or Lost or anything else on that network and you missed an episode, you can only go to their website. They keep the brand tight, rather than allow it become associated with another site like Hulu or Joost. Plus, if the ratings were one person lower because you didn't watch, they made less money. So, I guess they feel like you need to pay with attention for the show regardless of where you watch it.

As a consumer, I hate the strategy. However, I completely understand where they're coming from. It is a clear example of 'Content is King'.

But, here's where this could get interesting. It's not that the video I want to watch was created by/for the internet. It just happens that is where I can find it now. So, I plug my computer into my TV and use Boxee to get it onto the TV. If I was a cable company, I could cut this whole thing off immediately by just improving the on-demand content library. I cannot think of a good reason why they wouldn't (that's an exaggeration, but in a truly competitive market, it would likely be worth investment). Putting ads into the show on the fly seems relatively trivial at this point (as long as you can sell the inventory).

Hulu and Joost, while great websites with deep content libraries, still don't control their fate, which is their biggest weakness, as evidenced with the hulu-baloo over the removal of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia (aside: I love that show, but have no idea when it is on. I am without Sunny now. It doesn't seem like FX is making any money by taking it off Hulu). But, maybe what Hulu and Joost do really well is create fantastic user interfaces for quickly browsing through tons of content and choosing just what you want, and then suggesting what to watch next. Which could be the channel for discovery that I mentioned in my last post.

The current on demand channels on Time Warner Cable (in NYC at least) are pretty crappy. But, what's worse is that other than the premium channels (HBO, etc), most people don't even know they exist. There is a music videos on demand channel. Fitness on demand. A&E on demand. National Geographic on Demand. The list goes on. But, most of the channels have very limited selection and the browsing experience is designed to find something only if you know it exists. There is no serendipity button.

If the dream is 'anything at anytime', like I think it is, then this is the time for cable companies to invest in making their on demand offerings amazing. You can even do 'variable pricing' by putting in more or less ads depending on how much people might want to watch. Limiting fast forwarding like on Hulu. And, of course, micropayments for ad-free episodes (not to mention my 'learn the message' free episodes). Cable companies, which already take payments for pay-per-view items, could easily add the ability to buy one episode of a sitcom for 24 hours for $0.20 (the price point obviously needs to be studied in more depth, again with variable pricing depending on how recent the episode is, how many people want to see it, etc.)

I have to imagine that ads placed into on-demand content on a Saturday afternoon when I'm just trying to kill time would be just as profitable as those inserted into whatever crappy show is on FOX.

You like it? Pay for it!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 11:14:00 +0000

The advertising supported model is fantastic. There was a period of time when it looked like everyone wanted their business to be ad-supported. It's a good idea because consumers don't feel like they are paying for your product, so they may use it a lot. But, in reality, consumers are paying with attention. It's a very small micropayment, but it is real.

The fact that it is so valuable to introduce people to a product which they might not have heard about is wonderful. But, when you think about it, if you buy Charmin toilet paper, you're paying for the ads they run on television. If they pay to advertise during The View, and you don't watch The View, you are subsidizing someone else's TV show.

That's why I love car manufacturers. I don't have a car. I don't need a car. I don't plan to buy a car. But, I love sports. I spent every Sunday this season watching the NFL. Car manufacturers subsidize the hell out of that. It's great to know that something so expensive, like the rights to broadcast the NFL, is not paid by me. It's paid by all of the people who need pick up trucks (Aside: Why do marketers think that everyone who watches football needs a pickup truck? Probably because Ford and GM thought everyone in America were in construction).

But, the ad-supported model is coming under stress now. I think it's rather funny. We were headed towards a place where everything in the country would be free except for toilet paper. But, toilet paper would cost $80,000 a year. Now that the ad markets have collapsed, people are re-evaluating. It was a crazy phenomenom, because most of the ad-supported tech companies targeted early adopter-types who, for some reason, have a moral aversion to ads. They don't see paying attention to an ad in this week's episode of Heroes as the micropayment for the production of that show. They see ads as annoying (despite the fact that they give us cliffhangers which actually increase the enjoyment many programs).

Well, I want to suggest that we stop this madness. As consumers, we should be much more direct about what we like and don't like. We should all start paying for our content. We do it with the movies. Why can't we do it with shorter form content at home? There should be more options for consuming content.

For example, I want an episode of 30 Rock. I can see a lot of ways to support that:

Pay for it without ads (HBO)
Pay less for it with some ads (Cable)
Pay nothing for it with more ads (Networks)
Pay nothing for it with a lot of ads contingent on passing a quiz at the end that proves you watched the ads and learned the marketing message(s)

That last option is potentially revolutionary. Imagine the CPMs you could charge if people had literally promised to learn your marketing message. Even if you haven't found the right person for your product (for Charmin, that would be an ass-less guy), you have guaranteed that he knows your value proposition. It's possible that he has friends with asses and one day they'll talk about TP, and he'll share his knowledge. It potentially could take the wind out of the sales (punny?) of ad-targeting. I mean, who really cares if you played the right ad to the right person if they didn't internalize the message? Hard to believe that would result in increased sales.

But, the bottom line is that it would be great for us as consumers to get past the hurdle of paying for the show we want directly and thereby direct our resources to the content that we like, not the content that advertisers think we like. We need to become the patrons to the arts that existed in a bygone era.

Colbert Report: Audacity of Nope

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 04:13:00 +0000

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

The Word - The Audacity of Nope

Colbert Report Full Episodes
Paul McCartney Appearance

Funny Political Videos
More Funny Videos

Guess who has an iPhone?

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 03:18:00 +0000

Me!

Your favorite Blackberry lover got an iPhone. Don't go crazy or anything, someone stole my jacket and ipod over the weekend and a friend had a 1st Gen iPhone laying around for me. (Thanks Rabe!). So, now I'm carrying around an iPhone without service and a Blackberry Curve. I find it hard to imagine myself dropping my Curve for the same reasons I've been saying (mobile IM it better than SMS in almost every way, real keyboard, keyboard shortcuts, etc.)

But, most interestingly, I'll be trying to get it to work well as a remote for my computer. I already installed Mocha VNC Lite (which is awesome, if not a bit slow). Obviously, I installed the remote program for iTunes. As I've written recently, I'm excited about Boxee and I think the iPhone could be a great remote control (hence the installation of Mocha VNC). And, according to Avner at Boxee, they are working on the app.

Some of the other great apps like Pandora or Shazam won't be as useful for me, because I rely on wifi only. I'll be focusing on free apps though, because without the internet with me all the time, I don't think it's worth it to pay for apps. However, tons of other programs in the app store have potential for me. The instapaper free program looks to have tremendous potential to keep me up to my ears in content to read on the subway (auto downloading like I've been asking for from my mobile RSS readers). And, urbanspoon makes choosing where to eat downright entertaining.

So, friends with iPhones/iPod Touches, let me know what apps you've downloaded that make your experience amazing. In the meantime, I'll try to get used to the fake keyboard.

Palm Pre premiers at CES, people love it

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 03:54:00 +0000

I have to admit, I'd given up on Palm as a cell phone leader. I didn't even really know that this phone was going to happen.

Then, all of a sudden it's here. The blogs are going crazy right now. I haven't had a chance to read in-depth about it, but it definitely looks cool. Full QWERTY and mult-touch...nice.

The links are below if you want to give it a look yourself.

Hype Machine: Just let music bloggers influence you!

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 04:17:00 +0000

There are a bunch of music sites trying to introduce you to new music and stream it to you for free. They use algorithms based on the characteristics of the music (Pandora), on what your friends like or on what people you don't know but who like the same musician also like (last.fm). There are a bunch of others, too (like tumblr, 8tracks, Shazam with its iPhone app, and SeeqPod).

There are also a lot of people deliberately trying to influence your taste in music. Tons of them are blogging about songs they want you to like. Hype Machine pulls these blogs into one place so you can let these bloggers be influential. You can listen to the music, and if you want to read the review, you can click through to read the blog post.

I'm not sure what the legal requirements for them are, but these bloggers write about songs and add tracks to their posts. I'm guessing some get taken down and a lot are remixes (which may help avoid some copyright issues?). But you can listen to the site like a radio station, add songs and blogs to your favorites (and tweet about it) and connect with friends, or you can click through to buy the track from Amazon, eMusic or iTunes (which is how they make money).

What's great is that right now, they're rounding up the top 50 artists, albums and songs of 2008 and releasing them over the course of this week. The 2008 Zeitgest is available here, powered in part by imeem, and embedded below. Though, not all albums are streaming full versions of every song from imeem.

I'd love to know what music sites you use. I'm bballan on basically all of them, so hit me up with a friend request.

A Young Daffy Duck

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 19:58:00 +0000

Watch more Dailymotion videos on AOL Video

Cartoons were a major influence in my life. They helped me learn to think creatively (Wile E. Coyote might have been my biggest influence in becoming an engineer). I'm pretty sure that cartoons are the reason I constantly have big ideas, they may also be the reason I haven't yet had one hit the big time. Anything is possible in a cartoon.

This cartoon, Daffy Doodles, is from 1946. It's my favorite of all time. Looney Tunes made some of the funniest cartoons ever. I don't know when exactly it happened, but it seems that short cartoons like these are gone. They're still doing a good job selling Happy Meals and Trix. At least we can still dig these shorts up on the internet. If only it was on Hulu.

Young Daffy Duck cared about one thing: acting daffy. Older Daffy got too worried about his legacy and was constantly jealous of Bugs Bunny's fame. It's interesting how that happens. If only he could have stayed the same care-free duck, these short cartoons might still be around.

I guess even cartoon ducks get old.

Don't be scared of 'Advanced Settings'

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 23:10:00 +0000

A recent article in the New York Times focused on the new, feature-poor gadgets that people are buying. I've written about all the features we have, but don't use.

I think it's a bad sign that people are regressing in their love of features. It is an unfortunate situation that ignorance about technology is acceptable. Our whole world is becoming much more reliant on technology every day. If you don't make a modest effort to keep up, you will only get yourself into more trouble later. Think about what would have happened if 50% of the population refused to learn how to use a car. And if 85% of those who learned to use a car didn't learn to use the headlights or the windshield wipers. We'd have a pretty bad situation on the roads.

The article stands in stark contrast to some great new Sprint commercials (embedded below). The CEO, Dan Hesse, promises that they will teach you how to use all the cool features of your new Sprint phone. Just come in to one of their stores. To me, this is a brilliant and wonderful marketing campaign. Sprint hasn't been doing well. Hopefully, this will help them turn it around.

The point is: Don't be scared of the advanced settings and features on your devices! Computers are amazing. They are also very flexible. Programmers go through a lot of stress to give the end user as much customization as possible. They work hard to also provide a clean, usable interface

People are so scared of technology. It's yours! There is no way to permanently ruin your computer by messing with the advanced settings. This is especially true in software that you have installed (as compared with the drivers that make your hardware work).

Make some changes. Tinker with the settings. You can change a lot of things that will make your computer (and cell phone) interactions more pleasant and productive. If you don't like the way a change worked out, change it back. You can always reset a phone or computer to factory settings if you get flustered.

A few ideas:

In your Blackberry internet browser, set it to enable HTML tables. Many mobile websites will be much better. (You get there by pressing the Menu key and then going to options)
In Microsoft Excel, set the default for a new workbook to only have one worksheet (Under Tools > Options)
In Microsoft Outlook, set messages not to automatically mark as read. (Can you figure out where this setting might be?)

There are so many changes you can make to your computer and cell phone to make it easier to use, more productive. These devices are there to make your life easier. Learn to use them!

Flight of the Conchords Season 2 Premieres online

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 23:14:00 +0000

A sign of the growth for online video is that HBO is using Funny or Die (a website by Will Ferrell and company) to premiere Flight of the Conchords, a hilarious show. I'm embedding it here for your viewing pleasure. Hopefully, one day, I can subscribe to HBO over the internet, plug my computer into the TV and use something like boxee to see it all.

Without further ado:

Season 2 Online Premiere - Flight of the Conchords (US Only) - watch more funny videos

MP3s vs. M4P: Don't risk needing to buy The White Album again

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:17:00 +0000

Image via WikipediaIsn't it weird how everyone refers to any music file as an MP3? Like Kleenex, Xerox and Rollerblade it's a recognized brand name. What you probably don't know is that you aren't buying MP3's from iTunes.

You're buying M4P files. They have DRM (Digital Rights Management) so that you can only load it onto Apple devices. That's not a big deal for as long as you own an iPod, but the second someone else makes a better device, you'll be out in the cold on your music library. [There are ways around it, but it's a load of trouble.]

I bring it up because I read some stats claiming that Amazon's music store is a flop because it's just not as easy to use as iTunes so people aren't buying it. I recently bought a bunch of music from Amazon's webstore. It was very easy. On my mac after purchase, Amazon has you install a download manager which automatically imports your songs to the iTunes library. Totally easy, basically one step and the best part is that I'll be able to take my music with me on any device I ever buy without hassle.

The only other piece of advice I can give is to change some of the settings in the Preferences window. Under Advanced, make sure two boxes are checked. First, 'Keep iTunes Music folder organized'. Second, 'Copy Files to iTunes folder when adding to library'. For me, when I download a new song from Amazon or an audiobook from Audible, I just open it with iTunes and it is organized automatically in my folder and in my Library.

The bottom line: it's your music. Make sure you know how to keep it in your control. You don't want to be a victim like you were when they made the switch from cassettes to CDs and were forced to buy the White Album again, do you? [Not that The Beatles are actually available digitally, yet].

The perfect set-top box: it's about the pipes and the remote

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 11:57:00 +0000

What would the ideal set top box have in it?
It definitely needs tv, maybe games, and it has to connect to my existing downloaded content and the most importantly it needs the internet (a DVD player would be nice, too, in the short term).

#1 on the list is definitely television content. There is hardly a way for anyone to do without the content regularly delivered via the cableco. Most content can be had on demand, but the live events and news are always going to need to be streamed. The 'guide' that shows you what is on and when is probably the biggest advancement of content consumption since the tv was invented. And yet, the potential is so much higher.

What about a google search? Or relevant information about what I'm watching? What about bringing my fantasy team into a page on the guide that updates in real time while I watch football (it's been possible for at least 2 years)? What about the recipe being made on the cooking show I'm watching? Or the IMDB page for the movie I'm watching? Maybe overlay it on the screen. Yahoo is still working on tv widgets, which is the beginning of a solution.

The point is there is lots of secondary content relevant to what I'm watching on tv that would be great to have along side it. There are opportunities for ads in the guide, which might bring the gatekeeping cablecos along. The box could provide suggestions of what to watch (like TiVo) but from the full content library (Hulu, Netflix, etc), not just previously recorded programs.

Which gets me back to a point I've been making for a long time: cable cos suck. By making it so hard for people to hack their own set-top box together, they have limited innovation substantially. There's nothing about what I've suggested above that you couldn't already do on your pc. The hard part today is incorporating the tv, which the cable companies walled-in (CableCARD was a poor attempt to fix that).

The biggest problem with existing set-top boxes is that they can only have one cable input, compared to the cableco box that has two (so you can record one thing while watching something else). Any 3rd party set-top box you get you has to take the one output that would normally go to the TV and be in the middle, which eliminates the two source possibility. This has managed to get me to pay them $7 a month per box. TiVo charges $12 per month. I do believe that they have a better product and it would be worth paying more for, except that they can't get two sources if you have digital cable. Has a culture that used to buy VCRs and DVD players really abandoned the hardware model? I'm not that sure. So, why can't people continue to pay a portion of a monthly charge to the cable company with the rest going to a company like TiVo, who also gets to sell the hardware. I really think people would pay for a the right hardware with the right software (I still believe Boxee could be that software).

With Obama talking about national broadband, there is a chance we can cut the power of cablecos and make everyone get a richer experience. It's possible, we nationalized the highways once-but that's another post (hopefully coming soon, but requiring actual research).

So, how would you control the ideal box I've been describing which has tons of different features and configurations. With a touch screen remote (like the ipod touch-which I mentioned wanting to use as a remote way back when). But, the tv experience is often a lean-back experience, the tactile feel of a real remote makes browsing without looking away from the tv much easier. Well, you could do like the old palms and have people learn different gestures to do specific tasks, or a swipe across the screen could change modes. But that might not be ideal. I think I would want like 4-5 physical keys to switch to my favorite settings/modes and a home screen with everything else. But, that's a more tactical implementation discussion. I believe people would get past it or that you could solve the browsing issues by having a full keyboard as well.

The remote really is the key. You could get Picture-In-Picture with the remote as a screen with little speaker to keep an eye/ear on when the game comes back from commercial. It could be where you keep your fantasy scores (or otherwise replace the laptop on the coffee table). The finger flick of the iphone would be a good way to browse the program guide without bringing it up on the screen if desired.

The beauty of the touchscreen interface is that its a blank canvas so you can do anything with it. The question is whether we are over engineering this solution. I might be in this exercise, but I think we could all stand to get more from our tv experience.

How would you change it?

Boxee Money Makers

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 03:13:00 +0000

[So, immediately after I mentioned horror stories in cable company customer service, I got great service from my cableco. Although, that was in response to the literally immediate failing of my television and internet. Conspiracy? Prob not, unless it goes down tonight too]
Here are some of my ideas for Boxee to generate revenue. I'm focusing mostly on the video services, but Boxee also provides the ability to listen to music. [Also, please understand that I could talk for hours about each of these options. I tried to balance brevity with background.]

1. Get onto the cable or telco's set top boxes.
Cable companies control the television through their cable boxes. Getting into those boxes opens up a new world of potential user to your software.
This has to be the most unlikely of all of my suggestions because the cable companies don't want to give up control over the television. TiVo has been trying this strategy for a while with limited success. Even though they have gotten themselves on some Comcast and DirecTV boxes as a premium service, these agreements haven't reached their full potential. The cable monopolies continue to dominate. IPTV services like U-VERSE and FiOS might want a differentiator (which FiOS brought with whole home DVR).
However, for a long time the music industry thought it had a nice monopoly. As the distribution and consumption habits changed, Apple has taken control of nearly everything through iTunes (even though their DRM should turn off consumers and drive them to Amazon, but that's another post). Itunes even has made inroads into downloaded television programs and if they ever decide to focus on AppleTV, it could put a lot of pressure on the incumbent boxes. Maybe it's time for the cable companies to get out in front of this thing. The right software on an existing box can transform that loud, slow, unextensible box into something really strong. [Aside: it's amazing how lacking the existing boxes are. People are forced to put up with it because they don't know what could be better, but that's another post].
Why shouldn't the cable companies be happy to take $7 a month (what they get now) from any number of set top boxes and let box keep the premium above that?

2. Get on ANY set top box
There are tons of companies working on being the set top box that finally bridges the gap between computer and television. It seems unlikely that many of them will be able to successfully make their value proposition work to end consumers, unfortunately. The low chance of success of these companies could be an opportunity for Boxee to be basically outsourced UI design and help them conserve cash (especially right now). If you can be the software on every box, you can be the Microsoft of home media. You can make it easier for people to switch between boxes because of the common interface. That could drive hardware sales similar to sales of stereos and VCRs in years long since passed. Which could appeal to today's hardware companies.
Obviously this plan probably has a lot more development costs associated with it. Think of why they chose to build on Apple machines first, one type of hardware makes development way easier.

3. Make deals with content providers
Similar to how Netflix made a deal with Roku, why couldn't Boxee make a deal with Netflix? Why couldn't Boxee make deals with every content provider, Including the traditional networks?
If CBS needs more eyeballs watching its shows, wouldn't they be willing to pay a share of revenue for those eyeballs? Obviously, Boxee could be more targeted in its advertising than traditional television (as all new media products propose to be) so that should have value to advertisers and in turn content providers. This would be low-risk for the providers as it could be completely variable pricing based on the impressions, potentially with guarantees, etc.
Further, who knows how Hulu will be operating in a few years. Hulu could be buyers of original content not shown on TV first and basically become the world's first online 'network' with syndicated and original content (Boxee could become that as well, but Hulu has the head start here). That makes companies like Hulu and Joost and even YouTube potential partners (assuming they can figure out their own sufficient revenue streams).

4. Sell premium content
If Boxee provides the on-demand viewing we've all been waiting for, in addition to the helping us discover new content that we want, Boxee could sell downloads, rentals, individual channels (like a la carte pricing IPTV has been promising).
You can even leverage the social networks that Boxee is tapping into. When a friend buys a program, you could let them share a version that has commercials in it. Potentially, a whole load of friends would be buying the same content.

5. Launch an app store for plug-ins
Similar to how Apple does it with the iPhone. They provide value in the being the operating environment. If they can make plug-ins easy to buy and install, people might do it, but there are major hurdles to clear in order to get people to pay and download anything. Depending on how the above strategies play out, you may still have only a core of users who dowloaded Boxee already, in which case they would be more likely to pay for add-ons. I'm not sure exactly what those add-ons would look like, but that's why it's an app store and not a feature request. This is can be considered a modified 'freemium' model.

When I first wrote these down, I thought they were groundbreaking (or at least creative). Are they still that way? I'm not as sure. When I finally get to my post about the ideal mediacenter (based on technology that is around today), it will be more clear where I'm coming from.

However, Boxee's focus on Apple and Linux gives it a great foundation with people who are generally ready to find and install software. It also makes a bet on Boxee look a lot like a bet on Apple. The only real concern is whether they might be too early.

As always, readers, the floor is yours. What do you think?

Boxee brings your content and the internet's to your TV (well, computer)

noreply@blogger.com (Brian) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 12:16:00 +0000

Image via CrunchBaseImage via CrunchBaseVery few people that I know have Macs or run Ubuntu (Linux). Otherwise, I would have written about this program earlier.

Boxee is a great program that brings content from your computer and the internet to your computer. It's very easy to use, and though still in an alpha (read: very early) stage, it runs reliably with video quality as good as your sources. The major drawback is that it only runs on Apple or Linux machines (you can also hack it onto an AppleTV pretty easily). Frankly, this program has had me checking out how cheaply I could get a Mac Mini on eBay to plug into my TV (not cheaply enough, I might repurpose an old windows PC with linux, though a proper video card is expensive and might be tough to make work). Currently, I'm using a DVI to HDMI cable from my Macbook Pro to get the video onto my TV--it works great. The Apple Remote works to easily browse through the interface to access the different content. Also, you can pull in video RSS feeds, like the TED conference videos.

In addition to the typical mediacenter features, it has social aspects as well. You can set up friends (yes I have invites, just ask!) and recommend shows that you watch to friends with boxee or connect it to twitter to tell the world how much you loved $100 Baby.

Overall, the features of this product are great, assuming you already have hardware that can run it. For more on how to use Boxee check the links at the end of the post. Here's a video intro:

quick intro to boxee from boxee on Vimeo.

More importantly, it's part of the trend towards getting your tv to act as the on-demand device that was promised in that IBM commercial that I referenced when I first wrote about Hulu. This is an amazing trend and one that I have been looking forward to for years. Every major network has full length episodes online. The NCAA streamed March Madness games live online last year (though not in HD, which made it tough suboptimal when I plugged my computer into my TV via VGA). Meanwhile, nearly everyone has a horror story of dealing with the cable company that has a monopoly on providing your service. Maybe Boxee (along with all of the recent set top boxes being made) can be the beginning of a major change in the way we treat our cable infrastructure. This is a topic that I've been meaning to bang out a post about for a while. So, I'll stop here for now.

Boxee raised $4MM from some very respectable VCs in Fred Wilson from Union Square Ventures Bijan Sabet from Spark Capital to join its board. So, next up for Boxee is to find revenues. I have a lot of ideas about how they could make it happen, which is the topic of another post that has been in the works for a while (and that I've been telling anyone who will listen, along with what the ideal mediacenter looks like). Not surprisingly, Fred is anti-hardware for Boxee the company (but loves the mac mini as a mediacenter), so that's out of the picture.

So, if you have a mac or run linux, let me know and I will happily send you an invite to Boxee!