A member of the ActiveTopic network 
A member of the ActiveTopic network
What's high score? Did I break it?
Breaking news: Breaking news bar added to site
Last fall, I released a mobile version of this very site. At the time, I wanted something quick, so I used a third-party RSS-to-HTML service, FeedDigest, to port my blog’s feed back into a stripped-down HTML page. As I wrote back then, I knew there was a better way. Here’s what I wanted to implement with an upgraded mobile edition of this site:
A simpler URL: My original mobile URL was http://mobile.jasonclarke.org. While this is something (and I stress something) of a standard, I felt the domain was too long too ‘disconnected’ from the brand of my main site. So I chose to go with jasonclarke.org/m (something else of a standard), as I hope it will be easier and quicker to type.
A better back-end: As I said, my initial implementation was lacking. Relying on (even a great) third-party service isn’t entirely optimal, especially with the excellent Wordpress as my blog software. Now, the new version relies on Wordpress’ native custom templates, and a doubling of the Wordpress loop, to create a stripped-down, mobile page that automatically grabs posts directly from my database rather than porting them through a third-party. Even better, I have direct, integrated control of the page via my Wordpress admin area, either via editing the page itself or editing my templates within the Presentation editor. This beats my old system, where I had to get at the separate mobile domain via straight FTP.
In addition to these Wordpress hacks, I also made a variety of modifications to my theme files (header and footer, specifically), to detect via a variable whether or not a particular page is defined as “mobile” (as opposed to standard). This way, I can utilize single headers and footers for both types of sites without having to create nominally different versions of my theme’s headers and footers just for my mobile site.
So if you’re a mobile web user, check out http://jasonclarke.org/m and let me know what you think.
* A quote that appeared on my Google homepage quotes widget:
“No matter what side of the argument you are on, you always find people on your side that you wish were on the other.”
-Jascha Heifetz
* Former Red Sox closer Keith Foulke is retiring from baseball at age 34. Foulke said some dumb things during his tenure in Boston, but also earned 34 saves in 2004 as well as the final out in the World Series. Thanks, Keith!
* Following in Scoble’s footsteps, I’m now sharing recommended items that I find in my Google Reader stream. My shared items are here, and the feed is here.
* Speaking of RSS, I’m now offering a meta feed of all my feeds- my blog, podcast, links, videos, and shared Google Reader items, all in one big stream. In addition, I’ve got an OPML file of all my RSS feeds if you like it that way.
* You may have noticed a few changes around this blog, or you may not have if you get me in your RSS reader. I recently neatened up my sidebar thanks to the useful “Javascript Tabifer” Javascript courtesy of BarelyFitz.com. The tool creates handy tabs that I use to group my archives and my topics together to shorten up pages and hopefully make it easier for visitors to find the archived content they’re looking for.
* It looks like 2007 will really be the year for OpenID, a public, de-centralized indentity system for the web. The format has earned adoption from a number of big players in recent weeks, including Microsoft, AOL, and popular social news site Digg.
The laughably awful advertising industry website Adholes, which has declined steadily in terms of reach and influence over recent years, has taken another sad step on its way to irrelevancy by publicly calling me (and by extension other customers experiencing this issue) an “idiot” on their corporate website.
Not since CBS News hoisted fake documents on the American public in September of 2004 has a company’s lack of respect for its customers been so blatant.
Before some explanation, first take a look at their instructions for unsubscribing from their newsletter:
Clicking their “this idiot” link actually takes you to my original post (one year ago today, as a matter of fact) where I wrote about my specific, re-producible problem with their email unsubscribe process. It all began when I attempted several times to unsubscribe from the company’s lame email missives:
I have now unsubscribed via their unsubscribe process twice, both to no avail.
Compare that statement– I attempted to unsubscribe twice, and both times their published unsubscribe process failed– to the Adholes rebuke, where they think the problem was that I “still [couldn't] figure out” how to unsubscribe.
Notice how, in the process of insulting me, they don’t even fully understand what my problem is? You have to be pretty intent on not listening to your customers to not even be able to understand what they’re complaining about.
The situation declined from there. Three weeks later, I received yet another unsolicited email from Adholes after my previous attempts to unsubscribe. In that post, I detailed my further problems with their bug-ridden website:
I just spent a few minutes trying to follow their directions on ‘deleting’ my account with them- which, according to their instructions, involves logging in, changing my name to “delete”, removing my email, saving my account, and then logging out of my account.
That would be awesome, except…Their system won’t let me remove my email, nor is there an option to ‘logout’ of my account…so, wow. Just when you think incompetence can’t get much worse, it often surprises you.
With that, what began as a simple unsubscribe request had blossomed into full-on absurdity. As ridiculous as their “new” unsubscribe instructions were, I attempted to comply, only to discover that the instructions were completely wrong. So let’s recap:
1) Adholes did not have a reliable process in place for people to unsubscribe from their email lists. This brings them close to one of the the modern definitions of spammer: Company sending out commercial emails with no reliable unsubscribe mechanism.
2) Following three unsuccessful attempts to remove myself, Adholes then gave me incorrect directions on removing my email, providing instructions to “logout” of my account when no such option existed. This is either intention obfuscation, or quite poor website design and implementation. Either way, it’s an embarrassing way to treat customers.
3) To top it all off, rather than sending me an apology, or attempting to correct their complete lack of an unsubscribe process for other customers, they chose to brand me an “idiot” for not “figuring out” how to navigate their non-existent unsubscribe method. That also serves to insult any other customers who may experience the same issue.
Fortunately, in an age where corporate transparency and apology are gaining increasing traction, this type of outrageously poor behavior by companies is becoming more and more rare. That said, we as consumers need to remain vigilant in the pursuit of these companies who believe it is their right to insult us even as they provide abysmal service.
Well-known and outspoken entrepreneur Jason Calacanis, founder of blog network Weblogs, Inc (now a part of AOL), has walked into a potential mea culpa by publicly challenging Blogads, one of the blog world’s earliest franchises.
On technology blog Valleywag, Mr. Calacanis was asked about rumors he was planning to compete against Blogads, arguably the largest blog advertising network. Here’s what he had to say:
Q. So, poor Henry Copeland [of Blogads]. You’re finally coming after him.
A. That’s like Michael Jordan going after a 12-year old in a game of 1-on-1.
Subtle, right? But instead of letting Mr. Calacanis’ snide (yet typically boastful) remark fade, as it initially appeared it would (”Jason…makes me smile”, went Mr. Copeland’s first post), today Mr. Copeland posed an interesting challenge on the Blogads weblog, proposing a $10,000 wager on which network– his Blogads, or Weblogs, Inc– earned more money for its bloggers last year:
“…Let’s talk about the key performance metric. Does Jason want to put his big money where his bigger mouth is? I’ll wager $10,000 that in 2006 Blogads earned more for bloggers than did WIN. After all, blogger earnings is the true measure of a blog business, right?
What kind of odds would Michael Jordan give a twelve-year-old in a game of 1-on-1? A million to 1? Maybe 10,000 to 1… with the MJ blindfolded and his shoes tied together?
Well, this twelve-year-old would be happy with 10 to 1 odds, Jason’s $100K to my $10K. If those odds make Jason queazy, I’d be happy to discuss something gentler.
Jason apparently got $25 million from AOL and is the Michael Jordan of blog businesses, so he’s got the cash to toss on the table. Does he have the guts?”
Blogads owns much well-deserved respect within the blogosphere, so I’m a bit surprised to see them coming out swinging like this, particularly considering Mr. Calancanis’ fairly well-known reputation as a person who enjoys self-promotion, stunts, and often uses braggadocio in his personal writings. Frankly, I don’t see what Blogads could gain from this wager– as Mr. Copeland writes in his post, his network is a clear winner in terms of customer feedback; and with AOL’s recent jettisoning of several of the lower-trafficked Weblogs, Inc titles, it seems a bit like a bit of an off comparison to pit Blogads distributed network of ad carriers against the now-streamlined Weblogs, Inc. network of blogs.
Considering all that– plus the fact that Blogads is likely to win the wager by a large margin– I expect Mr. Calacanis to either ingnore this come-on completely, or else shoot back with some variety of mis-direction, changing of the terms, or some other similar stunt.
As Paul Giamatti once said in an interview (and I’m paraphrasing), “It’s not the competition. It’s the challenge.”
UPDATE: In a comment on this post, Mr. Calacanis calls this a “silly bet”.
TiVo alert: If you live in New England, tune in to regional news network NECN tonight from 8-8:30pm to catch Chet Curtis interview Lance Dutson about Lance’s coverage of the recent Libby trial.
NECN is pretty good about putting up video of their segments; if they have some of Lance I’ll link it later on.
UPDATE: Lance did a great job. As my TiVo was occupied, I took some grainy video with my digital camera and posted it on YouTube:
I have now been an eBay member for 7 years.
Ascent Amnesia: When somebody rising to power suddenly forgets that power is cyclical.
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