Ivory Terminal

I have now gone three weeks without the visual voicemail “feature” on my iPhone working.  AT&T cannot tell me why, and the Apple team is as usual clueless. 

Being without visual voicemail alerted me to a couple of things to add to the growing complaints about the iPhone’s lack of security, such as the fact that an iPhone comes set up without a voicemail password.  I never had to think about this issue until I found that my visual voicemail had stopped working.  Like my other AT&T phone, a venerable Blackberry, I began to dial “1” to get my voicemail.  However, with the iPhone, there was no password set up as a default.  Thankfully, I have one set up now, but for all of you other iPhone owners out there, your voicemail box is just a single caller-ID spoof away from the rest of the world, no 10,000 attempts necessary.

I like my iPhone so much, and could not imagine switching full-time to another device after two years of seeing how good things can get, but it seems like at least in the US, the combination of Apple and AT&T cannot quite get things done.  I do not imagine for a second that the incompetents at any of the other three national carriers could do half as well, but it is disappointing to see at least one supposedly current  feature (3G, visual voicemail, tethering, etc) always on the wrong side of the horizon.

If Visual voicemail is down much longer, I am going to change my iPhone plan to a Blackberry one and at least have the access to the great e-mail options when I switch my SIM out.

 There is a huge debate (at least being portrayed by the media) about what to do with Credit Default Swaps (CDSs), the pesky financial instruments that made AIG and others impotent, and have forced the US to put insolvent firms through anything but conventional bankruptcy. Since the US has put themselves on the hook to these firms, and to the firms that would stand to lose in swap payouts, they are taking the far cheaper bailout route.

Lately, many are calling for the banning of CDSs, and just as many are identifying them as a vital hedging tool. Since most people never look under the first layer of the financial onion, they come off as a tool of the insincere. Like short selling, it is “not nice” to bet on failure, so their purpose is not understood. However, the complete removal of CDS offerings would make investors much less likely to take on large corporate debt positions, hurting the bond and loan industries. In a sense, the existence of CDSs allows capital markets to be more “open”, a politically and economically important part of our current national agenda.

It seems to me that the obvious solution is also a relatively simple one. Make CDSs incredibly boring. Savings account boring. Regulate the market until nothing exciting can be done. Require dealers to be licensed, dictate the size of the market, and in one way or another require a debt position to be held to hold a swap. CDSs are much more like insurance than options or short selling shares. Equity shares (long or short) and options are generally instruments with evenly dispersed payouts. CDSs are betting on a (usually) improbable event, and that low probability is matched with a massive payout.

When limited to covering a risky investment, a CDS switches from an aggressive bet to a conventional tool. This also limits the size of the market, eliminating situations where is far more profitable for investors to have a firm go under. Instead of attacking what is difficult to understand, spend some time looking at the incentives these instruments offer, and build their future in a way that limits morally hazardous opportunities.

                With the recent attention on the economy, it is difficult to go more than a couple of days without seeing articles giving tips to job seekers.  My favorite articles are always the ones with tips from recruiters talking about their pet peeves, like this one found on the front page of Yahoo! today (I consider Yahoo!’s front page to be a general barometer of what the “average” Internet user cares about).  After spending more time than I would have liked over a lifetime dealing with HR as both a candidate and as someone attempting to hire, I think it is high time that we start seeing some articles about how to make the process better from within.  Here are some of my suggestions:

1.  Stop lying about open positions:  In an attempt to prevent sub-optimal hiring from within (a valid concern), many firms have instituted policies that require openings to be advertised prior to promoting or moving an internal candidate.  This practice has so many problems that it deserves its own list:

a.  This practice floods the market with bogus job listings.  “Entry programmer, salary $12/hr.  Would prefer Ph.D. in Anthropology, fluency in dead languages, and ability to carry up to 250lbs.  Must provide own transportation and computer”.

b.  The process wastes everyone’s time.  The hiring manager wants a person right now, and knows who it is.  An interview process can take weeks.  The time of interviewees is also wasted.

c.  The practice makes it more difficult to be promoted from within, which is a huge problem for employees in an economy where they are not getting significant raises or bonuses otherwise.

2.  Recognize job hunters who are and are not fishing with dynamite:  After returning to school and looking for an internship for the summer, I applied for four positions after doing a ton of research.  One was a position at a huge company that several of my peers applied for, and the others were positions at small or unconventional companies that were not even specifically looking for interns.  Because I did my homework, knew about the companies, and knew that I could fill true gaps in their workflows, I was able to physically interview for all four positions.   After meeting them, thanking them, and being told that I would be updated on their hiring process, I only received further uninitiated contact from the firms where I was given an offer.  I view the remaining firms as unorganized and unprofessional not because I was not chosen as the best candidate, but because a verbal agreement was broken by their HR representatives who inconvenienced me by not letting me know that they found a better fit.

Many of my peers applied for dozens or even hundreds of positions, and were hardly able to keep track of them.  Admittedly, this is a turn off described in almost every article, but the important difference is that many of the most qualified candidates do not attempt this type of application.  I feel that if you take the time to apply for a position that you are qualified for (and there cannot be that many), then it is the responsibility of the searching firm to acknowledge your application.  A non-response should only be used as a clear indication that you are not qualified for a position.  This practice could discourage candidates from fishing with dynamite.

3.  Recognize that job applications are time-sensitive:  In one case, I applied for a position, and received a call close to a year later from a hiring manager who was then upset that I was no longer interested in the position.  Qualified candidates are not applying for positions for fun, and there needs to be a relatively short statute of limitations for contact.  Once I left the corporate world for school, I received calls asking if I was looking for full-time work because I was no longer listed at my old company.  Ironically, this was well after I had begun looking for an internship.

4.  People that left a promising career to go to a full-time competitive graduate program likely did not get laid-off:  I am asked if I was laid-off at almost every interview.  Many people do not seem to understand the 9-12 month process of applying to a physical graduate program.  I cannot help but blame the uncompetitive for-profit online degrees for cheapening my academic pursuit.  If you are a recruiter, take five minutes to browse the website of the graduate school on an application.  This can tell you a lot very quickly.

  5.  You are not a detective:  Until you catch a candidate being dishonest, drop the ridiculous attitude.  Odds are, you are not going to break someone talented at lying to you, and you are guaranteed to turn off genuine candidates.  The ones in the middle that are bad at lying will reveal themselves long before the end of the hiring process, so the combative demeanor is not needed.  More than once, I have had to ask HR screeners if I am wasting my time applying based on their attitude when questioning me.  Based on my experience, lying employees will reveal themselves.  When in doubt, give them a simple computer skills test, regardless of the position.  I have been asked extensively about computer skills in almost every interview, regardless of the position.  I have only been on one interview where I was asked to demonstrate them.

 I am not an experienced television viewer. I got my first “very large computer monitor” in 2009. Being an audio freak, I attached my panel to a fairly high-end audio system. Watching the occasional program, I have noticed that many of the commercials omit a very high pitch tone. Thinking that I was just trying to find information in noise, I wrote the frequency off as an artifact of the compression used to make commercials sound louder than the regular programming.

This evening, when I was watching some programming with a couple of friends, I found myself bothered by the frequency, thinking that I had some equipment malfunctioning when the frequency first appeared. No one else seemed to hear any other noise, but I found the signal to be more perceptible than normal.

I decided to take a couple of minutes and use my DAW to compress a couple of signals until they sounded like television commercials to see if I could replicate the results, and I came up empty toned. I created some of the most obnoxious soundscapes in the world and still did not come up with any sustained high frequency tones.

Unable to create the tones as artifacts, I let my paranoia run wild. I am curious if the high frequency tones are used for devices like Nielson boxes to communicate whether or not commercials are being watched. Obviously, there is big money invested in television advertising, and the model will be turned on its head if DVRs are truly impacting television viewing. Months ago, I heard someone talking about Nielson Soundscan, and I am curious is this technology is also being used to measure viewership of some commercials. Coupled with Nielson’s ability to track advanced demographics, a time-coded signal over commercials would give market researchers an amazing amount of information, which could be used to valuate commercial time in the digital world.

Television advertising is still functioning as an old-world industry, and there are many people with a lot to lose if it turns out that quantitative measures show that advertising is ignored or ineffective. With the demographic information and a time code, the data could show who watches which commercials on which shows. If it turns out that desired demographics are tuning out commercials, rates could plummet even though general viewership is good. My worry for the advertising industry is that it will turn out that the demos targeted for advertising ignore the commercials, especially when they embrace DVR technology (for which adoption would likely rise with income). Lower rates would lead to even crappier programming, and a revenue loss that would likely lead to an increasingly hostile stance towards technology and the Internet (which is often blamed for the decline of old-world media). Regardless of why my commercials sound like garbage, advanced tracking will eventually come to pass, likely leading to some serious rate adjustments.

I sure wish there was a way to short FB right now.  It seems to me like they are already on the decline.  Unless DST got a glimpse of a totally new platform to be offered in the future, the valuation and the size of the position seems way out there.  

Facebook is very likely going to have to start aggressively slinging customer information if they expect to keep their valuation so high.  As far as my own bias, my life without facebook is just fine.  It was odd for a couple of weeks as I missed a few invitations sent via the platform, but everyone learned quickly and I now have no need or desire to be connected to the service.

I am still surprised by the slow rate of twitter adoption among my peer group, as it seems like a natural choice because of phone integration.  

Anyway, congratulations facebook, now get moving on that IPO so I can short…

            Recently, the makers of Quickoffice released their iPhone port, and I believe it will have major implications for the iPhone/iPod Touch platform.  It is one of the first productivity tools that is not a glorified browser.  Importantly, Quickoffice allows users to create and save local versions of the file, meaning that Internet access is not required to access any features. 

            I have not yet spent very much time with the platform, but it has already paid for itself as I have been able to quickly edit documents and return them to their sender.  You can access e-mail attachments and then send the altered files back to the sender, a huge victory for the iPhone platform. 

            The Quickoffice program shows proof of concept for powerful applications that exist independently of browsers, and I look forward to seeing what is possible with the relaxed limitations of the 3.0 software platform.  Once I can connect a Bluetooth keyboard to the iPhone, I will be much more comfortable leaving laptops at home, even for short trips.  The Quickoffice platform is the first piece of software that should rattle RIM and Palm, since it brings the iPhone up to par with the editing capabilities of the more established business platforms.  Obvious features like spell-check and formatting are missing for now, but hopefully some friendly competition will bring these all to market quickly.

I am almost reluctant to jump to the defense of Apple, but today’s released Q1 smartphone sales are completely misleading.  Many sites are making a big deal out of the fact that the Blackberry 8300-Series, the “Curve”, outsold the iPhone in Q1 2009.  What no one is mentioning is that on most carriers, the Curve is now available without a smartphone contract.  This means that handsets are going out at a heavily-subsidized price, yet Blackberry and the carriers are not receiving their data plan revenues.  It seems to me that the Curve is being picked up in droves by consumers interested in the perceived status of a smartphone (plus the great keyboard as text messaging become ubiquitous) without the high monthly cost of data and Blackberry E-mail plans. 

My guess is that the Curve is now a loss leader for RIM, who hopes that the users will think of a Blackberry when they are ready to get a true smartphone. 

This is not an attempt to discount RIM’s great quarter, but in terms of revenues, a Blackberry without a Blackberry plan is not exactly a smartphone.  Follow the money…

I deleted my myspace and facebook accounts after finally getting one too many requests/messages/etc from accounts that mostly represented bands or brands.  I still think that the social network halflife is measured in months, but I do like Twitter.  I came across this on Wired.com and had a nice little shiver.  It may be funky and offbeat bands, but just wait…  

I also got my first friend request from a random rap artist.  I wish them all the success in the world as the love the service, but I think this is the beginning of the end.  Call in the fail whale.

Like most Mac users addicted to megapixels, I add new spaces even more often than I add new monitors. Currently, with about 8MP of LCD’s and six spaces, I stare into a glorious ~48 megapixel world from my desk.

Spaces, Apple’s name for virtual desktops, allows users to create different environments, seemingly for different tasks. It is a savior for everything from work/life balance to privacy, and it is one of the most compelling arguments for why Windows only lives in VMs on my workstation.

Compliments aside, I think that spaces and virtual desktops have a long way to grow. Currently, I run several VM’s and applications that I would like to have a dedicated physical monitor, something that is not possible with the current software. Of course, one can dictate that an application always be on the forefront of the desktop space that it occupies, but that does not quite do it for me. Digital graphics representation is becoming an ever more important part of our lives, and it would be fantastic to be able to control each monitor like a separate physical machine.

In the next iteration of OSX and Linux environments, I would like to see a number of features. First, I would like to have the ability to assign applications and VMs their own monitors, treating them like completely separate machines. This would mean that if other monitors were turned on or off, the separated panels would not be impacted. This could allow for substantial energy savings by giving a user the ability to turn off unneeded monitors while still being able to see necessary output. Next, I would like to be able to select which monitors participate in spaces, leaving a scratch monitor that is application agnostic like a clipboard for applications. This would allow a user to drag an “alias” of output or programs onto a monitor that would remain identical in every space, comparing graphics or figures from programs that normally occupy different spaces. This can be done by dragging applications to corners in the current environment, but there is no command I know of that will put them back. Finally, I would like to see a command that would create “derivative” spaces where the visible applications do not change, but which monitor they are displayed on does. For instance, if using three identical monitors (positioned L-C-R), a derivative command could be created to move applications from L or R to the center panel.

The virtual desktops currently available are miles ahead of any other workflow options, but I have been given an inch and want a mile. Particularly for Apple, these enhanced features could be coupled with the Fingerworks-offshoot multi-touch gestures. If implemented correctly, an improved spaces could approach the usability of the fabled “touch wall”. I cannot think of a better excuse to add multi-touch to the desktop input devices, creating a truly unique hardware/software line.

Until recently, the mobile phone has been a quiet place in the world of telemarketing. As someone that uses mobile phones for all of my lines, I have greatly appreciated the lack of interruption. Considering that my lifetime score to positively responding to an unsolicited telemarketing call is zero, this has been a great relationship for both parties. Thanks to laws, lack of phonebooks, opt-outs, and so on, most of the calls that I receive are wanted, or at least not out of place.

Now that mobile phones are not only commonplace but even replacing landlines for mainstream consumers, the telemarketers must have needed a profit-saving change.

My blissful silence was halted by an e-mail this afternoon from GE’s capital arm announcing that the terms to my service were changing:

“You agree that GE Money Bank and any other owner or servicer of your account may contact you about your account using any contact information or cell phone numbers you provide (whether previously provided or provided in the future).

You expressly agree to the use of any automatic telephone dialing system and/or artificial or prerecorded voice when contacting you, even if you are charged for the call under your phone plan.

The above provision will become part of your account agreement if you consent to the provision by (i) using your account more than 15 days after this notice is delivered to you or (ii) keeping your account open after March 15, 2009. If you do either of these things, we will conclude that you have consented to being contacted on your cell phone in this way. If you do not want to be contacted on your cell phone in this way, you may call us at ***-***-**** at any time.”

I am left with two choices: Close my account ASAP, or agree to be bothered by all kinds of robot nonsense not stopped by conventional preventions because I have explicitly agreed to the contact.

Normally, I would instantly send them packing, but after reading an article on Wired.com about similar changes to American Express terms (discussing the security issue with the change which I did not even consider), I can only assume this change will quickly spread over the whole credit card community. Although this is an exceedingly aggravating change of terms, I am not sure that I am willing to give up credit cards as a whole. I have already called the opt-out number I was given, and opted out my mobile phone. Based on the wording of the message above, I will be interested to see if my account is closed.

I am not looking forward to having similar terms added to all kinds of phone-based (and unrelated) services. Everyone has been asking how Twitter and Facebook and the like are going to make money, and I am afraid that this is part of the answer.