Category Archives: What’s Going On

September 21, 2015 · 11:39 am

Eddie Haskell Software

Our topic today is something so mind-numbingly stupid that I hesitate even to write about it. There was an announcement late on Friday from the EPA about diesel engines from Volkswagen. These are the engines that the automaker markets as “Clean Diesel.” The announcement was shocking. As reported in the NY Times:

Eddie Haskell

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Volkswagen has been ordered by the Environmental Protection Agency to recall 482,000 diesel cars in the U.S. over software they say was intentionally designed to circumvent smog regulations. The cars, all diesels from 2009 to 2015, have a “defeat device” programmed to detect when the car is undergoing official emissions testing that only then turns on the full emissions control systems.

Many of you might not remember the Eddie Haskell character from Leave It To Beaver, the old TV show.  Eddie was a bad kid who acted like an angel in front of parents and other adults.  That is apparently what VW designed their software to do – behave nicely in front of the standard EPA tests while belching out unhealthy levels of nitrogen oxide emissions when the testers weren’t looking – as in 40 times more than the allowable levels of emissions..  It’s not something recent either: the bad software is in 6 model years of cars. Nice right?

Here is the thing about big companies.  Rarely does one person make a decision.  In this case, the people (plural) involved have put VW in jeopardy of having to pay around $18 Billion in fines.  At a minimum, they’re looking at the recall of 482,000 diesel cars.  But the automaker isn’t the only company to demonstrate this kind of idiocy.  Samsung has been accused of the same sort of thing to detect speed tests on their phone chips in order to demonstrate speed that really isn’t there in real life use.  Antivirus company Qihoo submitted different versions for benchmark testing than those provided to consumers.  I’m sure there are other examples across other business categories.

Knowing this, would you buy any of the affected products?  I wouldn’t.  What else aren’t they telling us?  How safe/effective/good are their products?  More importantly, if they would knowingly cheat this way, how will they treat me as a customer?  Will they lie to me just as they have to the testers?

This kind of behavior goes global rapidly today.  Like the Cleavers, who were well aware of Eddie’s true personality, consumers are better informed and bad behavior is always front and center.  Putting aside the destruction of the bottom line due to getting caught, how can anyone with an ounce of business sense think this sort of activity is a good idea?

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September 14, 2015 · 10:11 am

The New Year And Business Again!

A shofar made from a ram's horn is traditional...

A shofar made from a ram’s horn is traditionally blown in observance of Rosh Hashanah, the beginning of the Jewish civic year. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Happy New Year!  This is the third time I’m posting this piece since, as I announced last year, it’s now an annual thing, albeit not exactly Clement Clarke Moore’s “The Night Before Christmas.”  As Jews around the world celebrate Rosh Hashanah, I thought I’d try to put what the holiday means into a business context.  Enjoy!

Last night marked the start of the Jewish New Year.  I didn’t go down to Times Square to see if they were dropping a giant knish at the stroke of sundown – probably not.  L’Shana Tova – a happy and healthy New Year to all of you.

One of the things Jews do over the next 10 days (or at least are supposed to do) is to reflect on the year gone by and think about where it took you on life’s journey.  It’s not really as much about looking back in my mind as it is about looking forward.  Oh sure, one is supposed to think about where one strayed from life’s path in terms of dealing with other humans and human codes of conduct.  We get a day of fasting next week to get that sorted out.  But it’s also a time to think about a fresh start.  Which, of course, promoted a business thought.

When do businesses stop and enter a period of reflection?  It’s obvious when they’re changing – witness Facebook last week – but I, for one, certainly wonder sometimes if those changes happen due to the momentum of previous (maybe not so good) decisions or if they’re the result of a pause, some reflection, and a willful thought by the entire organization as to the direction.  Often, I fear, it’s the former.

Jews are to use the next ten days for reflection and repentance.  I like to think of them as ten days of self-improvement.  I’d also suggest that it would do many businesses a lot of good to build the same sort of period into their corporate calendars.  Some do – they call it the budget process – but I think that’s too selective in terms of participants and goals to do much good.  Some smart CEO needs to declare it New Year’s Day for the company once a year and get everyone to do the same sort of professional reflection that many of us do on the personal side.  Identify your sins (figuratively speaking) and atone.  Faulty customer service, weak brand identity, bad employee relations, products that aren’t optimal, fostering an atmosphere of fear – these are all good places to start.

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August 31, 2015 · 11:15 am

Gone In A Flash

If you are using Google Chrome as your browser, and over half of you are, your experience as you use the internet is about to change. Google has decided that as of tomorrow, September 1, they will begin pausing many Flash ads by default to improve performance for users. What that means is that if you are desperate to see an ad you will need to click on it to manually enable it. Otherwise, ads will remain plain images by default. Firefox is also doing this  and Amazon also said that it would no longer allow Flash-based ads to serve on its network or across its Amazon Advertising Platform.  In short, the bulk of web browsers is now Flash-unfriendly. This prompts several business thoughts.

First, yay Google and others!  Flash creates all kinds of issues, the biggest of which are that it drains batteries quickly, it doesn’t really perform that well on mobile devices (in a world that’s now mostly mobile) and, most importantly in my mind, it has abysmal security.  Just look at the recent malware attack launched via MSN‘s ad network as an example. This is a good thing for consumers and maybe makes our digital world a little safer.

Second, this is going to have a major effect of the digital ad world.  The supply of ad space is actually going to drop since much of what is out there is Flash-based.  That should kick prices up.  The question in my mind is will the price rise get publishers rethinking their ad load strategy?  I don’t know about you, but in my mind surfing much of the web has become a stroll through the proverbial Arabian bazaar – one hawker after another in an extremely cluttered environment.  Maybe this is how the tidal wave of ad blocking is pushed back?

Third, what will this do to the numerous ad-serving companies?  Who has technology that is so tied to Flash that their business model is disrupted and where are the opportunities in companies that aren’t Flash-based?

Finally, this points out how interdependent every digital business is.  The browser companies make a change and ad companies and publishers are affected.  A hardware company decides to change a business model, as Apple did with iTunes years ago, and nearly every subsequent business deal is held up to that standard.  Never a dull day in digital – how about in your business?

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