Mumtech
23 April 2006
Big news yesterday, broadband finally reached the mainstream in the UK. I know because I spent most of the afternoon getting it sorted for my mum.Let me explain MumTech, my unofficial standard for mainstream technology adoption. It's simple... if my Mum buys into a technology, it's mainstream.
My mum (a retired music teacher) will be 63 this year... she is not a technophobe, she is not a tech lover... but she will buy in at the point where perceived benefits outweigh perceived costs. Thus:
1999: Internet
2000: Colour Injet Printer
2001: Mobile phone
2004: Freeview
2004: Digital camera
2005: DVD
And now in 2006, Broadband. She's fed up of waiting until gone 6pm to surf the net :-)
So that's it. We been hearing for a while now how well Broadband adoption has been going in the UK, but now it's officially mainstream. The MumTech Standard says so.
Incidentally, you can also use MumTech as a barometer for other things. Just after Christmas I spent a dusty day clearing out her garage. At the end of the day we were staring at what was basically a big pile of junk.
"Maybe I should ebay it" said Mum. That's mainstream.
Posted by Nick Warren at 7:00 AM
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User's (REALLY) Don't Read Web Sites
18 April 2006
We've been saying for a while that the only things that really read web pages are Search Engines... user's certainly don't... they scan for links, sub-heads, bullets etc... then if you are lucky they'll read a little when they find what they are looking for.For us this is gut feel but there are guys out there who spend their time doing the science. Here is some fascinating info from Jacob Nielson about the F-Shaped Pattern For Reading Web Content.
Posted by Nick Warren at 9:27 AM
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Measure for measure?
12 April 2006
One of the features of 'proper' businesses is that they measure stuff; leads, sales, P/E ratios and more... sometimes a lot more.In the old days at IBM my boss ran his part of the business completely by the numbers... he knew exactly how much I cost him as an employee, from obvious things like wages right down the cost of the floor space my desk sat on. (He also knew how much I made him, but that's a whole other thing.)
Measuring can be an extraordinarily useful tool because it helps you focus on the things that matter to you, identify areas for improvement and then track improvements that occur... but you do need to make sure that you are measuring the right things.
At Semantic we don't actively measure very much at all any more. The main reason is that the things that matter to me aren't easy to measure*. As I've mentioned Semantic isn't really about profit (providing we get by). We value fun and lifestyle factors far more highly... but measuring the amount of times you laugh in a day would kinda take the fun out it.
Consequently I know broadly how the business is doing but I couldn't tell you, for example, exactly how much money we made in the last month, or our exact overheads in that period. This is business with a light touch, and is only possible because we answer to ourselves, not shareholders.
I'm not recommending this laissez-faire approach in general. I think we're unusually lucky here, and measuring stuff is a key discipline for most businesses... particularly if you are responsible to others. starting out. I'm just saying be careful that you are measuring the things that really matter.
*the other reason is laziness.
Posted by Nick Warren at 7:40 AM
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Do you have what it takes?
07 April 2006
Thorpe's Fame Calculator is now live. The question of the moment is do you have what it takes to be a self-obsessed, vacuous air-head? Perish the thought...
Posted by Nick Warren at 5:47 PM
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