Refine (Word of the Day)

Posted on by Four Hewes

refine |riˈfīn|
verb [trans.]
remove impurities or unwanted elements from (a substance), typically as part of an industrial process : sugar was refined by boiling it in huge iron vats.
• improve (something) by making small changes, in particular make (an idea, theory, or method) more subtle and accurate : ease of access to computers has refined analysis and presentation of data.

DERIVATIVES
refiner |rəˈfaɪnər| |riˈfaɪnər| noun
ORIGIN late 16th cent.: from re- [again] + the verb fine 1 , influenced by French raffiner.

 

I was trying to define “refine” for a child yesterday. It’s meaning wasn’t obvious to me from it’s anatomy, though it’s a word we use confidently every day.

PayPal at SXSW: Four sides good, three sides better

Posted on by Four Hewes

Breaking news and further coverage below the fold:

From CNET’s Paul Sloan at SXSW Interactive (via Twitter):

1:27 p.m.

@PaulSloan: Looks like PayPal is leap frogging Square: Its device lets people scan

checks, create invoices. #CNET

1:15 p.m.

@PaulSloan: PayPal releases  a blue triangle credit card device to take on Square.

#CNET

1:12 p.m.

@PaulSloan: At PayPal event, listening to eBay CEO John Donahoe talk

about mobile efforts with PayPal. Here comes the Square challenger?

Further coverage

PayPal unveils new Digital Wallet at SXSW 2012, eBay Ink

The entire PayPal SXSW demo, split into two videos

From the PayPal Blog

#SXSW: PayPal to Give Attendees First Look at New Digital Wallet

Sam Shrauger, Vice President, Global Product & Experience, PayPal

Friday, March 9th, 2012

We’ve talked a lot here about how PayPal is defining the future of money. On March 13, I’ll be at SXSW giving attendees a sneak peak of PayPal’s re-imagined consumer experience.  This marks the first time in our 13-year history that we’ve completely redesigned and re-architected the PayPal wallet…

Tthe new PayPal make possible:

  • Separating the purchase from the payment
  • Personal Lists
  • Found Money
  • Spending Rules

…Two familiar scenarios PayPal will change:

  • …combine the value of 10,000 airline miles with a $100 gift card…
  • automatically filter into separate “funds” … when I get my paycheck every week…

…We are reimagining money to free it in its digital form so that it can work better for everyone.

Defining a product starting with the UI

Posted on by Four Hewes

I’m helping a startup define it’s product.

We started with the big picture. We’ve discussed the industry they’re entering, the opportunity, their thinking and their business model.

At this point, to really start the business, they need to build their product. So they have to figure out what exactly to build. Not “exactly” ultimately, but “exactly” something specific. That activity will focus everyone, very pragmatically, to concretely define the path of their business in terms what their customers want.

Answering that question can take the form of discussion. Or declaration. We’re going to do something that encourages meaningful feedback: pictures and code. We’re going to define the end-user tablet UI in pictures. Sketches on napkins, on pads, on the screen.

(More later on this project’s design process as it progresses.)

iPad Screen Capture (wikiHow)

Posted on by Four Hewes

I’m helping a startup mock-up it’s tablet app, so we need to share earlier the work team members have done so far. One of us had built some exploratory iPad views.

How to we create images of iPad views to share?

Here’s how to reproduce an iPad view using it’s screen capture facility (from wikiHow)

  1. With the iPad screen arranged as you wish to capture it:
  2. Press the Sleep/Wake (On/Off) and “Home” buttons simultaneously.
  3. The screen will “flash” and a camera shutter “click” will sound.
  4. The screenshot will then appear in your default photo app.
  5. In your photo app: tap “email photo” to attach it to an email.
iPad product photo with power and "home" indicated by red arrows.

Step 2. Simultaneously press and hold power and "home" buttons to make a new image of the screen. (Credit: techtosh.com)

Web Video Calls, No Plugins (The Next Web)

Posted on by Four Hewes

Conference calling. Screensharing. Skype. Mobile calls. No Flash. Voxeo Lab’s Phono SDK for building video/voice calling in the browser will shift the VoIP app playing field.

Until now, video calling from your computer has required dedicated apps such as Skype or browser plugins like Flash… Voxeo Labs has demoed a way of making calls using … WebRTC … that allows developers to create real-time communications apps for the Web via Javascript APIs and HTML5.

[Voxeo's] Phono SDK also allows for real-time presence and chat capabilities, meaning that developers should be able to create Google Talk or Skype-like services with ease. … At the moment, WebRTC is only supported by the developer-focused Canary build of Chrome…

While the technology isn’t quite ready for you to try yet, you can find out more by watching the two videos below, in which Voxeo Labs’ Chris Matthieu [B T G] and Tim Panton [T] explain more about the technology.

Video of Voxeo Labs Phono SDK

From “Video and Voice Calls in Your Browser, No Plugins,” by Martin Bryant, Managing Editor, The Next Web, Thursday, March 1st, 2012

DeSOPA: great FF extension, bad dogma

Posted on by Four Hewes

DeSopa: a Firefox addon to easily bypass SOPA DNS blocking, Hacker News

I love this approach!

SOPA? DeSOPA, MF! Yes, run circles around these idiots.

Tamer, you also do a great job of explaining in passionately clear, objective terms, the SOPA agenda, the weaknesses of its assuptions and it’s dire consequences.

However, I strongly take issue with your own assumptions about the value of today’s internet services and the role of the internet in human progress. Don’t let trendy zeitgeist or wishful thinking undercut your excellent, commendable tactics!

Specifically, you say:
3) …we would not have many of the online services we take for granted…

4) …The internet creates market efficiencies that forces industries to adapt, thus pushing forward progress for humanity as a whole. … the Internet, built by the masses…

It is as foolish to take the internet for granted as it is to try to dictate to it. Foolish. YouTube, Pandora? Born yesterday. Primative.  Self-serving. Base and not very interesting. Not of lasting social value. Civilization can go on without them. Don’t fall into the internet’s own perspective of it’s own importance.

The internet is not an agent of human progress. Like the U.S. interstate system, it’s fundamentally a psuedo-military artifact of our economic system with lots of handy, nifty, shiny services built on top of it. Writing and the scientific method are agents of human progress. Rule of law and international treaties are. Pencils, optical lenses, printing presses, mass produced shoes, power grids, hair dryers, video tape, asepsis, the A-10 Warhog, carboratuers and the internet as clever technologies.

And the internet has been built by businesses, governments and a few stalwarts and visionaries, not the masses.

DeSOPA is a great response to SOPA. SOPA is dangerously shortsighted and fearful. Humankind is not at risk. The decentralized, accessible power of the internet ought to be fought for and advanced. Good work, man. Don’t get carried away. It doesn’t serve your cause.

Retail as user research

Posted on by Four Hewes

An illuminating commentary by Ron Johnson, Apple’s former senior VP for retail, from his new vantage as the CEO of J.C. Penney.

It would be easy for him to hold forth his laurels, rehashing the “business secrets” of Apple’s retail success: the lighting, the placement of service areas, signs, etcetera.

Wisely, Johnson advises his HBR‘s readers buy posing questions about broad business goals: what do the customers need? What sides of your business’ relationship with customers do you need to develop through the store?

For Apple, the stores provide customer support nonpareil. Here Apple make a silk purse of some of consumer computing’s worst weaknesses – their opaqueness, their inability to demonstrate to you specifically what they can’t do, their lack of self-understanding, especially of their limits. “face-to-face support”, writes Johnson, is “the very best way to help customers.” Through their stores, Apple turns the sales cost of  retail selling into customer and technical service advantages that their competitors can’t touch. One that people are “willing to pay a premium for”, in fact!

Product support is not every business’ opportunity – or need. So, Johnson boils it down further: any retailer is “…focused on building relationships and trying to make people’s lives better.” He coaches readers to discover how retail can best support their business’ goals: “…create a store that’s more than a store to people.”  “There isn’t one solution”, he points out. “…the retailers that win the future are the ones that start from scratch and figure out how to create fundamentally new types of value for customers.”

One function of Apple’s retail experience that is applicable across any business is  investigation of their customers. For Apple, that’s user research in it’s simplest form: their needs, feelings, budget, intentions, mental models, you name it. People walk in, pick up an Apple product and the staff starts asking them to open up. You couldn’t design a slicker survey or focus group of observation process. “… Their job is to figure out what you need…” Any good retailer does this every day as a matter of course with every customer. Bureaucratic businesses – large retailer like Apple and J. C. Penney, definately have to constantly, mindfully fight against their tendencies to be opaque, disinterested and impersonal with customers. So for their ilk, explicitly building this function into their retail process is key to effective retailing. Not incidentally, paying attention to what the customer wants is good service!

What I Learned Building the Apple Store
by Ron Johnson, Monday November 21st, 2011
Harvard Business Review Online Forum “The Future of Retail“

AXA’s Dominique Senequier: Refreshing frankness (FT)

Posted on by Four Hewes

Interrogatory interviews with business leaders are a dime a dozen and the format can be impersonal, leaving the reader with “answers”, but no impression of the person.

Last week’s news of HP CEO Léo Apotheker‘s ouster led me to investigate HP’s Board members, including Dominique Senequier of AXA Private Equity.

Amoung the citations was a short interview last year by the Financial Times‘ Emma Jacobs.Though her interview is a mere twenty questions, Senequier’s answers reveal a few personal qualities that inform her leadership. She is no-nonsense and confident while also ready to acknowledge her personal passions and her heartfelt values.

What are your three best features?
A long-term perspective; swift to act; ability to laugh.

What do you like most about your job?
It is challenging, inspiring and changing. You never stop learning from the people you meet.

When was the last time you lost your temper at work?
With myself, last month. It was over a missed opportunity. I very rarely lose my temper with other people. I think the ability to control one’s temper is a sign of maturity.

Has your job made your personal life suffer?
No. The trick is to be committed in all aspects of your life.

How do you want to be remembered?
A woman of laughter, spirit and heart.

(Senequier recently resigned from HP’s board. Apotheker sits on the supervisory board of her firm’s parent AXA, France’s largest insurer. Fellow board member and ex-CEO of eBay, Meg Whitman replaced Apotheker as CEO.)

Great job descriptions (HN)

Posted on by Four Hewes

I see many great job postings on HN, 37S, Prag and elsewhere, mostly for software  startups. Why do they stand out? They all are:

  • To the point.
  • Confidently informal.
  • Friendly, engaging, not intimidating.
  • Funny and enthusiastic.
  • Lacking self-promotional b***sh** and tired, empty career promises.
  • Offering contributing roles.
  • Offering a team of peers.
  • Expect you will bring your best.
  • Acknowledging you’ll learn on the job what you don’t know.

Most of all they addressed to peers and telegraph that a particular person (or team) is looking for an equally passionate, opinionated person to join in a meaningful work experience. They are refreshing.

Everytime I read one like this, I want to meet these folks, work with them, join their cause.

Until “mature” organizations get over themselves and talk to me this way, I’ll be looking to startups for challenging, rewarding, satisfying opportunities.

Here’s one I saw on HN this week:

“…You’ll be expected to punch above your weight class and grow into a team pillar, and will be rewarded as such.

You must:
- Get sh** done
- Thrive on responsibility and freedom
- Bulldoze through problems
- Not be an a**h***

A background in … is awesome, but not required. Just be ready to learn quickly.

We can promise two of these five things:
- Daily inspirational quotes read in-person by William Shatner
- Truly interesting and meaningful technical problems
- All-you-can-eat caviar breakfast, lunch, and dinner
- Weekend Lamborghini rentals
- An incredible team that will challenge and respect you (and drink with you too)

We…can offer market salary…, etc. just like everyone else. But what’s most important is the work you do and who you do it with. Everything else is just icing on the cake. …

What jobs grab you? Write about one that sticks in your mind and inspired you.