FiberGeneration

The Web 2.0 Typical Disease, or How To Make Your Product Stand Out

I've just cleaned up my .Me (formerly know as .Mac) email inbox, reducing the infernal number of messages from 500+ down to a more affordable 100+.***

Among those hundreds of messages that I sorted, archived, or trashed, more than 20 were confirmations of registration at this or that Web 2.0 new service or new application. I tell you what : I couldn't remember 4 out of 5 of them. What the heck is this or that stuff about, I can't tell.

My first conclusions on this fact : either I start suffering Alzheimer's Disease (maybe I should call on Dr. House) or the service itself wasn't worth the try - which explains why I didn't remember even the names. About names : I'm not the first one nor the last one to say that many of the Web 2.0 start ups have obscure names or products names - that's a Web 2.0 game, actually : choose the most non-sensed name, and you'll get noticed. At least for a short while (see above).

Now, the lesson : if you want your Web 2.0 app to stand out the crowd, make it shine. Make it visible. Make it recognizable. Pick a handful of early adopters, wait a month or two after they've signed up, and then ask them what your product is about. If they're able to answer right on the spot, you won. If not, better think again your model.

*** I do use my inbox as a To-Do list - that doesn't mean I've got 100 to-do items (ever heard of threads ? ;-)

Tip of the day : for those of you don't have a Gmail account yet, create one. Then, use it as a backup for your regular email account(s). I personnaly set-up a special Gmail account just for this backup task a couple of months ago, and I can tell : it's very very convenient. You never sweat again when you delete an important message by mistake : it's still there, somewhere in the Cloud ;-)

Like Shopping ? You Will Love The Mall Plus (dot com ;-)

Still not the colorful experience of a real journey at the Wafi City (for instance), but a true step towards full 3-D online shopping.
Let the fiber shine in to our homes, and we'll probably get real-time person-to-person interaction like in the real World.

[Web Too] IM-Translate

French startup IM-Translate is born, offering the first online instant translation of instant messages:

Immediate translation of instant messages. You do nothing differently — IM-Translate™ integrates seamlessly into your existing IM application — just type as usual. Forget copy, pasting or jumping back and forth to a web-based translator. Your buddy receives your message plus a translation — instantly. You see the translation of the text you typed. You also receive your buddy’s messages in both languages. Free! — Downloads in seconds with broadband.

First IM app targeted : Windows Live Messenger, aka MSN.
As I told my friend Georges, CTO of IM-T, they should release a Mac version as quickly as possible, since Mac users are more suited for beta testing campaigns : we love giving feedback, for the developers to enhance their products.
Also in the pipe : the app for Google.

Interesting : IM-T is formed by... US citizens and registered in... France, for some legal and market issues.
IM-T is a typical Web 2.0 start-up : of the six co-founders and team members, nobody knows more than two others face-to-face. They never met altogether so far ! Their collaborative tools : Google, Skype, and email.
One of the founders is my old buddy Georges Pantanelli. A french High-Tech industry veteran, who relocated to the US in the 90's. Georges got his american passport two years ago, in San Francisco. The lesson : in California, everything is possible for those who have the entrepreneurial spirit.

IM-Translate site and download here.

Looking Forward To The Googled Fiber World

Back from San Diego, I had a meeting yesterday night in Paris with the VP Sales & Marketing of a new startup working on some *fiber network monitoring* stuff. I can't disclose anything of course, just that it's about Fiber-To-The-Home.

Things we've discussed until late in the evening were on the forthcoming changes in the optical comms industry per se and our own lives.

Like this one : thanks to FTTH and 40G/100G/etc. networks, we're going to be "online" everywhere anytime, with our entire "life" relying on *The Net*. Fine.
Now, since we'll do everything - working, watching TV, training, sharing life, etc. - through a single fiber strand, this one better stay up and running 24/7 : we won't accept being cut off for 2 days until the Repair guys come in. Hence the need for monitoring systems, which would look after the faults on the fiber right up to our living room.

A tremendous challenge, provided the numerous FTTx networks topologies and technologies. A challenge which requires to think out of the box. Something the legacy Test & Measurement firms can't do. Something a well funded startup can do. How much do they need ? $5m. Which is not that much for a solution which will help change the World (because it'll guarantee your fiber stays okay).

Ed. note : French world-famous blogger Loic Lemeur got $6m for his Web 2.0 video-sharing platform. Raising $1m less to produce something which really serves the World shouldn't be that much a problem. At least in a perfect World...

It's About Small Teams Within Large Companies Making Big Impact

[updated 10:06PM]
Reading Robert Scoble' s latest post, on how small teams can make a big difference within large companies, I thought about... the Agilent Mini-OTDR. This little box, which is not as sexy as the iPhone of course, was the GameBoy of his kind at its release back in 1996.

To make it short, this product was a breakthrough-paradigm shifting optical tester, inventing a brand new category - the so-called handhelds - for a brand new type of end-users : the fiber optics installers. Almost 12 years after its release, the Agilent Mini-OTDR is still the reference, as the two main competitors JDSU and EXFO (ever heard of those names ? ;-) even do copy & paste - including the naming system.
What's the link with Scoble' s post ? Small teams. The Mini-OTDR has been defined, designed, and engineered by a 6-people team, within the HP Optical Communications Division group (aka Agilent Photonic Test Division or something like that as of today). Take Scoble' s text, replace "Microsoft" by "HP", "Yahoo" by "EXFO" and you get the same picture.

Who said "Less Is More" ?...

post-scriptum : the hands carrying the Mini belong to my dear buddy Dieter *John* Gustedt, the guy who made the Agilent Modular Network Tester real.

plusmo : Plus For Your Mobile Life

Just discovered a new cool stuff this morning, thanks to an unknown reader of FiberGeneration : plusmo.
Here' s the brief review by Jessica Dolcourt for Webware back in September 2007 :

"Plusmo's mobile widgets application is a cool way to read RSS feeds on your cell phone or PDA, but that's not the only reason it was named a finalist on the Webware 100 list.
In true Webware fashion, Plusmo's site offers hands-on excitement--the chance to publish and share widget mash-ups and create an iPhone widget from templates. Users can also make personal blogs available as a Plusmo widget, and can install a browser bookmarklet or Yahoo plug-in to snag feeds while they surf."

Full article here.
plusmo website here.

Doing Product Marketing The Web 2.0 Way

Remember Zattoo ? The beta is available since a couple of days only, and people start googling for "zattoo for iphone". See here.
Would I be part of the Product Marketing team at the startup, I would immediately digg a little bit further : someone searching something so specific is a potential user. Or a potential rival. Actually, it doesn't matter, because IMHO the equation is simple : search = opportunity.
That's what most of the french businesses don't understand with the Web 2.0 : it helps you developping new products faster and better, for specific needs and/or applications and/or end-users.

The Silent Blogger (Me ;-)

Dear FiberGeneration Readers : I must apologize for the poor blogging over the last couple of weeks. Frankly speaking, should I  find a blog like mine today, I would not click on the 'subscribe' button ! I haven't even post a twitt since seven days.

The reason for such a (relative) silence is simple : I'm building up a new company. Not mine, not for me, but still a pretty fun job. My employer : a french group, currently involved in the Optical Networks business. That's the only thing I'm allowed to disclose publicly at the moment. We're working in stealth mode, as the market we want to penetrate is quite a competitive one.

There are so many things I'd like to share with you Dear Readers on this new (ad)venture that I even thought lauching another blog under a nickname. You know, something like 'Fake Nicolas Sarkozy'. Too late. Gonna find another one.

Because there's so much good material for this blog : working in a 50-people SMB french firm, bringing them to the Web 2.0 level (you know, RSS feeds, collaborative apps, sharing, etc...), and of course, creating a new business from scratch by considering the holding company as the VCs so that I have to pitch the business plan and all that sort of startup things which are so fun to do live...

For instance, how to show your boss (read : your investors) that you can easily reach break-even by developping only three customers and doing business as unusual with them instead of going out there with a traditional cold calls approach and try to grab some clients here and there.

I'll be able to share all that exciting yet fruitful experience with you Dear Readers as soon as the new co(mpany) goes live, somewhere in Q1 2008.

In the meantime, maybe I'll find a way to post a couple of things without breaking up the cover shield. I gonna call on Fake Nicolas Sarkozy ;-)

 

It's About Accountability

Christopher Harris, President of Inventure Global, an IT consulting firm based in San Diego, CA, tells the World about his own worst day in business. In brief : Inventure Global was supposed to provide a new startup with the alpha version  of their website, but missed the deadline, hence endangering the startup' successful launch. Here's the lesson :

“Some of our most avid customers here were customers that we totally screwed at some point.  We went to them and told them we knew that we screwed up, told them we were going to fix it, and told them that whatever it cost them we’d make it right as best we could.  We did that, and now they respect us more for it.  That’s the way you earn trust is by how you handle yourself when the situation goes against you.”

I've personnaly encountered such a disastrous situation more than once along my 15+ years-long career as an entrepreneur and business developer. Most often, it occured when someone in the team screwed up the whole thing because she simply didn't feel accountable. It was always a "not my fault", "not my business", or "not my whatever"... Hence the mandatory Musketeers' Spirit : "One for All, All for One", which should be the only motto of any team of any sort. Because it makes the people accountable and responsible for every single decision that they take under the team's umbrella (and by extension, the company itself)...

I screwed up a project myself. Back in '83, when I left a fiber optics cable installation work to go home - because my girlfriend was expecting me to be back before night. I did it once. That has been one of the best lessons I've ever got from real life : don't act for yourself, act for the team, no matter the consequences at home. Because at the end of the day, that's your customer who's paying you. Not your girlfriend (otherwise, you're a lucky guy ;-).

See Christopher's article on GoBig Network here . Inventure Global blog here.