Agave Mountain

I'm currently in the process of nailing down and booking my travel for the rest of the year: one trip to Las Vegas, and two trips to Asia.  Given the tumultuous changes in the airline industry, I foresee that frequent flyer miles will soon be harder to use, and diluted in value, so I've decided to burn all of my 158k+ frequent flyer miles and vouchers. 

In February, my wife and I got "bumped" off of a Northwest flight.  As compensation, we were given paper TCV Exchange Coupons.   The gate agent assured us that this green and white paper voucher (printed on ticket stock) could be traded in for a round trip ticket anywhere in the US, Alaska or Canada.

Tonight, I tried to book the ticket, and even with the help of a very polite reservation agent, I failed. 

The tickets are out of "W class" or the same restricted selection of frequent flyer award seats.  Fortunately for us, there were seats available to Las Vegas, albeit on the less desirable flights (early morning and late night return).

After being put on hold several times, the agent came back with an ominous, "Oh... Is that a green and white paper ticket voucher?"  When I said it was, the agent stated that she could not process the ticket, only electronic vouchers.  I would have to drive to the airport and physically hand the ticket to an agent to process or mail it in.

Of course, no where on the Northwest Airlines web site stated this.  On the contrary, the web site instructed me to call reservations to use the voucher, which is incorrect.  To further confuse the situation, there are two types of TCVs: free roundtrip tickets and vouchers with a cash value.   Additionally there are paper and electronic TCVs.  Paper TCVs cannot be exchanged for E-TCVs.  Confused yet?  So was I.

Not surprisingly, given the restrictions, most paper TCVs are simply not redeemed.  

This Saturday, I will be driving out to the airport to trade in the vouchers for tickets to Las Vegas. 

Labels: business travel

Posted by Joe Turner at 12:50 AM | Permalink | Comments

I haven't posted anything for a while (I've been very busy). 

Tonight, I had to force myself to concentrate on the side of running a business that almost no one enjoys -- paperwork.  

Perhaps the biggest surprise this year was that QuickBooks miscalculated the Minnesota Unemployment Insurance liability payment.  It was off by $1.  Since QuickBooks Online won't allow you to submit payment through them, it wasn't a big deal.  When you pay at the State's web site, it is correctly calculated.  My accountant didn't sound to concerned.

However, when it came to reconcile the invoices, payments, and bank statements... I had a heck of a time trying to correct the problem (turning the non-posting payment, into a paid liability with an adjustment).  I'm still not 100% sure I corrected the problem.  It is entirely possible that my books won't balance anymore.

On a more exciting note, I am days away from finishing up with the 1U server.  It has taken longer than expected to validate the hardware, install the system services and then secure each an every service.

Up next:

• I briefly thought about moving from Blogger to Wordpress, but Wordpress has had a stream of systemic security issues.  I'm still looking for a Blogger alternative.
• SEO.  My web sites are absolutely broken in terms of SEO best practices.  I will be fixing them as I port them over the new web server.
• Moving my corporate portal from ASP.net to html.  Since I don't modify my corporate web site, I don't see the point of having it automatically generated.  I also need to concentrate on improving the web copy. 
• I will be putting up some postings on how to setup/secure the various services (Apache, PHP, SSH, iptables, etc), later on this week for those interested.

Labels: Announcements

Posted by Joe Turner at 11:26 PM | Permalink | Comments

I am still trying to figure out how to implement a 100% paperless office.  While I have had measured success in some areas, I still find myself filing paper.  

As I was shredding some already scanned documents, I pondered how long should you keep the digitized records around?

With that, I stumbled upon Eva Rosenberg's Slideshare presentation (below), which answered those nagging questions: 

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Labels: Business

Posted by Joe Turner at 7:33 PM | Permalink | Comments

I just don't get it.  I have a Facebook page for my company and I find it a total waste of time.  Facebook is a huge productivity sink. 

Others, apparently don't share my view.

This morning, I read an article at CNNMoney.com/Fortune Fast Forward  entitled, "How one CEO Facebooked his company."  The article details how CEO Jeremy Burton joined Serena Software (a 25 year old software with $250 million in revenue) and whereby he immediately started to mandate everyone sign up for and use Facebook. 

Explains Burton: "In Facebook, they can see what the people who are in the next generation of workers are already using. Every single software company has to go through this software-as-a-service transition. But it's not only how you build your software. It's how your people think. The people issue is much harder. Facebook gets people thinking along a new axis."

That's right, if younger people are using it, it must be better.  Hopefully the younger generation can explain it to the older generation what, "it's not about how you build your software.  It's how your people think" really means.  I thought software companies were supposed to put their efforts into building robust, easy to use, software that solves problems.  I guess not-- It's about thinking good thoughts, or thinking about John's Facebook page and looking at pictures of his latest drunken exploits on company time.  

Personally, I'm not sure that I would want to purchase software to automate business tasks from a company who's motto is: it's not about how you build your software.  It's how your people think.

Interestingly enough he further extols the virtues of keeping tabs on his employees through Facebook:

In addition, he says, "the status updates for people in Facebook give me a window into the company." He takes out his Blackberry, calls up the Facebook application there, and starts reading status updates for various employees. "Winding down and heading to the weekend," writes the Germany country boss. Comments Burton: "It's 10 p.m. there so I know he's working hard." The guy who won the award for top telesales rep in the first quarter "is listening to the Roots." The head of all company sales writes that he "is heading home from Europe." His profile photo shows him holding up a beer stein.

I laughed when I read the "It's 10 p.m. there so I know he's working hard."  He could have been watching porn for all Burton knows.  I remember working with a software engineer who would work until everyone left, he would go home and sleep, and get into the office before anyone else arrived wearing the same wrinkled clothes.  His boss knew he was pulling all night coding sessions and was "working hard." 

I wonder what Burton would do if he saw an employee who happened to have a weird fetish or pictures of drinking and puking on their Facebook page?   Would he send them a "poke" to say stop that?     

I would love to work for this guy.  I could take out my own blackberry, while watching Judge Judy and update my status to be something like, "working on Q2 report.. it's hard!" and go back to watching TV.

Burton could whip out his blackberry and smile, knowing everyone is working very hard. 

Unfortunately, Serena is a privately owned company so I can't short their stock. 

Labels: Business

Posted by Joe Turner at 11:36 AM | Permalink | Comments

Right now, I don't respond to RFPs (Request for Proposals).  My future plans are to only respond to government or NGO RFPs, if they come close to matching my future product offerings.

A RFP (Request For Proposal) is a an invitation to potential suppliers to submit a proposal for a specific commodity or service.  RFPs can be simple or incredibly complex.  Here is a well written example of  RFP from the University of Hawaii to purchase computers.

Generating a proposal in response to an RFP is sometimes a very time consuming and laborious process, and it is often a smaller part of a more time consuming sales process.  It is common for RFPs to ask for corporate information, financial information, qualifications, description of your products or services, project stages, milestones, cost and pricing.  For web design jobs they may or may not include detailed specifications.

The most common complaint I hear about RFPs (from freelancers) goes something like, "... after putting together a brilliant proposal complete with screen shots and mock ups, we didn't get the job because we were too expensive.  But six months they rolled out their new web site -- just as we proposed right down the fonts and colors!  The stole our specification and outsourced it to India!"

I am acutely aware that many times RFPs (Request For Proposal) can be used as tools to get inexperienced web designers to write detailed specifications for free.  However, Alexander Muse (Texas Startup Blog) highlighted a recent experience with RFPs (Avoid Undue Diligence like the Plague) which not only wasted his time but may have damaged his business:

Due diligence is the verification of information given to an investor by a startup in contemplation of a potential investment. Undue diligence, the solicitation of information for competitive reasons, is perhaps the most unsavory you can commit against a startup. Not only are you wasting the company’s time, you are getting their hopes up and potentially altering their behavior toward REAL investors.

Real investors, i.e. ones that you have heard of, rarely conduct undue diligence or if they do they have someone else do it for them.  You are more likely to fall victim to the services of a competitive intelligence expert like Dan Sklaire from Systems Research Corporation in New York City.  Experts like Dan are hired guns engaged by your competitors to learn about your a) business model, b) pricing model, c) service offerings, d) your competitive advantages and e) anything else he can uncover.

Basically, Dan Sklaire will send you a big RFP and/or pretend to be a large customer.  You think you are about to score a big sale and work to In reality, he is simply trying to get as much information as possible from you to give to your competitor:

The most common way a competitive intelligence professional like Dan Sklaire begins to understand your business is through the creation of an RFP (request for proposal).  Of course if you respond to RFPs and you are not in a commodity business you deserve a little undue diligence.  One of our companies recently responded to one of Dan’s RFPs with detailed responses and specific pricing.  I saw the deal in a weekly funnel report and asked about it.  The salesperson indicated that he had NEVER met Dan, but that he ran a marketing company that was relocating to Dallas and would need a new IT solution.  I couldn’t believe we responded to his RFP, but the salesperson insisted that we were looking good.  He had a meeting with Dan in a couple of weeks and hoped to close the deal at that time.  Needless to say we didn’t get the deal.  In fact, our salesperson allowed Dan to record their conversation where we went into great detail answering questions Dan and his client had about our proposal.  When the salesperson got back to the office I asked for the name of the client and his contact and I did a little research.  It took me five minutes to figure out that we were being played.

Labels: Business, Consulting, Startup

Posted by Joe Turner at 11:22 PM | Permalink | Comments

I'm in the process of setting up and testing a 1U server that will become my corporate application/web server.  This 1U server will soon be shipped to a colocation facility next week, after I finish stress testing.

After I made the decision that colocation would be best for my business, I sat down and started to research the requirements for a web server.  I quickly found that there is a vast range of choices for 1U servers, with extreme differences in pricing.  1U servers (with desktop motherboards) can be purchased for as little as $395 new.  Used 1U servers can be had for a song on eBay, where you can simply swap the drives and away you go.  Additionally, on the more expensive side, Dell, HP, Sun, and IBM each have a mix of 1U servers at various price points and configurations. 

Only Sun has a program (that I could find) which targeted startups (See Adam Kalsey's Sun Startup Essentials Pricing).  The program is called Sun Startup Essentials, which offers startup companies discounts, training, and support.  Those I found who joined had nothing but glowing things to say about Sun, especially in the storage area.

I wanted maximum uptime, and stability, and was willing to pay a reasonable premium for it.  Because the server will be located in another city, it would take me a full day to get to the server if there was a problem.  More than likely, because of the airline schedules, it would be minimum of 2 days (but given the recent changes in the airline industry there is no guarantee that I would get there in a timely manner).     

Hardware Requirements

Below are the "must haves" that I chose when picking out which server to purchase.  

• Intel dual core or quad core CPU.  The easiest way to be able to compare servers between vendors is to lock in on a single CPU -- dual or quad.  Ultimately, I chose the quad Xeon.  That made comparing price/features a little easier, otherwise I got into paralysis through analysis mode.  Note: While I have been more than happy with AMD products in the past, I've simply lost touch of the power/performance of their products (and I've heard some very disparaging things about their newest multi-core product), so I decided to go Intel only this time around.      
• Hot plug disk drives.  Should a drive go bad, I want to simply be able to mail the colocation facility a new disk drive and have them swap the drives without powering the system down (or cracking open the case).
• Hardware RAID-1.  I decided I wanted two drives, in a RAID-1 set.  More importantly, I wanted the ability to pull a drive, replace it, and see the hardware rebuild the array without powering down the server -- without any effect on the system.  That is, to state it another way: I can pull out one of the drives and the system will keep functioning without any issues.  When I place a new drive in the system, it should automatically rebuild the raid array. 
• Automatic power on.  The server must boot automatically when power is on.  Should the power go of at a colocation facility, the server must automatically boot when power is restored, without having requiring someone to press the "power" button.
• Remote control/virtual presence.   I want to have complete control as if I was in front of servers in the colocation facility or remote site.  IBM, DELL, and HP sell hardware that redirect the mouse, keyboard, and video over the network so you can control the box from power up, change BIOS settings, etc.,.  This is a worse case scenario to rebuild a system. 

Ship it!

After looking at the various vendors and applying back-of-the-napkin calculations to the various servers, Apple and Sun were the most expensive.  I also looked for a 1u server on eBay, but in most cases, the servers are way overpriced or simply to old (and too expensive).

In the end, I chose the HP DL 320 G5/Quad Core Xeon with a Smart Array E200, 2GB RAM, 2 x 160 hot plug drives.  After shipping the system clocked in at $1700.  This was way more than I wanted to spend, yet much less that I could have spent.  Spending the cash now will keep me from having to spend time and money later.

Quite frankly, this is more machine than I could probably use in the near future.  I rationalized the system would be "good enough" for 10 years, and would easily handle 1,000 concurrent users.  I figure if I max out this system, then it would be a good problem to have. 

Labels: Business, Consulting, Startup, Web development

Posted by Joe Turner at 11:53 PM | Permalink | Comments