Tag: CEO

Chutzpah And AT&T

Oh Mr. de la Vega, don’t you understand how business is supposed to work?

apple-iphone-3g.jpgI’m an AT&T subscriber and an iPhone user. Like many iPhone users I’ve experienced weird call drops (mainly while in Las Vegas or New York City–seldom in Connecticut). The prevailing wisdom seems to be there’s not enough capacity to support the voracious appetite of iPhone users.

Hey, AT&T–what exactly did you expect? You’re the ones bragging about the inexhaustible supply of iPhone apps. You’ve empowered us and now your surprised we’re taking advantage? Spare me.

Recently AT&T Mobility’s CEO addressed some of these data/phone concerns and then tossed in a curveball. Here’s part of the Wall Street Journal‘s read on it.

“With about 3% of smart-phone customers driving 40% of data traffic, AT&T is considering incentives to keep those subscribers from hampering the experience for everyone else, he said. “You can rest assured that we’re very sure we can address it in a way that’s consistent with net-neutrality and FCC regulations.”

Many customers don’t know how much bandwidth they’re consuming, Mr. de la Vega added. When AT&T conducted a broadband test, customers often reduced their data use. Longer-term, he said, a pricing scheme based on usage is likely, though it will be determined by industry competition and regulatory guidelines.”

AT&T admits its services “are performing at levels below our standards.” Unfortunately, this is one of those no-fault admissions, because AT&T’s not crediting my account to compensate for this poor service.

Instead they’re saying these issues, while using the service as sold, are largely the fault of their customers! Where I come from we categorize this as “chutzpah.”

Chutzpah? Look it up. There’s an app for that.

Oh Mr. de la Vega, don’t you understand how business is supposed to work?

I plan on using the crap out of my iPhone–using every bit and byte I’m entitled to use. I want to be one of your heaviest customers (the one’s you seem to dislike) until I’m passed by someone who finds even more ways to use it.

Don’t worry, even then I’ll find a way to catch up!

Get used to it Mr. dlV. Like you, we’re interested in seeing the other party in this deal completely fulfill its obligation. We’re going to want more, not less. One day we’ll look back at the data streaming to our phones today the way we look at a 300 baud modem!

It often seems servicing customers is an impediment business doesn’t want. Too bad.

Addendum: If you’ve gotten this far you also need to read FakeSteveJobs take on this. It is masterful. The language is “R” rated, but it’s well worth it.

Valuing News By The Pound

The struggling company has looked at the column inches of news produced by each reporter, and by each paper’s news staff. Finding wide variation, they said, they have concluded that it could do without a large number of news employees and not lose much content.

As hard as economic times are for TV, they’re worse for newspapers and other print outlets.

So, what do you do to get the bottom line up? I don’t know, but I suspect it isn’t this. Here’s a story from The International Herald Tribune. Michaels is Randy Michaels, CEO of the Tribune Corporation, now owned by Sam Zell, and heavily in debt.

…the struggling company has looked at the column inches of news produced by each reporter, and by each paper’s news staff. Finding wide variation, they said, they have concluded that it could do without a large number of news employees and not lose much content.

Michaels said that, after measuring journalists’ output, “when you get into the individuals, you find out that you can eliminate a fair number of people while eliminating not very much content.” He added that he understood that some reporting jobs naturally produce less output than others.

He said that The Los Angeles Times produced 51 pages of news for each journalist there, while the figure for two other Tribune papers, The Baltimore Sun and The Hartford Courant, is more than 300 pages.

Michaels had been CEO of Clear Channel Communications. When he left there, Radio Ink reported:

…industry message boards were swollen with vitriolic postings vilifying both him and Clear Channel. Various diatribes claimed that Michaels was everything from “the antichrist of Radio” to “a blight on professionalism” to “representative of the heinous crimes perpetrated by Clear Channel.”

Today, it seems Michaels is valuing content the way a butcher values meat – by the pound. But in the real world content is not equal word-for-word. You would hope some of the LA Times lower word count has to do with the depth its stories contain.

It will be sad to see newspapers disappear. I’m afraid that’s going to happen… and sooner, rather than later.

Right now, TV is incapable of providing the depth and story count papers do (though TV kills print in immediacy, emotion and a number of other categories). Few of the Internet news sites really produce their own content, and those that do seldom produce local news.

My daughter and her generation don’t read many newspapers nor do they watch much TV news. No one has yet figured out how to make traditional news more attractive to them.

It’s all very sad.

Verizon – This Really Worries Me

So, if Verizon decided to block geofffox.com or vonage.com or comcast.com, they now have self supplied permission. They can do it for any reason or no reason.

There’s a posting on Reddit.com, one of the techie sites I visit, about Verizon’s upcoming change to their Online Terms of Service. It is very scary – really, really scary.

…we have the right, but not the obligation, to pre-screen, refuse, move or remove any content available on the Service including, but not limited to, content that violates the law, our Terms of Service or our AUP.

AUP, in this case is Acceptable Use Policy.

So, if Verizon decided to block geofffox.com or vonage.com or comcast.com, they now have self supplied permission. They can do it for any reason or no reason.

Or, they could just place their ads on my site, or any site, before it gets to you.

I’m giving examples, but I have no idea what they would do, except to say they could do anything.

Throughout my lifetime, companies like Verizon have operated as common carriers. Here’s Wikipedia’s take on that:

An important legal requirement for common carrier as public provider is that it cannot discriminate, that is refuse the service unless there is some compelling reason (e.g post doesn’t allow to send cash). As of 2007, the status of telecommunication providers as common carriers and their rights and responsibilities is widely debated (network neutrality).

However, Verizon and other telecommunications providers like it aren’t businesses that opened and got saddled with these obligations. We allow them to erect their lines on our streets. We gave them (each incumbent wireline phone company) their original cell licenses.

We assume… I think we have a right to assume… they don’t inspect our communications across their network. We certainly wouldn’t allow it with their phone service. Is there really a difference here with this nascent form of carriage?

Don’t they have an obligation not to look over our shoulders?

I have written about Verizon in the past. Maybe you remember me quoting from Ivan Seidenberg, Verizon’s CEO, about cell service.

“Why in the world would you think your (cell) phone would work in your house?” he said. “The customer has come to expect so much. They want it to work in the elevator; they want it to work in the basement.”

Seidenberg said it’s not Verizon’s responsibility to correct the misconception by giving out statistics on how often Verizon’s service works inside homes or by distributing more detailed coverage maps, showing all the possible dead zones. He pointed out that there are five major wireless networks, none of which works perfectly everywhere.

I sense, if this becomes a mainstream news story, Verizon will relent. Sunlight is the great sanitizer.

Can they hear me now?

Something Special In The Air

The part of this that upsets me the most, is the way the airlines look at customers. Airline ticketing policies and contracts are one-sided, and often arbitrary and unreasonable (like one way fares often costing more than roundtrip). Their advertising does its best to hide full disclosure.

“We’re American Airlines, something special in the air.”

For years, that jingle played incessantly on radio and TV. No more.

If American has a slogan now, I don’t know it. There’s none on their website’s homepage. They surely don’t have the balls to dust off ‘something special’ right now.

Aircraft Inspections Affect Some AA Travel

We are very sorry for inconveniencing you with the cancellation of a portion of American Airlines’ flights which started on April 8. Additional inspections of our MD-80 fleet are being conducted to ensure precise and complete compliance with the FAA’s directive related to wiring in the aircraft’s wheel wells. For more information about the progress of the inspections, please check our Press Releases. Please be assured that safety of our customers is, and always will be, American’s first priority.

You know how companies that put you on hold often say, “Your call is important to us,” even when you know it’s not? I feel the same way&#185 about, “Please be assured that safety of our customers is, and always will be, American’s first priority.”

Do they really think I’m buying into that gratuitous throwaway?

My friend Farrell’s relatives, visiting from Israel, were scheduled to fly AA from New York to Palm Springs. They got as far as Dallas… took a long pregnant pause at DFW… then continued to LAX (a few hours drive from Palm Springs).

Their bags? Right. This isn’t a fair tale. They followed two days later.

When I last left them, my sister-in-law and her friend were arguing with the AA clerk because AA promised $100 p/day p/person for clothing or necessities. AA since retracted that. In the meantime, Vered (Farrell’s wife) had taken the four of them to shop yesterday since they only had carry-on (my advice was to pack as much as possible in their carry-on’s).

I think we’re in the process of watching a meltdown of the so-called “legacy” airlines. With Frontier going bust, since its creditor would not support the majority of their cash, and the merger chatter going on, it’s a matter of time before prices continue to rise and consolidation becomes an actuality.

Please don’t think it’s only American I’m upset with. I’m still smarting from Southwest’s cavalier attitude toward safety inspections, and they’ve been my airline of choice for years.

The part of this that upsets me the most, is the way the airlines look at customers. Airline ticketing policies and contracts are one-sided, and often arbitrary and unreasonable (like one way fares often costing more than roundtrip). Their advertising does its best to hide full disclosure.

Why would they expect us to respect them or have brand loyalty when they so obviously dislike us?

&#185 – “I take full responsibility” goes on that list as well, especially when said by a CEO taking non responsibility.

Interviewed For New Haven Magazine

I don’t belong anywhere near that list. Speaking to me is the journalistic equivalent of slumming!

Last week I was approached by New Haven Magazine. They wanted to interview me for a story.

Was I flattered? Sure.

Of course there are always nagging worries. Why exactly me? I don’t want to be like Dr. Joyce Brothers, emergency guest when all else fails.

I asked who else had been featured.

  • Roya Hakakian, author, Iranian ex pat.
  • C. Megan Urry, chair Yale Physics Dept.
  • Hugh Keefe, leading defense attorney
  • Jonathan Rothberg, scientist entrepreneur
  • Peyton Patterson, CEO

I don’t belong anywhere near that list. Speaking to me is the journalistic equivalent of slumming!

Tonight, New Haven Magazine’s publisher Mitch Young and photographer Steve Blazo, came by.

I always worry how to answer a reporter’s questions? I’m not interested in towing the company line, but I don’t want to tick off my bosses either. Anyway, everyone can tell when you’re bullshitting to stay politically correct. Who needs that?

Years ago, we had an anchor at the station who was often quoted saying outlandish, foolish or even stupid things. I suppose she was sought out once reporters realized she made for good copy&#185.

She’d write it all off to being misquoted, but if you read the words and closed your eyes, you could see her saying them!

One question tonight came out of left field. Mitch asked, in light of Keith Olbermann’s move from sports to news, whether I’d like to make the transition to anchor? Keith Olbermann is not your typical TV anchorman. His career, though on the upswing now, has not been without setbacks and hardship.

I find what Olbermann, Lou Dobbs, Bill O’Reilly and a few others do very interesting. Their job demands a skill set different from those employed by a totally impartial anchor. They also work within a structure different from conventional, and impartial, TV journalism.

I don’t think local news will be moving in that direction anytime soon, so the point is moot. It was still interesting to think about. It’s a choice I won’t have to make in real life.

I’ll let you know when the article is published… unless it’s incredibly embarrassing.

&#185 – Don’t ask. I will never tell. However, your guess is probably correct.

I Cannot Tell A Lie Radio Shack Style

What’s Radio Shack’s slogan: “You’ve got questions, we’ve got answers?” As it turns out, not all the answers were true – at least as they applied to the CEO. He resigned yesterday after revelations that the two degrees from non-accredited colleges he claimed, didn’t exist.

First of all, as long as you’re going to lie about it, why a non-accredited bible college? Why not Yale or Harvard?

I’ve never lied about my lack of education. I am an official high school graduate. I went to Emerson College on the accelerated dismissal program, flunking out during the height of Vietnam.

That probably tells you more about my intellect than anything else. Were it not for my high draft lottery number, who knows how my life would have changed?

My resume has always said, “attended Emerson College,” which of course I did (though infrequently). It was more like, “lived in dorm,” but that’s beside the point.

Now that my three years at Mississippi State University are complete, I’m still just a high school graduate.

MSU’s program is a certification curriculum. It’s as if you were allowed to attend college and only take your major subjects, no humanities, math or language. I learned everything I would have learned in an Earth Sciences BS program – no more.

I work with a PhD in physics, Dr. Mel Goldstein, and when I’d tell people I was completing my education at MSU, they’d often ask if I was getting my doctorate. I wish.

This Radio Shack guy, David Edmondson, lied and got caught. He probably deserves what’s coming to him, but the story is much deeper than that and it goes to the core of what college confers upon you.

I have a daughter in college. Steffie, stop reading this right now. I don’t want to throw you off the track.

There are many things college prepares you for, and many ways it broadens you. But college is not always necessary to succeed in a job or career – even some careers that are associated with specific courses of study.

Did I suffer in my career because I didn’t have a degree? Who can say for sure. I’ve certainly done OK for myself.

On the other hand, before I got the job here, I got a call from a news director in Boston. He had seen my tape and was interested in hiring me. Was I a meteorologist?

End of story. He said he liked me but he’d be lambasted in the papers if he hired me. I understood.

Back to this Radio Shack guy. He didn’t just come in from a craigslist.com ad. He was inside the company for well over a decade; a guy who worked his way, literally, to the top. He had been judged on what he could do, and really, it didn’t matter that he did it without a degree!

If you look closely at higher education, you will see it is designed by academicians, not practitioners. When we get interns here at the TV station, they learn more on-the-job than they ever learned in school. The same goes for fresh grads.

I’m not saying college is worthless. That’s just not so. I think it serves a valuable purpose and provides a good background and, hopefully, broadening. It is not the end all, be all, in career preparation.

It would serve companies well if they stopped using a college degree as a crutch and began looking at an applicant’s real skills. That’s what they’re going to use anyway.

This guy from Radio Shack – I feel bad for him, but he lied. There’s really little excuse for that, especially when he’s is the company’s credibility.

Wrongly, instead of proving what he could do without college, he felt it was necessary to lie. He felt his skills would never have been recognized… no one would have looked past his lack of academic credentials.

We overlook too many talented people this way, every day. Where’s the upside to that?

Barry Diller And Michael Eisner

I’m watching Michael Eisner, former Disney CEO, interview Barry Diller. This is one of those things you stumble on with digital cable. It’s on a channel high enough (106) that oxygen masks should pop out of the overhead.

When I originally posted this I went on without explaining who Diller is. I have second thoughts about his notoriety outside ‘the business.’

From Wikipedia: Barry Diller was raised in Beverly Hills and began his career in the mailroom of the William Morris Agency. He was hired by ABC in 1966 and was soon placed in charge of negotiating broadcast rights to feature films. He was promoted to vice president in charge of feature films and program development in 1969. In this position, Diller created the ABC Movie of the Week, pioneering the concept of the made-for-television movie through a regular series of 90-minute films produced exclusively for television.

Diller served for ten years as the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Paramount Pictures Corporation starting in 1972. With Diller at the helm, the studio produced hit television programs such as Laverne & Shirley (1976), Taxi (1978), and Cheers (1982) and films ranging from Saturday Night Fever (1977), and Grease (1978) to Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and its sequel Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) to Terms of Endearment (1983) and Beverly Hills Cop (1984).

From October 1984 to April 1992, he held the positions of Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Fox, Inc, parent company of Fox Broadcasting Company and 20th Century Fox. Diller quit 20th Century-Fox in 1992 and purchased a $25 million stake in QVC teleshopping network. Diller resigned from QVC in 1995.

Diller is currently the Chairman of Expedia and the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of IAC/InterActiveCorp, an interactive commerce conglomerate and the parent of companies including Home Shopping Network, Ticketmaster, Match.com and Citysearch. In 2005, IAC/InterActiveCorp acquired Ask Jeeves, marking a strategic move into the Internet search category.

In 2001, Diller married fashion designer and longtime friend Diane von Furstenberg

Eisner is subbing for Charley Rose. This rerun of a rerun is on Connecticut Public Television’s tertiary channel!

Diller is a guy I had only heard about (and, years ago when we bought stock in QVC) invested in. He’s not just a genius, he’s an amazing genius… though from what I’d always heard, maybe ‘evil genius’ is a better characterization.

Look at him and you see the physical polish that comes with money. His suit, tie and watch are impeccably stylish and reek of money. When you listen to him, you hear words from a man much younger than he.

It is obvious, when it comes to technology and where the mass dissemination of programming is going, Diller gets it. He is about 63. The promise of technology’s future has moved beyond all but a few 63 year olds.

It is a shame for Eisner, who is undoubtedly bright, that he’s sharing a stage with Diller. Anyone would seem dimmer in comparison.

If you see this interview coming in yet another rerun of a rerun of a rerun, make sure you catch it, if only to further scope out Barry Diller. This is another of those moments when, after the fact, I realize how little I know and how much more I have to learn.

JetBlue Emergency Update

When JetBlue’s Airbus A320 landed with its nose gear perpendicular to its motion, I wondered if anyone would try and connect this incident with JetBlue’s maintanence, performed in El Salvador and primarily by mechanics not certified by the FAA.

JetBlue doesn’t even fly out of the US, except to get its planes repaired or maintained.

Today the story hit the Washington Post. I’ve attached their story to the link below.

Continue reading “JetBlue Emergency Update”

The Customer Is Always Wrong

If you’ve read this for any length of time, you know I have been frustrated with the policies of Cingular, my cell phone provider. Maybe Cingular’s actions are just part of the prevailing attitude of cell companies in general.

Here are some snippets from an interview with Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg as conducted by the San Fransisco Chronicle.

“Why in the world would you think your (cell) phone would work in your house?” he said. “The customer has come to expect so much. They want it to work in the elevator; they want it to work in the basement.”

Seidenberg said it’s not Verizon’s responsibility to correct the misconception by giving out statistics on how often Verizon’s service works inside homes or by distributing more detailed coverage maps, showing all the possible dead zones. He pointed out that there are five major wireless networks, none of which works perfectly everywhere.

The fact that he thinks this is not surprising. The fact that he’s actually said it in public (as opposed to having it dispatched to lawmakers through a lobbyist) is astounding. Somewhere within Verizon, some PR person is suffering cardiac arrest.

This is hubris. Ivan, can you hear me now? Good.

Blogger’s note – T-Mobile now provides high resolution coverage maps from their website.

Another Media Prediction

After the Janet/Justin Super Bowl incident, I predicted there would be repercussions at MTV – even though MTV is not regulated by the FCC. It didn’t take long before some of the more explicit videos they play were pushed out of prime time.

Videos are no longer a big thing on MTV, so this move isn’t as significant as it might seem. Still, a change is a change. It is certainly a reaction to an upwelling of public sentiment.

Now, in light of Howard Stern’s banishment by Clear Channel, I predict he’ll soon be gone from Viacom&#185 as well.

Let me preface my explanation by saying I have no political ax to grind. What will be will be. It’s fun to make these predictions in the blog because I really can’t hide from them later. Just remember – this is only my read on the situation.

Here’s the set-up. Tuesday, Howard Stern had the ‘other’ participant in the now infamous Paris Hilton video, on-the-air. They talked, and took some phone calls. One listener asked some questions which were crude and racist, to say the least.

Wednesday evening, Matt Drudge had a short transcript of the conversation on his website. I’m glad I got to read it. I’m just as glad it’s no longer there.

I would hope Stern has the ability to monitor and censor inappropriate material before it hits air. In this case, he did not.

On Wednesday, after hearing an aircheck, Clear Channel Communications took action and issued this press release:

“Clear Channel drew a line in the sand today with regard to protecting our listeners from indecent content and Howard Stern’s show blew right through it,” said John Hogan, president and CEO of Clear Channel Radio. “It was vulgar, offensive, and insulting, not just to women and African Americans but to anyone with a sense of common decency. We will not air Howard Stern on Clear Channel stations until we are assured that his show will conform to acceptable standards of responsible broadcasting,” Hogan said.

Though America’s largest broadcasting company, Clear Channel only runs Stern on a handful of stations. Viacom is the actual syndicator of the show, and also runs it in many markets nationwide.

In this case, the tail (Clear Channel) will wag the dog (Viacom)!

Viacom is between a rock and a hard place because of statements earlier in the week. From Reuters:

Viacom president Mel Karmazin reportedly has imposed a crackdown on sexually explicit material on Infinity stations, declaring in a recent company-wide conference call: “This company won’t be a poster child for indecency.”

So, what can they do? Considering the Congressional hearings post-Super Bowl and Karmazin’s own public pledge, how can they stand behind Stern… especially in light of what Clear Channel’s CEO said?

They can’t. End of story. Hang out the “Help Wanted” sign. Stern is done.

&#185 – Stern is syndicated by Infinity Broadcasting. Infinity, in turn, is owned by Viacom.