Listening to: Lovin U (Bonus Track) - Alicia Keys

For the first week I was here I was lucky enough to have the moral support of three groups of Kiwis. The first were the Ponoko team that joined me at TC40, the second was Flight of the Conchords (*) and the third was Tim Norton. Tim has presented his work at DEMOfall and is getting much deserved love. Nice work Tim and the rest of the PlanHQ team.

(*) No, Jemaine and Brett weren’t there holding my hand, but I am amazed at how much of a presence they to have amongst the crowd I was mixing with. I bumped into the CEO of a company here - he opened his jacket and his t-shirt had “That’s why they call them business socks” written on it. That sort of thing has happened a couple of times. Initially, it felt odd, but as a friend highlighted - it’s better than being known for Hobbits.

Listening to: The Dope (Wonderful You) - The Dandy Warhols

This great little video outlines the importance of people loving your product and, importantly, how fostering that love is a route to product longevity.

Listening to: Englishman in New York - Sting

Well another NZ manufacturing company has decided to chuck it in and open shop in China.

I am up to my ears in the area of manufacturing these days and I am a little shocked at the level of debate going on. Manufacturers are saying that if the corporate tax rate was dropped to between 20 and 25% then they would be ok and wouldn’t have to move. The sad news is that YES YOU WOULD!

The traditional manufacturing model is broken … there are now only very few areas where you can sustain-ably mash atoms on the edge of the world and move them 1000s of km to your market to sell them. Tax cuts aren’t going to help you. You’re competing on COST against companies that move their entire corporate structures to squeeze every last cent, rupee and yuan out of the process. They are going to kick the collective ass every single time - because while you were sleeping they changed the rules on you.

Should NZ close up the manufacturing shop? One of my advisors regularly says that the manufacturers should cut a deal with go-karters, ten-pin bowlers and anyone else who needs a large covered space ‘coz it’s game over. It’s going to be more profitable to rent out the space by the game. He’s right … the answer isn’t in big spaces here in NZ or, importantly, even in big spaces in China. The answer lies in changing the rules again. The pieces are there to be put together. If you permit me to be a little parochial we’ve just got to behave like Kiwis again. A good Rod quote is:

“This is a global opportunity that we can credibly take from New Zealand. We really do understand how small businesses work and the sort of issues our small businesses have are the same as the UK and Australia.”

The same logic applies when it comes to atoms. NZ has always been on the edge of the world and that experience is something that can’t be replicated and is rich loam in which to grow new ideas. We have always known the constraint of moving stuff around the world. It’s time our manufacturers stopped asking for tax breaks and started working out how to own a manufacturing game they can win.

Listening to: Twilight Zone - Lupe Fiasco

As I have mentioned I have been advising VortexDNA. The Vortex guys are getting some great results (there will be more about that in the near future) with their technology and they’re looking at testing some interesting ideas.

Given that they have nailed the issue of relevance they are now pushing out and have started investigating the idea of the ‘My Web Hypothesis’:

Technology start-up VortexDNA is asking for volunteers to test the hypothesis that there is not just one Web.

Embedded within cyberspace, the organisation claims, there could be hundreds or even thousands of different web-worlds, each relevant to a group of people who share a similar outlook on life.

“This could lead to a profound change in the way we think about cyberspace and create a better web experience for everyone, “comments VortexDNA director Branton Kenton-Dau.

Called the ‘MyWeb’ hypothesis, the idea of thousands of web-worlds embedded in cyberspace is now being tested.

“Just as Newton passed sunlight through a prism to discover the entire spectrum of colour, VortexDNA wants to pass Google search results through a prism of your ‘DNA’ to see if your purpose, values and life focus provide you with a better search result,” explains Kenton-Dau.

When you think about it this is a very powerful concept … it’s the idea that amorphous mass of data that is the web can be tuned to match you, your needs and your goals. The Vortex guys are offering on of the key benefits of a walled garden app but on the public web … yeah, that’s pretty big

To test this idea on a larger group of users they are looking for people to start using their Firefox plugin.

Listening to: Don’t Believe Anymore - Icehouse

I have been watching the Twitter stoosh that has been dominating the Rails community over the past week. It has been interesting to watch the personalities at play and the various arguments be put forward. My take is very similar to:

In the big picture, Twitter did exactly the right thing. They had a good idea and they buckled down and focused on delivering something as cool as possible as fast as possible, and it’s really hard, in early 2007, to beat Rails for that. When all of a sudden there were a few tens of thousands of people using it, then they went to work on the scaling.

Listening to: Love Song - Simple Minds

We were out at Craft 2.0 on Saturday… telling the world our story.

The Ponoko Craft 2.0 Team

The reaction was amazing. I have spent years telling software only stories and only exciting software people. It was fantastic to present an idea and see so much excitement from a really wide range of people.

Oh! And the NewDowse is amazing… a phenomenal addition to the Wellington Art scene.

Listening to: HBR IdeaCast 31: What Is Wikinomics? - Harvard Business School Publishing

Well worth a listen… A great description of business strategy based on the way a lot of us already operate.

This week, IdeaCast producer Steve Singer talks with Don Tapscott, co-author, with Anthony D. Williams, of Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything. In its latest incarnation, Tapscott says, the World Wide Web has become a communal experience—collaborators from anywhere and any walk of life now have the ability to solve problems and produce results through the use of collective wisdom. Although some business leaders may find the prospect of this kind of openness rather frightening, Tapscott believes that leveraging the new wave of community is the way of the future.

Listening to: 14+-+Blue+Moon+_28London+Fabric_2C+16.03.06_29 - Bloc Party

The Celsias Blog is rapidly becoming one of the top climate change blogs in the world:

New Zealand-based global warming blog, www.celsias.com/blog, has zoomed from obscurity to the top 0.1% of worldwide blogs, according to the blog-ranking organization, Technorati. And it has done it in less than eight weeks.

Well done Craig! Awesome job.

Check out the technorati data.

Listening to: Annanas - Sascha Crnornja, Organic Grooves

Wharton Business School has just released a great article on the next steps in software business models.

…many wonder if the software business model that has made Microsoft so dominant for the last 20 years may begin to fade in the decade to come as new software business models — from open source to advertising supported — gain increasing traction.

The individual topics aren’t new for most of us (subscription, open source etc.) but they bring each element together really well. One of the points that really stuck out for me was the discussion about how lucrative the current model is for Microsoft. Particularly, how that “wealth spigot” has shaped their pursuit of new models.

If this sort of thing floats your boat I also recommend their podcast.

Listening to: Peter Fader on the New iPhone and Matching Technology to Consumer Demand - Knowledge@Wharton

For my own notes:

It is a common practice of many companies to focus their attention on grabbing market share from their competitors. But such efforts can actually be detrimental to the firm’s profitability, according to Wharton marketing professor J. Scott Armstrong.