Customer Service Is Good For The Soul

The iPhone 4 is definitely the sleekest design of all of the iPhones that have been released. But wow, I've had some huge problems with the phone, and it has nothing to do with the commonly reported antenna problems.

The first one last for about 6 months, and then the speaker phone functionality broke. Since I use the speakerphone a lot, especially while driving, I knew I needed to swap it out.

The second one lasted about a month, and then the home button went out. I had to mash the thing just to get back to the home screen, let alone double tap for multitasking.

The third one lasted a grand total of a week until the charging port screwed up. It would charge for a minute, and then would flicker on and off until it longer charged.

So, I'm on my fourth phone. Normally, I would be completely adverse to supporting a company. However, I didn't have to go through some complicated return process like with other sites - I simply went to a store and in ten minutes I had a new phone. The time I spent on the three returns took less time then when I had to return computer parts to an online retailer.

Great customer service is the best defense a company can fine. Amazon, Zappos, Newegg, and Apple get this. This goes beyond simply returning due to defects - it's about not not ripping off customers and taking them for granted.

Every time I see ridiculousness such as Best Buy's Buyback program, I'm reminded that we still have a long way to go before great customer service is commonplace.

Basically, Best Buy is charging people extra money to be able to exchange their gadgets for below market prices. I get that they are charging for the convenience of only dealing with one store, but it's a total rip off.

Quick example: Based in the FAQ, you have to pony up $69 for the "privilege" of exchanging an iPad for a gift certificate worth, at most, 50% of the purchase price! And that's only if you trade in within 6 months! Every 6 months, you lose another 10%.

As I stated in a previous post, I used Gazelle and got 70% of the purchase price, in cash, for my year old iPad (32G, 3G). That's $522, cash! Compare that to Best Buy's plan, where I'd get 40%, or $291. Oh yeah, plus I'd have to pay $69 upfront, so my total gain is $222. Is it worth $300 for the "confidence" of dealing solely with Best Buy? Hmmm...

I Have Front Row Tickets To The Next Shuttle Launch!

 

I used this pic on my first post a while back, but I have a great reason to bring it back!  I'm ... well, you read the title already.  I'm so excited!!!

From my website header, you can probably tell that I'm interested in space. A major part of my childhood revolved around Star Trek (TNG is my favorite) and reading / watching 3-2-1 Contact, which featured tons of space stories.

One of my favorite classes as a kid was an astronomy summer program I attended at the local community college. And of course, there was the Space Camp essay contest that I was erroneously disqualified from for cheating that I'm TOTALLY not bitter about anymore.

Well, the past is in the past! Like many science folk, I follow NASA on Twitter.  Recently they tweeted out that they were holding a Tweetup at Kennedy Space Center, and that they would select 150 random followers to attend events culminating in watching the launch from the closest possible distance with the press!

I was selected. I am lucky. More than that, I am honored to be able to witness history. Sending men to space is truly one of mankind's greatest feats. I get a front row seat to the second to last shuttle launch.

I'll leave you with this excerpt from my first blog post (that I'll have to edit soon because it'll be out of date!)

Today was the final launch of Discovery.  I have never been to a shuttle launch, but I felt a part of the action today thanks to SpaceFlight Now's live coverage.  People may have become used to Shuttle launches, but think about - we've developed a reusable peace of technology that's been active for over 40 years.  That's pretty amazing.  There has been human loss, but considering the amount of shuttle launches performed by NASA, it has been a successful use of technology.

The closest that I've been to a shuttle was the Enterprise at the National Air and Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.  If you haven't been and you have any positive thoughts about planes, I would strongly recommend that you visit.  In addition to the Enterprise, they also have a Concorde, the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird, and the Enola Gay.  I spent a day after a business trip in Reston, VA walking around the facility and came away impressed with the collection.

Some day I'll make it to a shuttle launch!

The New York Times Paywall Is Not That Bad

No more unlimited access to a website. Their explanation sounds cheery enough, but it's still limiting. Is it the worst thing in the world? Nah.

I use the NYTimes iPhone app religiously. But when I think about it, I rarely leave the Latest News tabs. If I do, it's for information that is covered better elsewhere (I.e. Technology, sports). Since the Latest News section will remain free, the new pay wall won't significantly affect my iPhone usage. The only thing that may hurt is losing access to the Opinion section, which is very valuable and unique to the Times. But is that worth paying $15 a month for website and iPhone access? And an extra $20 for iPad access? Nah, I'll just stick with the free articles that I see shared over social networks.

The iPad app is a different story. Because the iPad is a natural reading device, I usually go through quite a bit of stories on the tablet. But again, is it worth $20 a month (or $35 in conjunction with iPhone access)? After all, I was fine with the original iPad app that had limited content.

The price may have been easier to swallow if the limit of free stories wasn't so low. 20 stories a month is less than one story a day! Wouldn't they rather have more eyeballs on the page for their advertisers, as opposed to the few hardcore people that would be reading the content anyway? Arthur Sulzberger, chairman of the Times, stated that he wanted a flexible system where they could adjust the 20 news story a month limit up or down depending on the day's events. This would make sense if the limit was more reasonable, say 20 articles a week. As an example, Sulzberger said that the limit would have been canceled in the wake of 9/11. But .. there is huge news that happens very often, from the BP Oil spill to the Egyptian revolt against Mubarak to the Japanese earthquake and resulting tsunami. How will these be "ranked" in terms of the article limit being adjusted?

From my Quora post:

I've had an NY Times online account for about 10 years, and I use the iPad on iPhone apps all of the time. I love the content and believe that it is valuable.

However, the prices are just too high. The Daily charges $4 a month (for admittedly sub par content). The Times should not be five times more than this for the tablet option.

The only way that the Times could get away with this is if they kept nytimes.com completely free - which they aren't. I can understand paying for the improved user experience involved with the iPhone and iPad apps, if the web alternative exists.

There are too many other sources of information available that, while not being as great as the Times, are good enough. This is what the execs don't seem to understand

Why Don't I Use One Of My Favorite Websites Anymore? Poor Digg.com

Digg is a site where users can submit news stories that other users can vote up or down. The stories with the highest votes get pushed to the front page of the site. Because stories had no be manually submitted, it cut down on the power of major publishers. In a world before Twitter and excessive Facebook status news sharing (2004), this was the best way to get a sense of the news that people found important. So why don't I use it anymore?

I no longer use Digg because it has become a bloated mess after Digg's latest revision last year. What was once a front page driven by users (though some did admittedly game the system, like Mr. Babyman) became a dominated by major news publishers who were allowed to automatically submit content to the site. Digg became one huge RSS reader - one that purported to be the view of the community. Meanwhile, sharing news links via Twitter and Facebook became the new social currency.I can safely says that I find out about breaking news (like today's acquisition of T-Mobile USA by AT&T) from one of these means quickly.

Digg fell behind the times. Since Digg's founder Kevin Rose resigned in the last few days, there has been a flood of news coverage on Digg. In particular, Sara Lacy wrote a great Techcrunch piece on what Digg meant to the San Francisco tech community. It's a shame to see Digg fall apart in shambles and die as a former shell of itself, but that's what happens if you don't continue to evolve your product with the market.