Social media innovator Best Buy blows it over inside-joke video
...despite the fact that no one was associating this video with Best Buy, Best Buy decided to do the one and only thing that would suddenly associate this video with Best Buy in a way that is not, at all, flattering to Best Buy. If it was afraid of how this video would look for Best Buy, it probably should have considered how much worse firing the guy who made it looks.
Best Buy has been a bit of a leader with respect to integrating social media with their overall customer outreach, support and marketing. But now some senior-level (read: out-of-touch elderly) managers got their panties in a bunch and fired an employee for doing something on his own time that had no discernible connection to Best Buy.
The video itself has some profanity, and it's really only funny to those that voraciously follow wireless device industry news and have had contact with the general public in tech sales jobs. If that's not you, this video will come off as pretty stupid.
This will continue to happen until more mature managers are making decisions -- managers that, like the rest of us, can tell the difference between something that impacts the brand and something that doesn't. This didn't. And even if it had at some point in the future, it could have been handled easily.
Oh well. It's just disappointing to see a company take a step back after its two steps forward.
How mobile broadband caps stifle innovation
...no one seems to look back at the consumer internet access costs for comparison. In the early days, when many people had AOL, there were caps and metered billing. And some people used it, certainly, but it was nothing compared to what happened when AOL finally dropped its caps and suddenly people could really embrace and use the internet without worrying about hitting their usage cap. Unlimited internet access is what helped drive internet usage, making it such a powerful and useful platform. Mobile operators seem to want to go in the other direction and are working hard to try to limit how useful many people find their phones, due to limiting data plans.
While the AOL example is good, it was really AT&T that pioneered flat-rate unlimited dial-up Internet access, with their WorldNet service. So it's doubly sad to see AT&T pioneer the backwards-looking data caps now attached to iPhones and other devices.
It seems all telco, cable and other Internet-access providers are pushing for metered billing or oppressive bundles when consumers have made it clear Internet access -- at high speeds and without caps -- are the preferred service.
Telecom providers fear selling "dumb pipes" because then they'd have to compete on a level playing field: bits, speed, latency and reliability would be comparable across delivery modes (DSL, cable, satellite, wireless) and tiered plans. And we wouldn't want THAT, would we?
It is finished
Some trip stats:
- Total driving distance: 3,833 miles
- Days on the road: 6
- Starting and stopping points
- Oregon, Ohio
- Woodbury, Minnesota
- Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan
- Grande Prairie, Alberta
- Muncho Lake, British Columbia
- Glennallen, Alaska
- Anchorage, Alaska
- Longest driving day: 17.5 hours; 970 miles (Muncho Lake, BC > Glennallen, AK)
- Worst road conditions: Endless frost heaves (deformed and broken pavement due to permafrost) from Kluane Lake in the Yukon to about 15 miles past the Canada/Alaska border; the Tok Cutoff (between Tok and Glennallen) was also remarkably bad
- Wildlife spotted:
- Prairie dog (Saskatchewan)
- Deer (Saskatchewan)
- Caribou (British Columbia)
- Stone Sheep (British Columbia)
- Buffalo / Bison (British Columbia)
- Black Bear (Yukon Territory)
- Worst moment: Flat tire just before the Canada/Alaska border; noted by border guard -- then I changed to the spare tire, which required partial unpacking
- Interesting fact: I passed and re-passed the same semi truck, carrying Arctic Cat snowmachines in crates, about 8 times on the trip, every day, from southern Saskatchewan right through eastern Alaska
- Number of times I was asked whether I was carrying $10,000 or more in cash: 2
- Amount of Canadian currency I used on the trip: 0 (everything was via credit/debit card)
Driving Plan: Days 4 & 5 - Muncho and Kluane!
I start at Grande Prairie, Alberta on Tuesday morning, ending inside Muncho Lake Provincial Park in British Columbia, some 800+ kilometers away. Muncho Lake is a stunning location -- everything you would imagine an isolated glacial lake in the Canadian Rockies would look like. It's extremely isolated.
However, there's an awesome lodge there, called the Northern Rockies Lodge. It's a log structure with cabins and so forth -- just what you would expect deep into Alaska Highway territory. I stayed there in late February this year, during the drive down. I'd always wondered about the place but hadn't been inside before. Very nice, especially for the area. I'm excited to see it in the summer, with more light and more activity.
After Muncho Lake, on Wednesday I'll drive another 970 kilometers to Destruction Bay, Yukon Territory. This is on picturesque Kluane Lake. I assure you, it's a stunning setting, east of the massive Wrangell-St. Elias mountains and on a large Arctic lake. Be sure to check out the tons of Flickr photos for just a taste.
I'm hoping to get some wildlife and scenic photos along the way and will post to Flickr, probably once I'm back in Anchorage. Hopefully the weather and the animals cooperate.
On Cognitive Surplus
Somehow, watching television became a part-time job for every citizen in the developed world. But once we stop thinking of all that time as individual minutes to be whiled away and start thinking of it as a social asset that can be harnessed, it all looks very different. The buildup of this free time among the world’s educated population—maybe a trillion hours per year—is a new resource. It’s what I refer to as the cognitive surplus.
REQUIRED READING.
Two phenomenal thinkers and writers discuss the revolution upon us that is networked collaboration using surplus time and the desire to do interesting things.
If only public media leaders understood this. Ah... Who am I kidding? Public media is setup, by default, to keep the public out. So they'll NEVER get this. But maybe someone else will...
Link: Why Job Hoppers Make the Best Employees
It takes a good deal of self-knowledge to know what you want to do next, and to choose to go get it rather than stay someplace that for the moment seems safe. It takes commitment to personal growth to give up career complacency and embrace a challenging learning curve throughout your career — over and over.
Early in my career -- if you can call it a career in the conventional sense -- my parents were Freaking Out. I would take a job, do it for 6-9 months, quit, take a new one, do it for a year, quit, and so forth. They figured this was a recipe for disaster. I just got bored with the jobs or found better opportunities to learn new things.
My father started his career in the work-30-years-for-the-same-company era. But he gave that up after 18 years with one company in order to make more money. But he timed it badly -- at the opening of the 1980s -- and suffered a series of career setbacks as corporate downsizing reverberated through the economy for years. The notion of a 30-year career was destroyed during those years.
I watched my father go through that and learned a lesson: No company can be trusted. And my career has borne out that notion.
My mother sent me the article linked above because it surprised her, but she recognized me in the post and wanted to share. It's a great post. For those out there that want to know the difference between taking a job and making a career, this is it.
Longest job I've ever had: about 3.8 years. Longest I've been with any one company: about 4.5 years.
And I've known about my need for interesting, challenging work for years. I've gone to more than one boss and said "Please keep me around longer. Give me something new to learn and do." I think they didn't believe me. Until after I left.
Driving Plan for Day 3
I made it further on Day 2 than anticipated -- an extra 3 hours and 300 kilometers. So I'm within striking distance of a perfect 1,300-kilometer day.
Change of Plans: Moose Jaw
I made good time today, and was able to add about 3 hours of driving.
So now I'm in Moose Jaw for the night, north of Montana in
Saskatchewan.
just over the British Columbia line -- and the official start of the
Alaska Highway.
